In the aftermath of the 2024 United States presidential election, the Chronicle individually interviewed six University of Utah students — two Republicans, two Democrats, one third-party voter and one non-voter — to gather varying viewpoints about the election and politics as a whole on campus.
Student Profiles
Rorie Stewart is a freshman majoring in Political Science. Stewart grew up in Syracuse, Utah and is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She participates in the Associated Students at the University of Utah and the Utah Federation of College Republicans (UFCR). She is also a state delegate and precinct chair for the Republican party and plans on pursuing a career in politics after graduation. Stewart voted for President Donald Trump.
James Christensen is a freshman from Washington majoring in Parks, Recreation & Tourism. He is a member of the UFCR and identifies as an atheist. After college, Christensen plans to work in the casino industry. In the 2024 presidential election, Christensen voted for Trump.
Brooklynn Gallup, a 20-year-old business major pursuing accounting, lived in Washington until she moved to Utah at 13. She grew up a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints until her mid-teens. Gallup holds a leadership position in the College Democrats at the University of Utah. She voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris.
Eduvey Ramirez grew up in West Jordan, Utah, to Mexican parents. His mother is culturally Catholic and his dad is LDS, so Ramirez grew up attending the LDS Church in Spanish, although he is no longer active in the religion. Ramirez is a senior studying Spanish and English. He voted for Harris this past election.
Rodrigo Fernandez is a sophomore Political Science major at the U. He is originally from Spain but has lived in Salt Lake City, Utah, for most of his life. Fernandez holds an active role in Mecha, a leftist student organization, and the Salt Lake Branch of the Party for Socialism and Liberation. He voted for PSL candidate Claudia De la Cruz.
Sunny Lee grew up LDS in St. George, Utah, but is no longer active in the Church. He is majoring in International Studies and is currently studying French and Russian. Lee does not conform to a mainstream political party and abstained from voting in the 2024 election.
Gun Control, Healthcare & LGBTQ+ Rights
Broad social issues, such as healthcare, gun control, the LGBTQIA+ community and reproductive rights were prominent topics in the Trump-Harris presidential race. Many students felt strongly about the candidates’ opinions on aforementioned topics and considered them in their voting decisions.
In terms of the Second Amendment — the right to bear arms — Ramirez supports the Democratic stance on gun control in the United States.
“I am a strong supporter of Harris’s universal background checks and assault weapons ban,” Ramirez said. “I just believe that nobody should own these semi-automatic weapons that are designed to kill people in seconds.”
Fernandez, who voted third party, expressed a similar opinion on gun violence in the U.S., but said there are systemic issues behind the Second Amendment that “neither candidate has addressed.”
“The problem of gun violence stems much further than just who can own the gun,” Fernandez said. “If we can address the root causes of poverty, of getting people with better education, better health care systems, livable wage, better housing, things like that, better quality of life, we wouldn’t have these bigger problems, or we would at a much lesser extent … [both candidates] stick to the very surface level, guns or no guns. To me, that’s not enough.”
Christensen, who voted for Trump, said mass shootings are often made into a “big spectacle” by media corporations.
“If five people die at a mass shooting, it’ll get more attention than 750 people dying in that same time span via handgun shootings,” Christensen said. “I think the Democrats are disingenuous, because if they were ingenuous about stopping gun crime, they would want to reduce the amount of handguns … And that’s such a violation of the Second Amendment, it would just make a completely different society.”
Political parties have different ideas on governmental control over healthcare. Fernandez, who has lived in a country with universal healthcare, believes it should not be privatized.
“Seeing how many families go into debt for medical care, and seeing how expensive medical care is in this country, I don’t think it’s right to support privatizing healthcare when that has not worked,” Fernandez said. “And you can see other countries who have more socialized versions of medicine — their life expectancy is higher, their satisfaction with their healthcare system is higher and the rates of maternal mortality are lower.”
Christensen said many people feel frustrated with the current healthcare system, pointing to the support shown online for the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson as evidence of this.
“Our healthcare system is in extreme disrepair,” Christensen said. “I think the amount of support we’ve seen online for somebody who did an act of vigilante murder recently of a CEO proves that sentiment better than anything.”
However, he feels no candidate on the 2024 ballot provided a clear solution addressing problems with healthcare.
“I think that privatized health care at this level is not something I really support. We’ve given too much power to pharmaceutical companies,” Christensen said. “But the fact that the two candidates don’t have really radical solutions, turns it into a minor issue, even though it should not be a minor issue.”
