I just returned from an eight state road trip through Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. Mostly interstate travel, but also several afternoons were spent on back roads in the mountains.
I saw four Biden signs in the rural areas, and scores of Trump signs.
I didn’t see any sign of economic distress. Nicely maintained houses, well-kept yards, a 20-40K pick-up truck in most driveways, new cars, bass boats, huge campers, restored muscle cars, looks like everyone is doing well. Anyone who holds the idea that rural people support Trump because they are looking for him to get their job back is mistaken, in my opinion.
There must have been a Porsche show in West Virginia because saw 25-30 cars on the road to White Sulfur Springs (had to visit Barnwood Builders boneyard since I was in the area).
Most Trump supporters vote Trump because he’s on the Republican ticket. Period. I live in Illinois where Chicago ends and the rural part of the state begins. People around here vote Republican for two stated reasons, mainly. One is abortion. The other, misguided IMO, is that “Democrats are going to raise your taxes!”. Those two are huge, and drive lots of voters. There is a third, unstated reason.
Guns, certainly is another stated reason. But really, maybe it’s just the Republicans around me, but they do nothing but gripe about taxes. And they’re convinced that voting Republican takes care of that.
Pretty rural around here. I see both sets of signs – sometimes, as eenerms says, right next door to each other. One year I think I saw them on the same lawn – intrahousehold dissension, maybe.
I may be wrong, but I feel like the number of signs on display isn’t really that indicative of overall support. Trump supporters worship the man. I’m embarrassed for them. I’d crawl over broken, covid-infected glass to vote Trump out, but I’m not going to put a sign in my yard, or, god forbid, fly a fucking flag with Biden’s name on it in front of my house.