Eric Gay/AP Photo
The Washington Nationals celebrate with the trophy after Game 7 of the World Series against the Houston Astros, October 30, 2019, in Houston.
There are a host of reasons why the World Champion Washington Nationals should blow off President Trump’s invitation to come to the White House on Monday: his racism, his nativism, the threat he poses to American democracy—you know the drill.
But there’s another reason peculiar to the Nats: Their fans loathe Trump. In the 2016 presidential election, Trump received a trace-level 4 percent of the vote within the District of Columbia, and in the two Maryland counties bordering the District—Montgomery and Prince George’s—he received 19 percent and 8 percent, respectively. In the three Virginia counties bordering D.C., Trump won 18 percent in Alexandria, 17 percent in Arlington, and 29 percent in Fairfax. Trump’s total vote in all those counties plus the District came to 329,419; the total number of votes cast in those jurisdictions was 1,928,810—which is to say, Trump won a bare 17 percent of the 2016 vote in the D.C. metro area.
We have no data on how many of those 83 percent of Washingtonians who didn’t vote for Trump actively loathe him, but my hunch is that the percentage is notably high, even without factoring in those who didn’t vote in 2016 but hate him nonetheless. The fans that attended Game 5 and chanted “Lock him up” when Trump was introduced to the crowd merely reflected the prevailing local sentiment.
Never mind the questionable morality of celebrating the World Series victory with this dangerous, bigoted narcissist of a president. After a hard look at those numbers, no marketing executive would tell the Nats to show up.
