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Trump’s fight for Pennsylvania The faithful fear he won't be allowed to win

'Ambling on stage, more bronzed than usual, he raises a fist of defiance to one section of the crowd' (Hannah Beier/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

'Ambling on stage, more bronzed than usual, he raises a fist of defiance to one section of the crowd' (Hannah Beier/Bloomberg via Getty Images)


April 16, 2024   6 mins

John has PTSD. The 78-year-old is a Vietnam war veteran, but that’s not the source of his trauma — at least according to his t-shirt. PTSD, in fact, stands for “Pretty Tired of Stupid Democrats”, which is why John has made the 560-mile pilgrimage from his home in Wilmington, North Carolina to Schnecksville, Pennsylvania. He is here, along with thousands of others, to support “the best president of our lifetime”, who is holding his final rally before travelling to New York to face trial over an alleged hush money scheme. “It’s a bogus trial like the rest of them,” John says. “But at least he’s still coming to places like these — he’ll never stop doing that”.

Schnecksville might seem like an odd choice of venue: barely 3,000 people live here and until recently, the land was home to 1,800 acres of apple, pear and peach orchards. The politics of the area, though, are far from conventional. Schnecksville is in Lehigh County, a swing region in a battleground state that Biden won by roughly 80,000 votes in 2020 and Trump won by an even smaller margin (45,000) in 2016. It is so competitive that the neighbouring Northampton County voted for Obama, Trump, and then Biden in 2012, 2016 and 2020 respectively. What happens in this region could presage what happens elsewhere in the country later this year.

The mood here is buoyant. I arrive at 4pm, roughly four hours before Trump was due to speak but at least eight hours after his most devoted followers arrived. “I got here at 6am,” Sarah Wyncer tells me. “But there were still a good few hundred people ahead of me”. Wyncer points to a queue snaking through muddy fields lined with pick-up trucks draped in Trump regalia, which range from the heroic (Trump superimposed onto Rambo’s body) to the profane (“#FJB”).

Reports of Iran’s drone strikes on Israel slowly filter through the crowd, but the news does not dampen the mood. If anything, it gees them up. “Fuck Joe Biden” chants ripple down the line moments before Trump takes to the stage. Those who can’t get into the main area climb on top of gravel heaps, JCB diggers and pick-up trucks to get a better view of their man.

At around 8pm, an hour late, the former President finally takes to the stage. Blaring from every speaker is Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless America” and a sea of red Maga hats bob from side to side in unison. Ambling on stage, more bronzed than usual, he raises a fist of defiance to one section of the crowd and applauds another. He milks the atmosphere, shuffling from one side of the stage to the other, until he slows to a standstill. “The people of Israel are under attack right now,” booms the former President. “That’s because we’ve shown great weakness. It would not have happened if we were in office”. 

He chews on every syllable, repeating words he fears may not get a reaction: “they said inflation was transitory… they said it was temporary — temporary, they said”. Everything is in the superlative — Biden is the “worst president of our lifetime”, Trump is the “greatest” — and the tangents remain as delightfully esoteric as ever. “Gettysburg, what an unbelievable battle that was,” he drawls. “It was so interesting and so vicious and so horrible and so beautiful in so many different ways… Gettysburg — wow.”

Any time Trump, ever the impresario, senses that he’s losing the crowd, he quickly returns to the classics: inflation, crime, the border and, of course, “crooked” Joe. “Everything he touches turns to shit,” he states. “We’re like a house that’s burning down and it all happened in the last three years.” The crowd howl in agreement, splintering Trump’s comments with whoops, jeers and screams of “USA”. Megan (not her real name) nods along solemnly. She is standing next to me with her puppy called January (named after the 6th) nibbling at her ankle. I ask why she thinks the house is burning down. “Globalists took over,” she says. “And if Trump loses, then they’re going to be back in power once again. The streets will be lawless.”

Megan says all this with a kind of casual insouciance, as if the prospect of civil unrest was just another item on her shopping list that she needed to pick up. The 56-year-old tells me that she’s been in and out of prison, but likes Trump because he “lays down the law”. “Look, I’ve had my issues but I’ve always respected the police,” she says. “During the BLM era, the police were treated like dirt and that appalled me. Trump was the only one trying to bring back some respect for our men in blue.” 

