There really is a blue wave coming. I don’t know based on polls or pundits. I know because I’ve been traveling in traditional ancestral Dem country that moved red in recent years and strongly moved toward Trump in 2016. I left Portland, Oregon with my family on a year sabbatical in mid-August and have been camping, and hiking, and visiting historic sites and national parks for the past 5 weeks. I’ve traveled through northern Montana, North Dakota, northern Minnesota, northern Wisconsin, and am now in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
I’ve been to places like International Falls and Virginia in Minnesota, in territory dominated by iron mines and logging camps. I’ve been in places like Culbertson, MT dominated by cattle ranches or Dickinson, ND dominated by oil rigs. I’ve been in Calumet, MI with copper mines and collapsing buildings. This is country that was union strong, even if culturally conservative. This is territory that elected Democrats for decades, but has been slowly shifting red.
And, this is how I know a blue wave is coming. There are NO republican candidate signs in the yards and roadsides. Every single sign, mile after mile, is for Democrats. Whether its Tester in Montana, “Heidi for North Dakota” (Heitkamp), Walz and Radinovich in Minnesota, Baldwin and Evers in Wisconsin, or Stabenow and Whittmer in Michigan. Even the local races, state house races or county clerk, the Democratic logo is evident. And yet, I don’t even know who the Republicans are who are running because I see no signs.
I’ve spoken to shop keepers and campground hosts and I see enthusiasm for the Democrats or silence for the republicans. No one wants to say anything about Trump. They quickly change the subject. Now, maybe the Republican voters are just in hiding. Maybe they are not enthusiastic, not investing in signs, but will definitely vote in November and I will be dead wrong about this region. But, maybe they just won’t vote at all…