Widespread pro-Republican sentiments are relatively new to Fall River. Democrats have dominated politics in this Massachusetts mill city for almost 70 years. The city’s mayor, congressman and state legislators are all Democrats. When it comes to the presidential ticket though, Fall River is losing thousands of Democratic votes every election.
When John Kerry and Barack Obama topped their respective tickets in 2004 and 2008, about three in every four people in Fall River voted Democratic. But those numbers went way down when Hillary Clinton ran against Donald Trump in 2016, and Joe Biden fared even worse in 2020: the current president won just 54% of Fall River.
Much of this shift can be attributed to the fact that Fall River is a post-industrial city with a large white working class — the exact type of place Trump has wrested from the Democrats in other states. Lucy Oliveira said Trump’s brand as a successful businessman plays well in Fall River.
“Everybody wants to go for Trump because the economy is so bad,” said Oliveira, the manager of Fernando’s Place, which is located in a part of town called the Flint. An abandoned factory, the Flint Mill, gave the neighborhood its name when it used to manufacture textiles and clothing.
Fall River has swung harder to the right than nearly every other city in Massachusetts. Only Methuen, on the New Hampshire border, had a higher share of Trump voters in 2020.
This story was reported by The Public’s Radio. You can read the entire story here.
