Ellen Ferwerda, who owns an antique furniture store downtown just blocks from the worst of the destruction that is now closed, said that she was desperate for Mr. Trump to lose in November but that she had “huge concern” the unrest in her town could help him win. She added that local Democratic leaders seemed hesitant to condemn the mayhem.
“I think they just don’t know what to say,” she said. “People are afraid to take a stance either way, but I do think it’s strange they’re all being so quiet. Our mayor has disappeared. It’s like, ‘Where is he?’”
On Tuesday afternoon, Ms. Ferwerda was writing “Black Lives Matter” on her storefront in red paint. On Wednesday, after the fatal shooting the night before, she said she was most worried about the people from out of town who were driving around with powerful guns claiming to keep the peace.
She said she understood the looting and burning.
“I think the rage is justified,” she said. “Anyone who is paying attention should know it was going to explode at some point.”
***
John Geraghty, a 41-year-old worker in a tractor factory, a former Marine, said he was disturbed to see his town looking like “a war zone,” and he feared that the Democrats in charge were “letting people down big time.”
Politics for him had long been like a sport he did not follow. In his late 20s, he voted for Barack Obama, the first vote of his life. He did not vote in 2016, and he called the president’s handling of the coronavirus “laughable.”
Mr. Geraghty said he disliked how Mr. Trump talked but said the Democratic Party’s vision for governing seemed limited to attacking him and calling him a racist, a charge being leveled so constantly that it was having the effect of alienating, instead of persuading, people. And the idea that Democrats alone were morally pure on race annoyed him.
“The Democratic agenda to me right now is America is systematically racist and evil and the only people who can fix it are Democrats,” he said. “That’s the vibe I get.”
***
Mr. Biden on Wednesday denounced systemic racism and police brutality as he also sharply condemned the destruction and violence unfolding in Kenosha.
“As I said after George Floyd’s murder, protesting brutality is a right and absolutely necessary,” Mr. Biden said. “Burning down communities is not protest, it’s needless violence. Violence that endangers lives. Violence that guts businesses, and shutters businesses, that serve the community. That’s wrong.”
***
Meanwhile, President Trump promised on Twitter to restore “LAW AND ORDER” in Kenosha by sending in troops. “We will NOT stand for looting, arson, violence, and lawlessness on American streets,” Mr. Trump wrote....
Don Biehn, 62, owner of a flooring company, was standing in line at a gun store on Tuesday afternoon. He said that he had never bought a pistol before, but that he had a business to protect. “There’s people running all over with guns — it’s like some Wild West town,” Mr. Biehn said. “We are just waiting here like sitting ducks waiting to get picked off.”
He added: “It’s chaos — everybody is afraid.” Mr. Trump, he said, “was not my man,” but now he is grateful he is president. He said [Trump] seemed to understand in a way that other politicians did not. “There’s nobody fighting back,” he said. “Nobody is paying attention to what’s going on.”
Scott Haight, who was boarding up a line of businesses in a Kenosha strip mall on Tuesday, said he blamed Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, a Democrat, for what he said was irresponsibly stirring up emotion. (On Monday, Mr. Barnes said the shooting “wasn’t an accident.”) “It’s like ‘What, are you trying to burn our city down?’” Mr. Haight said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/26/us/kenosha-wisconsin-trump.html
