READING, Pa. — Danny Natal wasn’t always a Republican.

But as the 55-year-old, dressed in MAGA red from the belt up, waited in line outside Reading’s Santander Arena hours before former President Donald Trump held a rally there Wednesday night, he described feeling abandoned by the Democratic Party.

“They’re shipping money out to Ukraine, all these other countries, billions of dollars,” said Natal, a Reading native who is Latino. “They’re not taking care of their own.”

Reading is more than two-thirds Latino, one of several cities in the “222 corridor,” including Allentown and Hazelton, that have seen rapidly growing Hispanic populations, a demographic that Trump has shown surprising strength with. Although Reading is still overwhelmingly Democratic, Trump improved his performance there in 2020, and he’s hoping that continued gains will allow him to win Pennsylvania and defeat Vice President Kamala Harris.

President Joe Biden took 72% of the vote in Reading in 2020, while Hillary Clinton won 78% in 2016. In 42 of Reading’s 44 precincts, Trump earned more votes in 2020 than he did in 2016, according to an Inquirer analysis of election results. And in 38 precincts, Biden earned fewer votes than Clinton.

Even Trump’s anti-immigration platform, once thought to be anathema to Latinos, has found some appeal among voters who want more newcomers to follow the the legal entry and naturalization process.

“I don’t mind anyone coming into our country, but go about it the right way,” said Natal, an operations manager at a local college. “There’s a process.”

Earlier in the day, Trump held a rally in Scranton, Biden’s hometown. Trump did little to tailor his rally routine for either of his Keystone State audiences on Wednesday.

He did not acknowledge Biden’s history in Scranton during his speech there. And in Reading, a city where even many conservative voters have a positive view of immigrants, Trump repeated his usual tirade of comments about immigrants “invading” the country and lies about Venezuelan gangs taking over apartment buildings in Aurora, Colp.

“They came from places all over the world into your cities and small towns, changing them forever, and, I have to say, ruining them,” Trump said, “ruining your cities and towns, including murderers, drug dealers, gang members, people from mental institutions and insane asylums, human traffickers and women.”

Despite Trump’s 2020 gains in Reading, many local Democrats believe he has reached his high-water mark of support among Latino voters.

“In Reading, it’s mostly Harris supporters,” said Sophia Medina, a Reading native who is Latina and Black. “She’s for women.”

Medina, 39, was among a small group of Harris supporters who gathered Wednesday outside the Santander Arena to protest Trump’s event.

“They talk about (Harris’) record and everything,” said Medina, motioning to the lines of Trump supporters that stretched in columns along a downtown street police had closed off to traffic. “But he’s a felon.”

Medina said many Latinos in Reading were living in a low-information environment and were relatively tuned out to the larger political themes of the Trump campaign.

“The people I know that’s voting for Trump are voting because he gave them a stimulus check,” she said. “It has nothing to do with him.”

Instead of a red wave in Reading on Nov. 5, Medina worries that some Latino voters could simply fail to turn up at all and cost Harris critical support.

“You’ve got so many people who say their votes don’t count,” Medina said. “But if you’ve got 1,000 people who don’t do it, that’s a thousand votes we don’t have.”

Craig Mutschler, a 38-year-old from Williamsport who works in Pennsylvania’s fracking industry, used to be a Democrat but said his support for Trump comes easily. He criticized Harris, who in 2020 said she would ban fracking but has since backed off that position.

“She’s going back and forth,” Mutschler, who identifies as mixed race, said at the Reading rally. “The inconsistency — I’m not okay with it.”

Earlier in the day during his Scranton rally, Trump made no mention of Biden’s ties there, but he did run through the Pennsylvania-specific talking points he’s made on frequent recent visits to the state, including his vow to “frack, frack, frack.”

The Electric City has become a hub for politicians to try to prove their working-class bona fides, from Hillary Clinton in 2016 to Biden, who built his political brand around his early life there. Some attendees raised “Scranton firefighters for Trump” signs about an hour into Trump’s speech as he mentioned his support among rank-and-file union members.

In his speech, Trump discussed the Homer City Generating Station, a coal power plant in Indiana County that closed in 2023. Trump told the plant hang on until he is elected, implying he’d somehow reopen it.

“Today I make the promise, Pennsylvania, to stop the energy price hikes,” he said. “I will stop the plant closures immediately.”

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