Inside how Trump won the white working class

Sitting next to me the next morning at the counter of the Golden Dawn Restaurant, Marty McKenna, a retired postal worker, told me that he loved what Trump did with Carrier: “He is Ronald Reagan on steroids. I haven’t felt this good about a politician in years, because he is not a politician.” The day after the election, General Motors announced the closure of the third shift at the nearby Lordstown plant, putting another roughly 1,200 people out of work, and there was a whiff of hope that Trump could do for Youngstown what it believed he did for Indianapolis.

The Carrier deal plays so well because it fits with what people expect of Trump and what they believe Hillary Clinton would not have done—fight for the jobs that they want. Throughout the campaign, voters in Youngstown heard Trump talk about how he would protect good jobs and bring back lost jobs. From Clinton, regardless of what she said, what people heard was something different: talk of putting miners out of work, talk of retraining (a four-letter word in Youngstown), and a disinterest in fighting for the jobs that people in Youngstown aspire to. Dave Betras, the chair of the Mahoning County Democratic Party, told me, in between swearing about the election results, that national Democrats have forgotten “how to talk Democratic,” how to fight for jobs for people who “shower after work, not before.” He laughed bitterly when he explained that a billionaire from New York who “shits on a gold-plated toilet” did a better job of connecting with Youngstown workers than the Democratic standard-bearer.

The criticisms that Democrats and media have leveled at Trump over the last weeks simply have not landed with Youngstown residents, and to the extent they have registered, they tend to have worked in Trump’s favor. Shake the press pool? Take phone calls from the president of Taiwan? Tweet about cost overruns on the F-35 program? It all works because it is a different way of doing business, one that has the added bonus of irritating media and Establishment Washington. If traditional politics and traditional politicians of both parties have failed to deliver for two generations, doing things differently, even if they sometimes feel crass or off-kilter, is worth the gamble. Congressman Ryan told me the story of one of the last electricians left at Delphi, who was sent down to Mexico to train his own replacement. After the election, that same electrician approached Ryan and exclaimed, “I have been waiting 30 years for something new.”