As the 2024 presidential election enters its final month, a clear result has yet to materialize. Both parties are campaigning for undecided votes, and making some possibly unconventional choices along the way. Taya Graham reports from Baltimore and the suburbs of Lancaster, PA for The Real News, where conservatives and progressives alike are making a play for key swing voters.
Videography / Post-Production: Stephen Janis
Transcript
Taya Graham: This is Taya Graham for The Real News Network in Baltimore City, Maryland. I’m standing in a parking lot in Baltimore where just last week the so-called Blacks for Trump bus appeared, hoping to change hearts and minds in a very blue state. It’s one of many efforts to sway the precious handful of undecided voters in an election that many say is too close to call.
So we went on the ground from Baltimore to Pennsylvania to document two radically different approaches to picking up votes in otherwise hostile territory.
As the election looms over a bitterly divided partisan landscape, parties on both sides are pushing to make gains in otherwise unfriendly territory. Last week, Black Republicans visited deep blue Baltimore city on a so-called More Money with Trump bus tour. While attendance was low, confidence was not.
Diante Johnson: Baltimore is not an area that’s going conservative. The media has asked, why are we here? We can take Baltimore and with people like Kim Klacik, we will take Baltimore [crowd cheers].
Taya Graham: Kimberly Klacik, candidate for the state’s second congressional district in Maryland, said her party was reaching out to Black voters. Her argument? Democrats take them for granted.
What exactly are we seeing here? I’m not with her, the Black voters for Trump. What is this bus?
Kim Klacik: Yeah, so President Trump and of course VCF, they’re all in town today, just visiting areas like here, Morgan State University, just letting these students know that there is an option. You don’t have to vote for the leaning left Kamala, you don’t have to vote for this administration again. You can vote for change, which would be President Trump in this situation.
Speaker 1: Challenge them on the, he’s a racist. What does that mean? Tell me, what do you mean? He’s a misogynist. What does that have to do about good policies, effective policies that work for our country?
Taya Graham: Others said conservative ideas appeal to Black voters, even though they vote disproportionately Democrat.
Speaker 2: We stopped here in front of a grocery store in a targeted community because we know that inflation is high. We know that people are struggling to put food on the table for their families.
Taya Graham: The stakes are unusually high in Maryland. There, a former popular Republican governor, Larry Hogan, is running for a Senate seat that has been in Democratic hands for decades. His opponent, former Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, has been touting Hogan’s ties to Trump, but polls show the race is tight.
Meanwhile, in Pennsylvania, a different approach. At a community center, Lancaster Stands Up is organizing in the critical swing state that most agree could decide the presidential election. The nonpartisan group focuses on issues supporting candidates that back their policies. That means affordable housing, a living wage, and reproductive freedom.
Lindsay: So we’re a nonpartisan organization. So our goal is really to just support candidates both locally and on the national level that represent our values. So our members vote on local candidates, and then once we endorse them, we like to offer support through things like canvassing, phone banking, hosting meet and greets, things like that.
David Miller-Glick: We definitely do skew more towards Democrat than Republican. We tend to have a lot of problems with Republicans on labor rights and how they don’t really support workers.
Speaker 3: So we are running IE phones for Harris and Wallace because originally, we weren’t going to do anything when Biden was going to be this presidential candidate. But now that it’s Harris, we feel like she’s someone that we’ll be able to organize with and potentially work with in DC.
Taya Graham: Today, they were preparing people for door knocking, hoping that one-on-one encounters can change minds.
But just down the road in Lititz, a divided town shows changing minds won’t be easy.
Speaker 4: It’s a very polarizing time right now.
Taya Graham: Passions were so high that one resident we spoke to says he avoids talking about politics altogether.
Speaker 4: If you want to stay friendly with people, you don’t talk about politics. That’s the bottom line. Nobody’s getting convinced, and that includes my family. I don’t agree with my kids.
Taya Graham: Nevertheless, the people who did want to talk on the record about their choices were adamant.
May I ask who you’re voting for?
Speaker 5: Kamala Harris, and I just don’t like his politics and do not like what he would like to see, which is the United States to become a dictatorship.
Taya Graham: Phyllis, can you tell me if you’ve decided that you’re going to vote?
Phyllis: Yes, I have decided. Trump.
Taya Graham: Can you share with me what policies have inspired you to, if there’s anything in particular that really stands out to you as why you’re voting for him, I assume for the second time?
Phyllis: Just overall, because I don’t like who’s running against him.
Taya Graham: Is it the policies or the person you don’t like?
Phyllis: Policies and the person.
Taya Graham: This is Taya Graham and Stephen Janis for The Real News Network, election coverage 2024.
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