Trump’s talking points dominate ‘roundtable’ discussion in Delaware County

Kicking off the final seven days of the 2024 presidential campaign, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made two stops in the commonwealth as part of last-ditch efforts to drum up support in this key battleground state. 

The first stop Tuesday afternoon – which was supposed to be a roundtable discussion regarding issues facing senior citizens – quickly turned into a typical Trump stump speech that meandered around topics, with the candidate espousing previously debunked lies about voter fraud, the Southern border and transgender people in sports. 

The crowd, which began gathering outside the Drexelbrook Event Center in Upper Darby Township, eight miles west of Philadelphia, hours before Trump was set to speak, featured a sea of red “Make America Great Again” hats and Trump apparel. 

Trump took the stage alongside former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and former U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin (NY) more than an hour after the event was supposed to begin, riffing on his usual campaign talking points for nearly half an hour as roundtable participants sat quietly. Within the first few minutes of the event, Trump went from talking about the Southern border – falsely claiming half of Venezuela’s prison population has been brought to the U.S. – to transgender people in sports and the “woke military.”

Prior to his appearances in the commonwealth Tuesday, Trump spoke in front of supporters at his Mar-A-Lago estate in Florida, where he once again lied about voter fraud taking place in Pennsylvania. “There are some bad spots in Pennsylvania, where some serious things have been caught or are in the process of being caught,” he said.

Trump also falsely claimed to the Drexel Hill crowd that voting applications and ballot issues were taking place in Lancaster and York counties – including lying about 2,600 fake voter registrations in Lancaster County – despite county officials explaining that the claims had been investigated and that there was no evidence of fraud in either county’s election system. 

The roundtable took place a few hours before Trump held a rally in Allentown and two days after his rally at Madison Square Garden in New York caused an uproar for speakers’ racist remarks targeting Puerto Ricans, Jews and people of color. Trump’s campaign has tried to distance itself from comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s comments, saying they don’t reflect the candidate’s views. 

Pennsylvania, with more than 450,000 Puerto Rican residents, has a substantial number of voters in the sought-after Latino bloc. Philadelphia has the second-largest Puerto Rican population in the country, and Allentown is a majority-Latino city that is home to 34,000 Puerto Ricans – the eighth-largest Puerto Rican community in the country. 

A Puerto Rico-born roundtable participant, Maribel Valdez, expressed her support for the former president despite the recent news. “I want you to know that Puerto Rico stands behind you,” Valdez said to a round of applause. 

Trump thanked Valdez and said his administration “helped you through a lot of bad storms…and took care of a lot of people” – a comment that has repeatedly been proven false via reporting that Trump resisted sending billions of dollars in aid after the territory was ravaged by back-to-back hurricanes in 2017. 

Once roundtable participants began weighing in, the discussion ranged from the cost of living and Medicare to energy production and veteran support. 

One participant, Kathleen McGuire, shared her caregiving experience and the issues her mother has faced as she sought to age in place in her home in the Poconos region. McGuire said her mom, on a fixed income, was “asset-rich and cash-poor.”

Trump responded by stating that he’d push for a tax credit for family caregivers, also adding that he would like to financially help McGuire in her time of need. “I’m not in office, so I can do it,” Trump said. 

Alan Brink, a Radnor resident in attendance, said that despite part of the discussion’s focus on senior citizens, his top concern in this election is “the future we are leaving for our grandchildren.”

Brink argued Trump’s proposed tariffs, which would include a 60% tariff on goods from China and a 20% tariff on everything else the United States imports, would help the federal government reduce its deficit while raising prices for consumers “to some extent.” The owner of a manufacturing plant in Spring City, Brink said manufacturers stand to benefit from tariffs on imports and that employees like his wouldn’t be the ones facing the brunt of additional costs from tariffs; however, economists from across the spectrum, including the Wall Street Journal, have gone on record to state how disastrous Trump’s tariff ideas would be for the nation’s economy and workers like the ones Brink employs. 

“It would be the people buying Birkin bags” who would take on additional costs from the tariffs, Brink told City & State. “I would raise taxes on (people like) Taylor Swift.” 

The host organization of Tuesday’s roundtable, Building America’s Future, describes itself as a coalition seeking to ensure continued prosperity, security and strength in the United States. The nonprofit organization was recently revealed to be a Republican-led effort backing pro-Trump organizations. The group has also held similar roundtables with Trump in other battleground states, including Michigan and Nevada. 

The New York Times reported that Building America’s Future has raised and spent more than $100 million over the past four years and is the sole funder of two super PACs that have disclosed little about their backers. The first, Duty to America PAC, has targeted young male and Black voters they hope to persuade to vote for Trump.

The second, Future Coalition PAC, has gone after Vice President Kamala Harris in Michigan by highlighting her positions that are pro-Israel, along with the Jewish faith of her husband, Doug Emhoff, the Times reported; Michigan has a large number of Muslim voters, and several Trump-affiliated PACs have been highlighting the pro-Israel positions of the Harris campaign as a way to drive Muslims from voting for Harris. A focus of Building America’s Future this campaign cycle has been digital ads, one of the areas where the Trump team has lagged behind Democrats across the seven battleground states.

Trump closed out the event attacking his opponents, calling them “absolutely horrible people,” adding that he had no choice but to run for office again. 

“Would I rather be on the beach with the water hitting me in the face, my white skin getting all nice and tan? Or would I rather be here with you in Pennsylvania making sure that people aren’t going to cheat?” Trump said. “I will (choose) you and Pennsylvania every single day.”