You’ve seen the Snapchat story, you’ve read headlines on Yahoo! and Google, and you’ve heard jokes about Donald Trump’s hair; but how much do you really know about next year’s presidential election?
I’m going to give you a quick rundown on the candidates, the issues, and anything else that you might want answered in the FAQs.
Let’s start with the candidates. Democrats that have declared that they’re running in next year’s presidential election include: Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley, Jim Webb, and Lincoln Chafee. On the other side of the ring, the Republicans have a heavier stack, including Donald Trump, Ben Carson, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Carly Fiorina, Scott Walker, Mike Huckabee, John Kasich, Chris Christie, Rand Paul, and Rick Santorum.
Without knowing all of the names, you might have already known that Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, and Hillary Clinton were already in the running because of the amount of news coverage that surrounds them. And, no, Kanye is planning to run in 2020, not 2016. Speaking of news coverage, Trump has made quite a name for himself in the 2016 presidential campaign, as if he hasn’t done that already on our televisions.
Why is Donald Trump running for president? Good question. It seems that people are paying more attention to his hair and his strange comments in interviews than what his campaign is about. Jokes aside, though, Trump’s views, according to his campaign website donaldjtrump.com, are conservative and will focus on the failures of the Obama administration and the commonly Republican platforms such as the importance of a strong family and building a strong military.
The ‘long story short’ version of the main issues surrounding the campaign are expected to involve the Iran Deal (supported by Democrats and opposed by Republicans), same-sex marriage, climate change, immigration, and several other items that President Barack Obama addressed in his first and second term but never fully wrapped up.
Former Secretary of State, New York senator, and first lady Hillary Clinton has a campaign that is hard to ignore. How could you ignore a candidate that has already been in the White House and who could possibly be our nation’s first woman president? You can’t. Clinton is surprising people with her more than liberal views this year, and I’m sure she won’t stop there. She didn’t gain enough support for the 2008 election, but she may have enough momentum to keep her going in this one.
With the campaign just getting started and the actual election over a year away, there’s much more to look forward to, so stay tuned, because no matter what way this election goes, it should get interesting.
