The anger of Braddock is the anger of America

The small town of Braddock is typical for that of today's America: the
population hates the government and at the same time believes that only the
government can solve its problems. John Fetterman came to live there,
became mayor and hopes to teach his fellow citizens how to rely on
themselves.
Guus Valk 23-04-2016
Jodi Morrison moved from Brooklyn to Braddock in 2008 after she heard of the
pioneering approach by mayor John Fetterman. There she bought a former
bank building for 125.000 dollar that shows one defect after another,
including a huge leak I go from crisis to crisis, Morrison says (33). I don't
know where to start.
Photos by Gillian Laub
On the right arm of John Fetterman there are nine dates tattooed. Under each
other. In big, bold numbers. The last one is from less than a year ago: May
16th 2015. That day the 34 year old Deontay was murdered, by a family
friend. She was stoned and drunk. Shortly after that Fetterman drove to the
tattoo-parlor for the ninth time. With this he captures every murder in his city.
It reminds him, he says, that he has a job to do. Braddock is so small, that
most of the times I know the victim and perpetrator in person. These are
mostly young men that were sucked into crime because we made all drugs
illicit.
John Fetterman (46) is 6ft 10 tall, weighs over 300 pounds and is fully dressed
in black. His head is bald and he has a robust beard. Nothing of his image
compares to that of a politician, but for 10 years already Fetterman has been
the mayor of the little industrial town Braddock, in the American state
Pennsylvania. The zip code of Braddock, 15104, decorates his left arm.
Fetterman's nickname: Mayor of Hell.
This Tuesday (26-04) Pennsylvania holds its Democratic and Republican
primaries. According to polls Trump will win big and march on to the
Republican nomination. That same day another anti-politician hopes to make
a breakthrough in Pennsylvania. John Fetterman has joined the Democratic
primary for Senate in Washington, which will be held on the same day. What
he wants is to break the corrupt system, and restore the trust people have
lost in politics. According to the polls he doesn't really make a chance, but
he is the most discussed politician of Pennsylvania.

As a senator Fetterman wants to limit the power lobbyists and interest groups
have, revoke free trade agreements, fight the 'excesses of capitalism' and
'modern day slavery' by increasing minimum wage to fifteen dollars an hour.
He wants to legalize soft drugs, and combat the heroin epidemic which has
also stricken Braddock by not incarcerating addicts but by giving them
medical care. Fetterman is a populist and is proud of it. He doesn't stand
above the people, he is a part of it.
The last steel factory
Mayor John Fetterman, his wife Gisele and their three children live in an
abandoned garage, right in front of a huge steel factory - the last factory
which is still open in Braddock.
I enjoy the view, Gisele says cheerfully. the activeness, the smokestacks.
As if I'm on holiday everyday.
John and Gisele Fetterman aren't disconcerted easily. Untiring they battle
against the laws of nature of America's industrial decline. They hand out food
and clothing, patch up abandoned houses, drag unemployed youngsters to
kitchen gardens to grow vegetables. This attitude gave them the status of
heroes in Braddock, the small city which had lost all its trust in its
administrators. if I don't know what to do anymore, I call mayor John, a
senior resident tells. I have him on my speed dial. a woman at the butcher
shop says: Look at my jeans. Beautiful. And my shoes. Nikes, for the first
time in my life. Got them both from the Fettermans.
Braddock once was the center of the American coal and steel industry.
Thousands of workers found employment in the factories of Andrew Carnegie.
The tycoon made a beautiful city out of Braddock. He built big houses and
donated a library to the city. Till 1980 20.000 people lived there, ten times as
much as now.
Al Burghart, a pensioned worker, shows the main shopping street, Braddock
Avenue. Here, where we now walk, it used to be full of nightclubs,
restaurants and shops. On Saturday night we used to chase girls. I did quite
some messing around on this street.
The street is almost empty now, the shops are closed. Some buildings have
been broken down, others boarded up. Burghart stills knows all the stores
from the good times. Barbershop Pirozzi, dry cleaner Bagley, beauty parlor
Thomas. Names on broken facades, vague memories.
Ghost town
The story of Braddock is the same as that of all the other cities in the socalled Rust Belt. The string of industrial cities in the Northeast of the united

