Love him or hate him, President Donald Trump is a rock star.
That quickly became apparent early Tuesday afternoon as the crowd readied itself for his evening rally at the Wildwoods Convention Center.
The line to get into the rally was long. Very long. Blocks and blocks long. People toward the tail end of the line at 3 p.m., when the gates to the venue were opened, generally agreed they wouldn’t be able to get in but stayed in line anyway, just on the off chance they could see their hero. Many of the people in front of them had been there since early in the morning or even two nights before, sleeping in the chilly outside. In the end, people who had been in line since 6 a.m. said they hadn’t made the cut.
They had come from miles around. At one point I felt like I was climbing a ladder north as I was asking folks waiting in line where they’d come from.
“North Brunswick.” “Bayonne.” “Queens.” “Staten Island.” “Connecticut,” said one man who added, “I came to see the best man in the world.”
The rally drew folks from the New York and Philadelphia metropolitan areas for a reason. Trump enters enemy country when he ventures into most parts of the Northeast and, reasonably, tends to pick his venues carefully in blue states. South Jersey is red, or at least purple, in a decidedly blue state and geographic area, so his regional supporters, who hadn’t been offered a closer rally, responded with pent-up enthusiasm.
How big was the crowd? Trump and Congressman Jeff Van Drew, who represents Wildwood as well as all of Cape May, Salem and Atlantic Counties and parts of Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Ocean counties, including all of Southern Ocean County save half of Stafford Township and all of Barnegat, touted it as the president’s largest rally ever.
“So, we have tens of thousands of people outside,” said Trump after Van Drew had spoken to the crowd for a couple of minutes. “If anybody would like to give them your place please let us know,” he joked. “But we have thousands and thousands, tens of thousands, and Jeff gave me a number, he said 175,000 people signed up. Is that a fact?”
“It’s a fact,” answered the congressman, whose defection from the Democratic Party to the GOP in support of Trump drew the president to South Jersey.
“I think he’s on his way,” said Trump.
The president, as is his wont, then turned to the press and media.
“So, it’s been a little bit of the story,” said Trump. “See the fakers back there? Fake news!”
The crowd booed on cue.
“You know,” the president continued, “if another candidate has a thousand people, they say, ‘he spoke to a massive crowd.’ If they have 10,000 like Pocahontas (Sen. Elizabeth Warren) in Central Park in New York, I said, ‘what’s the big deal,’ and they said ‘oh, the crowds are so large.’
“Let me just tell you,” the president continued. “So here’s the story. So we have these massive crowds that fill up stadiums every single time. We have tens of thousand of people outside. They never mention it. So maybe they will tonight. But that’s an all-time record.”
Some press accounts disputed Trump’s claim, saying only about 10,000 people remained in the area come evening, watching the two Jumbotrons set up outside the convention hall. Who knows?
I’d say 175,000 was way too high. I parked on the street about eight blocks from the center of the action. If there had been 175,000 people I think I would have had to walk a mile or two. And even if the Trump campaign had given out 175,000 tickets over the internet, plenty of people who had gotten one might have decided not to go, realizing they’d never get in the venue.
On the other hand, there were plenty of people in Wildwood on Tuesday.
Derek Sorace stepped out for a cigarette on the porch of his family’s home about six blocks from the convention center. Sorace, who splits his time between Philadelphia and Wildwood, had come to his second home to make sure nothing happened to it as the crowds descended. Nothing had, he said, noting the crowds had been well behaved.
“My family has had this home for, oh, maybe 24 years,” said Sorace. “I’ve never seen it like this in the winter. Usually there are people through the summer up to, oh, just before Christmas, and then they start showing up again around Easter. But in January, usually you wouldn’t see a car parked for miles, not even driving around. January, February, March, you can hear a pin drop.”
The scene had been different, Sorace said, in the days leading up to the Trump rally. He had walked around town the night before, talking to people camping out, people enjoying the local bars. They had been having a fun time, he said.
And that’s the key. The exact number of people in Trump’s crowds can be disputed. But the fact is that there are a lot of them. And they’re having fun!
