Every US election since I was old enough to know what elections were, has been billed as ‘the most important election of our time’, and 2020 actually hits the mark. Considering the stakes, it is the most important election of our time, especially for Millennials such as myself, and Generation Z. We have the chance to begin addressing the horrible hand we’ve been dealt in high student loan debt, soaring housing & health care costs, climate change, and others, and to begin the pain-staking task of addressing the long-standing ills facing the entire country.
I’ve long believed that the outcome of the 2020 election will be decided in the primary. The key to Democrats keeping the House, winning the Senate and presidency is high voter turnout, and the Democrats must learn from 2016 by selecting a candidate that gets the base (young people, people of color, especially black women) excited about voting, not merely rely on their candidate not being Mr.Trump. And I’ll add, not trying to ‘win back’ white voters who switched from Obama to Trump in 2016, nor former Republican ‘Never Trumpers’ who do not understand (or want to) the dire straits this country is in. Trump or no Trump, this country is in need of deep, systemic change instead of a nominal modification to the status quo.
However I find that paying consistent, daily attention to the primaries mentally and emotionally exhausting, taxing, and boring. And I’ve refrained from regularly discussing the primary candidates on social media or in real life. That’s not to say I don’t know what’s going on, which candidates I’m leaning towards, or which candidates’ policies I like. But I’m not following the Democratic primary as I have in previous cycles. I’m not on tinder-hooks curiously following what every candidate says. I don’t watch the debates live, if at all, and not in their entirety.
One reason is mainstream media coverage of the candidates. They’re making the same mistakes that they did in 2016. White, moderate male candidates like Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg and until he dropped out, Beto O’Rourke, are dubbed as the face or future of the party, are given the most frequent and most positive coverage compared to candidates of color and/or women. For candidates of color, those who question white candidates on race, as Senator Kamala Harris and Julian Castro did of Biden during debates are considered ‘too aggressive.’ Senator Bernie Sanders, a white male candidate but not a moderate, does not receive the quantity or quality of coverage that he should given his level of support ranking him in the top tier of candidates.
The narrative of black support follows that we universally support Biden, even though anecdotal evidence shows that black Millennials are more or less torn between Senators Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris. Which brings me to the exclusion of Millennials generally from polls and surveys, which tend to focus on Baby Boomers. Even non-mainstream journalists on Twitter do this, despite Millennials being the largest voting block, Pew reports showing turnout for Millennials/X-ers/Gen Z surpassing that of the Boomers in 2018, and in 2016. The mainstream news media is not providing a truthful picture of the 2020 race.
Another reason I’m not paying attention to the Democratic primary is because of the length of the election cycle. I’m quite taken with the British election happening on December 12, simply because its happening so quickly—the minimum amount of time for an election in the United Kingdom is five weeks. That’s five weeks for candidates to get their act together, five weeks for political parties to give the public a reason to vote for them, and only five weeks of incessant media coverage to the exclusion of everything else. In the US, media coverage of an election cycle begins as soon as the previous one is over. Considering the multitude of issues that deserve coverage—climate change, fears of a global recession, anti-government protests sparking up all over the world, and others, such prolonged media coverage is superfluous to the point of exhaustion.
The third reason, is the prevalent toxicity in social media discussions about the candidates. Many voters who’ve already made their decision display a deep antipathy for other candidates and their supporters that surely will not end when only one candidate is left standing. Bernie supporters criticize Warren as a ‘fake progressive.’ Some African-American supporters of Kamala Harris question why a black person would support any other candidate aside from her. Black voters who are more critical of her question her blackness on a scale that Barack Obama was not subject to in 2008. A dislike for Buttigieg because of his age, white maleness or even his policies is dubbed as being anti-LGBTQ, especially from the black community.
Former president Barack Obama has waded into the primary, cautioning the left that bold ideas “have to be rooted in reality” and that “the average American doesn’t think we have to completely tear down the system to remake it.” Considering roughly half of eligible Americans consistently do not vote in elections, I doubt that. If anything, Mr. Trump’s election demonstrated that faith in the system is dangerously low and voters want a candidate who pledges to disrupt the status quo. The desire to blow up the system is why voters were drawn to Mr Trump, it’s why voters are drawn to Bernie Sanders and why Sanders voters either voted for Mr Trump or didn’t vote at all in 2016, after Bernie lost the Democratic primary. The dividing line is what kind of system voters want their candidate to embrace.
Other reasons I’m not paying attention to the primary are that it’s too long until the first votes are cast, there are too many candidates running and in the meantime too many other more immediate issues to focus on. Plus, winning the presidency is one thing but who controls the Senate is key. A Democratic president will not be able to do anything of consequence without Senate support, and no the Republicans will not experience ‘enlightenment’ and work with the Democrats should Mr. Trump be out of the Oval Office come January 2021.
American election cycles are too long to be covered so intensely, polls are given too much credence and the level of fear and irrationality among some voters make discussing the candidates more taxing than its worth. As the Iowa Caucus and Super Tuesday get closer this will change but until then I’ll keep my attention on the Democratic primary at minimum, for my own sanity.
Being American 