In the town of Windham, about 50 kilometers from Concord, the capital of New Hampshire, Benjamin Grill, 72, says he will vote for Donald Trump – just as he did in the last general election.
“I'm sure he's a bad guy in many ways, but he's not a lifelong politician,” he told me. “When he was here, the economy was in much better shape, and to be honest, I don't know what's going on at our border. It's a mess.”
It's a sentiment shared by many of the voters I speak to as I travel across the United States ahead of this year's election. While many accept that Trump has his flaws, they honestly believe that life was better when he was in power than the last few years under Joe Biden.
Many of them are willing to overlook his many legal problems – or, like Grell, believe they are part of a political witch hunt to prevent him from returning to power.
“These are trumped-up charges, no pun intended,” Grell says, when I ask him what he thinks about the 91 indictments Trump faces for alleged election subversion, illicit money payments, and his handling of classified documents.
Terry and Richard Taylor Republican voters in Salem, New Hampshire, at a Nikki Haley rally the night before the polls open.credit: Farah Tomazin
“But the more they try to do what they do to him, the more support he gets. What are his enemies afraid of? It's election interference. It's scary how biased everything is — they've weaponized the Department of Justice and the FBI, and you can't trust our authorities.”
In Salem, New Hampshire, Nikki Haley supporter Terri Taylor says she hates Trump so much she'll likely vote for Biden instead.
She says she initially considered other Republican candidates, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, “but Nikki is my favorite and I've been supporting her for months.”
“She has a calm nature, she has foreign policy experience from working at the United Nations, she has executive experience from being a two-term governor, and she's an accountant so she knows how money works.”
