I think like many other Europeans the folks at The Guardian are still amazed that even after being indicted on 91 criminal charges Trump still maintains a stranglehold on most of the GOP electorate...
So to better understand why that is, they sent a team to deep Red Greenville SC to examine grassroots (mainly) GOP support for and opposition to Trump. They also met with a small contingent of local Dems, who pointed out that their ranks grew as a result of Trump and as I've pointed out previously the turnout of Dem voters in that deep Red county grew significantly from 2016-2020. So in terms of Dem fortunes in the area, Trump provided a boost...
So the three groups they interracted with were the "official" Greenville Co GOP, who I'd characterize as MAGA, the life long GOP who had left the Greenville GOP (either voluntarily or not) over the Trump factor, and also the local Dems.The thing that leaped out at me was the fact that (politics aside) they were all pretty interchangeable in the way they looked and carried themselves. And among each of the three groups I found individual people that struck me as likable.
Kind of the same way I viewed my co-workers when I worked the polls in Bloomington with the same 3 distinct groups of MAGA types, anti-Trump GOP and Dems. Some very thoughtful and considerate people among each of those three groups of co workers.But on the other hand other people within each group who ,for want of a better term, I personally found "annoying"...
It was only when the tv crew left Greenville and headed to a Trump rally in Charleston that my personal perceptions shifted. That was the ultra MAGA crowd, and I don't remember a single one of them that struck me in a positive manner. To be fair, they spent less time interracting with those folks, and likely focused on the most extreme examples. And MTG being there and being a crowd favorite likely shaded my perception as well.
So to better understand why that is, they sent a team to deep Red Greenville SC to examine grassroots (mainly) GOP support for and opposition to Trump. They also met with a small contingent of local Dems, who pointed out that their ranks grew as a result of Trump and as I've pointed out previously the turnout of Dem voters in that deep Red county grew significantly from 2016-2020. So in terms of Dem fortunes in the area, Trump provided a boost...
So the three groups they interracted with were the "official" Greenville Co GOP, who I'd characterize as MAGA, the life long GOP who had left the Greenville GOP (either voluntarily or not) over the Trump factor, and also the local Dems.The thing that leaped out at me was the fact that (politics aside) they were all pretty interchangeable in the way they looked and carried themselves. And among each of the three groups I found individual people that struck me as likable.
Kind of the same way I viewed my co-workers when I worked the polls in Bloomington with the same 3 distinct groups of MAGA types, anti-Trump GOP and Dems. Some very thoughtful and considerate people among each of those three groups of co workers.But on the other hand other people within each group who ,for want of a better term, I personally found "annoying"...
It was only when the tv crew left Greenville and headed to a Trump rally in Charleston that my personal perceptions shifted. That was the ultra MAGA crowd, and I don't remember a single one of them that struck me in a positive manner. To be fair, they spent less time interracting with those folks, and likely focused on the most extreme examples. And MTG being there and being a crowd favorite likely shaded my perception as well.