Lee, who did not vote, said healthcare is an overlooked component of gay rights in the country.
“One of the massive components of homosexuality is health and safety, which is not actively being embraced by the United States,” Lee said. “It’s one of the things that’s necessary for an egalitarian society, where equal gay rights would be universal healthcare … I can appreciate that people are supporting the right to gay marriage. But there’s more to it than just that.”
Christensen said Trump’s platform is not as homophobic as many Democrats believe. He cited when Trump “removed opposition to gay marriage from the Republican platform.”
Immigration
Trump had plans to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border in 2016 and has mentioned plans to increase border security during his second term. Harris wanted to tighten security and make the process “more orderly,” according to AP News.
Stewart, who voted for Trump, worked for the Syracuse City manager, where she said she had access to evidence of drugs as an effect of immigration. It should be noted that 88% of fentanyl drug traffickers in 2022 were U.S. citizens, according to a report by the U.S. Sentencing Commission.
“The fact that there’s human trafficking going on, and I think that’s a very big problem that people don’t talk about or really like, think about because it’s very underground,” Stewart said. “Another thing is tons of drugs come from these foreign countries that are brought here and are killing people.”
Stewart expressed support for current systems in place that would protect wartime immigrants and allow them into the country. She also brought up the necessity for a speedy citizenship process, which would “incentivize people more to just stay in their country and wait for citizenship.”
Christensen discussed a similar sentiment about immigration, but focused more on the political aspect of a lax border, which he thinks could benefit Democrats.
“California is now a state that will never vote Republican again, because you’ve taken people with a perspective that puts them in line to vote for the Democratic Party,” Christensen said. “Oftentimes, I think they’re doing this intentionally. They’re creating a generation in the future that’s more likely to vote for them, giving them power for a long time.”
Another one of his concerns is taking jobs from the lower class who now have fewer opportunities for manual labor, as well as the gradual un-Americanization that immigrants bring.
“Within a couple of decades, you’ll see elections that are done by people who don’t even see themselves as American,” Christensen said. “[Ilhan Omar] held a rally in Minnesota where she didn’t even speak English. They flew Somali flags … She represents the interest of something other than America.”
Ramirez, who voted for Harris and was raised by Mexican immigrants, said immigrants have made positive impacts on the US.
“Most of my family members have contributed more to the economy than I have, and I’ve been a citizen my whole life … Immigrants, whether they are documented or not, contribute to the economy because everybody has to pay taxes,” he said. “It’s not just citizens who are paying for taxes. Immigrants work really hard and they do the jobs that a regular citizen would not want to have.”
Ramirez added that everybody in the U.S. has immigrant roots.
“Everyone in this country, unless you’re indigenous, has ties to immigration,” Ramirez said. “I think … the hardest sentiment for somebody to reach is empathy.”
Fernandez, third-party voter who grew up surrounded by both immigrants and people born in the U.S., said “one of the root causes of immigration in Latin America is U.S. intervention,” which he said neither Trump nor Harris is doing anything to fix.
“[Harris] also told Guatemalan immigrants not to come to the country, even though we’re responsible for most of the economic hardships going on in Latin America,” Fernandez said. “The United States is responsible for overthrowing democratically elected socialist leaders in Latin America, which leads to economic downfall, installing a dictator that’s sympathetic to us.”
He also added that while the common rhetoric is that Trump is the “anti-immigrant” candidate, Kamala “fails in those categories,” as well.
“She vowed to continue his border wall,” Fernandez said. “She’s run millions of dollars in ads about it. She was a prosecutor. And we know that her history was locking up people of color for small drug offenses, things like that. So even on the border, she’s about as right as Trump, even though she might express that differently.”
Abortion
Abortion proved to be a prominent topic for voters in 2024. Trump advocated for “state-level restrictions” on abortion access, while Harris supported more flexibility and the restoration of reproductive freedom.
Gallup, who voted for Harris, expressed support for the restoration of Roe v. Wade, questioning why lawmakers are “getting involved in other people’s lives,” and saying that the politician has no place in the “doctor’s office while you’re getting scraped up … and going through something.”
She disagrees with stances of the pro-life movement, expressing concern for women’s safety in medical circumstances as a result of abortion restrictions.
“A mother’s life is at risk,” Gallup said. “If you are pro-life, you would not let her die.”
