I’ve seen some amazing crowds in my life. In 1985, my mom scored me and a couple of friends tickets (and backstage passes) to see Prince in Worcester, Massachusetts, on the Purple Rain tour. I still remember standing in the crowd with my lace fingerless gloves on, thinking my mom was the absolute coolest for getting us into the arena. As Prince took the stage and spoke the intro to “Let’s Go Crazy” (“Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to get through this thing called life …”), thousands of people just like me went nuts. The rafters shook from the weight of all the jumping and shuffling feet.
Almost 40 years later, I stood in the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, waiting for President Trump to take the stage. Less than 48 hours earlier, he’d been shot in the ear by a crazed would-be assassin in Butler, Pennsylvania, the sad result of many months of dangerous rhetoric by Democrats and their allies in the corporate media. But he’d survived, pumping his fist to the crowd at the Secret Service dragged him offstage, yelling “Fight! Fight! Fight!” to his supporters. Finally, he took the stage. Compared to the sound I heard that evening, the roar of all those teenage Prince fans was nothing.
As we head into the final weeks of the presidential campaign, the corporate press continues to tell us that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are running a campaign of “joy.” They tell us that the Democrats are the ones painting a positive vision for our future while Donald Trump and J.D. Vance do nothing but sow division and push hate. In August, a headline in the Associated Press read, “Harris is pushing joy. Trump paints a darker picture. Will mismatched moods matter?” In September, TIME Magazine said, “Don’t Underestimate Kamala Harris’ Good Vibes Only Campaign.” The same article suggests that all Donald Trump had to offer was “continuous warfare.”
Well, I don’t know which Donald Trump those people have been watching, because I’ve covered dozens of Trump campaign rallies, and I’ve seen more joy than you could believe. I saw it in Milwaukee at the Republican National Convention, where the crowd screamed and laughed as they watched Kid Rock perform his hits and Hulk Hogan rip off his T-shirt to reveal Trump merch underneath. Since then, I’ve seen it at countless Trump rallies, which (despite what the corporate press will tell you) are filled with kind, fun-loving people who just so happen to be fed up with the Biden-Harris administration.
In recent weeks, President Trump has cracked up crowds with off-the-cuff quips about his attempted assassination. He’s been on the top comedy podcasts in the country, where he’s gotten belly laughs out of professional comedians. Every time he gets onstage, he cracks at least ten jokes that make his crowds roar with laughter. Just because the corporate press only airs the footage in which he points out the serious problems we’re dealing with in this country — an unending stream of criminal migrants at the southern border, for instance, or the increasing possibility that we’re headed for World War III — doesn’t mean Donald Trump can’t do joy.
In fact, he does joy better than any politician I’ve ever covered.
I’d like to see Kamala Harris do five minutes on how toilets don’t flush as well as they used to and make people laugh while doing it. If Tim Walz signs one of those stupid camo hats he’s always wearing and tosses them into the crowd, would anyone even bother to catch them?
Meanwhile, Donald Trump is throwing hats and cracking jokes, all while the media tries to portray him as some doom-and-gloom would-be dictator who wants to throw all his enemies in prison. So far, there are only two presidents I can think of who’ve tried to throw their enemies in prison, and those presidents are Barack Obama (who spied on journalists for reporting on his administration) and Joe Biden (who, as we know, has tried to throw President Trump in jail in two separate federal cases, failing miserably both times).
We are at a pivotal moment in this country. This election is the most important I’ve ever covered as a journalist. In fact, it’s the most important one I’ve ever lived through. On one side, we have an administration that wants to poison the minds of our children with ideas about self-mutilation and socialism and the entirely fictional scourge of “systemic white supremacy” that supposedly plagues our institutions. These people want to throw their political enemies in prison, and they expect us to believe the media’s lies that all they care about are fun memes and “joy.”
On the other side, we have people who want to teach our children that this country is the greatest that has ever existed on planet Earth. We have people who will strive to build amazing things and end all the seemingly endless conflicts that have upended the globe over the past four years. These people, led by Donald Trump, don’t want more foreign wars. They don’t want the government or corporations shoving a woke agenda down our throats and making all dissent illegal. They want freedom, prosperity, and equality of opportunity for all. And, at least with Donald Trump in charge, they want to have some fun while doing it.
How’s that for joy?
This article is adapted from Bianca de la Garza’s forthcoming book Incoming: On the Front Lines of the Left’s War on Truth, to be published on Oct. 22, 2024 by Post Hill Press.
