By Neil W. McCabe | RedState.com
Credit: photo courtesy of Brick Suit
The MAGA social media celebrity called up on stage by President Donald J. Trump at a 2018 rally told RedState when he saw South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem endorse Trump for president Friday night in Rapid City, he thought Noem gave Trump a huge boost.
“What Noem's endorsement means for Trump,” said Brick Suit, “is at a time when many Republicans may be reluctant to endorse President Trump--because of the indictments that have been leveled against him—having a high-profile governor come out and make a full endorsement is basically putting everybody on notice.”
Brick Suit said the Rapid City rally, hosted by the South Dakota Republican Party as a fundraiser, was the president’s first rally since his indictment by a Fulton County, Georgia, grand jury was released Aug. 15.
He said it was the reason he flew to South Dakota to cheer on the president.
“I just felt it was important to show continued support for him,” he said. “It wasn't going to be in the form of me just tweeting online with a fist emoji, like, still with you.”
Brick Suit said another positive about the Noem endorsement was that the governor had a political career and national profile before Trump launched his presidential campaign in 2015.
“She’s from the pre-Trump era, and there are not many politicians from the pre-Trump era who can really lay claim to the mantle of populism because that just wasn't the way things were done back then,” he said.
“You may have run on a populist platform or promises but then quickly succumbed to being another either uniparty or RINO-type operative once you got to Washington,” he said.
Brick Suit said it was the first time he watched Noem speak in person, and he was impressed with her.
“Let’s talk about technical aspects. Her tone was good, her pacing was good, her diction was good,” he said.
“She is very effective,” he said. “She’s very effective at making a connection with people, and [there was] a lot of affection for her in the crowd.”
Brick Suit said he saw many people holding up "Trump-Noem" signs as if the president and governor were already the general election ticket. It was striking that no one from the Trump team took the signs away, when people held them directly behind the president as he spoke.
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TWEET
Brick Suit @Brick_Suit
Official looking TRUMP NOEM signs in the bleachers and on the jumbotron.
Foreshadowing?
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“From my experience at many rallies that I've been to, any unauthorized signs that are produced in the bleachers behind the president when he's speaking are immediately taken away,” he said. It was as if the Trump team was cool with the Trump-Noem signs.
“Whether or not it was a Noem operative or a Noem supporter who just said: ‘I'm going to bring some of these,' and had them and handed them out, I don't know,” he said.
“I don’t know if they came from the campaign or if they came from the Trump side,” Brick Suit said.
“All I know is that after they were put up, nobody went to take them down, and so to me, it's like a validation because it wasn't corrected,” he said. “I don't know where they came from, but it was neat to see them.”
The origin story: Brick Suit has no memory of being on stage with Trump
Today, Brick Suit is one of the most recognized MAGA personalities on social media, with more than 150,000 followers on the X-microblogging platform.
Lynne Patton, a senior advisor to the Trump campaign, said he is a welcome sight whenever he is at a Trump rally or event.
“His iconic suit is not just a symbol of Trump’s historic border wall. Brick Suit, himself, represents the unprecedented and unwavering support that has galvanized and grown behind Donald Trump since the day he descended that golden escalator,” Patton said.
“That loyal support does not go unnoticed,” she said. “Brick Suit is an iconic visual reminder that re-securing the southern border will be a top priority for President Trump when he’s back in office.”
Ryan Fournier, the founder of Students for Trump, said the key to understanding his friend Brick Suit is his sincerity.
“BrickSuit is one of the most genuine people I’ve ever met. He spends his own money and time to support President Trump,” he said.
“There's many out there like him, but he's an OG from the start, and I can't think of this movement without him!” he said.
The Brick Suit said his story begins with a MAGA hat.
“In the beginning of 2018, what I like to call the great social media de-platforming took place, and you had people having their Facebook accounts, pages just deleted, Twitter accounts vanished, and YouTube channels just permanently suspended,” he said.
“Many different people disappeared during that time, and I figured: ‘If you can't have free speech on the internet, I'm going to have free speech in real life,'” he said.
