'He’s mentally ill:' NY laughs ahead of Trump's Madison Square Garden rally

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Matt Laslo
October 25, 2024

KINGSTON, NY — Former President Donald Trump’s upcoming Madison Square Garden rally is a joke, if a “depressing” one, to many New York business owners.

Tuesday, as the sun was still rising on a brisk, windless fall morning at the Wiltwyck Golf Club, down-ballot congressional candidates made their clunky pitches to local business owners, who sometimes found themselves more fixated on the buffet of eggs, bacon and quasi-fresh fruit laid out for them than on the politicians at the lectern.

The otherwise unremarkable event is memorable for showcasing the contortions of Democratic and Republican candidates alike this election cycle as they try to distance themselves from their party’s presidential candidate in this highly nationalized election cycle.

However, maintaining distance from the top of the ticket is increasingly impossible in the Empire State, partly because Trump keeps inserting himself into his (former) home state politics.

“We just rented Madison Square Garden,” Trump said to cheers at his Scranton, Pa. rally last Wednesday. “We’re going to make a play for New York.”

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While thousands are now signing up to attend—though it’s unclear if anyone’s bought the $924,600 "Ultra MAGA Experience" package yet —Trump’s last-minute announcement of an Oct. 27 rally at the iconic home of the New York Knicks and Rangers has been met with many eye rolls across this blue state.

“He’s mentally ill”

Once the candidates stopped talking and just as the golfers started swinging, Raw Story caught up with local business leaders on the man who paints himself as the ultimate businessman.

“Do you think Trump thinks he can win New York?” Raw Story asked.

“No, there’s no chance,” Chelsea, a small business owner in Ulster, NY, who asked Raw Story not to use her full name.

“But he thinks he does?” Raw Story pressed. “Or why’s he doing a rally at Madison Square Garden?”

“Because he’s mentally ill,” Chelsea said through a nervous laugh.

Others in this bipartisan, hyper-pro-business crowd aren’t laughing.

To many here in the state Trump called home until 2019 when he declared Mar-a-Lago his primary residence, this is just par for the course.

“Do you think Trump has a chance in New York?” Raw Story asked the chairman of New York’s Ulster County Regional Chamber of Commerce.

“No,” Al Roberts matter-of-factly replied.

“Then what’s his fascination with it?” Raw Story pressed. “Why’s he keep coming back here?”

“It’s his home,” Roberts told Raw Story. “It’s where he came from.”

“What do you make of him doing a rally at Madison Square Garden?” Raw Story asked.

“It’s who he is. He's an entertainer. A celebrity. Where else are you gonna get that kind of attention?” Roberts said. “If nothing else, he is a good marketer. And he knows his brand and doesn't change from it, as much as people want him to do it. It's worked, so he's gonna keep doing it.”

While his fellow business leaders may dismiss him as an entertainer, Trump’s brand is appealing to many in large rural swaths of this sprawling state.

Some younger Republicans see a path for Trump

A couple hours south of the historic country club — a ride replete with dozens of proudly pro-Trump signs on main thoroughfares and backroads alike — the Trump buzz is tangible, which makes news of a Madison Square Garden rally electrifying.

“I like that,” Dayton Leone — a junior in high school in an exurb of New York City — told Raw Story. “I like that.”

“Do you think he can win New York?” Raw Story inquired.

“I do,” Leone said. “I think he can win.”

Youthful optimism aside, Trump’s appeal outside of New York City is something many Republican congressional incumbents — even ones who’ve avoided his previous New York rallies — are banking on this cycle.

“I wouldn't say the state is in play for Trump, but in the districts that will determine control of Congress, he's doing very well in,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) told Raw Story at a high school football game in Mahopac, NY earlier this week. “That should send a big red flag to Democrats across the country that like, where there is actually competition is a very different dynamic than what they're projecting.”

“What's changed?” Raw Story pressed. “Like, is Trump just like an ethos now, or Dems doing such a poor job…?”

“It's the substance of the issues,” Lawler said. “So whether people like him or not, it's almost irrelevant to the point that what they don't like is the disaster at our southern border. What they don't like is that they're paying through the nose for groceries, gas, housing and Kamala Harris wouldn’t change one thing — like, ‘Oh, everything’s great.’”

Everything’s not great, especially among independent-minded voters who are sick of the tens of millions of dollars in lies blanketing their screens these days.

“It’s so depressing”

Back at the country club, as robotic golf caddies hum as they skirt across the manicured greens outside as they pull the heavy, clanging clubs of today’s lazy golfers, inside many New York business leaders are fretting.

“Do you think Trump thinks he can win New York?” Raw Story asked.

“No, I think that’s just a show. Everything about him is a show,” Jennifer — an Upstate New York credit union executive who asked we not use her last name for professional reasons — told Raw Story. “I try to ignore him, because he’s gotten so depressing. It’s so depressing.”

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