The president of the United States is easily the most important decision that the citizens get to be a part of. But at the same time, people do not like to educate themselves on the presidential candidates. Educating yourself is the most important thing to do when it comes to the presidential election; you should not be going into an election with the intention to cast a vote without knowing what you’re talking about. Everyone should create their standpoint on politics and should figure out what they stand for and what they believe is right, rather than letting a family member or someone else tell you what you should think. Because oftentimes, after someone votes, they will regret their decision when they see what the president is doing. With that being said, let’s take a deep dive into the political standpoints of our most likely upcoming presidential candidates.
Donald Trump is a president who you either loved him or hated him, there was no in-between. His policies were praised by some and despised by others. But what were some of his policies? Let’s start with the immigration and the border crisis, probably the most debated policy of his. Trump wanted to launch the largest deportation effort in U.S. history, paid for with redirected military funds. With this, he wanted to end what he called “catch-and-release” and instead detain all migrants who are caught entering the United States without authorization or violating other immigration laws. He supported the idea of ending “birthright” citizenship for children born in the U.S. to undocumented parents. Donald Trump also created the idea of building a wall, and during his presidency, he built about 450 miles of it. Now onto his policies on crime. Trump wanted to give police more authority, where they would deploy the military to fight the nation’s drug problem and impose the death penalty for convicted drug dealers. He also supported delivering record funding to hire and retrain police officers, strengthen qualified immunity, and increase penalties for assaults on law enforcement. And finally his policies on guns. During his first presidential campaign, Trump positioned himself as a defender of the Second Amendment. After the May 24, 2022, Uvalde, Texas, shooting at Robb Elementary School, Trump called for “drastically” changing the nation’s approach to mental health and “a top-to-bottom security overhaul at schools across this country” but dismissed calls for further firearm restrictions.
Joe Biden is a president that a lot of people voted for in order to keep Trump out of office, but immediately regretted it. Not because Trump is better than him, but because of how bad he is at being a president. Joe Biden’s policies on immigration and the border crisis would allow more new immigrants into the U.S. while giving millions of unauthorized immigrants who are already in the country a pathway to legal status. This would help create a pathway for even more immigrants on top of the 10.5 million that are already in the country. Moving on to crime, it doesn’t appear that Biden has any real policies on crime. A Gallup poll taken at the beginning of this year revealed that 70% of adults were dissatisfied with the nation’s efforts to reduce or control crime. This marked only the second time this century in which at least 70% of Americans registered dissatisfaction with this metric. And finally, Biden’s gun laws. He stated that he wants to ban assault weapons, high capacity magazines, and he wants to require background checks for all gun sales. He has also proposed a rule that would require more firearm dealers to run background checks in an effort to combat rising gun violence nationwide.
It’s on you as a person to educate yourself on the politics involved with the presidential election because everyone should carry their own educated opinions. You should never vote for someone just because an acquaintance of yours told you to.