While Lee, who did not vote, agreed with Harris’s pro-choice stance on abortion, he said there are “systematic issues” that prevent her from taking action on that stance.
“[The right to an abortion] is not federally recognized,” Lee said. “A woman’s right to choose … that is unalienable, nobody should be able to touch that.”
Stewart holds different opinions on the subject, supporting a total ban on abortion without exception. She considers human life to begin at conception, despite the manner in which they were conceived.
“People made in rape or incest deserve to live and deserve to have life,” Stewart said. “And so that’s why I say that — I see every life as equal and as valuable. And so if you say that people in [cases of] rape and incest can have abortions and stuff like that, you’re saying that people made in rape and incest are less valuable inherently, compared to people who are made of loving parents, which I don’t agree with.”
In the case of medical emergencies, Stewart said induced labor and C-sections could be a solution. In cases of the child being born into unfit circumstances, she discussed the “waitlist” of parents wanting to adopt. However, induced labor and C-sections are considered to be a type of abortion, and many people seeking abortion do not see adoption as an alternative, including experts.
Christensen says he “understands” reasoning on both sides, but that the decision should be left up to the states.
“Trump is, despite what people say, I think pretty normal on abortion. Politically, he’s come out against a national ban multiple times,” Christensen said. “He overturned Roe versus Wade, yeah, but what that does is it gives the option for people to vote it in if they believe that they want to eliminate abortion in that state …. If you support democracy, in theory, you should support that.”
Foreign Policy
With ongoing conflict in the Middle East and Ukraine, foreign policy was also an important issue for some voters in the past election.
Lee, who said the U.S. should “withdraw from Israel,” said a large part of his reason for not voting was because the “United States is active in encouraging the genocide.”
“Once again, there’s a systemic issue with the United States in foreign policy,” Lee said. “Specifically regarding their activity in other countries, I think that first and foremost, the United States needs to recognize what it’s done and it needs to recognize the state of the world … I think there’s a historical significance when discussing foreign policy.”
Fernandez shared similar beliefs. He said that although Trump’s policy in Gaza would likely be more destructive than Harris’s, a “moral compass” should prevent citizens from voting for either candidate as they both plan to continue supporting Israel.
“I just think that a lot of people feel comfortable voting for that because it doesn’t directly affect them and because of the propaganda of the party system,” Fernandez said. “Genocide is a red line for me. It doesn’t matter which candidate is funding it.”
Gallup voted for Harris because “she could have done probably a lot and still been a better candidate,” opting for who she felt better aligned with her views.
“[Harris] is complacent with Joe Biden and their actions in Gaza, but we also have to realize Donald Trump is going to do even worse,” Gallup said. “Like, yes, she has spoken out, there’s not really anything she can do, and it would be bad for her campaign and for her if she spoke out against the president who she is serving under.”
Stewart said that while she knows that “Biden and Kamala aren’t the same person, they definitely are the same administration,” which is why she trusts Trump’s ability to end the war over Harris’s.
“The fact that [Biden and Harris] haven’t really been able to fully get something done to end the wars is a problem to me,” Stewart said. “I’m not saying obviously, that [ending the war] is for sure gonna happen when [Trump is] president again, but … I give it a good chance that it could happen.”
Christensen said the situation in Gaza should not be a factor for most voters, as both candidates “have the exact same view on it.”
In terms of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Christensen said Trump would be advocating for peace, not for Russia.
“I feel like he wouldn’t be advocating for the interests of Russia as a country, rather than advocating for a peace deal,” Christensen said. “If he was [a Putin supporter] he would literally regurgitate some Russian propaganda, like, Ukraine is a country that is culturally Russian, or something.”
Lee said he is concerned about Trump’s relationship with Putin, saying he thinks “Donald Trump has a fascination with [dictators], which is extremely concerning.”
Economy
While Harris has adopted the goal of “building up the middle class” in her campaign, part of Trump’s “economic revival” is to lower taxes and increase tariffs, which Christensen approves of.
“I think that [his tariff policies are] a really good idea, because we’re involved in the national stage to this level that we are, and yet we still are so reliant on foreign economies, it’s insane,” Christensen said. “I would say I am in favor of the tariffs as a way to bring back industry to America.”
Gallup said increasing tariffs will hurt Americans and there are better alternatives to accomplish the same goal.
