President-elect Donald Trump will take office for the second time in January of 2025, making him only the second president in U.S. history to win two nonconsecutive terms. Trump won both the electoral college and popular votes with 312 electoral votes and 76,455,862 popular votes compared to Democratic nominee Kamala Harris’ 226 electoral votes and 73,793,437 popular votes.
Republicans went on to win both the House and the Senate, securing the party’s majority in all three branches of government.
As the Biden administration begins the process of transferring power and Trump selects his cabinet, Augustana students are feeling the results of the election in various ways. The uncertainty of the next four years and the years beyond has some students apprehensive about the future.
“No matter how this presidency goes, the effects from his presidency [over the] next four years will affect generations,” junior political science major Ally Lesher said.
While plans and policies proposed by those close to Trump are not yet in place, the potential for those effects to be felt when he takes office comes with concern and, for some, outright fear. For certain students at Augustana, these policies could have an immediate impact on education and career goals.
“I’m an education major, and I’ve looked into Project [20]25. It really scares me,” sophomore Olivia Bernus said. “It affects everyone.”
Project 2025, as defined on the policy’s official website, is a presidential transition project with a goal “to assemble an army of aligned, vetted, trained, and prepared conservatives to go to work on Day One to deconstruct the Administrative State.”
The policy includes proposed highly conservative reformations of various departments within the government, including the Department of Defense, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Education.
It covers hot topics such as abortion, stating that the Secretary should “pursue a robust agenda to protect the fundamental right to life” and gender affirming care, saying that “radical actors” are “promoting harmful identity politics that replaces biological sex with subjective notions of ‘gender identity.’”
Project 2025 also seeks to eliminate the Department of Education, a move that could impact federal funding for public education as well as incorporating a “core principle” of “safeguarding civil rights” by “rejecting gender ideology and critical race theory.”
Despite Trump’s claim during the Sept. 10 debate with Kamala Harris that he is not involved in Project 2025, he has since nominated Brendan Carr, the author of the FCC section of Project 2025, as the chair of the FCC.
Project 2025, among other ideas put forth by president-elect Donald Trump, has led to a feeling of despair for many members of the community.
“I heard so many people say ‘we’re going to lose our rights now,’ and while that is a possibility, I feel like there was a loss of hope for people and a little bit of a loss of perspective,” junior political science and communication studies major Genevieve Ryan said. “I think it’s really easy to forget that our democracy is very secure relative to other democracies around the world and that we have checks and balances that are tried and true, and they work and protect us if we participate.”
Despite the fear felt by some members of the Augustana community and the excitement felt by others upon waking up on Nov. 6, students emphasized the importance of remaining civil. Social media posts blaming, making fun of or threatening both sides spread rapidly in the days leading up to and following the election, leaving the community feeling even more divided.
“People who are posting these things are the same people who are complaining about polarization in our political system, and then they’re actively participating in that system and contributing to make our system worse,” Ryan said.
Come January, many unknowns about Trump’s presidency will slowly begin to become more clear. As of right now, he has made nominations for various members of his cabinet, most of whom require confirmation before officially being selected for the role, and has met with President Joe Biden to discuss a peaceful transition of power.
For Augustana students and community members, much of the next two months will consist of anticipation. Some may choose to keep up on every new update that is publicized while others may choose to tune out. Either way, Lesher said she believes it is important for people to keep their values close.
“I just hope people stay very active and pay attention,” Lesher said. “It [only] takes so many minor changes to completely see a different society.”