“I ordered my first MAGA hat,” he said.
Brick Suit said he would wear the MAGA hat around the San Diego area, where he lived, wherever he went, farmer's markets, baseball games, and the county fair. His goal was to trigger leftists and to let people know that a Trump supporter was in their midst.
“I would have it in the car, and I'd put it on when everyone was out in public, and what I found out is that I had a lot of positive responses,” he said.
“The first time I wore it out public, I went to the most high-end mall in San Diego County, and then I decided: ‘OK, I'm hungry. I'm going to go to Cheesecake Factory,’” he said.
“I ordered a dinner, and then I'm getting ready to pay, the server says: ‘Your check’s already been taken care of,” he said. “Don’t know who did it. Never met them.”
Brick Suit said when he remembers having his bill paid anonymously, he thinks about the extreme social pressure suppressing Trump supporters.
“There are people who may be in an industry where they can't necessarily voice their support for President Trump, but my experience is that that support is out there, and they appreciate when people are being visible,” he said.
“I just want to convince people to wear their hats, wear some Trump gear, wear something that's visible that just lets people know Trump voters are in my community,” he said. “They're nice, normal people, and they're not the boogeyman that the media portrays them to be.”
Brick Suit said it was with this in mind he wanted to make a more significant statement than just a MAGA hat, for a vacation trip to Pennsylvania to attend a historical railroad meeting with his father, especially since he was meeting his father at Washington's Dulles International Airport.
Knowing Trump's wall on the Mexican border was a lightning rod issue, he searched online for a wall suit, found one, and bought it. "It's not custom-made. It's an actual, off-the-rack costume suit.”
Immediately, he was feeling the buzz the suit generated, he said.
“I'm going to the airport in San Diego. It's 2018, it's not even an election year, and I'm wearing a brick suit,” he said.
“You do it the first time; it's a little bit shocking. Now, wearing a hat alone wouldn't have that experience, but with the suit, yeah, it was a different level,” he said.
He said the second time he wore the suit was at Trump’s Oct. 31, 2018, rally in Montoursville, Pennsylvania. It was his third rally. So he had an idea how to get a seat in the front -- where Trump could see him -- just so that Trump would know he was a supporter. "It's completely unplanned. Completely unscripted.”
Brick Suit said there was no way he thought the president would call him onstage.
“I thought maybe he'd just give a point and a thumbs up; that would've been worth it. I thought that was the best that could happen,” he said.
When Trump called him up to the stage, he said he did not know what to do.
“It took me a while to realize that he was saying for me to get up there. People are pounding me on the back,” he said.
He said he started looking for the Secret Service agents and figuring out how to get to the stage. "I'm just like: ‘The president's calling me. I got to go,’ so I started hopping over the barrier.”
Brick Suit said the last thing he remembers in detail was swinging his leg over the metal barrier and being careful not to step on the flag bunting and not to fall down, as so many eyes were fixed on him.
“I don't remember anything else about that until I came off the stage,” he said. “Everything you see me do in that clip, I have no independent memory of it. Everything is just from having watched YouTube.”
Brick Suit said the entire experience is a blank for him until he remembers walking away from the stage.
“It was just like an out-of-body experience,” he said. “If you look at how I went up there and shook his hand, I put my left arm on his shoulder.”
When his brother called and told him he had put his hand on Trump's shoulder, he said it did not happen.
“I’m like: ‘No, I didn't. I just shook his hand,’" he said. Later, Brick Suit saw he really did put his hand on Trump's shoulder.
“It was like you're greeting somebody that you'd known your whole life, like an old friend or an uncle or something like that, and it was just so natural,” he said. “I was on autopilot.”
Brick Suit said people still talk to him about when Trump called him up, and he sees it as a quintessentially American political moment.
“It’s just such a touchstone of how President Trump relates to people now, that he took somebody out of the crowd and invited them on stage, and you don't see that anywhere else,” he said.
“It sure as heck not happening in a communist country or anything like that, so it's just a testament to how he relates to the American people.”
