Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump waves to supporters during a campaign rally in Mobile, Ala., on Friday. (Brynn Anderson/AP)
MOBILE, Ala. — It was the most audacious Donald Trump spectacle yet in a summer full of them, as the Republican presidential front-runner, in his Boeing 757, thundered over a football stadium here Friday night and gave a raucous speech to one of the largest crowds of the 2016 campaign.
But Trump’s flashy performance was about more than showmanship. His visit to Alabama was coolly strategic, touching down in the heart of red America and an increasingly important early battleground in the Republican nominating contest.
The Manhattan developer, who strode onstage to “Sweet Home Alabama,” is trying to show that his candidacy has broad and lasting appeal across every region of the country — especially here in the South, where Alabama and seven other states are holding a clustered voting blitz March 1.
The scene Friday night put an exclamation point on an extraordinary run in which the flamboyant mogul has thoroughly disrupted the presidential campaign and kindled a national discussion about not just politics but American culture itself.
“We have politicians that don’t have a clue,” said Trump, wearing a red hat on which was printed “Make America Great Again,” his slogan. “They’re all talk, no action. What’s happening to this country is disgraceful.”
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