There are 8.5 million people in the very active “r/politics” group on Reddit, a public opinion forum that can be seen as a counter-balance to much of the “scientific” opinion polling done by paid pollsters, a field in which even the top professional practitioners (Pew Research, etc.) admit they often get stuck largely surveying Americans who use landlines and who, critically, are willing to volunteer time to be polled.
So it’s notable, if not scientific, when a candidate for office makes a pledge and the comments that rise to the top or r/politics are highly critical, as is happening after former president Donald Trump‘s recent promise to roll back transgender rights on “day one” in office if he is re-elected.
Commenters are calling out the former president, emphasizing their belief that the choice between Joe Biden and Trump is stark and not, as jaded voters assert, a choice between two similar candidacies.
The comments about Trump’s anti-trans rights agenda appeared under a share of an article in The Hill entitled Trump vows to reverse transgender student protections ‘on day one’.
One commenter, representative of the majority of comments surfacing at the top — there are more than 2.2k comments in all — wrote: “Imagine being so hateful that this is a Day 1 priority.”
Others pointed out that Trump’s ‘day one’ promise list is getting very long and includes the list below, derived from the candidate’s own speeches. Point #1, “be a dictator,” is meant to enable the accomplishment of the others.
- Be a dictator (just for Day 1)
- Reverse Biden Admin climate policies
- Remove transgender/LGBTQ protections
- Repeal Obamacare
- Close the US/Mexico border + deportation raids + end birthright citizenship
- Muslim travel ban
- Jail/Persecute his political rivals
- Free January 6th rioters
This list doesn’t specifically include his promise to oil companies to encourage them to “drill, drill, drill,” as Trump has also promised or a national abortion ban, which he has hinted at, then backed off saying abortion law would be a state-by-state decision.
The 2021 executive order by Biden that Trump pledged to reverse said that “all students should be guaranteed an educational environment free from discrimination on the basis of sex, including discrimination in the form of sexual harassment, which encompasses sexual violence, and including discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.”
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