In Pennsylvania, a crucial state in the race for the White House, Democrats are trying to appeal to the large Polish diaspora by emphasizing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military threat to Europe.
But in the Polish-American community outside Philadelphia, many immigrants whose families fled communism prefer Republican Donald Trump.
Jolanta Gora, who arrived in the United States 32 years ago, said her heart aches over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and she believes Trump, with his transactional approach and tough posture, is best equipped to help settle the conflict.
“I think that Trump is the only person who can actually negotiate with Putin to end this war,” said Gora, a fiftyish administrator at a physician’s office.
Earlier this week, Polish President Andrzej Duda paid a visit to a Polish-American Catholic shrine in Doylestown near Philadelphia and unveiled a monument to Poles who fought the communist regime.
Trump, an ally of the conservative Polish leader, had also been slated to appear but the plan fell through.
Duda urged attendees to cast their ballots in the November 5 vote, but Gora, who came to the unveiling with a friend, needed no reminding as she waved a “Trump 2024” flag.
“I do remember the old times in Poland, when I grew up and the communist government was ruling our lives. We don’t want this in Pennsylvania. We don’t want this in America,” Gora told AFP.
“That’s why, as a Polish-American citizen, I’m voting for Trump.”
Targeted advertising
In an election likely to be decided by a razor-thin margin in a handful of key states including Pennsylvania, Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris is not overlooking the Polish-American community, making sure to appeal to them during her debate with Trump earlier this month.
“Why don’t you tell the 800,000 Polish-Americans right here in Pennsylvania how quickly you would give up for the sake of favor, and what you think is a friendship, with what is known to be a dictator who would eat you for lunch?” Harris said.
One Harris campaign ad appears to specifically target Polish-American voters.
The 30-second clip published on social media features an excerpt from a speech in which then-president Trump tells a NATO ally that if it doesn’t contribute more, the United States won’t protect it from Russia.
“No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want,” he says.
Then, a voiceover says that Harris will “defend our brave allies for their freedom.”
“That is really the first time that a presidential candidate has done direct targeting to the Polish community,” said Maureen Pikarski, a Polish-American lawyer who helped create the ad campaign.
‘Very concerned’
In 2020, Joe Biden beat Trump in Pennsylvania by roughly 80,000 votes.
Today, the estimated eight million Polish-Americans in the US appear evenly split between Harris and Trump, Pikarski said.
Dominik Stecula, a political science professor at Ohio State University who studies the Polish diaspora, said the candidates are not aiming to lock in the entire Polish-American vote but to win over as many independents as possible.
“It’s just a strategy… to secure a few more voters in the key electoral parts of the country and, even within the states, the very specific counties that are very important,” Stecula said.
That is crucial in the so-called swing states which are expected to play a decisive role in November, including Wisconsin, where 7.7 percent of the population is of Polish ancestry, in Michigan, with 7.2 percent, and in Pennsylvania, with 5.5 percent.
Timothy Kuzma, president of the Polish Falcons of America, a diaspora organization, said he was moved by Harris’s debate performance.
“We are very concerned about what’s happening in Ukraine,” Kuzma told AFP. “It’s important to Poles, because they don’t want a Russian-controlled Ukraine sitting on their border.”
Kuzma was happy to see Harris single out the Polish-American community in her speech.
“In a state like Pennsylvania, where you have a large Polish population,” a swing of even 5,000 votes can make a difference, he added.
“So it can be an enormous game changer.”
