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Area family takes part in Trump rally

Amy Ones called it an opportunity that shouldn't have been passed up by anyone.

5/31/16 (Tue)

Political experience for the kids... Grace and Brooks Ones skipped their last day of school to be at the Donald Trump rally in Bismarck Thursday. Their mother, Amy Ones, said she was happy to see a large number of children at the rally and that the parents are educating them on democracy and how voting works. The kids' grandmother Alexis Huff snapped the picture before the rally began.

By Marvin Baker

Amy Ones called it an opportunity that shouldn't have been passed up by anyone.

Ones, a Kenmare-area accountant, along with her children Grace and Brooks and her parents Alexis and Dennis Huff of Donnybrook, attended the Donald Trump rally in Bismarck Thursday. Trump is a New York businessman who is running for president in November.

He is the Republican nominee for president and was the keynote speaker at the Williston Basin Petroleum conference.

Ones said whether you like Trump or not, anytime we have a chance to see a presidential candidate we should seize the opportunity because North Dakota is often overshadowed in the national scheme of things.

“I was glad I went,” she said. “It’s not something to bypass when a presidential candidate comes to town. We don’t really get to take opportunities like this.”

The atmosphere was one of enthusiasm, according to Ones. She said she got in line at 9 a.m. for the 1 p.m. rally and chatted with others in line and everyone was cordial. At 10 a.m., Secret Service agents opened the doors and at that time, Ones said the line of people stretched three blocks from the Bismarck Event Center where the rally was held.

She noted a disabled man was allowed to slip into the line and there were no negative comments about it. She said he would have never made it into the rally in time had he been at the end of the line

Ones got into the building early and saved seats for her parents and children. She said her kids brought flags to wave, but the Secret Service required them to remove the flags from wooden dowels used to wave the flags. But the kids were allowed to take the flags into the building.

She said there was definitely a police presence, from the Secret Service to bomb-sniffing dogs to the Bismarck Police Department.

There were also protestors and Ones said they were all very civil and nobody got arrested and there were no hecklers in the crowd.

She was pleased to see a North Dakota crowd of more than 7,000 acting civil and professional even though Trump was about an hour late for his speech because of a news conference that brought media from around the world to Bismarck.

Some of them included Time magazine, FOX news, CNN, the Wall Street Journal, the Daily Mail, a London newspaper, and the Sydney Morning Herald from Australia.

“Everybody got up and cheered when he came in,” Ones said of Trump. “He was much more polished than on TV. The first half of his speech was a lot of facts and figures about energy and how we can eliminate the red tape.”

She said he was using teleprompters, at least for the first half hour and during the second half hour was more himself and strayed off topic occasionally to bash Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton.

Trump also said a couple of things that seemed to really resonate with the crowd.

“He said he heard in the morning that North Dakota put him over the top (in delegates to reach the nomination),” Ones said. “It’s nice to see him recognize North Dakota like that.”

She also paraphrased Trump from his speech.

“‘We love our farmers and we love agriculture,”’ she said. “It was nice he said that. It was one of the first things he said.”

According to Ones, the speech really focused on putting America first and putting people before government.

Ones is hoping Trump comes back to North Dakota sometime before November to acknowledge that North Dakota sealed the deal for him.

Some of the key points during the speech included:

• Energy regulations would be worse than they are now under a Hillary Clinton presidency and that she wants to abolish the 2nd Amendment.

• He talked about building a wall on the Mexican border, but didn’t offer specifics on how that will be accomplished.

• Trump talked about getting rid of Islamic terrorists and stated “We’re going to knock the hell out of ISIS.”

• He talked about Bill Clinton and that NAFTA was the worst trade deal ever signed.

• Trump said he will make the Keystone XL pipeline happen and the U.S. should get revenue from Trans Canada for using eminent domain to build the pipeline across four states. “Without the United States, the pipeline would not exist.”

“I was surprised by the use of teleprompters but he still spoke his mind and I was happy with the outcome,” Ones said. “And I was happy to see the number of kids who were there. You have to commend people for taking the time to educate their kids on democracy and how voting works and not writing them off. They still have opinions.”

She added that it was good to see people taking the time during this election cycle to get involved and noted the stark contrast in attendance from Thursday and a Bernie Sanders rally that brought 2,000 to downtown Bismarck less than two weeks ago.

“Don’t complain about the president if you don’t vote,” Ones said. “Just get out and vote.”

Ones believes Trump’s rise to popularity has to do with the fact that his comments are not calculated. The American public is looking to move away from that status quo and Ones concluded voters are liking that change.

“I like Trump because he’s not a politician,” Ones said. “Politics is not a career choice and he doesn’t have to answer to lobbyists.” ... Read EVERY WORD on EVERY PAGE of The Kenmare News by subscribing--online or in print!