The unlikely election of Donald Trump as President of the United States has created nationwide controversy, even leading Green Party candidate Jill Stein to call for a recount of the votes. Local students, meanwhile, remain sharply divided as to President-Elect Trump’s merit as a leader. Senior Sarah Pouladdej, for example, claimed to still be in the process of recovering from the sheer surprise of the results.
“[When the results were announced] I just went numb for 24 hours,” Pouladdej said. “I’m honestly trying not to think about it.”
In an unexpected turn of events last seen with George W. Bush’s narrow victory over Al Gore in 2000, Trump won the election despite his opponent, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, receiving over 2 million more votes. His victory is attributable to the electoral college system, in which he received 290 electoral votes compared to Clinton’s 230. This unusual circumstance has led some to call for the abolition of the electoral college in future elections, with the most radical protesters even contesting the validity of Trump’s election and advocating complete vote recounts.
“When one of the candidates wins the popular vote, the person who wins the election… should not be the person who came in second place,” senior Max Faddick simply stated. “That’s about all I have to say about that.”
Other students, however, possess equal levels of enthusiasm for the other side of the debate.
“I’m pretty optimistic,” senior Vincent Milam said. “I think people are judging him a little too quickly… give him a chance, he could save America.” Milam, a long-time supporter of Trump, went on to compare the future president’s unconventional qualifications to those of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan. “Despite him having an acting background, I think he did a pretty good job. This could probably be the same.”
It should be noted that these represent only the most coherent of the interviews conducted by The Sage. Many more individuals at all points on the political spectrum responded entirely in the form of inarticulate screaming, or comments regarding their political opponents that were too profane for publication.
It remains to be seen whether American citizens will be able to reunify after such a divisive election cycle, but the president-elect himself appears optimistic.
“Now it’s time for America to bind the wounds of division,” Trump declared in his victory speech Nov. 9. “To all Republicans and Democrats and independents across this nation, I say it is time for us to come together as one united people.”
Darius Rahmanian ◊ Dec 7, 2016 at 6:27 pm
This is a really well written article Zach. You missed though, the massive back lash and flame wars started on Instagram. This article kind of downplays how much of an issue at our school the election has become. Students straight up crying and demanding teachers to tell others not to talk about it is downright against free speech. I did enjoy the fact that you kept it unbiased to the point where it was an actually good article. Other than Sam’s on politics you probably have the best one so far. Students have begun outright just wearing liberal/ conservative propaganda(less on the conservative side though). Seeing a student wearing a sign that says ” The color of your skin does not not denominate your worth” is good in principle but only serves to stoke the flames of arguments and not intellectual debates. ON the side of the conservatives, kids saying racially charged sayings(but for only like 3 seconds) has really pissed off the left. Personally I think the Sage could do an excellent job of covering the students reactions if the articles went a little bit more in depth. Still, good job on the article and adding one more non biased liberal fest to the site.
Sam Bodnar ◊ Dec 7, 2016 at 9:05 pm
Thank you so much for the feedback and for continuing to read “The Sage”