Staff Editorial: Trump elicits strong feelings from young voters

Donald Trump has become the face of controversy across the nation. Supporters and antis alike, he is currently one of the most talked about people. Trump is known to be an extremist. And, of course, his supporters are, too.

Current polls show that although Hillary Clinton is in the presidential lead, Trump has 41.8 percent of America’s votes. This scares a lot of antis. Talking to an average person about Trump, most get a negative response, especially coming from young adults, the next generation who’s votes count arguably the most.

Will Trump's ideas negatively affect society?

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A study by Harvard’s Institute of Politics found that when surveying a group of people under 30, 61 percent said they would vote for Clinton, and 25 percent for Trump.

Trump’s ideology scares millions. Women, people of color, the LGBT community, and other minorities are especially scared, since the laws that Trump wants to enforce will affect them the most.

In fact, an online poll of 5,478 voters taken after the first presidential debate revealed that 53 percent of women are scared for the election thus far, compared to 37 percent of men.

Junior Clara Marker said, “I think women and people of color will definitely be negatively affected by most of Trump’s ideas.  I think white, rich entitled men, just like Trump, will be affected positively.”

Slowly but surely, Trump’s ideals are becoming a large part of today’s society. He stays trending on basically every social media site, and is currently the fourth most talked about person, according to curiousityhuman.com.

High school students are particularity terrified of Donald Trump’s stances. With juniors and seniors planning their futures, the majority of them are at least thinking of attending college. Trump’s plan for college students is in the gray area, for he hasn’t expressed his opinion on either decreasing, increasing, or keeping college prices the same too much. Many people do not think that Trump wants to do anything about college prices.

“It definitely scares me because I plan on going to college, and the idea of being in debt for the rest of my life is very stressful, so the fact that he doesn’t want to do anything to fix this problem in our country is very disquieting,” Junior Flora Sherr-Nelson said.

Many students at school prefer Clinton to Trump at school; and around half believe that Trump supporters are mainly voting for him because they are Republicans who are voting for him by default and choose to ignore his policies. On the contrary, some students, based on their experiences feel that Trump supporters like him for his policies, not necessarily because he is the default Republican.

“People like the fact that he is not a politician, as he doesn’t ‘play the game’ and he voices their exact concerns bluntly and without a filter,” sophomore Bethany Olson said.