Why I’m Saying Goodbye To Trump Voters

This story has been a year in the making. I wrongly thought it wouldn’t need to be written. I assumed people in my real and online life would see the vile cartoon character of Donald Trump and reject him.

I waited.

I waited.

I’m waiting no longer. In life we decide the people we choose to surround ourselves with. Friends, acquaintances, even co-workers are decisions we all make. The old adage “you are the company you keep” has never been more true than in the case of Donald Trump voters.

Over the past year we’ve seen Trump refer to Mexicans as “rapists and criminals” even as the statistics don’t bear that out. Trump, referring to a federal judge born in the US, stated the judge would possibly have a “bias” based on his Mexican heritage.

The judge in question’s family has been in America longer than Trump’s family.

We’ve seen Trump make the grotesquely anti-combat soldier comment when talking about John McCain that “I like people who weren’t captured.” When Trump uttered that statement, I was certain his campaign was dead. I was also certain that people in my life that I know to be Republicans and very pro-military would rise in outrage.

It didn’t happen.

The only outrage I saw or heard were from those I knew to be fellow liberals. It was astonishing. It was disheartening. It was very telling about character.

Trump went after women with a vengeance. Continually horrific remarks about Rosie O’Donnell, Megyn Kelly and others. Trump has a long history of misogynist comments.

I expected women I knew to be Republicans to raise their voices against Trump’s disgusting attacks on other women. Time after time, I thought to myself, this will be the last straw. Surely they can’t look the other way this time.

I realized after the Kelly matter that silence was all I’d hear from virtually all but fellow liberals.

Over and over I waited for the Republicans in my life to say something either in person, on Facebook, Twitter, or in emails regarding the rise of Donald Trump. I held out hope that they were seeing what I was seeing and would agree that Donald Trump is not qualified to be President of the United States.

It’s easy to see why Trump isn’t qualified.

A dangerous demagogue without an iota of integrity. A person who doesn’t care about Republicans, but only of himself, as his third party threats showed. A person vicious in every manner, caring not who he insulted along the way. A person who has bankrupted casinos, barred minorities from renting apartments, run an alleged sham university, helped drive a sports league under, and apparently took undeserved writing credit for the book that propelled him into the international spotlight.

As the days turned to weeks, weeks to months, the summer of Donald’s announcement turned to fall, then winter, then the primaries… surely the familiar voices in my life would awaken.

I waited.

I waited.

And now I’m done.

I don’t want those who will vote for Donald Trump as part of my life.

It’s far more involved than “voting for the lesser evil” or “holding ones nose” in the voting booth to use as an excuse for voting for Trump.

I don’t have any problem with Republicans who will write-in a candidate, vote third party, vote Hillary, or leave the presidential part of the ballot blank. I have no problem with Republicans in general (I was at one time a member of the GOP) even as I disagree vehemently with the majority of their platform now and want to see them defeated at every level.

We all have the right to our political beliefs and this story has nothing to do with trying to abridge the right to anyone’s political beliefs.

It’s about when they give their vote to a person whose proposed policies are dangerous, when they support hate and bigotry, when they vote for the very antithesis of what America stands for that it’s no longer okay to give people in my personal or extended life more leeway than the stranger in the bar dropping racial epitaphs.

On Twitter, I follow the actor/poet/singer James Morrison. You might know him as Bill Buchanan on the TV show 24. We follow each other and at times engage back and forth. He’s an honest and refreshing voice in the crazy din of social media.

Below is a screenshot of a tweet he posted. It was copied from his Facebook page and it’s an honest assessment on why he needed to walk away from people who he felt are walking a path he doesn’t want to walk.

As I wrote at the beginning, this is a story I’ve wanted to write for a year. I didn’t have the courage until I read Morrison’s tweet. Fear of pushing people away stopped me many times over the past twelve months even as I felt sorrow that there were people who I personally know thinking the same thoughts as Trump and other extremists in the GOP.

Then I realized there is no reason to be afraid to be honest. I don’t wish anyone anything but happiness in their lives. I want them to love and be loved. I want them to live long and prosper. I don’t want anything bad to happen to them. I don’t think they are evil. If they are at peace with their beliefs; so be it.

But, if you truly stand for what Donald Trump espouses then there is nothing more to discuss. If you believe in the GOP platform that deprives rights to LGBTQ, wants to legislate against women’s choice, deny those in dire medical circumstances coverage, wants to take from folks struggling horribly to survive on food stamps…and you want to remove those who have been in America for years working hard doing the jobs you don’t want to do…

if you want to ban and/or remove people based on religion, if you want to impose your religion on our laws in violation of the Constitution, if you want to allow assault weapons to continue unchecked on our streets as classrooms of first graders are slaughtered …

if you will step into a booth in November and give Donald Trump license to set into motion a trail of destruction based on viciousness, hate, prejudice, and fear…

then in the words of James Morrison…

“I can’t abide you.”

Feel free to write me at Jamesbarraford@gmail.com