Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

Yes­ter­day, Unit­ed States cit­i­zens took to the polls with the out­come of their vote des­tined to cre­ate his­to­ry as the De­moc­rats’ Ka­mala Har­ris was poised to be­come the coun­try’s first fe­male pres­i­dent, and Don­ald Trump, the Re­pub­li­can nom­i­nee, was po­si­tioned to be the sec­ond pres­i­dent to serve non-con­sec­u­tive terms. 

T&T cit­i­zens who have called Mi­a­mi their home have had a front-row seat to the elec­tion, the cul­mi­na­tion of what has been de­scribed by com­men­ta­tors as a roller coast­er cam­paign. Pro­fes­sor An­tho­ny T Bryan, an in­ter­na­tion­al re­la­tions ex­pert and con­sul­tant on en­er­gy de­vel­op­ment, se­cu­ri­ty, geopol­i­tics, and re­new­able en­er­gy in the Caribbean who has dubbed the US his sec­ond home, ex­plained that a lot hinged on the out­come of the elec­tion.

“We are at a cross­roads in the Unit­ed States. It is a strug­gle be­tween pre­serv­ing a democ­ra­cy as we know it and al­so the op­tion is an au­thor­i­tar­i­an gov­ern­ment.” Dur­ing an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia from his Mi­a­mi home, Prof Bryan ex­plained that he was among the ear­ly vot­ers.

“There is con­tro­ver­sy, ob­vi­ous­ly. Trump is from Flori­da; Flori­da is prob­a­bly a pur­ple state now rather than a red state.” Torn be­tween two lands, Prof Bryan stat­ed that he has his sights set on the out­come of the elec­tion and its im­pact on him and his fam­i­ly.

“I think I like a bit of nor­mal­cy, and cer­tain­ly that is what the De­moc­rats of­fer. They of­fer to pay at­ten­tion to re­al is­sues that have to do with one’s stan­dard of liv­ing. Ka­mala has read off a num­ber of things she wants to un­der­take, in­clud­ing a cap on phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals and help with hous­ing; she’s out­lined it very well, and I think a lot of the Amer­i­can pub­lic looks at that and won­ders if things will be bet­ter for me. Trump is seen as a mir­a­cle man; a lot of peo­ple be­lieve him, but in the fi­nal analy­sis, one has to weigh in on the side of log­ic and trans­paren­cy.”

Dur­ing an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, De­ser­rie Perez, who has been based in Fort Laud­erdale for the last 20 years, said this was the third US elec­tion she had par­tic­i­pat­ed in.

“My ex­pec­ta­tion is to have some­one who is hon­est and eth­i­cal to re­al­ly ad­vo­cate for all the voic­es, not just with mon­ey and the biggest bank ac­counts that can fund the cam­paign but to the voic­es of the un­der­served,” she said.

A De­mo­c­rat, Perez said she found it nec­es­sary to im­merse her­self in an elec­tion that would come down to the wire. “I vol­un­teered do­ing calls for the De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty of Broward to sup­port Vice Pres­i­dent Har­ris, who we hope will be pres­i­dent, and dur­ing my calls I’ve made over 100 calls; it’s tough.”

She fur­ther ex­plained what made this year’s elec­tion stakes among the high­est in his­to­ry. “There are a num­ber of rea­sons lo­cal­ly, do­mes­ti­cal­ly, and in the US, whether it is health­care, women’s rights, in­fla­tion was at an all-time high. We have two wars that are hap­pen­ing and the US is a key play­er, and hav­ing a leader to nav­i­gate both lo­cal and for­eign diplo­ma­cy with tact and diplo­ma­cy is crit­i­cal for the world.”

An­tho­ny Hink­son and his wife, Marie, who have been liv­ing in Mary­land, Flori­da, run­ning their busi­ness and are root­ed Re­pub­li­cans, said their po­si­tions had shift­ed away from Trump’s pro­posed poli­cies.

“In 2024, in this elec­tion, I’m vot­ing for Ka­mala Har­ris at the end of the day even though I hold that Re­pub­li­can card. I don’t go with the par­ty I go with who I be­lieve will be the best fit for the coun­try.”

For Hink­son, de­ci­pher­ing the sharply con­trast­ing views of the pres­i­den­tial nom­i­nees was crit­i­cal for him.

“As a busi­ness­man, you tend to more lean to be a Re­pub­li­can than a De­mo­c­rat, but I tend to lean on the best per­son who can do the job. It can be a Re­pub­li­can or De­mo­c­rat; maybe I’m a De­mo­c­rat, but I vote for the best per­son to lead us, and for now, Ka­mala is the best per­son.”

Women’s rights, Marie not­ed, are al­so a ma­jor de­cid­ing fac­tor in how she vot­ed.

“Mr Trump, as far as I have seen through his pre­vi­ous tenure, has not been too nice to women, and he has been ig­no­rant and ir­ra­tional, and you need some­one ra­tio­nal in the White House who is able to take a deep breath and say let us fig­ure this out as op­posed to say­ing let’s go and bomb this coun­try.”