Originally published on Forbes.com.
I was hoping to pick up some tax news at the Donald Trump rally in Worcester last night, but did not come up with very much. Still it was an enjoyable evening, although a little scary. There were quite a few moments where I didn’t like the energy of the crowd. Trump talked about feeling the love in the room after the crowd start chanting USA, USA, USA in response to his promise to make us have a military so strong nobody is going to mess with us. I didn’t quite catch the loving feeling, but maybe it was because I was too high up.
The Scene
The DCU Center, which I persist in continuing to refer to as the Centrum was filled to capacity with people continuing to come in as Trump spoke. Ten minutes after the scheduled start time of 7:00 we were told that there were still 4,000 people outside and Mr. Trump wanted to give them more time. Then we were told that Mr. Trump likes to start with the Pledge of Allegiance, which we pretty much all stood up for and recited, as I respectfully remove my O’Connors hat. A Red Sox hat is fine for the Worcester gate area of Orlando International, but for something in the Centrum, I felt a really local marker was more appropriate.
I knew to park at the library and walk a few blocks avoiding the $20 event parking fee in the Galleria (or whatever they call it now) parking lot. Walking from the library it seemed like an older crowd, but that turned out to be a bad sample. The only person campaign related standing on the street was a fellow named Paul selling buttons ($5 or 3 for $10) and “Make America Great Again” hats ($25). I sprung for a “Vote for Donald” button. It had the eponymous duck on it. I wonder if Disney is charging royalties.
There was no mention of Donald at the rally. It was always Mr. Trump. Republican candidates were referred to by last name, except for Jeb Bush, presumably to distinguish him from his father and brother, but he was on a first name basis with the Democrats – Hillary and Bernie – and a no name basis with the other guy, who was the mayor of Baltimore (Martin O’Malley in case you forgot too).
The protesters on the corner were a young bunch. Somebody told me the count was 45, which seemed about right. Signs read “Immigrants Make USA Greater”, “The Bible Commands us to Welcome The Stranger” “Welcome Syrian Refugees!” and “Bring Back Crystal Pepsi”. The last, research shows, is not really campaign related, but it seems to be a thing.
In the long line that wrapped around the building and continued over a block, almost to Main Street, I was surrounded by college sophomores. Four guys from Nichols, which produces a lot of accountants, although one of the guys was majoring in sports management, in front of me and three Holy Cross girls behind me (sociology, English pre-med and political science). They seemed a little surprised that I remembered the name of the dorm I lived in when I was there. Other than somebody shouting “Liberals suck” as he was heading for the end of the line the crowd was well behaved and orderly. Worcester PD had a strong presence. I’m hoping the campaign was paying for the overtime.
Opening remarks were by Jim Knowlton of the Worcester Republican Committee. He noted that in 1854, when the Republican Party was emerging from the Whigs, Abraham Lincoln visited Worcester. That was a different Republican Party and a different Worcester. The first national women’s rights convention was held in Worcester in 1850. And in 1854 when the federal government was going to great expense to return Anthony Burns to slavery, it was the tough guys from Worcester, Stephen Foster, Abby Kelley’s husband and Free Church minister Thomas Wentworth Higginson who turned the encounter violent. After the Burns incident Higginson declared that getting to Worcester would be as good as getting to Canada for future fugitives.
Trump finally came out and greeted us by talking about how great Tom Brady is – a winner. He pointed to the press, who were confined in sort of a pen on the center of the floor and got everybody to boo at them saying that maybe 30% of them were OK. He then launched into talking about the problem of money in politics indicating that he knows all the other candidates can be bought because he has been buying politicians. He then went into how great he is doing in all the polls. He went on at some length about how rich he is and how bursting with pride he is about his campaign financial disclosures. That was probably the most detailed part of the speech.
He started talking about the Great Wall, that he is going to get Mexico to pay for triggering the first of three internal protests. In the upper front corner, three sheets were displayed that made a banner reading “Migrants Lives Matter”. They were quickly escorted out with Trump commenting that they were so misguided.
The other two protests were single guys yelling and getting escorted out. One started in when Trump mentioned food stamps. Trump commented on how overweight the guy was. Interestingly, as I was chatting with a couple of guys in the library parking lot afterwards, one of them speculated that the fat guy might have been a plant. He said he seemed to have a big grin on his face.
We heard about how badly Kerry screwed up the Iran negotiation, details of three murders by illegal aliens, extensive commentary on that dirty rotten traitor Sergeant Bergdahl, who will not be getting any time, Syrian refugees (mostly young men who look like tough cookies) being a Trojan horse and taking back the internet which is being used to recruit terrorists.
Having a President who wrote the Art of The Deal will help with the trade imbalance and bring all those jobs back. We’re going to have a military so strong nobody will mess with us and take great care of our veterans. We’ll get rid of Obamacare and replace it with something much better.
There were some points where rather than feeling the love, I was feeling just a little scared. Trump reminds me just a bit of the worst managing partner I ever had. The crowd loved him, although reviews were more mixed when I talked to individuals.
The only tax talk was a pretty vague reference to the $2.5 trillion that corporations have parked overseas because our tax laws are so screwed up. You probably won’t be surprised to learn that he did not explain how we will get that stronger military and take such great care of our veterans given that his tax plan scores something like a trillion a year revenue loss. Details, details.
Protesters Cleared Out
Worcester PD made the protesters clear out shortly before everybody came out from the auditorium so I did not get to speak to any except for a small group. Aly, Val, Diana and Cecily are students at Worcester Technical High School. The had a sign that read “Donald Trump is Racist, Dump Trump”. Two of them were wearing Bernie shirts. They said they had been inside and had been told that the Bernie shirts had to come off. They were escorted to the ladies room and reversed them for the duration.
I have to say that I appreciate Mr. Trump coming to Worcester and am going to read Art of The Deal at the first opportunity . And I’ll leave it at that for now.