The following is a lightly edited version of an email that I wrote to a friend who asked in a group chat if anyone who was a Trump supporter going into the first debate still planned to vote for him after he told the Proud Boys to “stand by.”
First, to be transparent about where I’m coming from: I went into the debate planning to vote for Trump, and left the debate feeling depressed and exhausted, and less confident about how I will vote. A few months ago, with the combination of Trump’s inept COVID response and his failure to lead when the riots broke out in late May/early June, I decided I would not vote for Trump and changed my party registration from Republican to independent.
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