Megan introduces me to her fiancé, who works in roofing. He used to run his own business, but claims he was undercut by cheaper — and illegal — Mexican labour. “During Obama’s presidency, I had a pretty good business,” says Jake (not his real name). “But during the second term I could see all this cheap work coming through and it was hurting my bottom line. Everyone kept telling me to just use the Mexican workers and save on costs. But I didn’t think that was fair to my American workers.” Eventually, Jake had to close the business. “Nobody seemed to care about how bad the problem was — until Trump came”. 

As voters in Pennsylvania, people like Megan and Jake will have an outsize influence on the election. The state has 19 electoral votes, but it remains a toss-up as to where those votes may go in 2024. According to the RCP poll of polls, Biden has the slenderest of advantages over Trump: 0.1%, which is why the President will be making three different stops of his own across the state this month. 

Both men will be fighting hard for the overwhelmingly white, working-class vote in the state. Historically, Lehigh Valley was populated by the Pennsylvania Dutch, described by one local historian as “the most conservative people in America”. But, in recent years, the make-up of the region has begun to change. Over the last couple of decades, the Valley has become the East Coast’s “supply-chain empire” for transporting one-click goods on interstate highways. Given its proximity to New York and Philadelphia, the Lehigh Valley serves as a node for 100 million people living on the eastern seaboard to receive their deliveries, bringing new jobs and revenue to the region. 

That has also caused a population boom, much of it driven by Latinos who moved to the area in search of work. Allenstown is now a majority-Hispanic city — a demographic that Trump has been actively trying to court. A recent poll found that the GOP contender now edges out Biden among Hispanic voters, with 46% supporting the former president. A separate poll shows that 42% of Latinos now support a border wall — up 12 points from December 2021. In a state where Latino political power is growing, this could pose a threat to Biden’s re-election prospects.

“No one can replace him”

But it is not his appeal to Latinos that makes Trump rallies so different from any other. It is how he electrifies a segment of the population in a way that no other politician can. These are people who weren’t interested in politics before Trump and, troublingly, won’t be interested in it after him. In some respect, it is a revolt of the disenfranchised. So much was confirmed by Megan, who told me that she hadn’t cast a single vote for a politician until Trump arrived in 2016, and she likely wouldn’t cast another after he left. “No one can replace him,” she says.

Unfortunately, though, someone does have to replace him. Standing among the Trump faithful on that chilly Pennsylvania night, I asked several supporters who they would vote for after Trump left the Oval Office for the last time in January 2029 (assuming he won). A few murmured “Vivek”, while others mooted — semi-seriously — a third term. “The forces of evil are circling, but Trump can at least delay it if he’s in office,” Megan said. “I’m a Christian and I believe that the forces of good will ultimately prevail. So even after he goes, I have faith the good will prevail.” Yet what form this “good” would take remained unclear. 

Not everyone’s here for Trump. One man wearing a Maga hat cautiously beckons me to one side as I am leaving. “I heard your accent — why are you here?” I tell him, before he confesses to me that he’s an undercover Biden fan. He pulls off his Maga hat as if it is some great disguise: “but I’ve got to admit — this guy can talk”. And even though he talked for over an hour, it wasn’t long enough for some. “That was one of the best speeches I’ve ever listened to,” a father told his son, while another stood transfixed, as if trying to commit the whole thing to memory. 

Despite the festive atmosphere it was hard to ignore an element of despair that seemed to flow through the crowd too. Nearly everyone I spoke to expressed doubt that “they” would let Trump win, and even if he did, “they” would be working to bring him down. “Whether it’s in the courtroom or at the ballot box, they will never let it happen,” Cindy, a bartender, tells me. “It’s just too important to leave to chance”. But what will she do if Trump loses — or isn’t allowed to win? “Go back to serving beer, I guess.”

So this is how the world ends: not with a bang, but a whimper. If we really are on the cusp of civil war, then few soldiers-in-waiting were to be found in this crowd. Once the show was over, the crowd quietly made its way home. The same surely won’t be said of Trump. 


is UnHerd’s Newsroom editor.

james_billot

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Champagne Socialist
Champagne Socialist
5 months ago

Trump goes down in another landslide, if he isn’t in jail by that time.
“Megan” sounds like the core Trump demographic – stupid people.

Arthur King
Arthur King
5 months ago

America is the Trump demographic.

Champagne Socialist
Champagne Socialist
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

I guess you missed the part where he lost to Joe Biden in an historic landslide?
Can’t wait to see his reply to this!

