‘Thrilled to be back’: Trump swaps courtroom for Bronx in play for Hispanic and Black voters

Even for a man known for his bombast, Donald Trump’s foray into one of the poorest, most diverse and staunchly Democratic parts of America, New York city’s South Bronx, on Thursday night was an offensive move of breathtaking audacity.

His rally in the crucible of hiphop, where 95% of the population is Black or Hispanic and where 35% live below the poverty line, was like voluntarily stepping into the lion’s den. Being Trump, he declared it a historic victory.

“When I woke up this morning I wondered whether it will be hostile or will it be friendly. It was a lovefest!” he said towards the end of his 90-minute speech.

Just a few blocks away from Crotona Park – the location of Trump’s first campaign rally in New York state since 2016 – is the congressional district of his nemesis, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Trump notoriously told AOC to “go back” to the country where she came from – a bold line to take with a woman born in the Bronx.

Yet despite arriving in a New York borough that is home to some of his fiercest critics in the Democratic party, Trump strode onto the platform on a balmy evening as though he were returning to his own personal playground. “Right here in the Bronx, I’m thrilled to be back in the city I grew up in, the city I spent my life in,” he said.

What he pointedly didn’t say was that he wasn’t just turning up in New York after a long absence. He has of course spent the best part of the past six weeks holed up in a frigid courtroom just 10 miles south of Thursday’s rally site, his eyes often closed, while a jury considers whether to convict him of falsifying business records to cover up an alleged affair with Stormy Daniels.

In five days’ time he will be back in the Manhattan criminal courthouse for closing