News Analysis: Email scandal overshadows Democratic convention, but attention could quickly shift to targeting Trump

The Democratic National Convention kicked off Monday overshadowed by a major scandal, but the attention could quickly shift to targeting Republican nominee Donald Trump, experts said.

In recent days, leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) showed that it tried to tip the scales in favor of Hillary Clinton to win against her opponents, mainly Bernie Sanders, in the primaries.

The scandal has grabbed headlines nationwide and sparked angry protests by Sanders' supporters outside the convention's venue in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Sanders supporters said the email scandal showed that the Democratic Party rigged the system to allow Clinton to unfairly grab the party's nomination for president.

Moreover, it has allowed Republican nominee Donald Trump to continue his narrative of "crooked Hillary" -- his claim that Clinton is corrupt - which is a major part of the brash billionaire's strategy.

"The controversy over the release of DNC emails mars the first day of the convention," Darrell West, vice president and director of governance studies of the Brookings Institution, told Xinhua.

It revives fears from the Sanders campaign that the nominating campaign was rigged against him, giving opponents grounds to complain about Hillary Clinton and her use of the DNC, West said.

Julian Zelizer, professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University, told Xinhua that the DNC scandal to allegedly keep Sanders out will energize his supporters to protest the unfair nomination process.

"It will also play into the (Trump) narrative that Clinton is someone who does not play by the rules," he said.

Still, in the fast-moving and Internet-driven media environment in which the story changes by the day and even by the hour, the news cycle is expected to shift in the next couple of days toward the convention and its array of speakers.

Clinton "can still have a successful convention. And given the quick nature of the media cycle, it is possible that the public moves on," Zelizer said.

West echoed those sentiments by saying that the story will overshadow the opening of the convention but speakers will quickly move the focus to Republican nominee Donald Trump and his divisive rhetoric. Trump has compared Mexicans to rapists and called for a ban on Muslims entering the United States.

"Democrats will outline his failed business ventures and how they hurt ordinary Americans and note that his policies are too risky for the country and the world," West said.

"They will put together a portrait of a Republican nominee who is too erratic for the presidency," he added.

Indeed, Trump has a reputation for skirting questions on his policies when pressed for details.

Speakers at the Democratic convention will capitalize on this as they weave together a narrative of what they view as a hot-headed and polarizing figure who is too unpredictable, and even dangerous, to be in the White House.

Clinton will need a bounce in the polls to keep ahead of the bombastic billionaire, and the convention provides her a good chance.

Trump on Monday surged ahead of Clinton in Real Clear Politics' poll average by 0.2 points, although the reading still means the two candidates are neck-in-neck, given the 2-point margin of error.

In a CNN/ORC Poll conducted by telephone on July 22-24 and released Monday, Trump surged ahead of Clinton by 44 percent to 39 percent, marking a significant bounce that has not been seen since the year 2000. Endite