The Kamala Harris campaign has no monopoly on joy. Just ask Edward X. Young and Shelly Gray Mullinax.
Young and Mullinax met two years ago at a Trump rally and, after a whirlwind romance, the two are now engaged after not seeing each other again until September.
Young, 65, had been to 97 Trump rallies as of Oct. 17. Mullinax, 53, has attended 27.
Young, who was divorced and then widowed when his second wife died of cancer after only two years, hadn’t dated for about 18 months. Young, an actor who works as a debt release agent and is a Republican committeeman from Point Pleasant, New Jersey. She had resigned herself to being alone.
Young first spotted Mullinax at his 54th Trump rally at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Wilkes-Barre on Sept. 3, 2022. 
“She caught my eye,” he said. “It was packed, you know. But I met her, and we started chatting.” Then the rally started, and he hadn’t asked for her phone number.
“I was in the VIP section. She was in the general section,” Young said. He hoped to find her afterward but didn’t see her.
“Normally, I would have driven home to New Jersey, but I was feeling tired, so I figured, well, I’ll stay in a hotel tonight. And in the morning, I figured, I might as well get breakfast.”
His late wife, Susan, had loved Cracker Barrel restaurants, so when he spotted one he pulled in. As he was leaving, he ran into Mullinax on the porch. They sat and talked some more, and he gave her his business card. But she lived in Atlanta, and “I didn’t want to come on too strong,” he said. “I wanted to be polite. She was there with her family and friends.”
Young, a super Trump supporter, would wear a green hat to stand out in the sea of red MAGA hats. He often goes over to schmooze with the press and tout Trump. Trump’s opposition to illegal immigration attracted him to the former president, Young said, because Young was seriously injured in a car accident caused by an illegal immigrant.
He also started making TikTok videos to support Trump, and Mullinax saw those videos.
“In September, I put up a video about the September rally at the Coliseum on Long Island, N.Y.,” he said. “I jokingly said a friend and I were going to camp out in a tent.”
Shelly spotted the video and, despite not having seen Young in two years, decided to drive up. But she had her doubts along the way.
She got about 300 miles from her Calhoun, Ga., home and decided it was crazy. “It’s a guy I met two years ago,” she thought, and she turned around. Mullinax, a spiritual person, believes an angel told her to turn around again and continue the drive to Long Island.
“Nassau Coliseum is a huge arena,” said Young. He was there with his friend, Mike, and both had VIP passes. Mike told Young someone was waving at them. It was Mullinax. He told Mike to hold his seat and went over to her.
They hugged and agreed to meet at the door afterward. Again, he didn’t think of exchanging phone numbers.
“I hoped she’d wait, but the place was packed,” he said. After it ended, security guards were forcing people out, and he didn’t see her in the lobby. But once he left the building, there she was.
Mullinax said she would drive back to Georgia. Earlier, Mike had suggested they go to a Friendly’s. Young convinced Mullinax to have dinner with him. They both ordered club sandwiches and then shared a sundae.
“We were feeding each other ice cream,” he said. “When she touched my back, it felt like magic.”
As she was leaving, Young asked Mullinax if he could kiss her, and she offered her cheek. “I said, ‘I was hoping for a real kiss.’ And so she kissed me on the lips. “It was very, very nice,” he said.
From there, they met halfway at a Trump rally in Wilmington, N.C. They called and texted. She was going to head back to Georgia, but her mother told her not to because of Hurricane Helene. So she stayed a few weeks with Young in New Jersey, and they went to more rallies around the country.
Young proposed at the Oct. 9 Trump rally in Scranton, Pa. He was standing with Mullinax and talking to a journalist, Brian Glenn of Real America’s Voice, who said they seemed to be so much in love that they should get married.
“I was shocked, but I believe there were a lot of signs that God had given us,” said Mullinax about Young’s proposal. “He brought us together. I was scared but happy.”
Young went to Trump town hall in Oaks, Pa., alone because Mullinax had to return to Georgia to deal with a family issue. Mullinax, divorced and the mother of two grown children, is a breast cancer survivor. She likes Trump because he always mentions the 325,000 missing migrant children. She brings a sign to rallies to inform people about these lost children, a cause close to her heart.
“That was the passion that led me on this crusade,” said Mullinax.
Young drove to Atlanta to go with her to the rally there on Oct. 17. Then she brought him home to meet her parents for the first time.
Young hopes Trump will officiate at their wedding. Maybe at the Madison Square Garden rally on Oct. 27? Stay tuned.
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