THE VILLAGES, Fla. — The golf carts lined up by the hundreds, festooned for former President Donald Trump fandom: a teddy bear with orange hair and a red tie. A surprisingly realistic Trump mask. A Trump rubber duck. An inflatable Trump tube, depicting his mouth open and fists pumped in the air.
On Saturday afternoon, The Villages, Florida’s retirement mecca, was abuzz with a parade for Trump — even as Tropical Storm Debby menaced.
“If Trump could take a bullet,” said Tommy Jamieson, the parade organizer, referring to last month’s assassination attempt, “then we can take a little rain.”
The people of The Villages, a sprawling planned retirement community northwest of Orlando and a solidly Republican stronghold, know that they live in Trump Country. But a week earlier, supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, held a golf cart rally of their own, drawing widespread attention, to the chagrin of Trump-supporting Villagers.
So Trump’s backers — with some donning T-shirts that read “I’m voting for the felon” and “I’m voting for the outlaw and the hillbilly,” referring to Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio — set out to show them up.
“There wasn’t that many people” at the Harris rally, opined Tom Sawyer, who moved to The Villages three years ago from New Jersey.
“That’s why this one had to happen,” added his wife, Donna Sawyer, who cradled the couple’s dog, a Havanese named Toby, in their golf cart.
To the uninitiated in Florida politics, the Harris parade showing, with about 500 golf carts, might have seemed as if Democrats had a chance to win over members of The Villages. It’s a place so unusual in its raison d’être — and so easy to stereotype, with its Disney-esque feel (it has billed itself as “Florida’s Friendliest Hometown”) — that it attracts throngs of reporters every election cycle to find out what retirees think, because older people are among the nation’s most reliable voters.
But Villagers would be quick to shut down the idea that their community is starting to lean more liberal. And Harris’ parade seemed to deepen the fervor of retirees supporting Trump.
Jamieson, who founded the Villages MAGA Club two years ago, estimated there were about 1,000 carts Saturday. Donna Hoak, whose cart was the first in line and who said she had attended similar parades for Republican candidates “since Obama,” said none had been quite as large, though one once drew about 800 carts.
Even if their turnout was lower, Democratic Villagers were still excited to see the level of support at Harris’ parade, especially in a state that has not voted for a Democrat for president since 2012 and is no longer considered a presidential battleground.
“About 250 people had signed up,” said Dennis Foley, 73, vice president of the Villages Democratic Club, which organized that parade. “So we were overjoyed that there was that much enthusiasm.”
The Villages is not just an electoral curiosity. With a population that has ballooned to nearly 145,000, it was statistically the fastest-growing metropolitan area in the country from 2020 to 2023, according to the census. Its enduring ability to attract older people from all over the country, most of whom then vote Republican, has helped turn Florida more conservative.
Not even Harris’ supporters, successful as they feel their parade was, think The Villages could be flipped. Neither could Florida, almost certainly, not when Republicans control every level of state government and have registered so many voters that they now outnumber registered Democrats by more than 1 million people.
“The numbers have, if anything, gotten a little more red,” Foley said, though he also blamed the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, for in his view making it harder for some to vote or remain on the rolls.
“We see this every election season,” said state Sen. Blaise Ingoglia, a former chair of the Republican Party of Florida who represents The Villages. “They take a bunch of golf carts together and they say that The Villages is in play. It never has been in play. It never will be in play. They’re trying to create the illusion that there is more momentum than there actually is.”
Yet to Democrats like Foley, winning The Villages — or Florida — is beside the point. It’s the energy that matters, in an election year that had little of it before Harris’ candidacy. Her Florida campaign says it has signed up more than 15,000 volunteers since she got in the race.
“We saw hope and that there’s a way out,” said Susie Barnhart, who said she attended the Harris parade. After Harris announced her last-minute candidacy, Barnhart said, she felt more optimistic that she would live long enough to see a woman elected president.
On Saturday, Barnhart wore earrings that said “Vote” and a T-shirt that read, “This childless cat lady is voting Kamala.” As she walked by the pro-Trump golf carts, she gave them a thumbs down.
Diane Ruggiero, 67, and her husband, Jim Guy, 79, both registered Republicans who moved to The Villages almost eight years ago from the Midwest, said they had not been excited to vote for President Joe Biden — and then were surprised to find themselves suddenly excited to vote for Harris. Ruggiero never voted for Trump; Guy said he voted for him in 2016 and did not vote for president in 2020.
“The level of excitement was beyond belief for us — and we’ve never been to a political rally,” Guy said.
Will Vermilya, 80, said he put two Harris signs on his golf cart after the parade. On his way to the parade last week, he said, two guys gave him a thumbs up — and one woman raised her middle finger at him.
“If they want to key it,” he said, referring to his cart, “or they want to argue with me, fine.”
The Trump parade organizers expected possible protesters along Saturday’s route, a trail of golf cart paths along golf courses and screened pools. But no protesters seemed to materialize.
As he drove the route, Bob Oberg, 78, a Massachusetts transplant, noted that one of his neighbors across the street and another one next door are Democrats.
“I’m optimistic,” he said of Trump’s chances. But, he added: “I think it’s going to be a close election. Very close.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
