This is The New Yorker Radio Hour with a special preview.

I'm Deborah Treesman, fiction editor at The New Yorker.

George Saunders is known for his short stories.

He's the author of the collection's 10th of December in Persuasion Nation, Pastoralia, and others.

Many of his stories deal with characters who are economically or socially or ethically on the margins of American life, who feel anxious

about their prospects, people who might, in real life, be fans of Donald Trump. So we asked Saunders

to take on a non-fiction assignment for the magazine, reporting from Trump's campaign trail.

Saunders attended rallies and events around the country, listening to speeches and talking

with both supporters and protesters, and he recorded some of his encounters.

Trump is racist, so are you. Trump is racist, so are you. Trump is racist. So are you. Trump is racist. So are you. So are you. So, George, that clip we just heard came from a video you took at one of the Trump rallies you attended.

Can you set the scene for us a little?

Yeah, I'm just having a flashback. I have to take a little moment.

Yeah, now this was, I think, outside the convention center in Tucson.

And that's the rally where the guy in the clan robe got punched in the head.

So I think that was, as the rally was letting out, and the game is kind of that the protesters will set up as closer they can around the doorway, so that as the Trump people come out, there's this kind of river and riverbank sort of confrontation that happens. So that, I think that's what we're hearing

there. But I think it becomes a bit of performance art. You know, if I can provoke you into saying

something really rude to me or pushing me or hitting me, then I have a sense that that's going to go

on the news that night. So to a certain

extent, it's performance. And if when you actually look at it, you know, if you could sort of pan out,

85% of the people are sitting there checking their phones or making plans for lunch. And then

somewhere over here, two people are suddenly fighting. And then the whole rally goes over there.

And everybody's filming everybody, filming everybody else.

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