What Trump’s Bronx Speech Looked Like On The Ground

“I Think They’re Building An Army From Within”

There is at least one other man on the 5 train uptown who is going to where I’m going. He is stocky and wearing a black and white American flag T-shirt and carrying a black and white American flag sign that he clearly made himself that says “Trump 2020.” His face is hard and mean: to me it reads both daring and afraid. It is May 23rd, 2024, and in a few hours we will both watch Donald Trump deliver a speech at Crotona Park in The Bronx.

I am a fast walker and I pull ahead as we walk fifteen minutes in the hot and muggy sun. The line is shorter than I’d expect for arriving just as doors open, usually you want to arrive a few hours early to things like this. Then again, how would The Bronx know? Trump hasn’t’ been there before. As the hours tick down, more and more people show up, until by the time I enter the venue there are at least a thousand people behind me. The arial shots you’ve seen of the rally? They don’t capture those people. Trump’s familiar lie about people who couldn’t make it in is true this time.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Trump rallies tend to be largely male, mostly gen-x, and almost exclusively white. This crowd is largely male, all right, maybe even more so than usual, but far, far younger and strikingly more diverse. I’d estimate about 20 percent of this crowd is nonwhite. The woman in line ahead of me speaks excitedly with reporters in a strong…