Growing up in a conservative household, Patricia Boe says her decision to vote for Barack Obama, twice, was an act of courage.
“During the 2012 election, my family rolled their eyes at me, but we were able to laugh about our differences,” said Boe, 39, of Santa Ana.
“But somewhere between then and 2016, my sister moved even further right.”
Two years ago, with Donald Trump’s election, the rift grew.
“We were no longer able to civilly discuss politics, especially on Facebook,” Boe said. “My sister and I used to be very close … But our political differences have spilled into our relationship as a whole and we now barely speak, aside from surface level conversations.”
“Suffice it to say, Thanksgiving this year is at her house, and politics is absolutely banned as a topic of conversation.”
It’s a rule that might come in handy at many Thanksgiving tables, particularly in the wake of the first election of the Trump era.
While the results of the Nov. 6 midterm signify at least some resurgence of anti-Trump politics, it’s unclear if that will douse – or inflame – Thanksgiving squabbles.
Of course, familial political divides didn’t start with Trump. But his presidency has highlighted a growing polarization in the country that has turned even close family members into combatants.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted early last year found that the number of people who said they’d argued with a family member about politics jumped 6 percent after Trump’s election. In the same poll, 16 percent said the 2016 election had prompted them to stop talking with a family member or former friend.
The Trump divide was a key reason why retired California prison guard Gayle McCormick divorced her husband of 22 years.
“It totally undid me that he could vote for Trump,” McCormick, then 73, told Reuters in early 2017.
“It opened up areas between us I had not faced before. I realized how far I had gone in my life to accept things I would have never accepted when I was younger.”
Tables turned?
You’re not wrong if you suspect that, in terms of politics, family Thanksgiving gatherings can be particularly fraught….
