Video of Donald Trump being applauded at the Bronx Barber Shop hits online

Video of former President Donald Trump’s visit to a New York barbershop quickly spread online Thursday afternoon. Supporters said the visit showed he was “authentic.”

The Republican presidential candidate was at the King of Knockouts barbershop in the Bronx before his Al Smith charity dinner later that evening.

According to local news reports, Trump spent about an hour in the store talking to customers and barbers while New York police and the U.S. Secret Service guarded the area.

The footage was shared on

Supporters then re-shared and liked the footage, with some commenting that he was a “man of the people.”

“He is authentic. We need a lot more of this in American politics,” one user replied.

Some believed the event was spontaneous, but owner Javiel Rodriguez told News 12 the visit took a few days to coordinate.

Barbers wore T-shirts that read “Make Barbers Great Again,” a nod to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” message often seen on promotional items.

Trump’s visit to the Bronx is not the first this election cycle. In March, he held a rally in the district where he promised to help Democratic leaders if he were elected to a second term in the White House.

“As soon as I get back in the Oval Office, I’m going to pick up the phone and call your mayor and your governor and say, ‘That’s President Trump and that’s what I want.’ “Come back and help,” Trump said at the time. He was a lifelong New Yorker until he officially relocated to Palm Beach, Florida in 2019.

His attention to New York, most recently garnered with a rally on Long Island, is unusual for a Republican candidate when the state is generally a Democratic Party stronghold.

The state has voted blue in the last nine presidential elections, and Trump lost in both 2016 and 2020 by a margin of about 33 percent.

Castle Hill, the neighborhood Trump visited on Thursday, is within New York’s diverse 14^Th Congressional district, currently represented in the House of Representatives by Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

It has had a Democratic Party representative since 1926 and has voted blue in at least the last six presidential elections.

For much of the 2024 campaign, President Joe Biden and then Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, overtook Trump nationally, but there are some areas that lean Republican, particularly in rural areas outside the city.

Trump was scheduled to travel to the city for Al Smith’s charity dinner, where, as is customary with presidential candidates, he would be the keynote speaker. Harris said she would not attend the event in person to continue campaigning, but did share a recorded video message that will be played by organizers.