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A few minutes later, another driver waves an obscene gesture out of his window.
The Rawleses wave or hold up peace signs with their fingers, unmoved by the negative feedback.
Politically, the Rawleses describe themselves as independents but remain lifelong Republicans. Both have worked in Arizona’s Republican Party and have run for Congress as Republicans. In 2016, they voted for Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson.
“I think the last three to six weeks have been a turning point,” says Tom Rawles, 70. “We can always fight over the issues. But we need to cut out the cancer that is infecting the body politic of America.”
That cancer to their party, the couple says, is Trump.
“We’ll support Biden not because we agree with him on issues,” Linda Rawles says, “but he’s a decent, kind, sane man. I’ve considered myself a Republican since I was 13. We’re not at home in our party. We’re not Democrats. We don’t have anywhere to go.”
Former Republican operative Tim Miller sees this group of political homeless voters as ripe for shifting in 2020, because now “their personal lives are being directly impacted by Trump,” he says.
But ads are not what’s driving the group’s 2020 effort — it’s elevating the voices of disappointed moderates and Republicans. On its website, Republican Voters Against Trump has posted hundreds of personal stories from people across the country. Spokeswoman Priya Gada tells CNN the site has received tens of millions of organic views.
“In 2016, people disapproved of Trump personally but still voted for him,” Miller says. “Concerns about him have come home to roost with the virus, the economy and the instability in their communities with the protests. Those reservations about Trump? Well, it’s getting real now.”
There also remain the Republican voters who aren’t sure what they’ll do on Election Day. Cheryl Coons, 56, a cardiac nurse on the front line of the Covid-19 crisis, would agree the issues in 2020 are real for her, professionally and personally, but she remains uncertain how she’ll vote in November. The self-described moderate is also a “registered, card-carrying Republican,” she says. “I have always identified with issues on both sides of the political spectrum and struggled with both parties.”
Coons, who is recovering from pneumonia suspected of being caused by Covid, doesn’t blame the President for her illness or the pandemic, saying the administration did what it could given the enormity of the outbreak. Coons also remains confident that Trump would lead the country best in an economic recovery. But what is making her consider voting for a Democrat for the first time in her life, she says, are the sustained protests and pain she’s seeing on America’s streets.
“I feel like we need more of a sense of unity and, and no antagonism on this issue at all,” says Coons, who voted for Trump in 2016. “And I don’t feel I see that being fostered. We have to come together as a people and we need a leader that’s going to help us do that, not poke the bear.”
Coons says she tries not to discuss politics with her friends, because nearly all of them are unmovable politically. In a time of such polarization, she says, it’s a little nerve-wracking talking about being a moderate.
Coons says it’s not too late for Trump to change her mind, though. Because when it comes to her vote, “I honestly don’t know yet.”
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