“Tariffs aren’t going to help people in America,” Gallup said. “I think [Trump] wanted to do that so people would start producing in the United States. But the thing is, they don’t want to. They want to outsource it so that it’s cheaper. But there’s a whole different way to go about it … You could give them money, an incentive to produce inside the U.S. that would make up for how much they would save if they produce somewhere else. That can be a different and better approach than implementing tariffs, because they’re just going to raise costs on people.”
Fernandez took issue with both candidates’ policies on tax cuts.
“The cuts won’t come from where they’re supposed to, which is the military, which gets the majority of the federal budget,” Fernandez said. “He’s going to cut federal services. Social Security, Medicare. Essential services that we need … we already have such a bad social welfare system in this country that we can’t afford to be taking money from those systems.”
Another reason Fernandez voted third party was because of De La Cruz’s plans for the economy.
“Their policies resonated with me very deeply because they vowed to cut the military budget by 90%,” Fernandez said. “Use that money for social welfare to seize the top corporations that are price gouging people and raising prices, which is leading to inflation.”
Ramirez said the current economy cannot be completely attributed to Biden’s policies.
“A lot of times the economy of today is reflected,” Ramirez said. “When Trump was in office, that was Obama’s economy that he worked for for eight years. And then with COVID, a lot of people talk about inflation. But inflation went up all over the world. Like, gas prices weren’t just significantly higher here.”
Lee attributed the ratchet effect — where economic policies tend to move forward or increase in one direction and cannot easily be reversed — to both the Democratic and Republican economies.
Personality & Character
Some of the interviewees expressed basing some of their voting decisions on the character of the candidates and representation of groups they relate with. Ramirez said he appreciated the Democrats’ representation of minorities in recent years.
“Seeing the polls where, if only people of color voted, like Harris would be President, Hillary Clinton would have been President,” Ramirez said. “Obama was president, but he would have [won by] a huge landslide [if only people of color voted]. I think that is very telling, but people aren’t willing to look at that fact and reflect on why that is.”
Gallup mentioned Trump’s treatment of women as another reason she voted for Harris.
“There’s a lot of people on the right that are saying all of the counts of sexual assault are purely a political move by the Democrats to get him in jail, to make him seem worse,” Gallup said. “I don’t think it’s just Democrats being like we don’t want this guy, so we’re just gonna send all of these women after you. I think it’s people, these women realizing that this man is going to be in power, and he did something to me that’s, like, heinous, and I need to speak up about this so that people know who he is.”
Stewart said Trump’s personality was appealing to her.
“I get how some people don’t [like Trump] obviously, but for me I liked how he was very outspoken and willing to go against corruption that he sees,” Stewart said. “I think that’s what I really liked is that he isn’t afraid to go against some status quo things.”
Fernandez saw both major political candidates as supporting the status quo and felt as though the PSL ticket was the only one that earned his vote.
“The Socialist campaign actually campaigned for my vote,” Fernandez said. “The Democrats sort of feel like they owned my vote just because the alternative was Trump.”
Lee felt similar, citing Harris’s economic stances as the reason he did not vote for her, despite his distaste for Trump.
“I felt very strongly about Kamala Harris being a prosecutor,” Lee said. “And I also don’t think that she represents the economic interests of the working class and … I think that Trump is just kind of crazy.”
Broader Views on Politics
Much of Gen Z participated in their first presidential election in 2024, with voters having conflicting feelings about the results. The topic of voting third-party, single-issue or not partaking at all was addressed in the interviews.
Ramirez, although he voted for Harris, said he can sympathize with third-party voters.
“I can see why people would vote third party,” Ramirez said. “But I think at the end of the day, being realistic, you just kind of have to deal with the cards that you are given.”
Lee, who did not vote, said he felt like it did not matter whether he participated or not.
“I don’t find our political system to be democratic … so why would I participate in this system that says that it’s democratic, but it’s not?” Lee said. “If I had voted, I probably would have voted for Kamala Harris. But if I had, what difference would it have made because the United States doesn’t really allow us to actively have free elections?”
Fernandez expressed similar sentiments as Lee. He said he has received lots of backlash for not choosing the “lesser of the two,” which “moves the Democratic Party further to the center.”
“When is the right time to vote for a third party?” Fernandez said about people who have criticized his voting choices. “Maybe when genocide is on the line? Maybe when immigrants’ rights are on the line? Maybe when Black and queer rights are on the line?”
Fernandez also said people should remain involved in political issues beyond voting in the presidential election.