Like a Concert
Or Sporting Event
The scene outside the convention center was more like World Series baseball games or rock concerts I have attended than any political rally I’ve ever seen.
There were tailgate parties and high-fives all around. Merchandise stands stretched far down the boardwalk and Trump hats and shirts were being hawked on every street corner for blocks around. Music blared from speakers set up by rally organizers, boom boxes and car radios. Beers were being shared; I haven’t seen so many pocket flasks in years.
Just like at a big-time sporting event, Trump’s fans were wearing their “team colors,” with MAGA hats and T-shirts worn over other clothes in the chill, the uniform of the day.
And just like Mets fans entering Shea Stadium in Game 7 of the 1986 World Series against the Red Sox, just about everybody was smiling. Hey, the Mets had just come from behind in a historic Game 6, giving them a chance to become world champions (they would). Well, Trump had showed the pollsters wrong in 2016 and promised to have an even bigger victory in 2020, so of course his supporters were on a high.
Well, in truth, some of the smiles on the long, twisting lines to get into the actual rally had turned to determined looks. Being on your feet for hours with the chance it was all for naught will do that.
And many of the protesters in a “penned off” area a few blocks away weren’t smiling either. More on that later.
But folks like John Gannon, who was part of a group of five from Philadelphia, were definitely in the party mood.
“This is my first Trump rally,” Gannon said. “I came because it is close to Philly. I couldn’t make the one in Hershey. I was busy.”
His group had spent $70 for two spots in an open-sided parking garage under a motel a couple blocks from the center. They had a spread of food set out surrounded by comfortable chairs.
“We brought our living room,” laughed his wife.
They also had plenty of beer, which they quickly shared – for free – with folks who stopped to talk to them.
“We got here around 3 p.m.,” said Gannon. “We didn’t come to get in. We came just to support our president and to be part of the crowd. It has been great, no hate, and that’s important. We love American and we love Americans. I don’t care who they are.”
People were in a good mood despite the chill (about 41 degrees under a cloudy sky). If one person shouted “go, Trump” or the ever-popular “USA, USA” 20 people down or across the street would immediately join in.
Gannon was far from the only person who told me they weren’t even trying to get into the actual rally. They had come for the fun, come, as John from Burlington County told me, to surround themselves with Trump supporters.
John wouldn’t give me his last name or even the name of the town he came from. “Let’s just leave it at Burlington County.” He wasn’t the only Trump supporter who during the course of the day used only their first name when I told them I was a reporter. Hmm, maybe there is something to the right-wing media’s claim that the polls had been wrong in 2016 because people were afraid to openly say they were Trump supporters.
Competing Chants
And Big Grins
A couple hundred protesters, who had gathered in an approved, barricaded-off area a few blocks down the boardwalk from the convention center, weren’t afraid to give me their full names.
There were other differences between the two camps as well. Although the majority of Trump supporters I talked to were from outside of the 2nd Congressional District or even out of state, the majority of protesters I engaged in conversation were more local. Many were there to protest Van Drew as much as Trump.
Dorothy Hogge was as local as you could get, from Wildwood, “born and raised,” a 30-year employee in the Wildwood public schools.
“I’m upset with Van Drew,” she said. “He’s always been very helpful to me, spoke to me personally. I guess he’s showing his true colors now. I’m very upset with him.”
Hogge sounded more disappointed and surprised than upset that her congressman had switched parties. Bud Glen of Galloway was more direct.
“He’s a traitor,” said Glen.
“I think Jeff Van Drew stole the vote of the people of this district,” said Sharon Stokes of Burlington County who also has a summer home in Wildwood.
The protesters spoke to me as Trump supporters on the boardwalk above them taunted them. “Get a job!” “Go home!” “Go back to where you came from!”
The two groups would often break out into opposing chants, with “lock him up” being balanced by that ubiquitous “USA, USA” or the blast from the past “lock her up.”
“They’re looking at us like we’re monkeys in a zoo,” said Hogge.
The hecklers on the boardwalk, mostly young men, didn’t seem threatening, just loud. An officer I talked to agreed. There seemed to be way too many smiles at the scene to suspect violence would break out.