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I’ll Never Forget What Americans Did, for Money

I’ll Never Forget What Americans Did, for Money

Last updated on: September 7, 2026 at 10:30 pm by Mary Pezzulo

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I’ll Never Forget What Americans Did, for Money 2026-09-07T22:30:15-04:00 Mary Pezzulo

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a grainy drawing of Donald Trump superimposed over the American Flag. In the foreground is a hand holding another American flag, partly covering his face

image via Pixabay

The neighbors up the block took down their TRUMP flag.

Besides the flag, their house was a pretty house, with a nice garden in the back and wind chimes on the porch. They’re the kind of people who not only decorate for Christmas and Halloween, but also for minor holidays, so there’s always something to see. Right in the middle of the front yard was a great big flag pole. On the flag pole was your standard red and blue flag in honor of Donald Trump. They had it up in 2019 and 2020, and they didn’t take it down during the Biden administration. I assume they must have replaced the flag at some point because it still looked crisp and new for the second Trump inauguration. But it’s gone now. I don’t remember the exact day that I noticed it missing. I think it’s been gone all summer.

Maybe this doesn’t mean anything.

If you want me to describe the way sentiment towards Donald Trump has changed in his second term, right here at the junction of the Rust Belt and the Appalachian mountains, I’d have a hard time telling you. On Flag Day this summer I was at a small protest with some friends over in Weirton, holding homemade signs picketing the president, and we had the expected number of angry horn honks and heckling. But it’s not as enthusiastic as it used to be. People still have TRUMP 2024 stickers on the backs of their pickup trucks. But in 2020 they had Trump flags on poles set up in the backs of the trucks, and they don’t anymore. I don’t see people in TRUMP t-shirts and I see people in MAGA hats. Not for awhile now.

And as for the midterms, I’m puzzled.

I often count the signs in people’s yards to gauge the enthusiasm going into an election. This is a more reliable metric than you think. In 2016 there were signs all over the neighborhood, some for Hillary and quite a few for Trump, and that’s how I knew we were in trouble. In 2020 there were more signs than I expected for Biden and that’s how I knew Trump would lose. And during the midterms, it’s the same. I saw signs all over for Ohio Issue One in 2023, and knew it would pass. This year, just before a midterm when Ohio will be replacing our governor and there’s a dead even race for the Senate, I have seen next to no yard signs. It’s already September, and I’ve seen one, for Sherrod Brown, in the vacant lot downtown. Other than that, there’s nothing. I’ve never seen the Steubenville crowd have less enthusiasm for the Republican party before. It just doesn’t happen.

If the fever is really breaking, and I’m not saying for sure that it is, I’ll never forget that the reason was money.

That does seem to be what’s changing everything now. People are losing money.

From 2015 until early in 2020, there were two excuses I heard for why I had to support Donald Trump. The first was that he was pro-life, even though he isn’t. He has never been personally pro-life and his policies aren’t pro-life either. I’ve already told you how the pro-life movement lied about everything and abortion rates are up 21%. But the second reason was that Trump was a businessman and making the economy great again. That was why people supported him. I heard from many who didn’t like him personally, but stuck with him because of the economy. And it went on that way. No, they didn’t like that he boasted about grabbing women by the p-word. But what about the economy? Of course, they weren’t comfortable with the Muslim Ban. But we can’t forget the economy. Sure, the Ukraine Scandal was an embarrassment. But smart people only worry about the economy. Of course, the family separation policy was troubling, but won’t someone think of the economy?

In 2020, the economy sagged all over the world, and Trump lost the election. He pitched a hissy fit. His fervent followers– including, I’m told, a member of my own family– staged a riot at the capitol and five people were killed, but Trump was not punished. For the next four years, I told myself he’d quietly fade away even as he kept staging rallies all over the country. He was indicted for all kinds of horrible crimes. He was found guilty of a felony, for crimes committed covering up a hush money payment to a porn star he had sex with while his wife was pregnant. He was found liable for digitally raping another woman and owes her tens of millions. He held a horrific rally at Madison Square Garden, a racist event like something out of 1930s Germany. But he was elected again, because of the economy. People wanted money. They wanted cheap groceries and lower taxes, for inflation to go down, for industry to come back. Those were the issues that really mattered to people. Immigrants, women, law and order, dignity, honor, these didn’t matter: only money mattered.

Trump came back into office and proceeded to wreck everything. Thousands of immigrants who have done nothing wrong are being rounded up and sent to filthy detention centers that actually do meet the historic definition of concentration camps. At least two American citizens were murdered in the street by ICE. We’re at war with Iran for absolutely no reason and we blew up a school for little girls. There’s a giant hole in the side of the White House and the Reflecting Pool is crawling with green goo. Measles and Cyclospora are rampant across the country. He’s picked a trade war with Canada for no reason, just to throw his weight around. Abortion rates, as I mentioned, are up 21%.

Now we’re losing money. And I’m beginning to think that this time, Trump’s star is really setting. Not for the reasons it ought to be setting, but for money.

It was always all about money.

People were willing to do this to their fellow Americans and the world, for no other reason than that they wanted money.

The last of Trump’s supporters will trickle away, in time. I don’t know when, but there will come a day when nobody admits voting for him. That relative of mine will pretend she was getting her hair done on January 6th, 2021. But we will remain the country we’ve proven to be. We are a country that did this to ourselves, for money. And we didn’t even get any money.

I will be glad when this is over. But I don’t know if I can ever respect my country again.

Mary Pezzulo is the author of Meditations on the Way of the Cross, The Sorrows an d Joys of Mary, and Stumbling into Grace: How We Meet God in Tiny Works of Mercy.

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