Pennsylvania Amish turned out in ‘unprecedented numbers’ to elect Trump after state cracked down on local farm over raw milk

Lancaster Farming reported in January that Lancaster County farmer Amos Miller was raided by the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture on January 4 following reports of illnesses traced back to raw milk. In 2022, Miller reached a deal with the federal government to avoid jail time over not complying with food safety laws.

In response, the Amish community saw the move as overreach by the government, and planned to vote for Donald Trump. Miller cited his religious beliefs for not adhering to Food and Drug Administration guidelines, and the Amish community rallied around him. A source familiar with the situation told the New York Post that the Amish began registering in "unprecedented numbers."

The source said, "That was the impetus for them to say, 'We need to participate.' This is about neighbors helping neighbors," and later added, "If you think about Amish people and their connection to nature, I mean, some of these people work in the fields barefoot to be closer to the earth." Trump went on to win the state of Pennsylvania, bringing in 50.5 percent of the votes to Kamala Harris’ 48.5 percent. In Lancaster County, Trump won with a roughly 16-point lead over Harris.

GOP groups aimed to get Amish people to the polls in the state, after Trump lost to Joe Biden in 2020 by around 81,000 votes. Jondavid Longo, the Pennsylvania director of the political action group Early Action Vote, told WHP, "You know as well as many others that typically the Amish are very isolated so they don't like to kneel with a lot of folks who they might call English, but that's why it was imperative that we were getting out to touch skin with them and hitting the ground. And we did just that."

Speaking outside the Lancaster County Board of Elections office in late October, Early Vote Action founder Scott Presler said that the number of Amish people he had helped register for 2024 was "in the thousands," Lancaster Online reported.