If not tomorrow: Why I still believe in America
CARLY KABOT: For four years, I have anticipated this night with fear, angst and the occasional existential dread. Tonight, mixed with election jitters, I feel something I would have never expected— immense hope for what this country can one day become. If not tomorrow (or more likely much longer), I will still believe in America.
I remember my mom waking me up as a sophomore in high school with the news that Trump had won. I thought she was lying. How could someone so outwardly racist, xenophobic, Islamophobic, anti-Semitic and downright unqualified be the ‘Leader of the Free World’? Someone who called Mexicans rapists, mocked a disabled reporter and said climate change was a hoax created by the Chinese? Someone who went against everything I ever believed in, everything I was ever taught? But, was I shocked that he had won? No. What I couldn’t wrap my head around was how America got here in the first place— how America was more divided than I could have ever imagined.
Thinking Trump was all talk, I hoped he would prove me wrong once in office. In 2017, as I paced around my kitchen watching the ‘Unite the Right Rally’ unfold in Charlottesville, I realized how wrong I had been. When you wake up to headlines in 21st century America that could be from Nazi Germany, you know things are bad. A president should bring out the best in the country’s citizens. Instead, President Trump brought out the worst— weaponizing hate as a political tool, handing power to white supremacists. I wonder how many Americans have stood as I did, glued to the news with that same sinking feeling in their gut.
The past four years have brought immense pain. The longest government shutdown in history. Withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, rolling back EPA regulations. The Muslim Ban. Family separation at the southern border, with hundreds of children still missing their parents. Mocking Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. Impeachment. Exploiting the pandemic to end asylum in America. Leaving WHO. And now, the loss of over 200,000 American lives to COVID-19. This list is by no means exhaustive, but certainly exhausting.
Yet, every single time the administration attacked America’s values, people stood up and spoke out. In my community, I’ve witnessed my friends find the issue they care most about— from gun control to LGBTQ rights to anti-racism— and start fighting for them. At home and at Georgetown, causal conversations became chances to educate each other. Our generation has shown relentless resistance from taking to the streets to late-night conversations in dorms (or now over zoom). In these past two years, I have learned so much from the knowledge and experience of those around me, professors and peers alike. The willingness to grow, combined with innovation, imagination and compassion, fills me with so much faith for what lies ahead. We are a microcosm of the America Trump has attempted to destroy. Unintentionally, his win mobilized young people across the country to start taking ownership of the world we want to create. In the past four years, I’ve done a lot of growing up— and I am a lot more aware of what’s happening in America than I would have been if the headlines had always gone the way I hoped. As youth voters turn out in record numbers, I find what is perhaps Trump’s greatest accomplishment.
Out of all the questions asked during the debates, I continue returning to the question asked by Brecklyn Brown: “If our leaders can't get along, how are the citizens supposed to get along?” Even before his time in office, Trump has been a model of what not to do. Yes, the president should be someone who all Americans, regardless of their political party, can look up to for their leadership, responsibility and unwavering commitment to this country. We have reached a point where waiting for the president is no longer an option. The pandemic has demonstrated that a Trump reelection will be a preventable death sentence for many unless we take matters into our own hands. The hour for complaining has passed; we need to be our own leaders. The potential damage of four more years of Trump will be devastating, irreversible, and ultimately deadly. There is no but, only an and. And we will keep doing whatever we can, however we can, to stand with those this administration seeks to knock down.
Yet, I accept that a Biden victory will not repair the deep divides that threaten our democracy. We, the people, are the only ones with the power to do so. The problems that brought us here will not disappear with Trump out of the White House. I don’t want to be back here in four years— telling my friends to stay safe, anxiously awaiting riots and unrest. That doesn’t sound like a functioning democracy to me.
We need to listen, then challenge. We need to ask, then provide another answer. There is something between shouting and silence we have yet to discover. How do we even begin breaking the echo chamber? We start with ourselves, our communities. The past few months have proven that we can build a new America from the ground up. No, I can’t control what happens in the White House, but I decide how I want to act each day. It is up to us to choose to have the difficult conversations with the people we avoid talking politics with. Debates are healthy, necessary— but they shouldn't end in screaming matches. We need to walk away from uncomfortable conversations knowing something much bigger at stake, something that both sides can agree on: America is stronger united.
Our experiment in democracy ends only when we give up. This may not be the America we want, but it is the America we have. In choosing to believe in America, I am committing myself to the work it will take to achieve a country I can be proud of.
If not tomorrow, we will keep pursuing the day where liberty, justice and freedom for all, at last, holds true.
Until then, we fight on.
Carly Kabot is an executive editor for On the Record. She is a sophomore studying International Politics and Religion, Ethics, and World Affairs in the School of Foreign Service.