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago

Yes, that is the beauty of 2020 – Biden’s margin over Trump (in Electoral College terms) was the same as Trump’s margin over Hillary in 2016, and we have Trump’s own confirmation that such a margin was “huge”.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
5 months ago

An historic landslide was Nixon over McGovern or Reagan over Mondale. But do go on.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  Alex Lekas

I doubt you are going to see those sorts of margins again. I mean, everyone loved Reagan, and as to Nixon….um….can someone a bit older than me remind me why everyone voted for him?

0 0
0 0
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

It wasn’t the attractiveness of Tricky d**k but his credibility compared to the incoherence of a party that replaced the Vietnam warring Johnson with the principled pacifist Mondale. Plus blowback against the war and against Johnson’s reforms among white supremacists.

And Nixon looked to have more stature as a President than as a scheming politician until old habits caught up with him. He did the opening to Red China, after all. Opening the way to globalisation, shareholder value and the de-industrialisation of America.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

Well, I agree about the “China” thing. I recall the old Vulcan saying – “Only Nixon could go to China”.

Christopher
Christopher
5 months ago

On problem for joe this time around, the polls will be watched much more closely.

Martin Pollecoff
Martin Pollecoff
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

If Democrats want to win they have to stop denigrating their electorate.

0 0
0 0
5 months ago

How do they do that? I hope your standard of political normal is not flattering to deceive as Donald has done ever since fleecing golfers when he was at business school.
However, too many of those Trump flattered have wised up now and the enthusiasm of those who prefer delusion won’t win them back. Whatever the Dems do or don’t.

0 0
0 0
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

Are you referring to The Coddling of the American Mind?

Arthur King
Arthur King
5 months ago

Either way Trumpism wins. Trump becomes president, or he becomes a galvanizing martyr for the working classes.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

Sure, but who do they rally around after he’s gone? There is nobody else like Trump, just pale wannabes like DeSantis.

T Bone
T Bone
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

DeSantis is literally nothing like Trump. Do you think at all before you type? You’re putting on a “misinformation” clinic the past day or two.

Champagne Socialist
Champagne Socialist
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

Both small time bullies who run a mile when they realize they are going to get a beat down. DeSantis with Disney. Trump kissing up to Putin.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago

Agree, but for whatever reason (and despite his faults), Trump draws people like moths to a flame. I can’t think of anyone else in US politics (certainly not DeSantis) who does that.

Carl Valentine
Carl Valentine
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

He is a demagogue just like Boris Johnson, a double glazing/car salesman, him and Biden are poor leaders, he does appear at the moment to stand up for the working classes, I wonder how long for though…

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
5 months ago
Reply to  Carl Valentine

He may be a “demgogue” and a “double glazing / car salesman to you, but in the immortal words of Pres. Obama:
AT LEAST HE WAS A PRESIDENT.
Whereas you are consigned to blabber ABOUT HIM, online from your mom’s basement.

Kevin Halloran
Kevin Halloran
5 months ago

What did Joe Biden and his family do with the over $3,500,000 that the richest woman in Russia wired transferred them while he was VP?

Christopher
Christopher
5 months ago

The MAGA movement is way bigger than the man himself. Not only self made, but made by the likes of Hiliary( deplorables) and Obama ( clingers). The “ transformation” lurching so far left, Clinton ( Bill) couldn’t even get nominated today. Don’t you worry , after Trumps next term, another will take the reins for a better America.

0 0
0 0
5 months ago
Reply to  Christopher

MAGA is a symptom of real wounds on the American body, economic and politic. But the possibility of it becoming a movement which could achieve redress, let alone rebuild, lies under the spell Donald cast and will likely remain so after he’s gone.
And that’s because those vie to control the Republican Party are no more interested than their Democrat opposites in the well being of the majority.

Carl Valentine
Carl Valentine
5 months ago

Nice to see you back. Surely ‘Trump kissing up to Putin is good? Putin is far more talented than Trump and Biden and certainly less enthralled to ‘the elites and Corporate bullies.’ Maybe he will learn something. Maybe he will discourage the CIA from meddling and sh*t stirring in foreign countries? Maybe he will repair Nordstream 2 which Biden and CIA blew up? Maybe he will remove USA from Nato and we ‘Europeans’ can manage our own foreign policies’ We would be better with Russia in Nato than USA, cheap oil too, we could keep USA and China in balance too.

Douglas Proudfoot
Douglas Proudfoot
5 months ago
Reply to  Carl Valentine

Provide any real evidence of Trump appeasing Putin. There ain’t none.

The Ukrainians most likely blew up Nord Stream 2. Biden is the biggest appeaser since Neville Chamberlain. Perhaps Trump’s negotiating position will get Europeans to spend 2% of GNP on defense (Sacre bleu!). Russia in NATO? Sounds like you’re kissing up to Putin.

Trump will drill for oil and natural gas, and allow unlimited LNG exports. Maybe you could start frackin in the UK, and produce your own natural gas.

To really embarrass yourself, you should comment on how deserving Hamas is of a cease fire.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
5 months ago

But in the immortal words of Pres. Obama: At least Trump was a President and Desantis a Governor.
While you are consigned to blabber ABOUT them ONLINE from your mom’s basement.

Douglas Proudfoot
Douglas Proudfoot
5 months ago

DeSantis beat Disney. Trump controled Putin a lot better than Sloppy Joe did. Russian Collusion was a hoax. Read the Durham Report for details.

I advise you to avoid direct sunlight. Expert J.R.R. Tolkien says sunlight turns trolls into stone.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

DeSantis is nothing like Trump. He has zero personality for a start, and he wears lifts in his boots. However, he wants to be like Trump.

T Bone
T Bone
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

Listening to you explain why you disdain DeSantis explains Trump’s success. Your critique of DeSantis is repetitive, robotic and clearly not your own opinion. I was only surprised you left out “pudding fingers.”

Think about what Trump is. He is crude, petty, resentful, salacious and often a cruel and mean-spirited bully. Which is exactly what you are showing yourself to be. But at least…he is authentic and that’s why these people respect him. He is what he is.

The only reason you dislike Trump is because he ran as a Republican. The sooner you recognize your own inauthenticity, the more the world will make sense to you.

0 0
0 0
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

Trumps awfulness as a person contrast with the fakeness of his enemies, which exposes they falseness. Trump is a bully, but so is Biden, it just that Biden dose it in private and is often passive aggressive about it, Trump just dose not bother to hide it. The power players in DC often act like trump when they are alone and with their underlings and when the camera stops rolling. Both men represent the rottenness of the ruling class, Trump represents their grandiosity and selfishness, Biden represents their superficiality and fecklessness. The way they treat people just shows’ how moral desolate those who rule over us really are.

T Bone
T Bone
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

Passive-aggressive Authoritarianism is a great description of what we’re dealing with.

Douglas Proudfoot
Douglas Proudfoot
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

What we’re dealing with is
Democrats are enemies of the Constitution and the rule of law. Republicans in the House impeached Mayorkas for not taking care that immigration law be faithfully enforced. Democrats refused to even have a trial in the Senate, proving they have no regard for the Constitution or the law.

Peter Lee
Peter Lee
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

It’s strange, before Trump ran for President he was idolized in New York City and beyond. Everybody loved Don especially the Dems, then he became a Republican and ousted Hilary.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

That’s politics everywhere, not just in the US. Where Trump differs from most leaders of democratic countries is his actions on January 6.

Julian Farrows
Julian Farrows
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

What did he do?

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  Julian Farrows

He sent his goons to invade Congress.

Michael McElwee
Michael McElwee
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

Biden is the action, Trump the reaction. When the left goes too far, we cling with desperation to a person who, in normal times, we would have little to do with. What we are seeing approach from the left is what in time we always see approaching from the left, and it is not democracy.

Andrew Boughton
Andrew Boughton
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

This is a very able and apt description. Anyone who is reasonable and honest would have great difficulty disagreeing.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

It may surprise you to know that for much of my life, I was a straight-up Thatcherite-Reaganite. If I were American (I am not) I would have voted Republican from 1980 (the year I turned 18) to almost the present day. I would almost certainly have voted for Trump in 2016, because I didn’t like Hillary. However, I have now seen what Trump is all about. As to my not liking DeSantis, one only has to listen to him talk to form a strong dislike of him. He is a “small man” in every sense of the term.

T Bone
T Bone
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

Interesting. So your position is that DeSantis is “weak.” Tell that to Disney who just settled.. or maybe tell the donor class that was spending more in negative attack ads on DeSantis than Trump and Biden combined.

He was a D1 athlete. He also went through military training. The idea that he’s “weak” is irrational. Your beef with him is something deeper than that.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

He wears lifts in his boots. There is nothing that screams “I am insecure and pathetic” more than that. Even leaving that aside, his personality makes him absolutely impossible to like. I was ambivalent towards him before he sought the nomination. I dislike him more than I dislike Trump now, because at least Trump is a character. As to the “donor class” spending on ads attacking DeSantis, I can see why they would do that. I am not even American, but even I bought a Nikki Haley t-shirt on the basis of her attacking DeSantis.

