Stacey May
On October 1, the Mount Republicans and Discourse Society hosted a watch party for the Vice-Presidential candidate debate. It was a full house, with about 40 people in attendance. The debate was between Kamala Harris’ Vice President pick Governor Tim Waltz and Donald Trump’s pick Senator J.D. Vance. This was the only debate between the two candidates.
Rhoda Simms (C’27), President of the Discourse Society, said, “We had a lot of meticulous planning that went into this, both me and my Vice President Clover Satchell. I’m very, very grateful for her, because she helped us reach out to the Mount Republican’s Club, and since they are directly correlated with politics and discussion of politics, we decided it would be perfect to collaborate with them to host this event, although everyone was welcome, not just republicans.” When asked if she thought the event was successful, she said, “Absolutely, we had over 35 people in attendance which was amazing, better than our last debate attendance--I think the pizza definitely helped. But just understanding that people are engaged in politics at the Mount, and that a lot of us want to be or are registered voters, was our goal in planning and organization of this event to foster that growth.”
Anthony Silvestri (C’27), President of the Republican Club, said, “We saw it [the debate] as a pretty good opportunity to have a nice event. The presidential debate obviously is a political event, but also the Discourse Society, the Debate Club, said they would probably be watching anyways [so we decided to do a collaborated event].”
One of the attendees was Santiago Canadas (C’28). He said, “I like it [the debate]. I think it’s a lot better than the last one... I don’t think there is a clear winner, but I love how they are agreeing on different subjects, and how they’re giving each other credit. I think that is very, very interesting, and something we really haven’t seen before.” Canadas also said, “I think the fact checking is interesting; I think it is an interesting concept and it will be cool to see how this plays out in different elections.” CBS had fact checking in almost real-time to give viewers an accurate view of the debate.
Sammie Fangmeyer (C’28), said, “I think both of them are dodging certain questions, or not answering them completely. I think these moderators are better than the ones at the presidential debate; they seem less biased.” She also expressed that she was interested in seeing the fact checks.
Andres Tinio (C’25), said, “I thought they both made solid points, it was interesting how they were trying to speak for their running mates' thoughts. I thought that was also something that was good, because I felt like in the presidential debate it was very vague about what the presidential candidates were thinking, because most of the time they were just arguing against each other. I thought this one was good and clear.”
Mary Gutshall (C’26), said, “I think it was better than the presidential debate, it was much more civil.” Gutshall also said, “I liked that they focused more on actual policy, so that was nice, because in a lot of debates nowadays you don’t really see policy, you just see slander towards the other person. Overall, they weren’t bad.”
If interested in joining, the Discourse Society meets Wednesdays at 8 PM in AC 106, and the Republican club has various events throughout the year.
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