“I also think that a lot of people think that their civic duty starts and ends at the ballot box every four years. But the truth is that we’re never going to liberate ourselves through voting,” Fernandez added. “All working-class victories have been fought by organizing and through populist uprising. Not by voting once every four years … The minimum wage, the five-day workweek, gay marriage — even these have been won by organizing from the people.”
Gallup said there should be more attention given to politics at a local level.
“We need to focus on local politics, because that can make or break the state. If we’re giving everything back to the states, we need to be involved with the state,” she said.
Christensen commented on the political divide in the U.S.
“People are very atomized,” Christensen said. “I think that probably comes more from the left wing than from the right wing, sometimes for justified reasons, but a lot of the times for very unjustified reasons … They’re too radical on social issues that don’t matter.”
Stewart said “dialogue and conversations” should be prompted through the education system.
“I think just having a mutual love and respect for everyone, that’s all I really hope for … that people can respect how I believe and that I can respect how they believe and that we have a diversity in opinions,” Stewart said. “Because diversity in opinions is how we develop the most innovative and best solutions … because we have people thinking different ways about things.”
Ramirez said there are times dialogue may feel difficult or impossible.
“I don’t think people see the bigger picture that [voting choices are] something that affects people’s lives,” Ramirez said, referring to circulating Instagram posts that promoted respect despite who one voted for. “It can be really personal for somebody if you voted for Trump just because of the economy.”
Influences on Party Affiliation
A person’s party affiliation often correlates with the region in which they live. The interviewees commented on the impact of their surroundings, age, education, money and gender on their party affiliation.
“If you go to college, you’re more likely to vote blue,” Ramirez said. “I think it is because education isn’t just being in class and being taught by professors, but it’s also the people that you’re around.”
Christensen said his values don’t necessarily align with Trump, as he “disagrees with Trump on 30-40% of what he believes,” but he sees character as “irrelevant” when voting.
“Like a lot, specifically, people who are young and who are Democrats and people who are older and who are Republicans, they vote based on emotional things,” Christensen said. “The policies of potential candidates are what will impact the country and steer us in one direction or the other. Kamala is probably a better person than Trump is. I couldn’t care less, because the policies … will affect hundreds of millions, if not billions of people.”
Stewart said the “fake news” on social media is one reason for the “partisanship” of the country.
“Social media obviously is an algorithm, so it takes in what you like,” she said. “It’s going to feed you more things that you like and feed into your political beliefs, and then just slowly get more to the far left or far right, whatever way you lean. And then starts presenting things that aren’t factually correct.”
Many interviewees said they get news from TikTok or biased media, but all stated they fact-check the best they can.
Fernandez said that much of his political beliefs, although he was not “born a socialist,” is because of the values instilled in him at a young age.
“It was very important the values that my family instilled in me; values of community, taking care of one another, how everybody deserves a right to live a life with dignity and a good life,” Fernandez said.
Both Gallup and Stewart grew up as women in the LDS Church, but described the religion having different effects on their lives.
“Morals and beliefs obviously shape who you are and shape what you believe in,” Stewart said. “I think that my religion is the foundation of who I am … That’s what shapes my political beliefs.”
Gallup said that while she grew up religious, the behavior of fellow churchgoers turned her away from the Church.
“I grew up being taught to love everybody and to care for people, and that is not what I see with these Christian nationalists,” Gallup said.
Christensen said religious beliefs do not always have an effect on politics or feelings about the government.
“I think that because a lot of so-called atheists base their decisions on irrational things that they believe as well,” he said.
At the end of each interview, the Chronicle asked students if their environment growing up had an impact on how they voted.
One student said no. Two students said likely. Three students said yes.
“Our life experiences shape our values and beliefs and shape who we are, and so my perspective of my life and stuff like that is different than someone else’s,” Stewart said. “And so I think if I lived a different life, like, lived somewhere else, that definitely would have been influenced.”
Lee expressed a similar sentiment, due to his own experience being queer in a conservative environment.
“Social alienation really leads to attempting to find a different source of community or other social outlets,” Lee said.
Christensen was the only interviewee who answered “no.”
“I don’t think my upbringing had much to do with who I voted for,” Christensen said. “It’s not really about values or personal attachment, because, like, if Trump wasn’t a politician, I would probably dislike him. I feel like it’s just about the path that we’ll take the country down. And I agree with Trump’s path more than Kamala’s path.”
