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Transcript

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Welcome to Ready To Be Strong. I’m Tania Israel. On this podcast, we’re broadening our minds, opening our hearts, and strengthening connections to face the challenges of a divided world. Pema is not able to be here today, so I’m just gonna be talking to you on my own. I wanted to share a little bit about my experiences and the lessons I learned from canvassing in Hazleton, Pennsylvania before the election.

So Hazleton, Pennsylvania is a small town, about 30,000 people in Northeastern Pennsylvania. The closest big city is Scranton, and I wasn’t planning to be part of any campaigns this election season. I’ve been really busy, uh, talking with people about my book, Facing the Fracture, giving talks, talking to media, and I thought, I just don’t have time.

But in the middle of October, ’cause I was giving a talk at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania. I found myself on a Friday in a swing state and I was like, “I’m supposed to leave today, but I should stick around here and see if I can do some good”. So I reached out to a friend of mine who was traveling around to swing states and I was like, “Harley, where are you?”

And he said, “I’m going to Hazelton, Pennsylvania today.”And I was like, “Great. I am gonna figure out where that is and I’m gonna meet you there.” So, I went to Hazleton, met up with Harley, and uh, found this, uh, small campaign office there with some, uh, mostly volunteers working there, for the Kamala Harris campaign and I learned a little bit about Hazleton.

So it’s a town that like many other small towns in Pennsylvania, used to have a population largely of Italian, Irish, and Polish immigrants who worked in the mines. And then the mines flooded and the town fell on harder times. And then there was a period of community development. And then in the past 20 years, there has been an influx of Dominicans from New York and New Jersey who were appreciating the more affordable housing in Hazelton.

And uh, really that community grew quite rapidly, so that currently 63% of the population of Hazelton is Latin. And so I got to know a bunch of the different areas in Hazelton. I canvassed sort of all over the place, and so I wanna share with you some of the experiences that I had, some stories of people I talked to, just to gain a little glimpse into what’s going on in a swing state like Pennsylvania in a small, very American town like Hazelton.

It’s a town where there had been racial tensions with the changing population, and I talked to people in some largely Dominican areas, in some very mixed neighborhoods, and also out in a rural area that was, uh, almost entirely white. So I’ll start there. Um, I went to this one house that was set sort of far off the road, and there was a man in the yard, raking leaves, and he was surrounded by deer and okay, I don’t have that experience of being surrounded by deer so much. So I was completely charmed by this. Turns out that people who have deer surrounding them all the time are not quite as charmed by the deer who eat all of their vegetables and things like that. But anyway, this man seemed to be getting along fine with the deer.

So I, you know, asked him, uh, “Can we, uh, count on your support for Kamala?” And he was like, “Absolutely not.” So as a canvasser, you know, you’re not supposed to argue with people, and so often when somebody just states that they’re supporting the opposing candidate, then you just move on. But I am. Both curious, but also I had learned that there were people who were undecided and possibly movable in that area.

So I just wanted to know a little bit more. And so I asked him, you know, “What? What is it about her?” And he said, “Well, she is just not qualified.” And he said, “I would vote for a woman who’s qualified in any party, but she’s just not qualified.” and I could have asked more, but the other people I was canvassing with were waiting for me.

And so, I you know, just thanked him and I went on my way. But, you know, I, I thought, all right, this is somebody who’s sort of saying the things that, um, I would sort of expect someone who’s supporting Trump to say this seems to be the message that the campaign is putting out there, that, that people are repeating.

And also in this area, you know, it seemed very conservative. There was actually, um, pinned up onto a pole, uh, a figure, a life-size figure of, um, uh, wearing a beige suit and a donkey head, and it said, “Comrade Kamala Border Czar” on it so that this wasn’t too far away from where I found this man. So I recognized that this was a particular kind of area.

