I'm sure it some combination of the other things mentioned here like allowing clear text, which I enabled for localhost. But this was the final piece in the puzzle.
project.ext.react = [
entryFile: "index.js",
// ADD THESE THREE
bundleAssetName: "index.android.bundle",
bundleInDebug: true,
bundleInRelease: true
]
RN: 0.61.3