Donald Trump and his people have concluded that he has to win the labor vote in 2020, despite the fact that his trade war is destroying manufacturing and many associated jobs. That's pretty much the Trump campaign’s only hope.
"If we don’t win Florida, the race is over," an official with America First, Trump's main outside group, told Politico. "And if we win Pennsylvania, the race is over because the reality is if Pennsylvania goes for Trump, you're going to see others break his way." Sure. How are they going to do that? They are creating a "workers coalition" by the end of the year to "feature rank-and-file workers and labor leaders who are sympathetic to the president's trade policies and deregulatory agenda." This coalition will also join three other "grassroots" groups the campaign is creating focused on women, Latinos, and African Americans. It will send these recruits "'back into their communities and their neighborhoods to spread the word' about the president's positive accomplishments, according to a senior Trump campaign official."
And how will they get these workers (and women, and Latinos, and African Americans, presumably) to join in the first place and then go out and evangelize for Trump, against their own interests? "They just will," says the same official. "I don't know how they will convince people to do it, but I know that there are people who are willing to do it just because they believe in the president so much."
"They just will." Oh, okay. "This doesn't mean every single union member that agrees to support the president has to have his or her name on a list, or be publicly identified," the official added. This sounds like a winning strategy!