The United States Presidential election in November has been a massive topic of conversation and controversy worldwide. As many know, the original candidates were Donald Trump and Joe Biden, but when Biden stepped down and appointed Harris, many began to either support or oppose her. Several people, including myself, knew little about Vice President Kamala Harris before she became a presidential candidate. However, as people came to learn about her, they began taking sides. Many Democrats, or just opposers of Trump, planned on voting for Biden for the sole reason of preventing Trump from returning to office. Yet, when Biden’s office announced he was stepping down and Harris was stepping up, Democrats and opponents of Trump planned to vote in support of Harris herself. This situation was exactly how it was for me.
Before Harris was appointed, I didn’t consider myself very political, I just knew I didn’t support Trump becoming president. Many people think that some are only voting for Harris because she is a racial minority and a woman; however, for most people, that is not the case. Initially, I wasn’t sure because I honestly hadn’t heard great things about her and didn’t think she was relevant. Nevertheless, Harris has done an exceptional job with her campaign, especially coming into the race with only four months until the election. As I have learned more about her, I have seen how great of a president she would be.
Harris strongly advocates for oppressed groups and is passionate about women’s rights. During her time as a district attorney and attorney general in California, Harris has been an advocate for domestic violence survivors and informative on sexual assault. In 2012, she created the Human Trafficking Work Group, which discussed the growth of human trafficking crimes statewide and the challenges of addressing them effectively. She also provided many resources and guides to help companies comply with the California Transparency and Supply Chains Act, which helped combat human trafficking as well. On the topic of women, she has been a champion for women’s reproductive rights throughout her entire career. Along with women’s rights, she is an advocate for LGBTQIA+ rights in the U.S and wants to ensure that queer citizens across America are protected and treated equally. Not to mention, I find Harris to be a brilliant, compassionate, strong, and competent woman, and in my opinion, her character is very different from her opponent.
In the United States, convicted felons and criminals do not have the right to vote. However, Donald Trump is a candidate who is responsible for 34 felonies. He was found guilty of falsifying business records to conceal a $130,000 hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels to influence the outcome of the 2016 election. This was the first time a former or current United States president had been convicted of criminal charges, yet is still allowed to run again. Trump was also found liable for sexual abuse in the jury verdict Trump v. Caroll in May 2023, attempted a Muslim ban, and was responsible, on January 6th, 2021, for the attack on the United States Capitol Building in Washington, D.C in response to his defeat in the election of that year.
Based on the above information, I do not think Trump is a good person. So although many people criticize Harris’s character, claiming she's a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) candidate or that she “slept her way to the top,” even if you believe these things to be accurate, why are we not also judging Trump’s actions? In my opinion, Trump’s choices and behaviors are consistent with someone who is homophobic, xenophobic, misogynistic, narcissistic, anti-immigrant, and an overall threat to civil rights and democracy. He is a convicted felon, and while that doesn’t make his supporters any of these things, it shows that these characteristics are not dealbreakers. Donald Trump wants to set the United States back several decades and create divisiveness. Kamala Harris wants the country to move forward, and she wants to bring people together. In the words of Kamala Harris, “We are not going back.”
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