Canada gainer pushes everywhere in the valley like garlands attached to the rock. The brilliant shine of its leaves, as pink as pepto bismol tablets, contrasts with the dark melancholy of the Cumberland mountains in this misty region of the Appalachians, in the south of the Virginia-Western. 300 km west of Washington, everything seems abandoned. From War to Mullens, in what was once the mining pride of the whole country, Route 52 which winds along the Tug Fork river, is only the bodied path of a brick and jail cemetery. At the age of industrial glory, with these declining coal hills, fuel of factories that are now missing.
Houses collapsed as if missiles had perforated them, American cars out of age, giant liners of Interstates When Detroit still produced it, rotting in mud, like abandoned toys, shops with empty windows – we no longer even bother to resell them – hotels with windows made by boards … The County of McDowell, would like to believe that Trump, with customs duties, by dint of protectionism, can revive the Made in USA. In other words: that it resuscitates America!
The roads of social misfortune
McDowell is a sick territory. More than a third of its inhabitants live below the poverty line. The average income is twice as high as in the rest of the United States. Life expectancy is the lowest in America: 63.5 years for men, 71 years old for women, the equivalent of that of Congo or Haiti. In 1950, the population was just over 100,000 inhabitants, against 17,000 today. The decline turns to decomposition.
We trust the instinct of the “president businessman”
As in any economically sick in America, the rare commercial brands that hold the blow are called Dollar General or Dollar Tree. We see their yellow trucks crisscrossing these roads with social misfortune and pouring their products made in China: electronics, clothes, toys at broken prices. Dollar General makes those who count in yuan. THE Made in USA has disappeared. In Mullens, in the neighboring county of Wyoming, Patrick holds the dark counter of one of these discounters. For some time now, he has seen some customers scrolling through “Stocks after Trump’s announcements, even if for the moment prices have not really moved”. Customs duties on all that the small hands of the Middle Empire make 145 %, the few consumers are frightened. Patrick welcomes the voluntarism of the president: “Trump dares!” I just heard that Nissan was going to repatriate part of his factories to set up a production line in Illinois. This is good news! »» In the midst of a pricing war, and despite the 90 -day break decreed by Trump (except China), local radios disseminate ads for automobile dealers between two country pieces. “Here, we still have stock, and the prices are still displayed with the old customs duties! »» is the message that comes up most often on the air. The second -hand market is in Cran: good deals have become rare and the ratings jumped in front of the procrastination of Washington and Wall Street.
Far from the coastal mega-cities and the winners of globalization, the inhabitants of McDowell are however not in speculation: having often lost everything, even their illusions, they do not have much to win. Truth in New York is not truth in the Appalachians. Welch, the county capital, was once nicknamed the “little Manhattan”. Its main avenue overflowed with theaters, cinemas, chic restaurants. The elders remember that Welch was the first American city to build a storey parking lot. Today, this building rots on site. John F. Kennedy had campaigned there in 1960: the Blue Cols still voted democratic, from the time when protectionism and industrial patriotism were values defended by the American left against the Republicans of Barry Goldwater-then, later, of Ronald Reagan-supporters of free trade.
Sixty years later, McDowell votes Trump. Massively: 80 %, last November. The wooden houses still display their slogans in favor of the Republican. “Keep on Truckin ‘”“Keep the course”, has become “Keep on Trumpin ‘”. And it doesn’t matter that this CAP, in customs, sometimes changes overnight. In the county, we trust the instinct of the “president businessman”.
On April 8, in the middle of the stock market marasm, Trump signed a series of decrees aimed at relaunching the coal industry, classifying fuel in the category of critical minerals for national security and justifying its decision by increased electricity demand for artificial intelligence data centers. But also by the revival of the steel industry: if America is reaping, from A to Z, its Buick and its Jeep, it will need steel. And therefore the anthracite of Welch, as in the good old days of the “Little Manhattan”.
Residents’ hope to revive “Little Manhattan”
Here, we do not settle in the corner by love at first sight for the beauty of the landscapes. There are a few tourists to practice the “Urbex”: but this leisure, almost morbid, has not resurrected the county. The inhabitants are those who have not left. As rooted in this rust scar that is the Rust Belt, they challenge, day by day, boredom, the spectacle of the rubble of the past, but also the idea that everything is damn. “Whatever you think of customs duties and the policy implemented, this debate also echoes a real need for pride here, as if we had forgotten that it was good to be proud”said Jennifer Justice, director of the McDowell Tourist Office.
The return of the made in the USA
On Wyoming Street, a few steps from the abandoned premises of the last local daily newspaper, the Welch Newsstands the Jack-Caffrey cultural center, named after a local figure in the steel industry. The place looks like the conservatory of a missing world, a kind of Jurassic Park of the Made in America. “Here, the helmets that minors wore. There, their front lamps … And you see, these metal boxes, it is in there, for example, that my mother put my father’s lunch ”explains Jennifer, with a touch of emotion. On all artifacts, the mention “Made in the USA”. We ask him the question: “When did you last saw this registration on a product that you recently bought? »» She hesitates. “Honestly, I don’t know. »»
Under Trump II, whole America finally dares to ask the question. And open your eyes. Chaotic or not, Trump’s customs policy has had the merit of putting the question of industrial survival at the center of the interest of policies. Even if the United States lives “Some painful moments like a patient who has just undergone an operation”to use the metaphor used by Trump. In this tired city setting, Mary Evans holds a stuffed animal business on the premises of the insurance office that her late husband held. “When I heard about customs duties, I watched the labels … and all my bears, even those disguised as Americans, are made in China! I said to myself: well, a plush at 20 dollars will therefore be billed 40 dollars. We will see if Trump maintains this decision. He is someone intelligent, rational. He knows where he’s going “said this septuagenarian who, in 2026, will close her shop where no one goes by almost no longer. As with millions of his compatriots, his immediate concern is more earth: “I had a little apprehension for my Mercedes. A German car is expensive to maintain, especially with 350,000 miles on the clock. But I learned that it was made of Alabama! Like what, it’s possible! »»
Even fentanyl is Chinese
For the moment, Trump has spared Europeans, granting them a respite. In this Rust Belt, we never evoke the old continent as a rival power. It is China that nourishes resentments. The county of McDowell has the fifth highest rate of overdose deaths in the country. In Welch, at any time of the day, it is not uncommon to meet these zombies which barely hold on their legs. Fentanyl, opiate that passes through the Mexican border, is most often a Chinese product. By drastically increasing customs duties, Trump also threatens Beijing who, according to him, does nothing to stop this flow. As if the Chinese threat, in addition to winning the country’s industry, carried in its path the last souls who populate the Rust Belt
