Driving through rural Pennsylvania on Nov. 7, you’d have no idea a major presidential election was just announced. It was calm and quiet, in spite of the fact that it was the state that just decided one of the most stretched out, pro-longed elections in American history. The public displays of politics of this area varied: in stretches of small towns, Biden/Harris signs dominated, but the further out into the country we went, the more Trump flags flew.
I spent that weekend in the car with my fellow reporter, Lauren Hoffman. We wanted to capture diverse reactions to the election results.
Reading, Pennsylvania. Saturday, Nov. 7 at 1:30pm — roughly 2 hours after Joe Biden was declared President-Elect
Our first stop was the small city of Reading, Pennsylvania, located in the red Berks county. Participants in a pro-Trump rally had parked at a church, and walked over to a nearby bridge above a highway. There, they raised flags that read a number of different slogans, including: “Trump 2020 Keep America Great,” “Women for Trump,” and “Trump 2024”. They did not wear masks, nor did they practice social distancing.
A woman stood in the middle of the bridge with a megaphone in hand, but her words were muffled by noise from the highway. The people around her cheered.
50-year-old Janelle from Reading declined to share her last name. Although her blue and red Trump sign made her vote plainly obvious, for the sake of accuracy I asked her who she voted for. She laughed and responded that she, of course, voted for Donald Trump.
“I hope the next steps will be prosecution and processing of corruption. If there were fraudulent votes, the public wants to know. It’s not a Democratic or a Republican issue, it’s an American issue,” said Janelle in response to my question about what they hope to achieve at the rally.
As we were talking, cars drove by making noise. Some honked in support, giving thumbs up out the window. Others drove by revving their engines loudly while blasting FDT by YG, a song whose chorus repeats “F–ck Donald Trump” over and over.
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Saturday, Nov 7 at 3pm — roughly 3 ½ hours after Joe Biden was declared President-Elect
The next event was much larger in scale, and much more organized. It took place outside of the State Capitol building in Harrisburg.
Before we came across the main event, we saw a small group of people gathered on the steps of the State Capitol building. It turned out to be two separate groups, one of Biden supporters and one of Trump supporters. Police stood in the middle acting as a barrier between them. The Trump supporters stood at the top of the steps, while the Biden supporters stood towards the bottom. They taunted one another and yelled things, most of them inaudible from where we stood, more than six feet away. It was a stark physical representation of the division between two different political voices in Pennsylvania.
On the other side of the building, the rally took place. There were easily hundreds of people there, all decked out in Trump gear, none of them wearing masks. They were holding signs that said “Stop the Steal” and flying Trump 2020 flags. The group here was much larger, and much more diverse in terms of age, race, and even motive. We were clearly not the only people there to cover the event, which is what it felt like at the last rally. There were plenty of people with cameras and notepads, straining their necks to get better views of the crowd. A woman who held a Biden sign and wore a face mask that said, “Wash your hands and don’t be racist” spoke with people that approached her.
Based on the atmosphere of the event, and the way in which speakers confidently declared that Donald Trump would be the next president of the United States, Biden’s win seemed imaginary.
“We just want transparency,” said Gino Harris, a 32-year-old who is the regional coordinator for Black Voices for Trump. “We want to know everything and make sure everything was right, and was fair with these mail-in ballots. And we’re coming together just to voice our opinion.”
I asked Harris what he thought the next steps were in this election. “I think we need a recount. I think we need to go in and go through the votes and see if, in fact, everything was done the right way and legal way. We had some issues with people being prevented to oversee and observe the ballot counting. I think we just want to make sure that everything was fair,” he said.
“So, one thing I wanted to remind everybody is that for generations, our elections have worked. The process has worked. Then, they change the process, and when the outcome is in question, we have a duty to make sure that it’s a legitimate election,” said a participant over the loudspeaker.
In spite of this woman’s claims, the voting process did not change – the ratio of people voting in-person versus using mail-in ballots did.
Still, her speech was followed by applause and cheering. “We love you Donald Trump!” said a man over the megaphone.
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Sunday, Nov. 8 at 1pm — roughly 25 hours after Joe Biden was declared President-Elect
“I think it’s just kind of funny, like why are you still going with this? They already lost, at this point it’s just kind of ignorant,” said Love Jr., a 15-year-old from West Philadelphia. Lauren and I spoke with him by a growing crowd of Trump supporters in front of the Philadelphia Convention Center.
Love Jr. was out on a bike ride with his father, Love Sr., who asked that their last name not be used, when they stopped in front of what appeared to be a stand-off between Trump and Biden supporters. The group was standing outside of the Philadelphia Convention Center, holding up Trump signs and blasting country music. Across the street from them was an even larger group of Biden supporters, holding up Biden signs and waving BLM and LGBTQ+ Pride flags.
Though the atmosphere in Philadelphia wasn’t quite the party it had been the day before, I felt a sense of relief and lightheartedness as people hugged at the counter protest.
“I feel like [Trump’s] followers, a lot of them blindly follow him and don’t really understand what he’s for,” Love Jr. then pointed to the group of Trump supporters across the street from us. “This is a perfect representation of how dumb – well, I ain’t going to say that, – of how they should think a little better before doing things like this. I’ll just say that,” said Love Jr.
I talked to the father-son duo a little bit more, and asked what they thought of the rally.
“Personally, I think they have a right to do it. I think that’s what makes our country great is that we’re comprised of different people with somewhat similar ideals, but just different ways of getting there. However, the data is the data, right? So we got the data, and the data says Trump lost,” said Love Sr.
Love Jr. rejoined the conversation with his own opinions about Trump. “I feel like with Trump, he’s a dividing person. His name divides people, you know. And I think that, if that’s really not what he wanted to do, if he wanted to be more of a positive person, and for the people, he should have looked out for everybody,” he said.
“That’s the issue, Donald Trump’s rhetoric is so damaging. And he’s convinced millions of people that this election was stolen, and skewed against his favor. I feel like every piece of evidence of that so far has been debunked so fast,” said 20-year-old Kevin Prochner, another counter-protestor that had come in from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He and his friends were among the group of people holding Biden signs and waving pride flags.
“Trump discouraged them from using the mailing system. So right now, he wonders why none of the mailing ballots are for him,” he said. “It’s because he told his supporters not to. So he shouldn’t be surprised.”