Presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump is scheduled to speak at two events in Washington state Saturday, well in advance of the now perfunctory primary to be held on May 24.
One rally is being held in Spokane, which only makes sense as it’s the most populous city in Republican-heavy Eastern Washington. But the Western Washington rally is being held in Lynden, a small border town that few outside of Washington and British Columbia’s lower mainland have ever heard of. How, and why, did that happen?
Residents of Lynden and Whatcom County were just about as surprised as anyone to learn Trump was coming there, to the Northwest Washington Fairgrounds.
“Oh my God, this is the biggest news since the Delft Square fire!” said Sean Beanblossom to the Washington Examiner Friday. Beanblossom runs the Cubano Cubano food truck out of the rebuilt building at the heart of the town.
The Bellingham Herald reported that the choice of Lynden for a Trump rally was “sort of a last resort.” The plan had been to hold a rally at a hangar in Boeing Field, near Seattle, but that fell through. Just why is a matter of some dispute.
“King County is not very good to work with,” charged Trump supporter and state senator Doug Ericksen on Friday. “We had contracts with a hangar provider and at the last minute King County refused to issue permits.”
The Herald got a contradictory story from a spokesman for King County who “contends the campaign’s agreements were with a private tenant who didn’t ask airport staff about the plan until Wednesday morning, May 4.”
Whatever the case, it became clear that Trump was coming to Washington and that the venue his supporters thought they had wasn’t going to work. The Trump team looked at other possible locations and settled on the Lynden fairgrounds at practically the last minute. The contract was signed Thursday night.
Erickson was likely the man who put forward Lynden as an option. He serves as a state senator from Whatcom County and lives in nearby Ferndale. And he understands that Lynden, though small, is the natural backbone of the local Republican Party.
