The Sad Legacy of a Historic (and Broken) Pier

2020 was such a disastrous year for the entire world. The pandemic was in full swing, bodies were piling up around the planet, we didn’t have a vaccine, the information was all over the place, the lockdowns were frustrating, the Trump Administration was clearly ill-prepared and just guessing, and I had lost my job, apartment, and almost all my finances throughout the nonsense. I had to get away when it was election time, because I just didn’t want to be in the same place as we were having to rely on Joe Biden to finally put a stop to the MAGA regime.

I did random research and stumbled upon a nice beach town called Lauderdale-By-The-Sea, which had a few affordable motel options close to the ocean, and best of all there was a 24-hour pier that you could spend time in. Anglin’s Fishing Pier was a nice popular destination and relaxing getaway from the chaotic scenes related to the deadly pandemic. The ocean is a great natural resource when it comes to improving your mental and physical health, and it’s a good reason why the Covid rates down here were never as strong as they should have been.

The fishing pier was extensive, the sights were amazing, the fish were plentiful, and was always a good vibe. One section appeared to be under construction. The 2020 election happened, Joe Biden won, and I made a commitment to return to the area as I enjoyed the laid-back energy and hidden restaurant gems (and Flannigans, which deserves a location in Central Florida as soon as possible).

However, my next visit had a part of the pier still closed off. The very end of the pier seemed to have suffered some damage related to a bad storm that had hit the area. You could still pay to get in, but the very end was still inaccessible. I curiously asked what appeared to be the owner about when they were going to be able to fix the end, and he mumbled frustrated words and simply said “You know, Biden…” I found that answer weird, I wasn’t sure how Biden affected a pier that clearly had been incomplete for a while despite being president for less than two years. I brushed it off, went about my day, and then started noticing some of the other changes happening in the town.

In 2020, the tiny stretch of shops and restaurants leading towards the pier and the beach didn’t have any sort of political slant. It was more friendly, more Jimmy Buffet-like. However, after Biden won, the vibes changed a little. There is now a “Trump Burger” in the oceanside restaurant adjacent to the incomplete pier (from the same owners who complained about Biden), there’s a puppy shop selling loud Trump merchandise, the small tourist trap shops were prominently putting the Trump stuff front and center. This little town was clearly making the effort to appeal to a certain base. I didn’t have access to the numbers to see if the strategy was working, but I ended up rolling my eyes a lot while traversing through the end of Commercial Boulevard.

Then came 2022.

Hurricane Nicole visited Florida and did some damage along the Atlantic coast. Flooding, high winds, dangerous waves, storm surges, and luckily for everyone it wasn’t more than a category one storm. But it did claim a couple piers, including Anglin’s Fishing Pier. The pier that had been under construction for years and had been allegedly waiting for years for the permission to even fix the area had the worst hit imaginable. The pier got split in half, the wooden floors got wrecked, and a once-beautiful sight has become an eyesore and an example of mother nature’s cruelty. I visited in 2022 and 2023, and the pier kept looking sad and abandoned, even if the rest of the beach looked beautiful (while also appearing imposing during this area’s high tides).

Four years after Nicole, not only has the pier not been repaired, but they haven’t even started. Lauderdale-by-the-Sea is already a very small beach town with literal miles of competition and surely enough as other beaches (and even other piers) fully recovered and bounced back, this small town still has a broken pier that has been connected to lost town revenue and closed businesses. April 2026 featured a particularly hostile community meeting concerning the situation, where the town leaders publicly said they don’t have the money to fix it and their options are limited since they don’t actually own the space. The actual owner is complaining that the costly reconstruction will benefit everyone much more than them, and the citizens are frustrated because they are watching the businesses close up left and right, which the town leaders partially attributed the sluggish tourism numbers to the pier’s non-existence.

I present this sad tale in my travel blog because this town is suffering the consequences from trying to appeal to the worst of people as well as emulating the vibes from the worst of people, whether it be the pier owner who has decided that every problem is attached to Dems and not Republicans, or the several shops that have decided to make Trump their primary merchandising personality. The pier owner could easily publicly request help from his MAGA friends, as Florida has been ruled by Republicans since the turn of the century. The town leaders could easily reach out to Broward County, one of the richest counties in the entire country for some financial assistance. But it feels like the broken pier is an issue that nobody wants to resolve, despite its lingering effects on the town’s economy.

It’s fascinating to see business owners on one hand thank their Republican leaders for whatever they’re supposedly doing, while on the other hand beg for help and ponder why its not coming. I witnessed this same thing happen on the other Florida coast with John’s Pass at Madeira Beach, as they had a sand problem for literal decades that only recently was finally “fixed,” but with debris still threatening the health of the region. The COVID era when everything was shut down was the perfect opportunity to fix the issue as traffic was reduced, but DeSantis instead was battling to reopen Florida in the middle of the pandemic to help his orange buddy.

Maybe the Trump stuff scared off potential returning tourists, as back in 2020 most of the people visiting the pier and fishing from the pier were Latino. Maybe the bad juju related to this white supremacist cult full of hate and selfishness convinced people within the region to head elsewhere. Not having a pier doesn’t destroy a beach town, but bad energy can. I didn’t feel as welcomed in all my visits after 2020, despite some really nice places with really nice people (shoutout to Breakaway Inn, Living Green Fresh Market, Tacocraft Taqueria, and of course, once again, Flannigans).

But it’s the sheer selfishness and unwillingness to compromise that is complicating a situation that already has tons of obstacles, financial and natural. As the fines against the owner pile up, as the pier continues deteriorating, the ocean can just as quickly deliver another nasty blow and further damage the structure. But with the town leaders, citizens, business owners, and pier owner all at odds with each other, the light at the end of the tunnel appears farther away. The pier in its current state is a great visual representation of the current state of Florida: broken, in need of fixing, but surrounded by beautiful nature that demands your respect and attention.

Lauderdale-By-The-Sea was one of the highlights in the dismally awful year of 2020. This place temporarily revived me with good food, good sights, and a welcome change of scenery after spending months hiding from a lung-threatening virus whose effects ranges from person to person. But the town over the years is facing some of the economic, political, and cultural consequences of chasing the MAGA fanbase for extra dollars.

I truly hope that this region can turn things around and find alternate ways to find the funding and resources necessary to fix a pier with decades of history and good memories. But it starts with abandoning and squashing the efforts and behaviors attached to appealing to a cult that has created the deterioration of this great, varied, but severely flawed and broken country. MAGA is not Florida, regardless of what the political leadership wants you to believe.