Opinion | The president-elect whose voters don’t like him

It started with a random TV news interview a couple of weeks ago. 

I have no idea which station conducted the interview – one of the broadcast networks – but it featured a dairy farmer from one of the Dakotas. The farmer was a Trump voter who couldn’t bring himself to vote for Kamala Harris because – and I’m paraphrasing slightly here – he didn’t believe the things she said. 

The interview, however, was not primarily about this farmer’s political preference. It was, instead, about the fact that more than half of his employees on his very large dairy farm are Hispanic immigrants. Many of them, judging by the tone of the interview, had somewhat questionable legal statuses. 

So, what, the interviewer asked the farmer, was he planning to do when Trump and his team started combing through the immigrant population of America, demanding citizenship papers, deporting those with questionable statuses and scaring the hell out of most immigrants? 

“I don’t think he’s going to do that,” said the farmer. 

I’m not joking. That’s what he said. 

He went on to explain that such action by Trump – the very action that Trump promised repeatedly during the presidential campaign to carry out – would be “bad for business,” and he simply didn’t believe Trump would carry through on that promise. 

So, just to sum up: This farmer – and he most definitely is not alone in this line of thought, because I’ve heard it repeatedly – couldn’t vote for Harris because he didn’t believe her, but did vote for Trump because he didn’t believe him. 

It is enough to make your head explode. 

But it gets worse. 

A few days ago, Bill Britt, the editor in chief of APR, sent me the results of a Quinnipac University national poll – the latest in a string of similar polls that all found relatively similar results on these issues – that weighed the American public’s views on specific policies and actions proposed and/or being considered by the Trump administration.

Here’s what they found: 

• A majority of Americans (51-38) are against tariffs on China and Mexico. 
• A majority of Americans (55-36) prefer granting immigrants a pathway to legal status instead of deportation. 
• A majority of Americans (59-33) oppose Trump pardoning those convicted of Jan. 6-related crimes. 

In other reputable polls, Trump’s new Oligarch Czar, Elon Musk, who has apparently been tasked with finding the fastest pathway possible to an oligarchy, is viewed unfavorably by more than half of Americans. Trump, himself, is also upside down in favorability polling. And both Musk’s presence in helping shape the government and the administration’s apparent plans to cut Medicare and Social Security are insanely unpopular. Like, 70-plus percent of respondents hated it all. 

Additionally, the American public is taking a dim view of Trump’s appointments overall, and they are specifically unhappy with several specific individuals, such as Pete Hegseth and Kash Patel. 

And it doesn’t stop there. 

A Washington Post story published late last week talked to numerous Americans living on the edge of poverty – the working poor, they’re called – who voted for Trump. They asked about his apparent plans to cut the very benefits that are currently keeping them fed, housed and alive. They’re hoping, they said, that he won’t carry through with his repeated promises to cut them. 

So, again, to recap here. 

You don’t like Trump or the people he’s putting in charge of things. You don’t want his specific policies to be implemented and you don’t want him to attack the very people he’s been promising to attack or help the very people he’s promised to help or cut the very programs he’s promised to cut. 

But you voted for him? And you voted for his policies? 

I’m not even going to pretend that I understand what’s happening here. I have no solutions. I don’t even know what to say, to be quite honest. 

But it seems to me that a whole bunch of people have shirked the responsibility of participating in our representative government by researching issues and candidates and voting based on information and truth, and have instead been guided by anger and fear into voting for retribution or voting for “change,” or voting based on child-like characterizations of machismo and strength.  

Now, before you get all offended and say I’m criticizing you because you voted for someone I don’t like, no, that’s not it. Because, and I say this in utter bewilderment, I find myself in the very unique and very insane position of criticizing you for voting for someone that YOU apparently don’t like. 

To be quite honest, that scares the hell out of me.