TYBEE ISLAND ― Greg Poole volunteered as a Republican poll watcher for the 2022 midterms, unsure what to expect.
“I heard a lot of talk about election interference and ballot stuffing out of the 2020 election, and I wanted to get deeper into that and to see if there was any truth to it,” said Poole, who runs a property management business on Tybee Island, the beachfront community east of Savannah. “What I found was a lot of people — both voters and poll workers — passionate about voting and the election.”
Poole, who describes himself as a “small-l” libertarian, hopes to serve as a poll watcher again in the November election when he expects a large turnout, particularly among people like him who support former President Donald Trump.
In Savannah and Chatham County, Trump received 9,583 more votes in 2020 than he did in 2016, demonstrating his ability to grow his appeal in the state’s largest county outside of metro Atlanta.
A recent Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll showed Republicans are again rallying behind Trump. Nearly three-quarters of GOP respondents to the survey conducted between July 9 and July 18 said they are “very enthusiastic” about Trump’s chances in the 2024 election.
However, half of all voters surveyed — Republicans, Democrats and independents — had an unfavorable view of Trump.
Poole expects the passion he saw from Republican voters two years ago to carry over to November, especially given the lingering effects of higher inflation that have marked President Joe Biden’s term. The Democratic nominee is Biden’s vice president, Kamala Harris, tying her to the Biden economy.
Those concerns have only deepened in recent days with government reports showing a dip in hiring trends and an uptick in unemployment.
“People have a feeling that Trump can actually take care of inflation because of his business acumen,” Poole said. “They’re going to vote with their wallets this time without a doubt.”
Republicans and right-leaning moderates will vote in high numbers, Poole said — and he understands why. Poole, who grew up in Baltimore, joined the U.S. Navy out of high school and served two combat deployments to the Persian Gulf during his eight years in the military. He then worked as an educator before starting his own business. The big government policies of Democrats are alienating to him and others like him, he said.
Further energizing Trump backers is the criticism and “smears” leveled against the former president by Democrats and the media, Poole said. The labeling of him as a threat to democracy if elected to a second term is fearmongering and amplifying the former president’s divisive rhetoric is a strategy to stoke anti-Trump sentiment among moderates and liberals, he said.
Poole’s sentiments are shared by other Trump-leaning voters in Savannah and Chatham County. Vint Keener, who promotes Trump’s candidacy through T-shirts and pocket-size laminated cards bearing slogans such as “Save America” and “Never Vote Democrat Again,” predicts a backlash against Harris and Democrats at the polls in November.
“When Trump came along, he was a businessman who didn’t play the political game and simply told the truth about the direction of our country,” " Keener said. “Then I started to see what the Democrats were doing to try and stop him, and it just made me sad.”
Both Keener and Poole believe support for Trump is building among on-the-fence conservatives following an assassination attempt in July and Trump’s reaction to it. After being clipped in the ear by a rifle bullet while speaking at a campaign rally, Trump told followers to “fight, fight, fight” while being whisked to safety by U.S. Secret Service agents. That episode showed Trump’s “true colors,” Poole said.
“People realize this guy is a billionaire who could play golf all day and count his money only to get shot at, stand up and tell people to fight,” Poole said. “The guy’s got passion, and he loves his country. And voters are going to love him back and turn out to vote for him on Election Day.”
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