U. students rally for candidates in both parties

Throughout the 2016 presidential election, many University students of every political creed have worked to further their ideals, whether alone, as a part of an on-campus organization, or on social media.

Since this past August, the Princeton College Republicans have taken a neutral stance on Republican nominee Donald Trump. According to the group’s president Paul Draper ‘18, the organization is focusing its campaign efforts on state and local Republican candidates instead.

Draper said that this neutral stance does not indicate any significant shift in the College Republicans’ core values.

“There has not been a change in the motivations of the group,” Draper said. “We are just as dedicated to the Republican Party.”

However, Draper said that not endorsing Donald Trump has had drawbacks.

“The neutral stance has put a damper on our efforts to organize,”he said. “Usually, the nominee is the rallying point.”

Although the group has had fewer organized activities, individual members have still been active in campaigning. For example, Draper said, one member was in Florida supporting a Republican Congressman.

According to Amanda Glatt, president of Princeton College Democrats, student involvement this year has been significantly greater than in previous years. “Whereas the group last year was mostly composed of sophomores, this year it is mostly comprised of freshmen,” Glatt wrote in an email.

She attributes the change to the election.

“Donald Trump has driven moderates to our group, particularly for campaign work as opposed to the social aspects of our group,” Glatt wrote. “Republicans have not been involved with our group, even though I know many of them are voting for Hillary.”

The College Democrats have travelled to Pennsylvania for door-to-door canvassing.

“12 students went on a trip to Florida over fall break to campaign in Orlando’s 7th district for Hillary as well as the local congressional candidate,” Glatt said through email.

Get the best of ‘the Prince’ delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe now »

Max Parsons ’20 was one of the students on the trip. “A group of people called the Princeton Progressives provides funds for young Democrats to go around the country to do political activism,” he said. “We were sent to target lower-income groups that are often subject to political attempts to stifle their vote.”

The Princeton Progressives are an alumni group that supports progressive groups on and off campus, holds progressive events, and seeks to build a network of progressives.

According to Parsons, the students went door-to-door canvassing potential Democratic voters. They helped low-income voters develop a plan to vote on Election Day.

“The [Democratic National Committee] has radically shifted their grassroots campaigning, and that’s why they’re so effective,” Riley Owen ’20, who was not affiliated with the trip, said.

“Canvassing doesn’t change people’s minds,” Owen said. “It’s giving them the information and the resources they need to get out and vote.”

However, Owen said he didn’t believe grassroots efforts would have as large of an effect on the election this year as it has in years prior.

“The Trump movement has a very localized culture about it, but it seems to lack the comprehensive grassroots organization that the [Democratic National Committee] has effectively mobilized, which is what the Republicans have lacked and still lack,” he explained.

According to Parsons, besides canvassing, the group spent a day volunteering at a Hillary Clinton rally. The rally was attended by Democratic senate candidate Patrick Murphy and civil rights activist Congressman John Lewis.

“The nature of the campaign right now is that [Clinton] doesn’t need to be that political. Think about Obama, Romney. They were debating the details of tax plans, the details of health care reforms.” Parsons said, stating that this year’s election is far less specific in terms of policy due to the extreme ideological differences between the candidates.

“I went into the trip thinking, if you support someone, you vote for them, and that’s that,” Parsons said. “But when you go and you help other people to vote, that’s what gives an individual a greater impact.”

Students who are not active members of on-campus political organizations have also noticed their efforts. David Landeta ’19 cited examples of student involvement in the 2016 election, including the Campus Democrats’ trip to Florida to campaign for Secretary Clinton and mass emails from student groups and individual supporters of both major candidates.

Landeta also noted the increased role of social media in the 2016 presidential election, which has allowed students to receive constant and near-immediate updates on both campaigns and to get involved by championing their opinions to an international audience. In particular, he said he’s noticed an increase in political news posted to websites like Facebook, as well as a greater online presence from the candidates themselves.

“In 2012, even though social media was still on the rise, you didn’t see candidates tweet at each other or tweet at their political opponents,” Landeta said. “Social media is playing a big role.”

Seth Lovelace ’20 said he remains unaffiliated with any campus political organization because of time constraints.

“I have a lot of obligations,” he said. “I feel like that would take up a lot of time outside of what I’d like to do.” He added that he and other unaffiliated students nevertheless remain involved in the election in other ways.

“I feel like, in general, different types of campaigning efforts are effective. For example, when I went back to my high school in New Orleans, I saw that they were actually holding phone campaigns to call voters in Florida to vote for Hillary, specifically. I feel like actions like that are very effective in the sense that you’re trying to reach as many voters as you can and trying to really inform them to vote certain ways.”

“Most of the people I know are not involved with organizations like that but we like to talk politically or engage in some other way,” Lovelace said.

Ben Parker ’20, who is also not affiliated with a particular political group on campus, voiced similar concerns about the time commitment of joining an on-campus political organization, but said that he stayed involved in other ways.

“I have other obligations and it would take up a lot of my time,” Parker said. “I go to FiveThirtyEight every day pretty much, and I read The New York Times, and also go to Reddit and look at both the pro-Donald Trump subreddit and ‘Politics,’ which is generally pretty liberal.”

He added that this accessibility often comes at the cost of reliable fact checking.

“I think the internet allows you to stay involved, but I think it also comes with more bias than other sources of information. I think that the internet allows people to produce things a lot more quickly, but that comes with less accuracy. People can just kind of say things and they don’t really need to have facts behind them.”