Donald Trump Opens Campaign Office on South Street
The front window of the Trump campaign office on South Street. | Photo: Dan McQuade
South Street is a legendary Philadelphia street. It’s home of everything from high schoolers exploring downtown for the first time to young men blasting tunes and yelling at women. It’s the home of a solid cheesesteak rivalry (Jim’s vs. Ishkabibbles) and a concert venue that’s hosted everything from rap and rock shows to little person wrestling. It’s home to Fat Tuesday and a 24-hour diner and actually is kind of upscale now on the other side of Broad Street. It’s also now home to a Donald Trump campaign office.
The office, which is between 8th and 9th streets, sprouted up sometime in the last week or so. A worker inside, who did not give his name, said it was Trump’s second office — the first is in Northeast Philadelphia. It’s full of Trump lawn signs and other campaign paraphernalia. The worker told me no one from the campaign was yet ready to talk about the field office. Messages sent to the Trump campaign were not returned.
Trump’s office is in an old hair salon that’s mostly been vacant in the past decade. It’s between Schell Street and a quality (if pricey) iPhone repair shop.
On the campaign trail, Trump occasionally calls for his opponent to be jailed, though this is the first time I’ve ever seen a campaign field office literally say the opponent in the race should be in prison. His campaign store sells products like a “Guilty as Hill” t-shirt and a t-shirt featuring a drawing of a jumpsuit in old-timey black and white prison stripes.
Pennsylvania may be a state Trump needs to win to capture the election, but Hillary Clinton leads, 46 percent to 41 percent, in the latest RealClearPolitics polling averages. FiveThirtyEight gives Clinton a 69 percent chance of winning the state.
