We met the only Trump supporters at New York’s anti-Trump rally

Donald Trump is a candidate who belongs to a world of showmanship and reality TV, so it makes sense that his supporters are all total oddballs.

Yesterday thousands of protesters descended on Manhattan’s Grand Hyatt Hotel, demonstrating against a GOP event inside.

New Yorkers from all walks of life took part in the Shut Down Trump rally: Black Lives Matter, minimum wage campaigners, high schoolers, and the odd pensioner all stood against the loudmouth Republican Party frontrunner.

All except for a small band of Trump fans, who we found around the corner from the main protest, fenced in by barriers as set-jawed NYPD officers watched nearby.

New York City is a notoriously blue city (an estimated 30,000 attended a Bernie rally earlier this week – even more than Obama drew in 2008), but you’d have to be pretty hardcore to stand as one of the Donald’s few local fans at a mass anti-Trump rally of thousands.

So we asked them why.

First up is high schooler Thomas, who tells us he’s a senior in high school.

“I support Trump,” he says breathlessly. “I like his foreign policy. His fiscal policy is pro-working class, pro-middle class, and pro-small business.”

We ask what his friends think of his Trump hat. “Some of them laugh. Some of them support me, and some make fun of me,” he admits. “I think the hat looks great.”

Jackie Anderson, an executive assistant is holding up a large Trump sign next to Thomas.

“I’m here to support Trump, and also here to support the American interests. I like that he is pro-America,” she says.

“As an African American, my people, the poor things, they think they’re on the right side, standing across the street,” she explains, gesturing towards the anti-Trump crowd. “But those Mexicans are coming in and taking their jobs, and those jobs are supposed to be for Americans.”

And does she agree with all of Trump’s policies?

“Most of them.” She pauses and lowers her sign for a moment.

“Uhhh. Listen. The ones that I am most passionate about are the only ones he’s touching base on. For instance, bring jobs back from China, bring jobs back from India. We need them here in America, we have lots of Americans who can do those jobs. We need the American economy to be strong again, he’s a businessman, he’s run his own businesses, he knows what he’s doing.”

She puts the sign back up, and returns to the protest – on the other side of the street, the occasional passersby shout “fuck Trump” in our direction.

We spot a man in an England scarf next, and wave him over. We can’t quite believe it. With a huge grin on his face, he says he’s here from the North of England, and is protesting because he’s “tired of corruption.”

Brandon, like nearly everyone else here, is also alone. We’re beginning to sense a pattern with this crowd.

One half-remembered campaign soundbite segues into the next: “If you really want a major change, then this is why you’ll support it. You see what’s going on around the world, and we should be a good example. Trump is a very moderate person in a lot of ways. Hardcore conservatives don’t like him because he’s not conservative enough. He’s willing to make deals, he’s willing to be open. His stances are actually pretty middle ground.”

So what about the wall he wants to build between the US and Mexico?

“At least it gets the conversation going, at least we’re talking about immigration now,” says the man who moved here from England.

Carmen, 31, walks over next, keen to be interviewed. She explains she’s an immigrant, a legal one, she stresses, from Slovenia.

“I did everything right, and some illegals are not paying their taxes and taking advantage of the system.”

Next to her is Joey, a 21-year-old. Up till now, most of the people we meet have only spoken in platitudes – Joey is the first to talk with a bit more sting.

“Oh man, we need to take the illegal immigrants out of this. There’s too many people coming in and taking our jobs, it’s not cool. In my town, I live in West New York, New Jersey, I can’t get a job because I don’t speak Spanish, it’s full of illegal immigrants. This is America, I should get a job when I speak English, this is our language. It’s not fair.”

Yelling over each one of our conversations is Joanne, a sort of demonstration ringleader, who we manage to grab for a second.

“You’re being killed over there. Your country’s going to hell,” she says when we tell her we’re from the UK. But she’s distracted and wants to join back into the throng, hurling slogans back at the counter-protesters across the street.

“I want to support Donald J Trump, he’s the greatest guy ever for President. We need someone like him.”

She gives us a wink, breaks off our conversation, and then starts to shout at a postman driving past, urging to vote for Trump.