Peter Lee
Peter Lee
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

Are you sure about that, Martin? I think he just want to be President next time round.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  Peter Lee

I doubt it. The US usually elects tall men to be President. DeSantis is a midget.

Champagne Socialist
Champagne Socialist
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

What kind of a dork thinks of Donald Trump as a martyr?
I’m not surprised that you mugs would fall for a tin pot dictator. But even I am surprised that you pick a clown like Trump to be your king! How embarrassing!

0 0
0 0
5 months ago

Certainly true that Trump won’t get anyone what they wish for, he’s had enough trouble working out how to please himself. But the most worrying thing here is the lack of any sign his supporters could hold him to account. Those who’ve wised up have flaked off and those that remain attached are too wound up to look after their own interests.

Peter Lee
Peter Lee
5 months ago

It must be a good week for you CS, rolling in dough from trolling! Nobody believes anything you say, thats the embarrashment

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  Peter Lee

One gets paid for trolling? Shoot! I have always done it for free!

Julian Farrows
Julian Farrows
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

It doesn’t pay very much.

Carl Valentine
Carl Valentine
5 months ago
Reply to  Peter Lee

You speak for all of us do you Peter?

Cathy Carron
Cathy Carron
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

It’s not just the working class who yearn for a Trump Administration. Many more if us are tired of an ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ that ironically printed more money that exacerbated inflation. We’re tired of the constant drumbeat of ‘you’re a racist’ because you won’t sign onto the inane policies of progressivism. We’re tired tired of vote-buying by forgiving student loans and draining the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. We’re tired of millions of illegal immigrants who are putting pressure on the housing supply, driving up costs all over. We’re tired of the growth of government and taxation. We’re being squeezed from all sides. We’re tired of being ruled by entitled Democrats who think they know how we should live rather than just leaving us alone.

Martin M
Martin M
5 months ago
Reply to  Cathy Carron

And Trump will fix all that, will he?

Christopher
Christopher
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin M

It’s a tough job when the entire swamp , left and right, prefers the status quo.

Carl Valentine
Carl Valentine
5 months ago
Reply to  Cathy Carron

Agreed we are all feeding the corporations greed and our politicians are the enablers, and we are voting for them! You can’t make it up. STOP buying from Amazon, Stop giving your data to Zuckerburg it’s easy if you try, Facebook is retarded anyway, why do social media then complain that the corporations are bringing in cheap labour to buy their products?

Douglas Proudfoot
Douglas Proudfoot
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur King

The Mayorkas Impeachment is an example of both anti-Constitutional acts and acts against the rule of law. Democrats are domestic enemies of the Constitution and the rule of law. As Democrats ignore more of both the Constitution and the law, they lose more support.

Here’s a clarifying question and a follow up:
How much of the Bill of Rights actually applies to Trump?
If almost none of the Bill of Rights applies to Trump, how can you be sure it applies to you, or anybody else?

0 0
0 0
5 months ago

Despite your efforts, still have no idea just what these people think they are against, let alone for. Maybe that’s the point? Vague if intensely felt discontent the perfect harvest for a demagogue.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
5 months ago
Reply to  0 0

Maybe they are against four more years of open borders, inflation, rampant crime, expanding bureaucracy and dictates, and the use of govt agencies against people who do not obediently support the regime. Just a guess, but that could have something to do with it.

Andrew Boughton
Andrew Boughton
5 months ago
Reply to  Alex Lekas

And bombing or cajoling 3/4 of the world into adopting the same ideas.

0 0
0 0
5 months ago

That is haubut does it bother MAGA types? Better than their kids going to fight.

0 0
0 0
5 months ago
Reply to  Alex Lekas

You go and tell them, they don’t seem to have a clue. But leave out the stuff that isn’t actually happening as that will put them off.. Like all that stuff in your list. None of which is real.

