The 2020 Presidential elections are set to be foretelling and intense regardless of your point of view, and various biases. Currently, in the Republican primaries, Trump seems to be the front runner for The President, but there are many other candidates that have chosen to run against him, but to no avail. The reason for some resistance in his own party is due to his policies straying from the classic conservative ones at times, and many controversial comments. There have been a couple candidates who have taken the challenge to run against a sitting president of the same party. For example, former representative Joe Walsh and former governor Bill Weld both have chosen to run, but many state governments declared that they will not be holding a Republican primary or caucus, and have already accepted Trump as the Republican Candidate. In order to continue for his second term in the office, Trump must first remain for his entire first term, which due to some of the more recent news, like an impeachment inquiry starting in The House of Representatives, may not be certain to happen. Currently, Trump’s approval rating sits at around 46%, and 53% of Americans believe that at least an inquiry into impeachment, while only 6% believe that no action is warranted. 

     Overall, the public perception of Trump’s presidency varies by who you may ask. When an anonymous Junior at Friends was asked, they stated, “Economically, I believe he has done great things in improving our GDP, lowering unemployment, and reducing taxes for the middle class, however, some of the things he says and does are questionable.” One important part of that quote to address is the idea that Trump has been doing great things for the economy. While the fact that the S&P 500 is up about 45% since he took office, many economists and analysts would argue that is because of his huge rate cuts, while in the short-term boost the economy, but exhaust possible options should we fall into a recession, which could then lead America to possible negative interest rates. Also Trump’s trade war with China has hurt many average americans, and industries like trade and steel in the process. So, while Trump may have boosted the economy in some factors, it may be at the cost of long-term growth. 

     While Trump has done various controversial things, what set many Americans off was telling The Ukranian Government to investigate his political opponent, and front-runner for the democratic primary, Joe Biden, or else Trump would withhold hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid. The American people have been outraged that Trump would directly ask a foreign state to interfere in our elections, and many believe it should warrant at least impeachment. It is also important to note that impeachment does not mean that the President must leave office, just that they will be sent to the Supreme Court for the decision, and it would be decided by the justices.  When Mr. Ergueta, a history teacher at WFS, was asked about the election, he said, “I think that the election on the past record highly favors Mr. Trump, a strong advantage for current president it also favors a president whose term has been characterized by low inflation and low unemployment. And then, the electoral map favors him due to gerrymandering done by Republican controlled legislatures.”

     For Joe Biden, he has been leading the Democratic Primary’s polling with an estimated 33%, while Bernie Sanders, follows with 21%, and Elizabeth Warren with 16%*. As it has seemed during debates, and due to similar policies, Warren and Sanders seem to be having a temporary “alliance” of sorts, while they have much more liberal policies, on platforms like universal healthcare, than Joe Biden, who has stated before that he does not truly want to fundamentally change most people’s lives, unline how some candidates propose radical new ideas, good or bad, for the country. This is all in comparison to the Wall St. and Wealth Taxes, Sanders and Warren have proposed. Many critics of the Wall St. tax cite the fact that when a similar tax was enacted in Sweden most of the industry left to The London Exchange. There have also been many other candidates who have not polled as highly, like Andrew Yang, who propose revolutionary ideas, like a “Freedom Dividend” ($1,000/month to every adult), but he only polls around 3% lately.  For whatever candidate one might support, in the end, this will be an important election, to help decide the future American heads in. New student, Siba Sharaf’21 said, “I am not really sure what will happen, I am sure that it will be a close one!”

*These numbers were accurate at the original time of publishing.