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Fall 2021 was a unique semester for politically active Yalies — as heightened political tensions soared across the country and COVID-19 caused classes to move to Zoom, many students spent the semester engaged in the political sphere.

Yalies participated in various 2020 elections in many ways: through campaign work, stressing over polls, watching debates and rejoicing in the streets when results were announced. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s victory turned Yale’s majority-blue campus into a celebration.

“Saying the words ‘Madam Vice President Kamala Devi Harris’ still gives me chills,” Ananya Kachru ’22 wrote to the News. “After the 2016 Election, I didn’t anticipate watching a South Asian American and Black woman become vice president of the United States within four years. This moment means a lot to me, and my family, and I think I have yet to even fully process it.”

A plethora of Yalies joined the 2020 action by taking a leave of absence to work on political campaigns. The motivation was twofold: an eagerness to avoid a remote semester during the pandemic, and an urgency spawned by high-stakes races happening across the country on local, state and national levels.

One of these students was Lizzie Bjork ‘22, who emphasized the latter motivation in an interview with the News this fall.

“There was something Kamala Harris said in her convention speech that really stuck with me,” Bjork told the News. “She said: ‘Where were you when the stakes were so high?’ I felt very fueled by the sense that I needed to do everything I could. And for me, I’m lucky enough to have the option to delay graduation and the ability to relocate and do campaign work.”

Candice Mulinda ‘24 also seized the opportunity to take time off, move to a new state and work on a campaign. Mulinda said she never would have considered taking time off for school if not for COVID-19.

But Amy McGrath’s campaign against then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made her keenly aware that it was a “key moment” for Kentucky.

“I thought, this opportunity won’t occur for me anytime soon, so why not?” Mulinda said. “Kentucky’s super red, and I’m from a decently conservative region, so if I learn how to canvass in this deeply red area, it’ll help me when I come back to improve my community.” 

Meanwhile, as Election Day approached, enrolled Yalies watched several Presidential debates.

After the first debate, several students interviewed by the News expressed frustration at the lack of conduct demonstrated by candidates. President of the Yale Debate Association Ellie Singer ‘22 said neither candidate was impressive. 

“At the end of the debate, Jake Tapper said ‘that was a hot mess, inside a dumpster fire, inside of a train wreck,’” Singer wrote in an email to the News. “I do not disagree.”

Much of the Yale community rejoiced the weekend after the election, when CNN called the election for Biden. This included many Yale professors, who expressed to the News a wide range of emotions, from happiness to relief. Daphne Brooks, professor of African American Studies, said the news put her in a state of “elation.”

“I am shocked at what it feels like to not wake up with a kind of existential anxiety about my government terrorizing me,” Brooks said. “I feel hopeful and comforted by the idea of a government that will engage in a politics of care in the midst of the worst health crisis we’ve seen in a hundred years.”

That day, celebrations erupted across the U.S. in city streets, where many remote Yalies were living. In Evan Roberts’s ‘23 Colorado town, residents were banging “pots and pans” with joy.

In the election — and in election cycles prior — faculty at Yale overwhelmingly donated to Democratic candidates and groups.

An analysis of Federal Elections Committee data by the News found that over 600 Yale faculty members had donated at or above the $200 minimum reporting threshold to political groups and campaigns during the last seven years. $2,196,222 went to Democratic aligned parties, while their Republican counterparts received just over $20,000 from University faculty.

“Yale professors seem overwhelmingly in favor of some central values and policies that fight against inequality, against sexism and against racism, while advocating for social justice, good and universal health care, and other similar ones that better the lives of all inhabitants in the U.S., citizens and non-citizens alike,” Jesus Velasco, chair of the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, told the News in the fall. “I am happy to be part of a community of colleagues who express this degree of universal solidarity.”

The 2020 presidential election took place Nov. 3.

OWEN TUCKER-SMITH
Owen Tucker-Smith was managing editor of the Board of 2023. Before that, he covered the mayor as a City Hall reporter.