Feeling out of place at a Trump rally is possibly the scariest thing any college-aged Bernie Sanders supporter could ever experience. But posing as a die-hard Trump fan in the front lines of one of his rallies? Don’t even get me started.
On April 16th, I had the opportunity to go to a Donald Trump rally in my hometown of Syracuse, NY. In order to drive two of my friends that had journalistic obligations alongside reporters from CNN, MSNBC, and Fox, I arrived around 7:00 am to stand in line. Seeing as the doors didn’t open until 10:00 am, I had a solid 3 hours to people watch, mingle, and gain the trust of the rabid crowd in order to save myself from the violence and harsh words I had seen many other young protesters my age receive in rallies around the country.
Wearing nothing but a pair of cutoff jean shorts and a homemade sleeveless t-shirt with a satirical message from a company called GOP Teens, I entered the Oncenter arena. I was able to make it to the front of the crowd which provided me not only with the perfect view of the Donald, but the perfect crowd experience for a Trump rally.
The people around me were from a mixed bag of backgrounds, but all were eagerly awaiting the arrival of their Messiah. Young men wearing suits adorned with Make America Great Again pins on their lapels surrounded me; veterans wearing insignia from their respective battles; old men with knock off Trump memorabilia; women and children holding video cameras to capture each word Trump uttered. The energy in this crowd was overwhelming. Chants of “Build that wall!” and “[expletive] Obama!” spread through this crowd as they eagerly anticipated the man of the hour to take the stage.
Trump’s opening act, GOP activist and businessman Carl Paladino, started off the rally in a very Trump-esque way: a blistering attack on the press standing at the back of the arena. He the instructed the 3500 person crowd to turn around and boo the godforsaken press, telling us that they were, in fact, liars and absolutely terrible people. This rhetoric seems to be very commonplace among Trump supporters. People around me quickly fell into conversations about how the media skews their coverage in order to make Trump out to be a very poor candidate with nothing substantial to say.
After what seemed like a lifetime, Trump took the stage. Utilizing the very popular song “Jock Jams,” which would probably fit in better as a hype song for a hockey team than a potential presidential nominee, he sauntered to the podium, flanked on either side by assault rifle-wielding Secret Service policemen. The crowd went nuts, as expected. It took a full 3 minutes for the crowd to finally wind down in order for Trump to even speak.
In the 45 minutes or so that the Donald spoke from the podium, I didn’t learn much. He droned on about Syracuse’s heroin epidemic, the loss of manufacturing jobs from companies like Carrier, and how he planned to solve each and every problem that plagued Central New York. But his crowd didn’t care much for his policy rhetoric. He was able to reel the crowd back in whenever they lost interest by talking about how big his wall was going to be, how much of an outsider he was, or how great he was going to make America again. Trump likes to talk about how great his words are (because he has the best words), but not many of his words were utilized. As a non-Trump supporter, I was left with absolutely nothing by the end of his speech. I had no idea how he planned to enact his policies, what his policies even were, or how he planned on paying for anything. I only learned that he was going to build a wall, the wall was going to be great, and that Mexico was paying for it.
At the end of the day, I left with a perfectly intact cover and a heart full of worry. I don’t believe that a man that has nothing better to say other than how big his wall is going to be should be our president. I fear that if he’s elected, these next four years will be the darkest years of our country. The mania surrounding the Donald is a mysterious, yet scary one. I hope that America makes the right choice as they head to the polls this election cycle and chooses a candidate that can keep America the way it is and always has been: great.
