It is the story of a Midwest, with two faces, those of the two candidates for vice president of the United States in 2024. These great plains, which stretch from the Appalachians to the Rocky Mountains, forgotten territories that we fly over from New York to California without stopping there, are one of the keys to voting in the November elections. The dark Midwest is embodied by Republican JD Vance, 40, Donald Trump’s running mate, who recounted his journey in 2016 in his autobiography. Peasant Elegy (Harper, 2020): A family derailed by violence and drugs, descended from the hills of the Appalachians in Kentucky, and stranded in the Ohio steel town of Middletown, a town in the middle of nowhere that has become a symbol of Rusty Beltthe deindustrialized “rust belt” whose desperate voters brought Donald Trump victory eight years ago.
Opposite, the Midwest of Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’s running mate, who grew up in Valentine, in the desert plains of Nebraska: a 60-year-old former teacher and sports coach with a grandfatherly look, who calls for concern for his neighbors, spreading a message of joy and brotherhood in an America in search of reconciliation. “When you grow up in a small town like this, you learn to take care of everyone., He insisted at the Democratic convention in Chicago in August. The family down the street may not think like you, they may not love like you, but they are your neighbors, you take care of them and they take care of you. » His arrival on the political scene, after that of Kamala Harris, shook up the political atmosphere. The America of 2024 is not that of 2016: the wounds of the 2008 depression have healed, another story seems possible. Donald Trump’s black man, made of desperation, territories mined by drugs and a latent civil war, may suddenly see the optimistic return of the pioneer spirit, which would allow the Democrat to partly seduce the white working and agricultural classes of the Midwest.
Reality or illusion? To be sure, head to Valentine in northwestern Nebraska. First, fly to Omaha, the city of cattle ranchers and billionaire Warren Buffet on the banks of the Missouri, then drive more than five hours west. Grain barns, warehouses of John Deere agricultural equipment, the landscape is very desolate and invites a pause with a progressive farmer, Art Tanderup, who fought under Donald Trump for the passage of the Keystone XL oil pipeline through his land. The septuagenarian, owner of solar panels and an electric car, is beaming. “We are very excited. Tim Walz has a lot of roots in Nebraska, he attended high school across the street, 85 miles away. [137 kilomètres] thence”He rejoices, giving an idea of the distances and suggesting a real change of opinion.
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