Caroline County is the kind of quiet place that found its voice in electing Donald Trump.
It’s rural and Republican territory, a 90-minute drive from Washington DC, and it backed Trump at the election.
Gauging political opinion isn’t necessarily easy here, division runs raw in small-town America.
As one cafe owner told me, in declining an interview: “My business is worth more than my opinion.”
Did we find any buyer’s remorse among Trump voters? In a word, no.
It’ll exist, no doubt, and there is enough anecdotal evidence of voters having second thoughts.
In Bowling Green, Caroline County, our straw poll – unscientific – found that Signalgate had left a Trump support shaken but not stirred.
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“I’m impressed with the agenda,” said Robert Hayman, who voted for Trump.
On Signalgate, he said: “In my opinion it’s a non-story, compared to the misgivings of the previous administration.
“(It’s not a big story) to the extent that it has the effect on our safety.”
Patty Roberts, who also voted for Trump, said the Signalgate episode had passed her by.
She told me: “I don’t know a whole lot about that. So I would probably refrain from talking about that. I don’t watch TV.”
How politics lands with people here depends on who they support and where they get their information.
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The response of the Trump administration has been to deny, dispute and deflect from the notion of incompetence surrounding the Signal chat story.
Non-Trump supporters were damning in their assessment of the Signalgate episode.
Iris Silver told me: “It just shows you where putting the wrong people in power positions is not a great idea.”
Jeremiah Hirsch, also anti-Trump, told me how the politics of the day weighed on the community.
He said: “We need this thing that we all deserve that’s a part of the American dream. I feel in some ways we’ve lost that.”
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For some, Signalgate is a stone-cold scandal, for others not so much.
Caroline County is known as the cradle of horse racing.
The runners and riders are currently out of season, unlike the politics.
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In that race, it’s a marathon and a sprint.
