Steven B Rutledge

Every GOP strategist, consultant, and candidate should be forced to participate in a role-playing exercise this morning. Your name is Bob. You’re a 49-year-old blue-collar worker in Ohio. You’ve always struggled to make ends meet. The good jobs were all shipped to China and the few remaining pay a pittance wage, undercut by endless illegal labor. You’re a 3x Trump voter because you believed he would finally make America great again. You put your son through Ohio State. He graduated cum laude in computer science. You couldn’t have been prouder. After months searching, he landed an entry-level job at Microsoft. Beneath his qualifications, but a good start for a smart kid. Then he got laid off. That same month, Microsoft applied for 150,000 more H-1B visas because it can’t find qualified Americans. Your son has spent six months back in his childhood bedroom, sending hundreds of applications without landing an interview. On TV, Trump boasts about the greatest economy in history and how many women and minorities are finding jobs. You decide a father-son steak night might cheer him up. Gas is $4.50 a gallon. Filling your truck costs over $100. At Kroger, ribeyes are $30/lb. You settle for hamburger, even though 70/30 ground beef still costs $10+. At checkout, a fat black woman is screaming at the cashier because her EBT will only cover most of the filet mignon and lobster in her cart. You think to yourself how the Iran war has made everything expensive, but at least we’re stopping their nuclear bomb. You weren’t even sure where Iran was before you googled it after we first bombed them in March. After dinner, you take your son to the county fair. Half the people aren’t speaking English. Virtually none of the crowd looks like you. You’re forced to leave early after a “teen takeover” turns violent. A foreign born judge pledges none of them will go to jail. Back home, you turn on the TV. Vivek Ramaswamy is lecturing the crowd about American mediocrity and why Ohio needs more foreign talent. Your son grows upset. You change the channel. Now a Republican surrogate, the daughter of a governor or wife of an elderly billionaire, explains that young White men are the REAL welfare queens. They’d rather play videogames in their parents’ basements than work. Your son says nothing. He just goes back to his childhood bedroom. You turn off the TV. Then your neighbor starts blasting reggaeton and cracking open Modelos. He brought his cousin’s family from Mexico to help with all the minority-business contracts his construction firm keeps winning. Tonight they’re celebrating his nephew’s birth, the family’s first birthright American citizen. You sit alone in your living room. You worked hard, paid taxes, obeyed the law, and raised your son to do everything right. You voted Republican again and again because you believed somebody in Washington would finally fight for you. Instead, your wages are stagnant. Groceries are unaffordable. Your community is unrecognizable. Your country is fighting another foreign war. And upstairs, the son you sacrificed everything for is lying awake in the bedroom he slept in at twelve, wondering what the heck he’s even supposed to do with his life now. Every time you turn on the TV, the Republicans you elected are either congratulating themselves or explaining why you and your son are the problem. For ten years, they told you America’s future depended on your vote. Now you aren’t even sure America has a future worth defending. The Republican Party needs to answer one simple question this morning: You’ve spent a decade demanding Bob’s loyalty. You’ve given him stagnant wages, unaffordable groceries, another foreign war, and a son who did everything right but can’t find work. And when they complain, you call them lazy, entitled, and racist. What possible reason have you given Bob and his son to vote Republican? Do you honestly think you deserve their vote?