Trump expected to repair rift
“It’s become a soundbite population.’’ — Bill Wickham, 53, owner of a roadside pumpkin farm stand outside Rochester, N.Y.
“I’ve seen so much hatred come out among friends that I never knew existed. Social media has been a huge factor in that. It saddens me to see what that’s done to relationships, to friendships, to families.’’ — Laura Hodges, 53, a registered nurse and small-business owner in Greenville, S.C.
The president “is trying to unify one segment of the population against the other. He is trying to unify the privileged and people who are not immigrants, people who are not people of color.’’ — Tony Choi, 28, of northern New Jersey, a social media manager for 18 Million Rising, a non-profit organization that aims to promote civil engagement in the Asian-American and Pacific Islander community.
Trump promised to be the president of all Americans. Many of his supporters and opponents said he’s either widened the divisions or failed to narrow them. Even Trump voters expect him to do something to bridge the gulf.
“I’ve never seen people so upset about a president getting elected,” said Ed O’Connell, 48, a construction company owner in Allendale, N.J. “Trump really needs to reach out. Clinton had all those supporters, and (he should) have her next to him and have a unified speech to perhaps sway some people to give him a chance.”
Jerry Nieland, 41, is an Iowa Democrat who voted for Barack Obama in 2012 and Trump last year. “He needs to step out of the Republican side,” Nieland said. “He needs to bring in some Democrats that have some commonsense ideas — even Bernie Sanders — and just entertain some of the statistics from countries that have universal health care.”
“‘Make America Great Again,’ to me, means everyone being unified as one,” Keeling said, “one whole nation, one country, one America, and not being divided by different thoughts, views, religions.’’
Of course, what’s divisive rests in the mind of the beholder.
Keeling cited “the Black Lives Matter group, the anti-police protesters’’ as a reason the nation’s “slipping in the wrong direction, just with people dividing.”
Others praised the Black Lives Matter movement for demanding social justice and protesting police brutality. Choi, a Korean American, said making America great “also means respecting the dignity of black lives.’’
Nieland, who comes from a rural area of northwestern Iowa, said, “People who live in smaller towns see things from a different perspective, and a lot of people don’t have the amount of money to live in the big condominiums in the large cities.’’
Some concerns bridge the urban-suburban-rural divide.
Scott Hagenson, 47, is a line supervisor for the municipal electric department in Lake Mills, Iowa, a place he calls “a great small, Midwestern community to raise my two sons in.” He worries about crime, which he said “used to be a big city thing. Any crime out there, from murder to child abuse to anything like that, now, it’s every town in America.”
One of Trump’s proudest achievements was preserving jobs at the Carrier Air Conditioner plant in Indianapolis. Last year, Carrier announced it was moving manufacturing operations to Mexico, a plan Trump denounced during the presidential campaign. After he was elected, Trump announced a deal with Carrier to keep some of the manufacturing jobs in Indiana in exchange for tax credits.
Robert James, 57, a forklift driver at the plant, said he appreciates Trump’s efforts but didn’t vote for him. He said, “I still wonder