Donald Trump’s win touches off a mix of celebration and trepidation in the Philly region

This was not the outcome that he anticipated — or in any way wanted. But on a day when the election results stimulated a mix of exuberance and trepidation throughout the region, the Rev. Cory Jones said that he and the 1,000 members of his Tabernacle Baptist Church in South Jersey had no choice but to accept them.

So while supporters of Republican President-elect Donald Trump celebrated a victory whose margin exceeded their expectations, Jones was summoning his crestfallen predominantly Black congregants to prayer.

Members of his church viewed Trump’s victory over Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris with “a profound sadness and anger and disappointment,” he said.

“We have problems with this man,” he said he told churchgoers on Sunday, “but if he is elected, all we can do is pray. There’s a power beyond him.” The Burlington church planned to hold a service Wednesday night “to let people express how they feel, and we’re going to pray.”

Across the river in Bucks County, which was poised to flip to Trump, the outcome was viewed quite differently by members of Susan Webber’s Bible study group. “Everybody was thrilled,” said Webber, who lives in Newtown. “They just thought, ‘That’s who God wants in control.’”

The emotional responses to Trump’s victory over Harris appeared to parallel the chasm between the two major parties.

In Philadelphia, where some said they stayed up until the early-morning hours and watched the results in disbelief, dozens of high school students walked out of classes to what they said was a political system that leaves them powerless, chanting, “Too young to vote, old enough to be affected.”

Some adults interviewed around the city said they feared what the next four years may bring. “Things are gonna change,” said 37-year-old Juanita Serrano, with her 9-year-old daughter, Hilda, at her side in Mayfair. “Women are not going to have the same liberties,” she said, referring to abortion rights.

At Broad and Erie, Franklin Noble, 58, said he “didn’t like at all” that Trump won a second term in office, and expressed fear over his ability to afford rent under another Trump administration.

After spending some time without housing, Noble said, he had just secured an apartment through a housing assistance program and was “trying to better himself.” Now, he’s afraid it could all go away.

“Prices are already so high, I don’t see them getting any lower under Trump,” Noble said.

Said Jones, the Tabernacle Baptist pastor, “The last four years have been very challenging for people,” and that contributed to Trump’s victory. Housing and food prices have shot up, he said, while wages have not kept pace.

“People are struggling,” he said, but added it would be wrong to put all the blame on President Joe Biden and Harris.

“I think we live in a world that doesn’t do its research and lacks critical thinking skills,” he said.

According to exit polls conducted on behalf of CNN, ABC News, and NBC News, 24% of Black men supported Trump — double the percentage who supported the Republican nominee in 2020.

But Trump’s victory, Jones said, is “hard to swallow” for some Black residents, “when you talk about things like police immunity, with a group of people that have been historically harassed.”

Trump’s victory is a source of concern in the LGBTQ community.

On a bench in South Philadelphia, Anna Farino, 34, a trans woman, said it felt like she had not stopped crying.

“I will never not be myself,” she said. “But what if I can’t get my hormones, what if I can’t get health care in general?”

“I just feel numb,” said her friend Bridget Horan, a therapist. “I feel like I am dissociating.”

Horan primarily treats low-income trans and queer people and worries about how potential funding cuts would affect patients.

But on 10th Street, the gang at Renzulli’s Twin Smoke Shoppe was celebrating Trump’s victory.

On Sunday, the shop had closed off the street for a big “Italian Americans for Trump Rally.” Now, all they could feel was pride.

“Joy,” said Gary Guaraldo, a retired Philly police officer who works as a cop at the University of Pennsylvania.

“I actually walked out my house, I told my wife, ‘The air smells sweeter.’ Because we won.”

The nearly dozen smokers filling the shop’s leather chairs and couches shrugged off Trump’s authoritarian language.

”They started it,” said Anthony Renzulli, of the Democrats. “How could you call people ‘Nazis and fascists’? It’s ridiculous.”

For 34-year-old Feme Oluko in Northeast Philly, the result was a clear disappointment — he voted for Harris and has voted for Democratic candidates all his life.

“Her policies would have benefited all the people who are suffering, poor people,” said Oluko, who moved to the United States from Haiti in the 1980s. “Trump was more of like a raging person.”

Despite his preferred candidate’s loss, the Northeast Philadelphia resident sees no path forward for the nation besides an attempt at both parties trying to get along.

“You just have to come together and unite,” Oluko said.

That means that Oluko is expecting Trump to tone down his inflammatory rhetoric, despite the former president showing no indication that he plans to do so.

He added: “It makes people angry when you talk like that.”