What party do you usually identify with?
Voted democrat my entire life, now independent not aligned with any particular political party. I consider myself a classical liberal. Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and gender equality are all important issues to me.
Why do you support Trump?
He is the president, who if we are to respect our democratic process and law of the land, was elected by our electorate. He may have lost by 3mil in popular vote, but 62 mil people in the nation still voted for him and he turned states that have never gone red since the 80s red.
I don't blindly go with every position he holds, the POTUS is not my ideology. However, as matters stand, I do agree with most of his positions including immigration, trade agreements, terrorism, investment in infrastructure, and reformation of federal agencies such as the FDA.
Where do you diverge with him?
A couple, namely climate change. I also did not agree with how the travel halt was executed, but as we've seen, the country is a country of laws. If he does something wrong and unconstitutional, there are systems in place to correct it.
I also feel that he is wrong in the way he treats the media. I do believe the MSM is extremely skewed and really just pushing their own spins on non-stories. I'm tired of seeing "kellyann's shoes on the couch", "trump was wrong- sweden is great", "trump banned press from conference". It was a press gaggle (informal exclusive interview where ABC and NBC were still invited and the full transcript of which is on whitehouse.gov), Sweden clearly has been negatively affected by its poor immigration polices ("no go zones" was recently covered by Vice News's Tim Pool in person), and Kellyann's issue was completely trivial. However, the MSM still has a significant pull and reach to the American people. He needs to learn to utilize them to bring the country together rather than label them as the enemy. He wasn't a politician and he his campaigning style probably gave the MSM unnecessary amo in attacking him, but I think it is necessary to find common ground with the MSM in a constructive way if he is to be able to reach all of America.
When did you start supporting him?
Actually, a month ago. It was the hypocrisy I was finding in my party and those who labeled themselves as "liberals" that really pushed me. I actually went to my city's women's march a month ago and was shocked to find "feminist" propping up the march organizer's Linda Sarsour, an open advocate of Sharia, and people wearing hijabs in "solidarity"- so quick to forget that under Sharia, laws following exact scripture from the Quran, apostasy (leaving the faith), homosexuality, and adultery are all punishable by death. They seem to also ignore that the actual reasoning for the hijab, similar to why men of Islamic faith would not shake a woman's hand, is to "protect women from sexual aggression of men". This is a classic case of blaming the victim for the acts of the aggressor. Forcing women to bare the consequences of what is believed to be the natural condition of men is inherently oppressive. There are many more instances of this kind of hypocrisy that is done in the name of "freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and justice".
It's complete denial of reason and fact. I don't think we should be aligning ourselves by the values of any person. We should be aligning ourselves with reason, fact, and evidence. The funny thing is, I know from having been on the other side before, both sides are accusing the other of the same thing. Thankfully we have facts and the realities of the world to weigh out the nonsense.
Who was your first choice in the presidential race?
Bernie Sanders, but now I feel that many of his policies, while well meaning, are flawed in execution and are not property prioritizing issues that are of graver concerns and would have more impact on the problems he wants to solve.
