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In La Plata County, voters may resonate with policy-driven campaigning after assassination attempt

Political science professor predicts messages of unity likely to be welcome among voters in Southwest Colorado
U.S. Secret Service agents converge to cover Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump at a campaign rally Saturday in Butler, Pa. (Evan Vucci/Associated Press)
Jul 16, 2024
La Plata County residents react to attempted assassination

Many oppose the use of violence as a tool in American Democracy – that much has become clear in the aftermath of an assassination attempt on presidential candidate former President Donald Trump at a rally Saturday in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Trump says his ear was pierced by a bullet; two spectators were injured and one was killed by the gunfire, and a suspected 20-year-old gunman was killed by authorities.

Despite the consensus that Saturday’s violence was an unacceptable intrusion into American democracy, its impact on the side-by-side campaigns seeking the support of a profoundly divided electorate may be difficult to clock.

Most national polls have Trump, 78, up by a few points, backed by a staunch base that has been unphased by his 34 felony convictions or promise to weaponize the federal government to go after his political enemies.

His opponent, 81-year-old President Joe Biden, has struggled to combat concerns about his age, an issue that catapulted from an underlying concern to the forefront of voters’ minds after a historically poor performance in a debate earlier this month.

How will the assassination attempt impact the race?

“I don’t know,” said Paul DeBell, associate professor of political science at Fort Lewis College. “I think anybody who says they know, doesn’t know.”

DeBell

And that’s not really the question he thinks anyone should be asking.

“The stakes are very high, but this sort of horse-race framing, I think, emphasizes the conflictual and it emphasizes the all-or-nothing, win-lose aspects,” he said. “(If) we keep walking down that path, we will face some very dark times.”

Biden said there was a “need for us to lower the temperature in our politics” in a statement from the Oval Office on Saturday night. Trump told The Washington Examiner that he has rewritten the speech he intends to deliver at the Republican National Convention on Thursday and will deliver a message of unity.

DeBell predicts those messages of unity are likely to be welcome among voters in Southwest Colorado.

He sees exasperation at the state of politics – particularly the defining kind of political gamesmanship that seems to offer gains to whoever can foment fear and anger.

“I think if candidates are able to deliver on real problems that people really face every day … I think that that could resonate really well,” he said.

He added, “I think there’s a thirst for that.”

At a “freedom ride” Sunday organized by the La Plata County Republican Central Committee, two of the party’s executive committee members predicted that the nation’s political divisions might get worse yet.

In a written response to questions Monday, the county’s GOP Central Committee said “We believe (La Plata County) voters will react with calm but renewed dedication to the party and the principles we stand for.”

The committee also shrugged off concerns around Trump’s own rhetoric that has hinted at violence and parroted some of history’s most famous dictators.

“The LPCRCC isn’t aware of any Hitler-like comments or threats of violence made by former President Trump,” the committee said.

In numerous speeches, Trump has referred to immigrants “poisoning the blood of our country,” a phrase that parrots a line from Adolf Hitler’s manifest “Mein Kampf”: “All great cultures of the past perished only because the originally creative race died out from blood poisoning.” Both figures also referred to enemies as “vermin.”

In April, Trump was asked by Time about the possibility of violence if he loses the election, to which he responded “it always depends on the fairness of an election.”

However, the LPCRCC believes that using phrases such as “threat to democracy” to describe Trump – as many have in the wake of comments that he would not be a dictator “other than Day One” – are to blame for the assassination attempt.

La Plata County Democratic Party Chairwoman Anne Markward said she was horrified by the outburst of violence, and said she was “begging” voters to pay attention to the issues.

“We have to take aim at Trump, yes, and his policies – but again, not guns, not fists – (with) ballot boxes,” she said.

While Trump’s indication that he will turn the page on divisiveness (at least for now) could make him an even more formidable opponent in November, Markward is hesitant to write off what she sees as policy baggage.

Trump in recent days has tried to distance himself from Project 2025, The Heritage Foundation’s right-wing policy road map for a second Trump presidency, although many of its architects have close ties to the former president.

“For him now to say, ‘Oh no, let’ just take the higher course,’ and ‘we didn’t actually mean any of that,’ … I think that that’s a bit disingenuous,” Markward said.

rschafir@durangoherald.com



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