At a town hall event in La Crosse, Wisconsin, on Thursday night, Donald Trump and former Democratic congressperson Tulsi Gabbard, now a Trump campaign surrogate, attempted to pitch themselves to the crowd as supporters of reproductive rights.
Gabbard, who moderated the event after endorsing the former president earlier this week, opened the town hall with emotional remarks about her experience with in vitro fertilization. The comments came shortly after Trump said in an NBC interview that he would make the government or insurance companies pay for IVF if he’s elected, although it’s unclear how he would accomplish that or if he’s serious about the proposal given the pivotal role he played in overturning Roe v Wade.
“We were not successful in trying to get pregnant. For us, IVF seemed to be the only option and the last resort,” said Gabbard, who described to a quiet audience the costly and at times painful fertility treatment process she said she underwent 10 years ago.
Following Gabbard’s comments on IVF, Trump reiterated his promise from earlier in the day.
“We wanna produce babies in this country, right?” he said.
By stating his support for IVF and claiming that he would leave abortion laws to the states if elected, Trump is hoping to retain the support of women who count reproductive rights as a top issue – but risks alienating his supporters on the religious right.
Trump also repeated his usual talking points on immigration and the economy. In response to a question about job opportunities for young people, Trump blamed immigrants, saying there had been “no job creation” from Joe Biden and falsely claiming that all new jobs “were filled by illegal immigrants”.
During the event, Gabbard denounced “warmongers” and set up Trump to riff on the topic of foreign policy. As he frequently does, Trump praised Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s authoritarian prime minister, and told the audience that Orbán “said you have to bring Trump back as president of the United States”. Trump promised later in the evening to “bring back that level of respect” from foreign adversaries, which he claimed he enjoyed during his first term.
La Crosse, a city in western Wisconsin, leans blue. In 2020, about 55% of voters in La Crosse county voted for Biden, to Trump’s 42%. If Trump’s campaign is able to narrow Harris’s margins here, it could improve his chances at taking the critical swing state.
The campaign likely hopes that Gabbard, who ran for president in 2020 before leaving the Democratic party and eventually embracing Trump, will serve as a bridge to independent voters. Gabbard also appeared with Trump on Tuesday at the National Guard Association of the United States’s 146th general conference on the third anniversary of the US’s chaotic withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan.
She is the second ex-Democrat to endorse Trump in the past week. Robert F Kennedy Jr, who suspended his third party presidential campaign on Friday, has also endorsed Trump. Kennedy, whose candidacy likely drew a small share of votes from both Trump and Kamala Harris, remains on the ballot in key states including Wisconsin, Michigan and North Carolina.
Trump reportedly plans to bring Gabbard and Kennedy onto his transition team if he wins the general election in November.
Melissa Nelson, a voter who attended the Thursday town hall, said if it weren’t for Gabbard’s endorsement, she likely would not have supported Trump this year. In 2016, Nelson, who describes herself as disabled, supported Bernie Sanders, citing healthcare and supplemental security income important issues for her.
“The Democratic party is going downhill,” said Nelson. “They didn’t give anybody a chance to vote in a primary for Kamala.” Now, for the first time in her life, Nelson is throwing her support behind a Republican.
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Michelle Thiessen, a 57-year-old nurse from the La Crosse area, said she worried that the fall of Roe v Wade could draw support from Trump. While Thiessen said she supports abortion rights, it isn’t her top issue. She doesn’t want the United States to get involved in another war, and likes that Trump – who has claimed he would broker an end to Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine and has suggested the US let Israel “finish the job” in Gaza – supports isolationist policies.
“I’m with Trump, let’s just try and get along with them – let’s just try and get along with them,” said Thiessen. “And if not, you’ve got a strong hand and he’ll put down the gauntlet.”
For some attendees, Trump’s appeal has less to do with policy and more to do with how he speaks to a changing culture.
“He knows how to appeal to our demographic,” said Trevor Lahey, who is 21 years old and attended the event with his brother and a friend from the University of Wisconsin campus in La Crosse. “People kind of laugh at it, but [men] have been kind of discriminated against, with the idea of toxic masculinity. It’s hard to talk about that.”
As audience members filed out after the event, Village People’s “macho man” blasted over the speakers.