states. The factories of Braddock were closed one by one, the coal mine as
well. Within a few decades 90 percent of the population left the town.
Braddock became a ghost town. For those who stayed disaster after disaster
followed. Half of the population lives in poverty. Braddock became a food
desert where vegetables and fruit were impossible to get. The mayor at that
time plundered the town-treasury, and went off with almost 200.000 dollar.
Braddock got filled with crack and heroin addicts.
Resident Marc Benzo, who lives in a half crumbled down 19th century
building, uses an example from his front garden: I had three trees. In the
first an owl lived, in the second a hawk, in the third some sparrows. Then
people from the county came by and cut down two trees. All the birds went
up in one tree, and started to attack each other. No I don't have any bird left.
like his trees disappeared, so did the factories in Braddock. And those who
stayed behind started to fall out at each other.
The population got betrayed, Gisele Fetterman says. People felt
abandoned by their leaders. she was born in Brazil, and came to the U.S. as
a child. I come from a third world country, still I can't understand how people
in America were abandoned by their leaders, and that those same leaders
can get away with it.
Fifteen years ago the Fettermans came to live in Braddock, John studied at
Harvard, and was thinking of a political career. Very soon they decided they
wanted to change Braddock. John Fetterman presented himself as a
candidate for the upcoming mayoral elections and won with the difference of
one vote. After that he was re-elected easily two times. They bought one of
the ten abandoned churches and made a community center out of it. Gisele
Fetterman started a give-away shop which she uses to provide Braddock with
clothing. She has created a food bank-app which shops and restaurants use
to inform volunteers when they have food left. Every week surplus food is
being delivered to 400 people in Braddock. With their own money they
renovated stores, started a beer tasting and hung small signs across the city:
'attention: more hugging please' the downfall of Braddock has been stopped,
John Fetterman says. For the last couple of years the population is growing
again.
Braddock is located in the Northern area of the Appalachians, the mountain
belt which is crucial to understand the presidential elections of 2016. The
area stretches from the countryside of New York and Pennsylvania to the
conservative Deep South. Many Americans are somewhat condescending
about Appalachia. Mine workers live there, farmers and factory workers.
Stubborn, religious people. People with fighter mentalities and a big desire
for personal freedom, Colin Woodard writes in his book American Nations. To
put it less friendly: Hillbillies and rednecks.

Trump scores in Appalachia. He drains the anger over the failure of the
government while pleading for intervention from above at the same time. Sarah Jones, publicist
The power base of Trump lies in Appalachia. Consistently he scores high in
districts which belong to the region, like Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky. In
the Buchanan district, in the mountain region of Virginia, he even almost got
to 70 percent. Appalachia is a magnified version of the national perception.
You could say: the atmosphere of Appalachia has spread to the presidential
elections. Voters distrust their leaders, and reward outsiders.
The differences with Trump are big, but also the left wing Democrat Bernie
Sanders has booked a lot of success in Appalachia. He wins states on the East
Coast with difficulty, but relatively has much more success in the districts
which belong to the region, as in the South of Virginia, parts of Tennessee. He
goes ahead in West Virginia, which votes in may.
The political soul of Appalachia is split, publicist Sarah Jones recently wrote.
She herself is from this area, but now lives in Washington. The people in
Appalachia are looking for miracles. Like the writer of (Bible book) Psalms,
they look up at the mountains: from where can they expect help? Sure, from
god and his apostles, but maybe from the government as well.
The government, Sarah Jones writes, Is not only seen as what has caused
the crisis in Appalachia, but also as a possible solution for its problems. Time
after time the national and regional democracy didn't intervene when
necessary, or did intervene with a policy that only increased the regions
misery.
Take the coal mines for example, when there had to be intervened, like
complying with strict safety regulations, the government didn't respond. But
the same government did put a lot of effort in closing free trade agreements
like NAFTA (1994), which had devastating effects to Appalachia's mines,
factories and manufacturing industry.
Social services
These are fertile grounds for Trump. He doesn't preach the conservative
gospel of an as little as possible federal government nor low taxes like Ted
Cruz does. His message is better adjusted to the voters of Appalachia. And
with them to the voters of America of today. He combines their anger over
the government's failure with a plea for action from above. He doesn't want
to do it in a different way, he wants to do it better! The numerous social
services, not very popular among conservative hardliners, he wants to keep
intact. Many people who live in the Appalachias make use of elderly care,
social benefits or small veteran funds.

