In this episode, The Daily reports on how students and leaders of political student organizations are reacting to the inauguration landing on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. This episode explores how this coincidence makes students feel and how they’re balancing the two events.
JEANINE YUEN: I do not think that it is an issue that Inauguration Day and MLK Day are on the same dates this year because they are both fearless leaders that are fighting for the rights of their people.
APOLLO UMBRA: What we’re seeing happen is kinda the antithesis of what MLK Day should be for, which I think is ironic.
TERESA AYALA LEON: That was Weinberg senior Jeanine Yuen and Communication senior Apollo Umbra on their feelings about President Donald Trump’s inauguration falling on Martin Luther King Jr. Day this year.
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TERESA AYALA LEON: From the Daily Northwestern, I’m Teresa Ayala Leon.
ISABELLA JACOB: And I’m Isabella Jacob. This is Digital Diaries, a podcast capturing peoples’ lives in their own words.
Every year, Martin Luther King Jr. Day falls on the third Monday of January, and the presidential inauguration typically occurs on Jan. 20. This year, both events happened on the same day.
President Trump will be the third president to be sworn in on MLK Day, following former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.
Umbra said he feels the coincidence is ironic since, to him, MLK and Trump stand for different values.
APOLLO UMBRA: I think of MLK Day as like supposed to be this day that not only represents a more diverse America and pushes for progress, not only for Black people, but for all people. And I think kind of the state of what we’re seeing happen and the irony in it, of this group of people who are just kind of running a rich oligarchy.
ISABELLA JACOB: Yuen, president of NU College Republicans, said she feels as though this coincidence has created a “harmonious” occasion.
JEANINE YUEN: They were both fighting for the same things. MLK was fighting for civil rights. So is Donald Trump, fighting to protect the rights guaranteed by our Constitution.
ISABELLA JACOB: Yuen said she believes that NU is part of the country’s political discourse and that it’s important to tune in, even if you disagree with what’s going on.
TERESA AYALA LEON: On the other side of the political spectrum, Weinberg junior Clark Mahoney, co-president of NU College Democrats, considers the events as polar opposites.
CLARK MAHONEY: MLK champions such different things than what Trump advocates for, just like how to view the world and people who are different from you. But, I feel like there is a lot to learn and contrast between these two people.
TERESA AYALA LEON: Mahoney said he hopes that the NU College Democrats can provide support and unity for one another during Trump’s presidency.
CLARK MAHONEY: Our main focus right now is to build a community of Democrats on campus. I mean, that’s always our goal, but especially now that we have a Republican as our president. So, whether that’s just weekly meetings where we are checking in on each other or talking about the news, what Trump is doing, we’ll start doing that, I’m sure, hosting events with professors to talk about what Trump is doing, and what ways we can respond, almost, or precedents or anything like that.
TERESA AYALA LEON: Weinberg sophomore and treasurer of the NU College Republicans Gabriel Bayer emphasized that a person’s political party affiliation doesn’t have to correlate with how you feel about the inauguration.
GABRIEL BAYER: There’s a wide range of opinions within the club. I guess, in some ways, it’s really a wide umbrella, and you have people that are celebrating today and people that are giving their criticism of the current administration and everything. So, I think we’re going to continue having lively discourse about it in our meetings.
[music]
TERESA AYALA LEON: From The Daily Northwestern, I’m Teresa Ayala Leon.
ISABELLA JACOB: And I’m Isabella Jacob. Thanks for listening to another episode of Digital Diaries. This episode was reported and produced by us, Isabella Jacob and Teresa Ayala Leon.
The Audio Editor of The Daily Northwestern is Anavi Prakash. The Multimedia Managing Editors are Kelley Lu and Jillian Moore. The Editor in Chief is Lily Ogburn.
Our theme music is “Falaal” by Blue Dot Sessions, used under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License provided by the Free Music Archive.
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Email: [email protected]
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