“I wish the president literally smiled like that,” Purnell said as he drove by the Trump mural on a frigid weekday afternoon in January. “That would be wonderful if he were actually smiling without laughing at somebody or making fun of somebody.”
Purnell, 57, was a lifelong Republican who grew up and worked on a dairy farm in nearby Wells Tannery. His family had always been conservative, he said. He watched the 2016 election unfold as many others did elsewhere in the country: He couldn’t fathom Trump winning the GOP nomination, let alone the presidency. Repelled by Trump’s behavior, he voted for John Kasich in the Pennsylvania primary…
Purnell’s party switch makes for interesting, though not heated, conversation at Fulton Electric, where he works. Owner Travis Horton decorated the office with a mounted bull elk he shot in New Mexico, an assortment of pelts, and at least one sign espousing the Second Amendment.
“It’s nice to hear someone out who has a different opinion without going down a slippery slope and getting personal,” Horton said of Purnell.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member