This is a wonderful book for all of us who wondered how and why Donald Trump became president in 2016. The author visited Luzerne County in Pennsylvania, a blue county that went red for Trump in record numbers. Bradlee visited typical voters in that district to find out why, even those who traditionally voted Democrat, supported Trump. There are many lessons here for Democrats if they hope to build on their successes in the mid-terms of 2018 to retake the Senate and White House. Instead of simply running against Trump, they need to be able to tell the middle class what they will do for them on issues that really matter - taxes (not simply a tax cut for the rich as Trump did), health care, education, jobs, etc. I recommend this book for anyone who cares about the direction our country is moving in and for anyone who is contemplating running for office. ( )

The “Forgotten” Whites of Luzerne, PA Speak Up

Luzerne County in northeast Pennsylvania flipped for Donald Trump in the 2016 election. Nearly 6000 Democrats changed their registration so they could vote for him in the primary. The overwhelmingly Democrat county then gave Trump his biggest win in the state. Ben Bradlee Jr. went almost immediately to investigate why. He came back with the answer that Hillary Clinton made whites feel ashamed, while Donald Trump made them feel good about themselves. Bradlee lets them speak their minds in The Forgotten, a quick and easy read that makes it understandable.

The county used to be an incubator for the middle class. Coal was the first great booster, and when that faded, manufacturing sprung up to keep it all going. Wilkes-Barre, its largest city, topped out at a population of 90,000. Luzerne is mostly Catholic, with a strong and growing evangelical component. They get their news from Fox, Breitbart and Infowars.

The decline accelerated with company relocations to Mexico and China in the late 90s. With no jobs, property values plunged, to where good housing can be had for five figures - but no one wants any. The death rate from opioids is four times New York City’s, with an average age of death of 38. The crime rate is 50% higher than the Pennsylvania average. Guns are a non-controversial part of appearance.

Luzerne has been humiliated by scandals like Kids for Cash, in which judges sent juveniles to for-profit prisons for kickbacks. The population has also changed dramatically: it is now 52% Hispanic, mostly Dominican, the same as for Reading and Allentown nearby. Finally, Pennsylvania ranks fifth in the nation for the number of hate groups operating there, including the Ku Klux Klan in Wilkes-Barre, the county seat. Its population is now 40,000.

Bradlee spent several weeks roaming Luzerne, finding out who was who, and interviewing a dozen diverse white Trump voters in great depth. The chapters profile them, with a photo, the story of their thoughts leading up to the 2016 election and how they came be Trump voters, their family and career history, and how they see Trump now.

The common thread in Luzerne voters’ complaints is a lack of simplicity. They enjoy the simple, tweetable solutions, leveraged so well by Donald Trump (though several wish he wouldn’t tweet so much). They have no time for implications or unintended consequences. For example, Kim Woodrosky , a high school graduate, made herself into a successful landlord, tooling around her properties in her signature bright yellow Corvette. She has 65 apartments providing her a $90,000 annual income. She leases to the lowest end, Section 8 renters, people on welfare. But she complains bitterly about people getting something for nothing. “How is that fair?” she rails repeatedly. She pays taxes, and the money goes to welfare, she claims. Yet if Trump halts welfare, all her tenants will default. She will have to evict them, fall behind on her mortgage payments, and with no real estate market, be unable to sell them off. She will lose her buildings to foreclosure and file for bankruptcy herself. More than her tenants, Woodrosky lives nicely on welfare.

There is also a strong thread of rationalizing Trump. No one actually ignores all his lies (6.5 per day), his infidelities or his crassness. Instead, they have become apologists: “What he really meant was…” or “We’re all sinners” or “Do you know anybody who doesn’t curse?”, or “It’s refreshing.” So no matter what he says or does, he’s the best for them. And they can’t believe the whole country isn’t behind him as he remakes it in his own fantasy.

They absolve Trump of blame for not replacing Obamacare as promised numerous times. Even though he claimed to have his own plan that was far less expensive and offered far more benefits (“Believe me”), the Luzernians blame the Republican Party instead. They say it had seven years to come up with a better plan but didn’t. Even though the party was always against any health plan at all.

They all have unkind words for Hillary Clinton. She was either an unwanted extension of the vile Obama, a criminal in her own right, or an insult to the intelligence of women, who don’t want to be considered single-issue voters (a female president). So even if they couldn’t rationalize Trump, they would not even consider Clinton.

The Obama years weighed extra heavily as Luzerne deteriorated over the past decade. They say it was Obama who was “a degradation to the office”, not Trump. “He almost gave the impression he did not like America, apologizing for our exceptionalism, and I never understood why,” says Erik Olson, a war veteran. He likes Trump because he is not a politician, something strongly echoed throughout The Forgotten. They applaud his unorthodox approach to everything. That’s what they voted for, and they got it.

There is one rising star in Luzerne. Lou Barletta, the mayor of Hazleton until he landed a seat in Congress (on his third try), is now running against Bob Casey for the Senate. A seat of the pants successful entrepreneur and nice guy, he achieved fame in 2006 by trying to expel illegal immigrants from Hazleton, a decade before Trump came along. Barletta was key to Trump’s success in Pennsylvania, and Trump is the one who insisted he run for the Senate seat. He had offered Barletta Secretary of Housing, but Barletta preferred Transport, and so got left out of the cabinet. (Mitch McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, had dibs on Transport.)

Life has not changed in Luzerne, except that many people don’t talk to each other any more because of the Trump/Never Trump rift. They unfriend each other on facebook. Some warehouse businesses are starting up, thanks to Wilkes-Barre’s location at the intersection of Interstates 81 and 84, but the outlook is still grim, with blatant, overt crime at the top of everyone’s list. Followed close by immigrants/race, and gun rights.

Possibly the most important profile in the book is of Alia Habib – who left. She is not “white” according to whites, and she is not a Republican or a Trump supporter. Anyone with education and/or talent leaves, but Alia has analyzed it better than everyone else. Everything in Luzerne is measured through a race lens, she says. Growing up, she was classified “sand nigger” or “camel jockey” because of her name. When she moved to New York City, she was shocked that people thought her intelligent and attractive. She is now a literary agent, and pessimistic for the future of Luzerne, where negativity and support for Trump rule. “I don’t see the next four years will see the residents of Luzerne County better off, but I do think it will be even harder to live there – economically, socially, emotionally – if you number among one of the groups Trump scapegoated.”

Meanwhile, another woman profiled is thrilled that she wakes up “every morning and say to myself Donald Trump is our president so my day doesn’t get any better.”

David Wineberg ( )