And, uh, you know, but not everybody I met in that area was a Trump supporter. I met plenty of Kamala supporters and I met an interesting couple, uh, where there was a woman who said, “You know, I’m voting for Kamala and my husband’s voting for Trump.” And I was like, “Wow, you know, I know that can be a difficult situation to be in sometimes.”

And she said, “Oh. He’s a Steelers fan. I’m an Eagles fan. We know how to do this.” And I was so struck by the fact that people not only have different opinions about political candidates, but also have different relationships to politics where some people would never be able to be in a relationship with somebody who’s gonna vote for a different candidate. And they were just working it out. 

So on a different day, I was in, uh, the neighborhood that was largely Dominican and there were some, uh, small hair salons there. And I was looking for, you know, somebody, uh, who was on my list in the hair salon. It turns out she was the owner. So I’m talking with her while she’s at work and I asked if we could count on her support for Kamala and she said, “No”, that she was, uh, gonna vote for Trump.

And so I said, you know, I’m curious why that is. And she said, “You know. I own the salon. I work very hard. I pay taxes, and I have a friend who doesn’t work and she gets all these benefits from the government and she just had liposuction and she got coupons for that.” Okay. I don’t know more about what that situation was, so that was her experience of it.

So, that was interesting because it’s not necessarily the take that I had been hearing from people about who was gonna be supporting Trump. But it made sense to me. I was like, you know what? If you wanna vote for the candidate, who’s gonna give fewer benefits to people who are unemployed, I think probably you’re making the right choice in voting for Trump. So, I thought it was interesting. It’s a well thought out position and you know, that related to really what her interests and concerns were. 

I went to another hair salon, uh, where I was looking for somebody who wasn’t there. But there was this young woman, a 19-year-old woman who said, “Oh, um, I wanna register to vote. Can you help me to do that?” And I was like, “Oh my gosh, yes. It’s one of my favorite things to do, to help people register to vote.” So this was a great opportunity. So I realized I didn’t have any voter registration forms with me. So I called the campaign office and I, you know, said, I’ve got somebody who wants to register.

I don’t have any forms. They said, “Well, tomorrow is the deadline. So the best thing to do is to get her to, um. To register online.” And I was like, “Great, can you text me the link and then I can just give her my phone so she can do it there?” And they’re like, “Sure.” So I’m waiting for them to text me the link.

And I say to her, “So, uh, do you know who you wanna vote for?” And she said, “Well, I’m not even sure I wanna vote, but I wanna be registered, but I, I think I’d like to vote for Donald Trump.” And I was like, “Oh, no!” (laughing). And so, nonetheless. I really want to register people to vote, and so I was like, you know, obviously I’m gonna register her anyway. And I asked her, “You know, are you really committed or are you still thinking about it?” And she said, “Well, I’m still thinking about it.” And so I was like, okay, here’s my chance. So I asked her like, “What is it that you like about Donald Trump?” And she said, “Well, I really like what he did during the pandemic.” And I said, “Oh, like what did you like about what he did during the pandemic?”

And she said, “Everything.” So I was like, all right, there’s, you know, it’s sort of vague. But I try to find a point of agreement. That’s something I always tell people to do. So I said, “Oh, well, something I really liked that the government did during the pandemic is that they made the vaccines available really quickly, and I appreciated that.” I said, “But I really didn’t like that Trump made it so divisive about whether or not people got vaccinated.” 

And so then I handed her some materials about Kamala Harris and there was a picture of Kamala shaking hands with people in the military. And she said, “Oh, was she in the military?” And I said, “Well, no, but Tim Waltz, her running mate, uh, was in the reserves.”

So I was like, okay, I am finding ways of connecting with her here. And at this point I’m sitting down next to her and we’re chatting and she said, “Um. Trump wants to send people back to the countries where they came from, right?” And I said “Yes.” And she said, “Oh, well my boyfriend is undocumented.” And I said, “Oh.” And she said, but I figure we could just get married before he took power. And I said, “Well, sure you can do that. But, um, what, it would be nice if you didn’t have to,” and of course it’s also… I didn’t say this then… but it’s much more complicated than that as well.

