Tolkkinen: Why Trump? Rural Minnesotans explain

A tough, pointed question arrived in my email box this morning.

“Do you think people that live around you are racist and transphobic and misogynistic? Or do they just vote that way?”

Ouch.

Some of you know that I live in Otter Tail County, in a deeply conservative part of Minnesota, which voted for Trump as expected.

On Election Day, I hung out at voting precincts in Clitherall, Battle Lake, Underwood, Sverdrup Township and Fergus Falls, interviewing voters after they left the polls. There was one moment, after I interviewed five Harris supporters in a row, that I wondered if the universe had tilted on its axis. I headed to a more rural precinct where I quickly met two Trump voters who set me straight.

Are the people around me racist and transphobic and misogynistic? I understand that question comes from a deep sense of grief at the outcome of the election, based on Trump’s rhetoric and his plan to overturn federal diversity, equity and inclusion hiring, his stacking of the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, and his plan to end transgender participation in women’s sports.

All the phobias exist in greater Minnesota as they do in any other place. But I hope Twin Cities folks don’t think all of greater Minnesota is that way.

In rural Minnesota, from what I’ve seen, the group that takes the brunt of open rejection is transgender people. People run for school board pledging to get rid of LGBTQ books in public schools. Social media users pass around memes mocking drag queen story hours, whipping up fear and anger over “men in women’s bathrooms,” and arguing that men can’t get pregnant.

They don’t like the debate over pronouns, the terms “pregnant people” or “menstruating people,” (I don’t like saying “pregnant people” either), and they were especially willing to believe conservative embellishment over the debunked claim that Gov. Tim Walz requires schools to put tampons into the boy’s bathrooms.

Furor and misunderstanding around transgender issues have almost single-handedly tarnished the DFL image in the eyes of many rural Minnesotans. Transgender people live in greater Minnesota, but they are a small, vulnerable group, dependent, as I heard one transgender person recently put it, on the mercy of those around them. They are an easy group to exploit as a way to drive voters into the arms of the GOP. Instead of crediting Democrats for welcoming minority groups, there are many who use it against them.

To make matters worse, DFL leaders seem afraid to talk about LGBTQ issues that need a candid, reasoned public airing.

One of those is whether to allow transgender women to compete in girls’ or women’s sports. Biological males benefit from bigger, stronger bodies, with larger lungs and hearts, the reason we separate sports by sex in the first place. I’m not saying they shouldn’t compete with biological females. I don’t know enough about it yet. That’s where a candid, reasoned conversation would help. Maybe the answer is yes. Maybe it’s no. But it’s something we need to be able to talk about without being labeled homophobic.

There are many reasons rural Minnesotans support Trump that have nothing to do with phobias about people. Adam Baker, 43, a college accounting instructor from rural Otter Tail County, said one of his top issues is gun rights. An avid hunter, he worries that his right to own a gun could vanish under Democratic leadership. I get it. A couple of decades ago, that was my big worry, too.

Phil Bernstetter, 40, a bar manager in Fergus Falls, said he voted for Trump because he’s getting pinched by the rising cost of groceries, and because he wants the government to deport people who are here illegally if they’re not working.

Heidi Lien, 53, a Fergus Falls nurse, said she voted for Trump because she doesn’t like seeing the government giving money to immigrants while rural elderly people can barely afford to buy necessities.

One woman, who didn’t give me her name, said she voted for Trump partly because of abortion. She believes it should be legal only in cases of rape or incest, not the health of the mother. She believes that women know ahead of time if their lives would be jeopardized by pregnancy, that their doctors would have warned them not to get pregnant, so they have no excuse to get an abortion when a pregnancy threatens their lives.

Misogyny? Maybe. Or, as a first-time voter in her 40s, who always found voting too confusing to participate in before, maybe she just doesn’t know enough about medically necessary abortions.

Many school board candidates against LGBTQ literature in the schools lost their races in greater Minnesota. There were also voters in our conservative county who chose Harris.

“Saving democracy,” said Hans Ugstad, 40, a Fergus Falls plumber. He wasn’t the only voter who told me that, reflecting fears that Trump will serve as an anti-democratic authoritarian leader in office.

A three-generation family, grandmother, mother, and daughter, told me they struggle with health issues and often run out of money to buy food at the end of the month. They voted for Harris, too.

First-time voter Adrian Hengtgen, 18, a senior at Underwood High School, said she voted for Harris to try to end prejudice against minorities. It might take years, she said, but she hopes Americans will eventually unite.

“Hold each other’s hands and sing ‘Kumbaya,’” she said.