Trump strongly opposes against free trading, for the last decades an
undisputed subject for both parties. According to him the 'shipping off' of jobs
to low wage-countries has been inflicted by 'the bad deals' American
governments made with foreign trading partners. In Appalachia people pay
attention when Trump says something like that. They don't expect any
ideological quibbling, but they want an active leader who takes care of their
business.
A John Fetterman in the White House
Al Burghart is a Republican but also a passionate supporter of Democrat
mayor Fetterman. He's the hero of the working class, he says. Burghart
studied philosophy a couple years ago, and learned a lesson which also
applies to politics. In both worlds you have many different ways, which all
lead to nothing. Ideology is useless. You need leaders who understand you.
Trump is an odd duck, but someone who has practical ideas.
John Fetterman feels at home with the ideas of Bernie Sanders, they even
campaign together in Pennsylvania. I stand up against large interest
groups. He is critical about the NRA's gun lobby but does own a firearm. Just
like Trump and Sanders he is critical about free trading which according to
him Ripped this community apart. The trust of the voters depends on how
well the economy is doing here. We need policy which benefits America in the
first place.
Gisele Fetterman says change goes slowly in Braddock. Many problems are
of a structural kind, we can't just solve them. a couple of people came to live
in Braddock, like some curious hipsters. But most of the houses are so
neglected that renovating them has no use anymore. The drinking water is
polluted, the air is dirty. Residents that want to move can't move because
they can't sell their houses anymore.
Shopkeeper Al Strozier is one of the last store owners of Braddock. He sells
sodas and snacks in a small, overly packed shop. With mixed feelings he
looks at the vigor of the mayor and his wife. The Fettermans also make the
community passive, he says. They do everything for us. They arranged a
biological vegetable market, give away all kinds of stuff. But they also make
us lazy. What should we do if one day they'll go away? Then we will wait for
the next leader to come.
Primaries in five states: poverty and decline dominate
On Tuesday primaries are held in five states, all in the Northeast of the United
States. The residents of Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and
Rhode island choose their favorite presidential candidate.

There are a lot of delegates that can be won, especially in Pennsylvania and
Maryland. The day is also called 'mini-Super Tuesday'.
Donald Trump is expected to win big. The Republican front runner has a
sizeable lead on his two remaining opponents Ted Cruz and John Kasich. From
Rhode island and Delaware there are no reliable polls available. Trump needs
a big win to obtain the number of necessary delegates, which guarantees him
the nomination before the Republican National Convention in July.
For the Democrats Hillary Clinton is heading to a victory. She hopes to make a
decisive win over her opponent senator Bernie Sanders. Clinton leads with
277 delegates and also has the support of more so-called superdelegates.
Those are prominent party members who have a vote at the Democratic
National Convention.
Economic issues dominate the debate in the Northeast. The industrial decline
has caused people to move on a large scale and increased the numbers of
crime and poverty. Appalachia, the mountain belt which Pennsylvania is part
of, has met great social problems due to the recession. With illicit drugs,
cancer and heart diseases lowering the life expectancy of middle aged white
men.
In thirty years the number of suicides in the USA has never been so high.