Trump’s message of American decline resonates in Michigan

Chuck Brenner, a retired Saginaw cop, is another one.

The 49 year old, who still works part time in probation and runs his own real estate company, says he’s seen up close the problems here.

“Almost everybody’s dad worked in the car industry,” he told me.

“Back then, everybody had money and jobs were readily available. You’ve seen the change, people are struggling because people are growing up poor and then drugs and all that.”

Trump’s message of American decline resonates with Chuck.

“Absolutely,” he told me. “Because you can see it.”

But although he voted for Mr Trump in 2016, he went for Joe Biden in 2020.

“There was a lot of drama with Trump,“ he added. “And the legal issues. I kind of got sick of that.”

This time round, he’d only make up his mind, he insisted, once he’d watched the debate and heard what both candidates had to say.

Saginaw, like the wider state of Michigan, was once solid Democrat country – its political inclinations revealed in the list of candidates it has backed down the decades: Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Kerry, Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

That 2016 vote, when Saginaw went – like Mr Brenner – for Trump, marked a shift.

You don’t have to spend long here to realise just how remarkable a shift that was.

Jeremy Zehnder runs a truck polishing company, doing the kind of work Democrats used to be able to depend on for support.

Surrounded by the giant, gleaming trucks and trailers, the lifeblood of the American economy’s distribution networks, he tells me it’s not debate performances but the cost of living that will determine how he votes.

And a majority of voters tell pollsters they trust Trump more on the economy.

“With the truckers, every one of those that we know of are leaning towards the right,” he told me.

“What, every one?”, I asked him, slightly incredulous.

“I don’t know of one that isn’t,” he replied. “I mean we do hundreds of trucks every year. And they all want to talk about it, everybody talks about it.”