This article was written by Michelle Cirino Yarris, a friend of West Boca News who volunteered to go the rally for us since we could not attend. This was at the Sunset Cove Amphitheater in South County Regional Park.
I went to a Donald Trump Rally. This shocked a lot of people. I have been pretty vocal about the fact I am not a Trump supporter. However, the event was a 15-minute bike ride from our house at the local county park. I probably would have gone to see most any candidate at that point.
The real reason I went is due to all comments I have seen on social media on the Trump supporters. The racist, hateful, uneducated Trump supporter. What I found was a very diverse crowd of people. First time 18-year-old voters to 80-year-old people with walkers and everything in between. I saw people I knew who were businessmen, a doctor, a teacher. Educated people. I saw people of every color. Not just a handful either. There were many legal immigrants. One young man had a sign that he made that said “Immigrants for Trump”, another had one that said “Hispanics love Trump.”
Talking to a group of young men (barely at 18), I asked why they supported Trump. Their responses were two fold. First, one told me that they are tired of all the handouts to every group. Nothing is free. Someone has to pay for it. I kid you not – an 18-year-old boy said this to me. His friends all agreed. The second most concerning issue to this group was ISIS. They are concerned for the future of our country, our world. They don’t understand why we have such an open border policy in a time when we know people are streaming in with the intent to harm our country.
The conversation that shocked me and surprised me the most was from a young man from Virginia, who knew all about the voting patterns in his state. He was 18. I would guess most adults have no idea about voting patterns and counties.
All in all, I was very surprised at the crowd. Maybe it is Boca, or maybe we are only seeing a small piece of what really is going on.
This isn’t an endorsement of Trump in any way, but a closer look at his supporters. There is a very large silent group who is afraid to come out and vocally support their candidate for fear of repercussions. Which is not the American way. Those we do hear from, who are very loud, are not representative of what I saw at the Trump rally.
Whatever your view, whoever your candidate, let your voice be heard and vote!
Voting in Palm Beach County is on Tuesday March 15, 2016 in Florida from 7am to 7pm.
Local photographer Johnnie Butters also volunteered to take photos for us. He had a media pass which may have helped him get in early but severely constrained his movement and ability to get photos. Here are some of our favorite photos from his collection.
You can see all of the photos he shared with us on his Facebook post to our page or on his website.
Also we saw this photo from a regular reader known as “Boca Rat” in our comments and he said we could use it in this article. We love both how it captures the size of the crowd and also that view to the west.
