'MAGA junkie' turns against Trump in my Appalachian hometown because of DOGE; Mocking her doesn't help our cause

Parkersburg, West Virginia is making national headlines due to MAGA people seeing the light because of DOGE cuts. We should be encouraging this.

I had planned to write about the UAW contract bargaining at the Chattanooga Volkswagen plant, and likely still will later in the week, but this story was too timely and close to home to ignore.

A self-described “MAGA junkie” sees the light after losing her job

Maybe I’m more sensitive to this story because it’s from my hometown, but I’d like to think I’m pretty consistent on this topic over time. I recently wrote about how the made-up DOGE committee’s very real cuts were hitting the Bureau of Fiscal Service in my hometown of Parkersburg, WV.

The dust has settled a bit since that news broke, and we’re starting to hear stories from some of the people who lost their jobs due to those cuts. As I correctly pointed out,¹ it wouldn’t just be a bunch of left-wingers who lost their jobs — the BFS employed people that represented the electorate at large.

A self-confessed ’MAGA junkie’ from a red-voting city devastated by Department of Government Efficiency firings has said she regrets voting for Donald Trump. In the lead-up to the election in November last year, Jennifer Piggott, from Parkersburg, West Virginia, flew a Trump flag outside her house.

Pigott said she cried after she was axed. “I was a MAGA junkie, a MAGA junkie who thought her government job would be safe with Donald Trump in office. I cried. It’s scary, you know, it’s a really scary thing, and I was embarrassed,” she said.

Piggott and her colleagues were let go based on alleged poor performance. But in her final review just 21 days before she was axed, Pigott, who has voted for Trump in the last three elections, got “the highest rating you can get on review,” she told CNN.

She added that she now “regrets” voting for Trump. “To cut the knees out of the working-class Americans just doesn’t make sense to me. I expected more from President Donald Trump,” she said.

Her woes have not stopped. Pigott, who has spoken to the national press about the issue before, has been targeted by vandals and has even received death threats since speaking out.

I can empathize with her situation while also feeling frustrated by how she voted

I want to be very clear: I’m not explaining away or making excuses for how anyone votes by writing this. But if you live in a “red state” or have family that are conservative/MAGA/Republicans, then you know exactly what I mean when I say you have complex relationships with people you know and love who voted for Donald Trump.

I don’t care how hardcore MAGA you are, I’m not advocating for you to lose your job.

I empathize with what this woman went through because I recently lost my job due to extremely unfair circumstances last year. I know how terrible it feels to be without work, especially when you are struggling to get by and the job market is shit. And believe me, in Parkersburg, the job market is shit. Working for the BFS was a stable job that paid well, and that’s extremely hard to come by in Parkersburg. I genuinely feel bad for her and her colleagues, who are now in an extremely difficult situation because of an out-of-touch billionaire who only cares about making himself more money.

Credit: Reuters

The left has treated this as a dunking opportunity. That’s a mistake.

Obligatory statement: this is not a “when they go low, we go high” mentality I’m advocating for.

It’s extremely counter-productive to spend time tearing apart the people who aren’t the ones causing harm.

This was a big, important step that Jennifer took.

Jennifer Piggott is facing death threats by speaking out against Donald Trump. As someone very familiar with Parkersburg, I cannot imagine the kind of social out casting happening to her right now. Parkersburg is an extremely conservative community, and the MAGA movement has a very cultish following outwardly and online. What she did was very brave.

Now, many have pointed out that had she not lost her job, she would very likely still be on the MAGA train and there would have been no self-reflection. Fair. But humans are first, and foremost, motivated by self-interest.² How else would you expect someone’s mind to change?

I’m not saying you have to agree with me, but I personally don’t care how someone gets to the point where they reject the MAGA movement and Donald Trump, I just care that they get there at this point. We can’t go back in time and change their votes. I am not compromising any of MY values by saying to someone like Jennifer Piggott, “I am grateful to you for speaking out against Donald Trump and DOGE.”

People need to feel empowered to go against social stigma

So when people on the left, who I believe genuinely want to stop a fascist takeover of our government, are celebrating this woman’s firing with a “FAFO!” and a “You got what you voted for!”, I do find it offputting.

I get the inclination from an emotional standpoint. Genuinely, I do. I understand the frustration, and I’d be lying if I wasn’t emotionally there with them at certain points.

But here is my final two cents on the matter.

I know it may seem like I’m fixating on internet comments, but they do in fact matter to a certain extent when it comes to stuff like this. For every Jennifer Piggott that exists — someone who lives in a deeply MAGA community willing to risk public exile to speak out against Donald Trump, there are easily 5-10x that amount of people thinking of doing that but unwilling to risk being a social pariah in their community. And places like Parkersburg are SMALL communities.

They need to see that there are people that will support them doing so. If everyone — from all sides of the political spectrum, is dunking on them and shitting on them — what incentive is there for them to come out publicly against anything that Donald Trump does?

If you truly believe that Trump is the threat to the government that, for all of its flaws, does do a ton of important shit, hopefully you’ll consider this.

(I created a Spotify playlist for this Substack where I’ll add weekly listen music each week. Follow it if you use Spotify)

This week, I’m listening to Jason Isbell. While he clearly needs no introduction, he is an iconic rock legend from Northern Alabama who previously played with the Drive-by Truckers and has had an incredible solo career that has spanned several decades.

Jason Isbell is one of those artists that you have to be in the right emotional state to listen to at times, because a lot of his music cuts incredibly deep from the heart (just listen to the song “Elephant” and try not to cry if you don’t believe me).

But the reason I’m bringing him up this week is because of my favorite song of his, “TVA.”³ It’s a bit cheesy, but I’ve been listening to this song recently because it reminded me of FDR’s New Deal and how it brought so many people — included my Syrian great-grandfather — out of poverty.

Jason Isbell has a new song called “Foxes in the Snow”, and it’s available here if you want to buy it and support the artist directly.

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1. From my linked post: “Fiscal Service isn’t an agency populated by left-wing moonbeam socialists, y’all. I genuinely wonder how people in the city will react to seeing many peoples lives be upended by these latest firings. I know that this has shaken the city quite a bit.”

2. Stop everything you’re doing if you think otherwise and try to respond to this with something other than “I” or “me”

3. Technically a cover of the Drive-by-Truckers song. I know I’ll get shit on if I don’t make that distinction.