What is real is 50 years of néolibéral shareholder value levelling down real wages and wasting America’s once impressive productive capacities. That’s what MAGA was about. Trump promised to do something about it, but that didn’t amount to a hill of beans partly because he’s so chaotic but mainly because it can’t really be done. The best effort so far has been Biden’s IRA and war policies, but those have messy side effects

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
5 months ago

The faithful have reason to believe, as the subtitle says, that Trump won’t be allowed to win. Witness the unprecedented efforts to first, keep him off the ballot in some states and now, the perpetual lawfare in which specious cases are used as the pretext for derailing him. The fear that this man inspires in establishment Washington should be enough to arouse the curiosity of all Americans, blue ones included, but it doesn’t.
The only thing that has yet to be tried, as best we know, is violence and who would be surprised if it comes to that? The people interviewed are accurate about how a potential second Trump term would go – much like the first, where the Democrat/media/DC complex opposes him on everything and a fair number of GOPers join in. What drives them is the alternative – it’s not hard to understand why some might not like Trump, but it is impossible to understand why any normal citizen would want four more years of Biden.

T Redd
T Redd
5 months ago

If Joe’s administration was not a far left team of progressives then he would see his life change before him, but the kids and the Gavin Newsom lovers are controlling joey…who would ever Presidentially certify trans awareness day on Easter? A far left admin of Joes…he never knew about it…..

Andrew Boughton
Andrew Boughton
5 months ago

The US is a dilapidated ship with some truly capable and well-motivated professional engineers and hands, but a large part of the passenger list are non-paying and verging on riot. The captain of this worn-out luxury vessel is ever-harried by his neo-con backers to speed up and prove to the world this really is, stll, the fastest vastest and most unsinkable Titanic. At midnight, Trump is to relieve Captain Smith.

Peter Lee
Peter Lee
5 months ago

The fundemental question is who would make a better president in 2024 -2028. For once we have all the answers because both men will have been president for 4 years. Who do you think did the better job and made the US stronger, safer and more economically sound with low inflation, low unemployment even for the minorities?
This is not a question of personality, charm, likes and dislikes or charisma, this is a question of who did the better job as President of the USA.

Paul Hemphill
Paul Hemphill
5 months ago

It beats me how so many ostensibly intelligent folk of a right wing complexion to believe that trump is a stable genius and god’s gift to Amerka.
Some choice comments to the contrary”:
What kind of a dork thinks of Donald Trump as a martyr?
I’m not surprised that you mugs would fall for a tin pot dictator. But even I am surprised that you pick a clown like Trump to be your king! How embarrassing!
… no idea just what these people think they are against, let alone for. Maybe that’s the point? Vague if intensely felt discontent the perfect harvest for a demagogue.
but one sobering point:
If Democrats want to win they have to stop denigrating their electorate.

Douglas Proudfoot
Douglas Proudfoot
5 months ago

There’s a limit to how many fraudulent votes Democrats can cast. In the 1982 election for Governor of Illinois, the Chicago Democrats’ Machine cast 100,000 fraudulent votes. Republican Jim Thompson won anyway, by just under 9,000 votes. It’s possible to beat the margin of fraud.

By the way, the Reagan Justice Department got 63 convictions for vote fraud after the 1982 Illinois election. That deterred vote fraud for a decade or two.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
5 months ago

“Schnecksville is in Lehigh County, a swing region in a battleground state that Biden won by roughly 80,000 votes in 2020 and Trump won by an even smaller margin (45,000) in 2016.”
Are you sure about those figures?

Colorado UnHerd
Colorado UnHerd
5 months ago

Do you suppose John, he of the “Pretty Tired of Stupid Democrats” shirt, understood irony enough to be embarrassed by Trump’s Gettysburg comments? (Gettysburg. Wow.)
We Americans are in a sorry state, facing a presidential election with two geriatric candidates, neither of whom most voters want in the White House. (Though, can Trump rule from prison? Another of those thorny Constitutional questions he raises. Thank God that in these United States you can be elected president even if you’re a convicted felon, though you’re ineligible to vote.)
Trump is a narcissist and autocrat of questionable intelligence; his thoughts seem separated by vast spaces during which he stupidly keeps speaking. But certain of his policies appeal to the dispossessed, including — I’ll admit — this former Democrat. Biden, whose cognitive powers are obviously in decline, seems run by woke handlers, who do not speak for the party’s historical base. I will not vote for a man bent on erasing the historical rights of girls and women — including those encoded in Title IX — in obeisance to male trans activists.
I’m for Kennedy — alternately smeared and ignored by mainstream media — who with the two-party lock on our system will never prevail. Definitely an uphill battle, and as Gen. Robert E. Lee — or perhaps it was Knute Rockne, or maybe Jack Sparrow — famously said, “Never fight uphill, me boys. Never fight uphill.”