So at this point, she’s filling out the registration form on my phone, and she gets to a question. She says, what does this one mean? And it’s the one about, are you willing to work at the polls on election day? And so I explained to her, you know, they need people to work at the polls. If you’re free that day, you can, uh, check that off and they might reach out to you.

And so she checked that off. Then the next question was, are you willing to be a bilingual interpreter on election day? And she checked that off and I was like, oh my gosh, this is so exciting. ’cause she is getting engaged in our democracy and I love that. So she finishes up her registration, takes a picture of the screen, so she’s got that information documented.

And I said to her, you know, I am so happy that you registered to vote. I am here as a volunteer for the Kamala Harris campaign, and I know that Kamala wants everybody to be able to vote. I’m not sure that Donald Trump wants that, but you know, I am just so happy that you’re registered. It’s really a wonderful thing.

So then I’m talking to some other people before we leave the salon and I come back to her before I go and I say, so how are you feeling now? Are you strongly in favor of Trump? Are you more undecided? And she said, “Well, I’m more undecided now.”  I don’t know. She might have just been being nice to me, but, um, but it felt like a win in so many ways because she got registered and she was willing to engage in the voting process and helping other people to vote. And I just thought that was wonderful. So I felt really so fulfilled from that interaction that I had. 

So those were some of the people I talked to who were, uh, more interested in voting for Trump, and it was a pretty wide range there of types of people and types of reasoning and, and all of that. 

There were also certainly people I talked to who were excited about Kamala Harris. And so there was in the, uh, Dominican neighborhood, there was one house I went to that had all of these Harris signs out front and I was like, oh, this is so great. So I knocked on the door and, and, I will admit that I was having a little barrier to communicating with people in that neighborhood because I don’t speak Spanish and so, you know, but the person at this house, you know, we were able to communicate well enough that I got that he was voting for Kamala and that he was really excited about her.

And so when somebody’s really enthusiastic you wanna like try to get them to volunteer. So I said, “You know, do you wanna volunteer?” And he said, “Oh Yes. Well, I got these signs and got together with some people and we put signs over here and over there.” And I was like, “Oh, that’s great. Are you willing to talk to voters?”

And he said, “Oh, yeah.” And so I was like, great, let me make sure I get your phone number and we’ll give you a call. And I turned to leave and then I paused and I turned back and I said,  “Is there any chance you’re available right now because I could really use some help. I am having trouble talking to some of your neighbors because I don’t speak Spanish, and I could really, um, use some help with that.” And he said, “Let me change my shoes.” 

So he went, he changed his shoes and he and his 8-year-old granddaughter came with me for an hour and a half knocking on doors. I would find the number and the app that I had, the address and the, his granddaughter would go and she would find the house, and then he would talk to the people there. And then I would put the information in the app and it was such a delightful experience, um, because they were just so warm and, and excited about what they were doing. And I just felt like they were such lifesavers for me because I felt like I could then be more engaged in that community, um, with some assistance there.

So that was such a great experience. In fact, he came with me again. The next day and canvassed again and learned how to use the app, and so it was just such a lovely experience. Election day was so great because it was going out there and talking with people. People had already voted and they were so proud to show their I voted sticker.

I asked people if they wanted, you know, a bumper sticker or a button because we had all the swag left in the office and. So I got to give people things. I, you know, came across a bunch of children who were excited about Kamala, so I gave them all buttons and that was so much fun. And I was out there like walking up and down stairs in apartment buildings, and I was going to houses and just.

So, um, engaged in the community and such a day that felt like, uh, there was so much possibility and there was so much, um, uh, excitement that I was picking up on from people about voting and about Kamala. Well… we all know how things turned out. They didn’t exactly turn out the way I was hoping they would, but I wasn’t exactly surprised.

