Politico reports:

Early GOP concerns that depressed turnout in the red-leaning region could cost Trump in the southern battleground have largely been replaced by resolve to mobilize his supporters to the polls, according to interviews with more than a dozen Republican campaign officials, operatives and county party chairs working in the state. Trump and Republicans have seized on anger from residents on the ground that meaningful federal aid has not come as quickly as they would like, despite a number of GOP officials from the area praising the government’s early response.

“Arguably, they’re more eager. I mean, the good thing for us is that President Trump has the single most committed and intense voters of probably any American politician in history,” said James Blair, Trump’s political director. “That is definitely what we get on the ground, with people saying things like they will crawl through the mud and walk down the mountain barefoot, whatever it takes to cast their vote — because it is their protest to being screwed in the response, on top of the fact that they wanted to vote for the president, anyway.”

Sarah Sanford, walking out of the Yancey County Board of Elections Thursday with her sister and brother-in-law, said her trailer was spared, despite having no water or electricity for 20 days. She spent hours trying to get from work back home to her ill and disabled husband the day of the flood, trudging through mud and relying on neighbors to help to get past inaccessible roads and a washed out bridge leading to her mobile home park. The 46-year-old found her husband safe, but he passed away a week ago, Sanford said, the grief still fresh.

Her sister Helen and brother-in-law Joseph Marotta, who is fighting cancer and uses an oxygen tank, stayed for days at a shelter. All of their eyes were misty as they spoke about the harrowing three weeks they had endured.

And they all wanted to come cast their ballots for Trump at the first opportunity.

“If it wasn’t for Samaritan’s Purse and some of these other church foundations, we wouldn’t be getting the help,” Sanford said. “Our current political party that’s currently running this country, one was on vacation, the other one was wherever she was, campaigning. And the one person that came down, stuck his feet in the river, helped pull somebody out, was giving donations out, was Trump.”

Despite disinformation and online memes generated by artificial intelligence that depicted Trump knee-deep in water, wearing a life vest and rescuing puppies and children, the former president has not yet made the trek to the disaster zone. [Continue reading…]