When, Not If in Ohio

Image result for trump toledo rally

Ohio, as always, seems to be the place to be in the last few weeks of an election. With Clinton’s campaign trying to stop the bleeding from the new email discovery, Trump has had room to keep calm and make the argument he wants, Image result for trump toledo rallyand he does this in Ohio. During the first debate, Clinton was able to portray this image of her being President of the United States. Trump followed suit this week in Ohio by using the future tense in his rhetoric which seems to be a good tactic to encourage hope with his working class voters.

Many times during a rally in Ohio, which Trump showed up an hour late to though none of his supporters minded, Trump kept changing “If I’m elected…” to “When I’m elected…” and this seemed to rally the crowd. The working class is a large component of the electorate in Ohio and this positive rhetoric worked the way it did back in the primaries. The rally in Ohio was meant for the working class, not just because of its use of a more positive future tense, but because of its content. Trump made sure to discuss certain companies that moved to Mexico and talked about Clinton’s “inadequacy.” He also talked about Mexico and the wall: “And yes, we will build a wall…and Mexico will pay for the wall.” Trump recognized that this rally was his typical “Trump rally” and understood his working class audience well enough to say all the right things. But he made sure to say all the right things in a more hopeful and positive light.

What was interesting, was that during this rally, Trump did not discuss much about voting down the ballot, but Pence sure did. With the rally looking like it was composed of working class voters, someone had to have the goal of encouraging other votes besides one for Trump. Trump, as usual, wanted to spark his audience, which he did, while Pence had a surrogate’s job. Trump utilized a future (and hopeful) tense in portraying his win and went on to discuss popular working class issues which kept his base, but did it get him anymore votes?

One thought on “When, Not If in Ohio

  1. I think you bring up an interesting point when you talk about hope he “…made sure to say all the right things in a more hopeful and positive light”. Changing “if I’m elected” to “when I’m elected” is instilling a sense of hope and confidence that doesn’t line up with the strategy to rally voters when they think they’re behind in the polls but I think is important.

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