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Fort Wayne Mayor Tom Henry has passed away after a brief battle with cancer.

President Trump Plays His Hits In Fort Wayne Rally

Rebecca Green/WBOI News

President Donald Trump was the first sitting President to visit Fort Wayne since Ronald Reagan came in 1982. He spent more than an hour in front of supporters at the Allen County Memorial Coliseum Monday evening stumping for Northern Indiana Republican candidates.

The Coliseum was packed with Trump supporters hoisting signs reading “Jobs Not Mobs,” “Get Out and Vote,” and other slogans. Representative Jim Banks, Senator Todd Young and Senate candidate Mike Braun all took the stage to rally supporters ahead of Tuesday’s midterm elections.

Before Trump spoke, former Notre Dame head coach Lou Holtz offered his support for Trump, saying he likes people who “get things done.”

When Trump took the stage, he began by touting his economic agenda and the jobs market, noting consistency despite this year’s hurricanes which, traditionally, slow the market down. He warned his supporters of “radical Democrats” wanting to “take a wrecking ball” to that agenda.

“They can take it apart just as fast as we built it, but I don’t think that’s going to happen based on what I’m seeing all over the place,” Trump said, commenting on the size of his recent rallies.

Trump brought the “greatest hits” show for his Fort Wayne supporters Monday night. Seven minutes into the rally, he brought up the nomination and hearings of Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh.

He referred to a letter Senator Chuck Grassley sent to the FBI and Justice Department, asking them to prosecute Kavanaugh accuser Judy Munro-Leighton for saying her claim of a vicious assault “was a tactic.”

“She never met him, it didn’t happen! She was lying! She was lying! It was a false accusation, a false accusation. A disgrace,” he said.

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Supporters followed by chanting, “lock her up.”

Trump also mocked Senator Dianne Fienstein for her demeanor during the hearings and suggested they “take a look at the other ones,” referring to Kavanaugh’s accusers. This was followed by the first of three protests that interrupted the occasion, which he used as a bridge to take hits at the press.

“They never want to show the crowds," he lamented. "You have to see, I just left Ohio. You want to see, it’s incredible. This is incredible. Outside is even more incredible because there’s even more people. But they never show it; they keep it right trained on my face.”

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His continued criticisms of the Democratic Party were fast, loose and consistent, saying they want to “put illegal aliens before American citizens.”

“Democrats are inviting caravan after caravan of illegal aliens to pour into our country, overwhelming your schools, your hospitals and your communities,” he said.

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The number of migrants in the caravan from southern Mexico has been estimated somewhere between 3,000 and 8,000 individuals. For perspective, the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum can hold 13,000 people at capacity.

The caravan, which is moving on foot, was also projected to be 830 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border on Friday, November 2. The second protest of the evening followed this tangent, and put a brief halt to the proceedings.

For the next ten minutes, the rally would morph into the Trump Administration Variety Show, as Trump invited his daughter Ivanka, along with communications officials Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Kellyanne Conway, to speak for a few moments. Conway used the moment to remind supporters about the importance of voting.

“If you think that it doesn’t matter to have a small majority in the United States Senate, you did not live through the Brett Kavanaugh hearings. It matters. Elections have consequences, and your vote is so incredibly important.”

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Trump shifted attention to Mike Braun’s opponent: incumbent Democrat Joe Donnelly, who recently issued campaign ads supporting the funding for a border wall, praising the work of Immigration Customs Enforcement and critical of far-left Democrats.

The President’s not buying it.

“On Wednesday, they’ll go back to who they are," Trump said. "And we’ll never get a vote from Joe Donnelly, when we come in with the health care, when we come in with whatever we want, we will never. Because it’s obstruction.”

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Braun was then given several minutes to speak on his platform, and was greeted by “drain the swamp” chants from Trump supporters. A brief mention of healthcare led to the third and final protest of the evening inside the venue.

“I don’t know what it is about Indiana but I’m not surprised, I haven’t had one of these things happen in a long time and I have three tonight," he said, adding, "That’s Indiana for you.”

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Trump continued his healthcare platform, highlighting his measure to decrease the cost of prescription drugs. He also reaffirmed his support for Medicare and the protections of pre-existing conditions, a recent break among Republicans from years of counter-rhetoric threatening those very programs.

He moved on to the latest influx of drugs like meth, cocaine and fentanyl, and turned to blame weak border security for the problem. Trump then went on to praise the work that ICE has done, highlighting 127,000 arrests in 2017, which led to referencing a video Trump promoted in an anti-immigration ad that drew controversy over the weekend.

“He wanted to come into our country and he asked for a pardon," he started. "And the announcer said, ‘Oh you want a pardon, what is it for?’ ‘Murder.’ ‘What, murder, you want a pardon for murder?’ This was one of the people in the caravan.”

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The long version of the ad aired during NBC’s "Sunday Night Football" game between the Green Bay Packers and New England Patriots. After backlash, NBC pulled the ad, apologized and followed the decisions of Facebook, FOX and CNN to not air it; CNN openly deemed the ad as “racist."

For the final stretch, Trump came full circle on an optimistic note for his supporters. He flaunted his economic agenda and the current jobs market, while calling his Presidency the “greatest political movement in the history of our country.”

His final call for supporters to vote on Tuesday was met with widespread approval.

“From the farm fields of Indiana, to the big sky of Montana. From the deserts of Nevada, to the red rocks of Arizona. From the coal mines of West Virginia, to the steel mills of Ohio, and to every city and town across the land: we are going to work, we are going to fight, and we are going to win, win, win.”

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The outcome of Tuesday’s midterm election wouldn’t be known for another 24 hours, but Republican voters largely left the Coliseum Monday energized and enthusiastic with their President, their candidates, and the direction of the country.

Trump left the stage to the Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” a common outro for the President since 2016 to the chagrin of the band’s members. He held one more rally Monday night, in Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

If you want to hear the President’s full speech, you can listen to it here.

Zach joined 89.1 WBOI as a reporter and local host for All Things Considered, and hosted Morning Edition for the past few years. In 2022, he was promoted to Content Director.
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