You know, I live in California and people who knew I was in Pennsylvania kept texting me and saying, oh, so what’s happening are, are we gonna win? What are you hearing from people? And every time I would have to respond and say, I really have no idea what’s gonna happen, and I really didn’t. I mean, I realized that afterwards, I didn’t predict the outcome, but I did have some hope about how things were gonna go.

And so I, I was certainly disappointed, but there are things that I got from that experience that were so valuable. I feel like I got some real insight into what was going on in Pennsylvania and what was probably going on for a lot of voters. So I had gone to Hazleton for this one weekend in the middle of October, and then I came back for the final week before the election.

And on my way back into town, I stopped at the Trader Joe’s in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, which is an hour and a half from Hazelton, but it’s the closest Trader Joe’s to Hazelton now. I live in Santa Barbara, California. I live 15 minutes from three different Trader Joe’s, and that’s the way I like it. There I, it’s really the only place that I shop and I love Trader Joe’s so much.

It would be so easy for me to think about Hazelton like, oh, these poor people in Hazelton, they don’t have a Trader Joe’s. And what I realized was. They don’t wanna Trader Joe’s, they don’t want my life. As different as these populations are within Hazelton, the Irish, Italian, Polish immigrant communities that have been there for a hundred years, and the Dominican population that’s been there for the last 10 to 20 years.

They’re really different from each other, and there’s been some tension around that. They eat different foods, they listen to different music, they live in different parts of town, and yet they have more in common with each other than any of them have with me. And what I realized is. That’s not so unusual for a lot of people on my side.

There were a couple of busloads of people from New York City who came into canvassing last weekend before the election, and I realized, yeah, these people are a lot like me. They’re, um, upper middle class, um, liberal people who, who wanna do good and, and don’t live any place like Hazelton. And I remember there was this one woman who at the end of the day was, you know, she had been out talking to voters and she said, oh, you know, I met somebody and he said he was voting for Trump.

And I, you know, I can’t remember exactly what she said, but she kind of hurled an insult at him. And I was like, oh no, that’s not something that we should be doing. We can’t go to people’s homes and insult them, but it’s so much of what I hear from people around me. People say, oh, those people are voting against their own interests, which is such a dismissive thing to say.

They say, oh, but the economist endorsed Kamala Harris. Well. People in Hazleton, Pennsylvania aren’t necessarily reading The Economist. There’s an elitism that I know, uh, the left is accused of, and it’s not entirely wrong. There are ways that we can be self-righteous, that we can talk down to other people, that we can think that we know better about other people’s lives.

So. I came away from Hazelton, humbled and wanting to share that experience because being self-righteous is not a winning strategy. Not only is it not gonna win votes for the Democrats, but it’s not a winning strategy for our democracy. And it concerns me how corrosive that kind of attitude is.

Ourselves for our relationships, our communities, and our democracy. So that’s some of what I took away from Hazelton. I will say, I also took away from it some wonderful relationships with other people on the campaign who, you know, the beautiful thing about a campaign is that you’re working together with other people toward a common goal in this very.

Kind of intense short-lived space, and it’s such an amazing bonding experience. So if you’ve never done it, uh, I just encourage you to take opportunities to talk to voters, to volunteer for a campaign. And even if you don’t wanna do something political, get engaged in your community, working with other people toward a goal together, it’s so fulfilling and it’s actually really positive for our mental health.

So that’s what I wanted to share today. I just wanted to bring you some stories from Hazelton, Pennsylvania and my experience of it, and I hope that you find some interest or insight in that.

I’m Tania Israel. Professor, psychologist, and author of Facing the Fracture, make your choice. Are you ready to be strong?

Ready To Be Strong was created by me, Tania Israel, and Pema Rocker and edited by Hailey Gray. Our theme music is by Jeff Marcel at Premium B. Bring this conversation into your circles. Rate and review the show wherever you’re listening. And most importantly. Share this episode with a friend.