Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier will anchor Thursday FOX News Channel’s Town Hall with President Donald Trump at the Scranton Cultural Center.
                                 Photo courtesy of FOX News Channel

Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier will anchor Thursday FOX News Channel’s Town Hall with President Donald Trump at the Scranton Cultural Center.

Photo courtesy of FOX News Channel

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<p>Martha MacCallum</p>
                                 <p>Photo courtesy of FOX News Channel</p>

Martha MacCallum

Photo courtesy of FOX News Channel

WILKES-BARRE — In 2016, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump appealed to who he called “the forgotten people,” promising things will be different — better, he said — when he is president.

On Thursday evening, from 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., FOX News Channel will host a town hall in Scranton, where now=President Trump will have an opportunity to respond to questions from the audience — including whether those 2016 campaign promises will ever be fulfilled.

FOX News anchor Martha MacCallum on Wednesday said she is looking forward to a spirited give and take between Trump and residents of Northeastern Pennsylvania. She said many of the 750 or so in the room at the Scranton Cultural Center will be supporters of the president, but Trump shouldn’t expect all fluff questions.

“I’m sure the president will point out how well he did in Northeastern Pennsylvania in 2016,” MacCallum said. “I mean, that is the story of his 2016 election —how he spoke to the forgotten men and women of America. I’m sure people will ask if those campaign wishes have been fulfilled —has the president delivered on his promises?”

Theda Skocpol, Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology at Harvard University, has been heading a study of Trump’s first term, concentrating on key counties that played a significant role in Trump’s 2016 victory, including Luzerne County.

“In the 2016 campaign, Trump often suggested he would bring back large numbers of well-paying manufacturing and mining jobs to areas like Luzerne County and that obviously has not happened,” Skocpol said. “More specifically, Trump promised no cuts to Social Security or health insurance benefits, but his administration is fighting to have the courts throw out the Affordable Care Act in its entirety, including the expanded Medicaid benefits and protections for affordable coverage of preexisting health coverage that many people in Luzerne County need.”

Skocpol went on to say that the Trump administration is pushing for cutbacks in Social Security disability benefits and is telling his richest contributors that he will look for cutbacks in Medicare and Social Security spending if he is reelected.

“The Trump administration also works steadily to weaken workplace safety rules and labor union rights,” she said.

MacCallum said Trump enjoys forums like the town hall because it offers him the opportunity to engage people with some back and forth conversations.

“I’m sure there will be a lot of Trump supporters at the event, but we expect that with any candidate,” MacCallum said. “We will offer follow ups to many of the questions.”

MacCallum said she and co-anchor Bret Baier will get things started with a few questions on key issues like the coronavirus and, of course, the 2020 presidential election.

“But we want to get the audience questions out there quickly,” MacCallum said. “Some have been emailed in already. We review the questions and select a good mix on several issues. We want viewers to get a good sense of where the president is on several issues.”

FOX News confirmed that the campaign selected Scranton for the Town Hall just like every other campaign has done for their town halls this cycle.

The town hall series began in April 2019, and the second show featured 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-VT, that still holds the record for the highest-rated event of its kind for any candidate this cycle in total viewership, with nearly 2.6 million viewers.

Others featured in 2020 have been Pete Buttigieg on Jan. 2, and Mike Bloomberg on March 2 — both have since ended their campaigns.

Thursday event marks Trump’s first town hall of the 2020 election cycle.

2016

Trump won Luzerne County in 2016, but lost in Lackawanna County.

In 2016, the heavy Democratic Luzerne County supported Trump, a Republican, giving him a 26,000-vote plurality over Democrat Hillary Clinton — just about guaranteeing a Trump victory in Pennsylvania.

Luzerne County was pro-Trump almost from the beginning of the race for the White House, as evidenced by the 11,000-plus that filled the Mohegan Sun Arena on both of his appearances here in 2016 — in April and again in November. He came back in August 2018 to stump for Senate candidate Lou Barletta and again, more than 11,000 filled the arena.

Trump received 78,303 votes in the county in 2016, to Clinton’s 52,092. That vote difference of 26,211 made up more than 40% of Trump’s unofficial statewide lead of 64,347 over Clinton.

Biden or Sanders?

Brian F. Carso, Associate Professor of History and Government and Director, Honors Program at Misericordia University, said he feels former Vice President Joe Biden is a stronger candidate than Sen. Bernie Sanders.

“While the left and right get a lot of attention at primary time, most Americans identify somewhere closer to the center of the political spectrum,” Carso said. “Biden is much more attractive to the centrists from both parties — a very large portion of Democrats, and the segment of Republicans who find a second Trump term to be problematic.”

Carso also said Michael Bloomberg announced Wednesday that his vast and well-funded campaign infrastructure will work for Biden’s election, targeting Trump’s shortcomings, will be very effective.

Carso said Sanders’s association with democratic socialism would be a gift to Trump — something that can easily be turned against Sanders — but also against every down-ballot campaign, from Congress to state assemblies.

“Biden is the Democrat’s best choice,” Carso said. “If he picks a vice presidential candidate that has some appeal to the progressive left, like Elizabeth Warren, he could assemble a powerful coalition of voters.”

Christopher Borick, political science professor at Muhlenberg University, said both Biden and Sanders pose challenges for Trump, but that both certainly have liabilities in Pennsylvania and beyond.

“The path to winning statewide races in Pennsylvania for Dems is with moderate candidates,” Borick said. “Biden would need to regain a small slice of working-class Dems and trust that animosity to Trump will generate energy among progressives.”

Borick said Sanders would have the natural energy on the left and may get some new voters in, but questioned whether he could hold older suburban Democrats.

“I think it’s a harder path,” Borick said.

As for running-mates, if it’s Sanders or Biden, Borick said it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which they don’t chose a woman to join them on the ticket — and also some balance with someone younger.

Reach Bill O’Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle.