Election week—or, should we say, the entire 2016 presidential campaign—has been a rollercoaster for all involved.
We were curious about how young women voting for the first time felt about the election—from the lead-up to the aftermath. Reuters reports that 15 per cent of 2016 voters were first-timers, up from 9 per cent in 2012's election. We asked four women about their first experience with this crucial political process: Upasna Barath, from Tennessee; Amelia Lamp, from Nevada; Kinsey Hirae, from Massachusetts; and Morgan Jerkins, from New York.
How did you feel in the weeks leading up to the election?
Kinsey: I was apprehensive. I'd had an idea of who I was going to vote for for some time, but when it came to actually filling out my ballot I almost couldn't believe that I was in the midst of voting for our next president.
Upasna: I was feeling very optimistic. I thought the election would go in favor of my candidate, so I wasn't too stressed or anxious.
Morgan: I was feeling pretty optimistic. I just knew that Hillary had it in the bag despite the email controversy. Perhaps, in retrospect, I overestimated how appalled the nation would be about Trump's indiscretions.
Amelia: I also felt apprehensive. I come from a very rural, very conservative town, and the general feeling there was very pro-Trump. I've also been taking a class that is analyzing presidential elections, and we've been keeping an eye on the polls. They have been so close for so long, it seemed like it was going to be close no matter what.
What were the issues that mattered to you during this election?
Kinsey: LGBTQ rights and equality, the mental health crisis, housing policies, campus sexual assault, protecting animals and wildlife, criminal justice reform, women's rights and opportunity, paid family/medical leave, and racial justice.
Upasna: I've always prioritized domestic policy, so the issues that mattered to me the most included gun control, LGBTQ rights, criminal justice reform, climate change, reformed drug policy, gender equality, and welfare reform.
Morgan: Racial justice, women's rights, and prison reform.
Amelia: Definitely LGBTQ+ issues, women's issues (specifically reproductive rights), immigration reform, race justice issues, and environmental issues. I was also concerned about foreign problems, like international environmental treaties and other international agreements like NAFTA.
Apart from voting, did you participate in any political activity, such as volunteering or attending political events?
Kinsey: I attended Bernie's rally when he visited Rhode Island, but other than that I just kept tabs on the news.
Upasna: Before the primaries, I canvassed and phone banked for Bernie Sanders and I also attended his rally in Illinois. I canvassed for the Senate General Election as well, for Tom Cullerton. When I felt like I wasn't doing enough, I wrote essays and spoke up in Political Science class. I also run a diversity club on my campus, and we put on a panel where conservatives and liberals discussed their primary and secondary factors of diversity and how it contributed to their choice of candidate.
Amelia: I volunteered with the local Democratic party in my county. I participated in phone banks, and ran the Twitter account for the Elko County Democratic Central Committee. I spoke very openly and often about my voting preferences with the people around me, who were often not informed about the state of the world or our country. I felt a kind of obligation to bring them into the civic sphere, even if it was just to disagree with me.
Was gender an important factor for you in deciding who to vote for?
Kinsey: Not really. The only factor that gender played in my decision was who I thought was better for gender equality. It wasn't necessarily the candidate's gender that mattered to me, but how they would handle social issues that involve gender.
Upasna: I always valued the fact that Hillary Clinton is a woman in that I respect her immensely for standing up for her rights. But I think that voting for her on the basis that she is a woman would invalidate all of her other accomplishments. Still, it was nice to know that a presidential candidate could potentially understand where you're coming from when you feel strongly about sexual assault and issues of gender inequality.
Morgan: When I heard about their stances on abortion, I couldn't help but see how their gender may have influenced their choices, especially when it came to Trump. During the last presidential debate, it was clear that he doesn't know about how women's bodies function, period, and it was a very stereotypically male (read: sexist) move.
Amelia: I feel like this is a difficult question to answer. Did the fact that Hillary would have been the first woman president, effectively shattering the one of the highest glass ceilings, impact the way that I voted? Did it ever cross my mind that if Hillary won, there would be even more young people who would not have seen a white man in the Oval Office? The answer to both of those questions is yes. For me, the concept of a woman proving once and for all that gender does not determine how qualified a candidate is was extremely important. So to a certain extent, yes, gender did impact my voting choices. But it was not at all the only reason I voted for her.
Who did you vote for, and why?
Kinsey: I voted for Hillary—not only is she a woman and would represent all women across our nation, but she is highly educated and well-spoken. Although she has an immense amount of baggage, which would have followed her into the White House, she is educated on political issues and is pretty damn good at what she does. She stands up for our rights as people and as women, and she doesn't participate in 'locker-room talk' that denigrates people of color or people of different genders.
Morgan: I voted for Hillary. Although I'm critical of how the Clinton administration was responsible for massive incarceration rates, especially amongst African-Americans, Clinton was the more qualified candidate, and she wasn't inciting white nationalists.
Amelia: I have been a Hillary fan since she ran the first time. Like Kinsey said, she's extremely well qualified for the office for a plethora of reasons, spanning experience, drive, ideology. I agree that she wasn't perfect, and there were definitely problematic things that Hillary has done in the past, but I think that she had the country's best interests at heart, and was the only person qualified for the job.
Did you feel excited about voting and about your chosen candidate?
Kinsey: Considering the issues that surrounded each candidate, I cannot say that I was super excited about who I voted for. Yes, I support Hillary, but that doesn't mean I agree with everything she has done during her time in a political office.
Upasna: I am very optimistic, so I felt that if I continued to be passionate and excited throughout the whole election season, the result would be awesome. I love Hillary Clinton as a person and I am fascinated with her biography, but I feel like it's not unusual to be nervous when you throw your support behind someone since you're not sure exactly what to expect.
Morgan: I felt very excited about voting. I thought I was a part of making history and it just felt right.
Amelia: I was so proud to be able to exercise my civic right. I was also so excited to be voting for the first major female candidate.
Did you follow media coverage of the election results? What did you think about it?
Kinsey: I followed the media coverage all night, up until the very end. It was my first time voting, so I wanted to take it all in. I was on the edge of my seat most of the time, but towards the end I realized how the results were going to turn out. I was impressed by the amount of unbiased coverage and I was very interested to see what experts had to say about the poll numbers.
Upasna: I think the media played such a huge role in this election. However, I look at the media in two different ways. As a political science student, I see bias in the media from both sides of the political spectrum. As a regular person, I see it as exciting, amusing, shocking...but for all the wrong reasons.
Morgan: It was perhaps the most overwhelming night of my life. I was watching with a group of people and one of them could not stop crying. As the night progressed, the ambience became bleaker and quieter. I was almost in a catatonic state.
Amelia: I followed the media coverage almost religiously. Not only because I was involved in generating content for a party, but because I have taken plenty of classes that have stressed the massive impact that biased media can have on the outcome of a political event. From Brexit to the recent Landtag elections in Germany, the media controls the issues that are covered, how they are covered, and who sees what when.
I was disappointed with the American media, actually. I didn't see it as unbiased whatsoever. The amount of free media that Trump got outstripped what the rest of the candidates received. They did all of his advertising for him. I wish that they would have talked about Trump less, given him a smaller platform to speak.
How did you feel when the result was announced?
Kinsey: I think my heart dropped out of my body. There was a moment where a wave of shock hit me, and then a feeling of extreme sadness…and then shock again.
Upasna: It felt surreal. It felt like my dreams had been crushed.
Morgan: I was angry at America because I realized that [a bigger proportion of] black women voted for Hillary than white women. I just felt like I was living in a country where the majority would probably like to see me dead or subjugated in the worst ways. My back was all twisted in knots.
Amelia: Honestly, I cried. I cried so hard for so long. I felt sick to my stomach, like I couldn't breathe, couldn't think. I felt like my country had turned its back on me as a person, and that we just jumped into the abyss.
Will you be participating in any further political activity now that the election is over?
Kinsey: I think I will check in here and there, especially since there is still so much progress to be made after the election. I want to see who is elected into the Supreme Court; I want to see how the decisions from the ballot questions are carried out.
Upasna: I'd like to run for Congress one day. That's where the real action happens.
Morgan: I'm going to try, but right now, I can't even think about it. My heart is too broken.
Amelia: Absolutely. There is so much to be done in the next two years. I am grieving now, allowing myself to feel the pain of this loss. But I am going to harness my anger, sadness, disappointment, horror, and pain, and put it towards getting Congress back in the midterm elections. And work in my state to ensure that people continue to have their rights respected.
How has this election made you feel about the electoral process and politics more generally?
Kinsey: I was never big on politics and sometimes I would say I consider myself apolitical, but during this voting period, I felt that it was my duty to understand politics to a certain extent in order to decide who I thought would best lead our country. Frankly, I think it is important for all of us to educate ourselves about it. There is a lot of corruption…but then again, where isn't there corruption? It hurts my head and my heart at times, but it's reality.
Morgan: I never had much faith in politics to begin with. I tend to be very pessimistic and I'm even more so now because of the outcome. I'm still in a state of disbelief, especially since I am a black woman and I don't know if I will ever be able to fully forgive America for what it has done this past Tuesday.
Amelia: Politics is our government; our government is politics. In order to make our nation better, we have to be willing to participate and engage with the system. There is so much work we have to do to make our nation the best that it can be. Partisan politics are tearing at the very threads of our constitution, and the Supreme Court is barely keeping it together. But I refuse to give up on my government. I am going to turn my passion into change, and I will not stop fighting until I can turn to my future children and say that their world is going to be more equal, more loving, and more open than mine.
This roundtable has been edited for clarity and concision.
