College Democrats campaign for equality

Noldon Starks, Contributing writer

College Democrats seeks to make politics interesting for our generation.

Club president Matthew Hatfield is organizing events to promote Democratic candidates in all types of political races. The purpose of the club’s activism is so the candidates they favor are elected.

“We’ve been very active in coordinating activities with a lot of political campaigns that are currently running right now,” Hatfield said.

The political events are meant to help club members get a feel for what it is like to participate in the current political system. Currently, the club is focusing on the supreme court race.

“There is a Supreme Court race in Pennsylvania where there is three open seats. Pretty much we are trying to get as many Democrats on the Supreme Court because they have a big impact on redistricting that are drawn in certain ways for or against some political parties,” said Hatfield.

“We are trying to make sure that the rules are fair and its conclusive to millions of voter registrations for Democrats in Pennsylvania.”

Rather than vouching for one candidate, the club supports any Democratic candidate whom they believe is going to make the right decisions for this nation.

“Our vice president is working with the Bernie Sanders campaign, trying to coordinate activities in the Erie area and I’m in contact with Hillary for America. That is the organization trying to push Hillary Clinton for candidacy for the Democrat party,“ said Hatfield.

“The reason behind our support of these candidates is that we believe that out of the 16 Republican candidates are pushing climate change, denying xenophobic bigoted policies. A lot of people and college Democrats believe that these policies are harmful to this country, so we are trying to get behind candidates that are promatic opposed to dogmatic that are trying to push for equality throughout the nation.”

Club secretary Lauren Murphy believes that a lot of Democrats, and people in general, want equality in this world. She believes the country is getting there, but it is happening slowly.

“There’s not a lot of Republican candidates that talk about what they are going to do for college-aged kids. I know Bernie has talked about what he plans to do about tuition and obviously it’s going up and it’s not going to stop,” Murphy said.

The club accepts all people and doesn’t mind having members who have different view on politics.

“We like to debate” Murphy said.

In the future, the club would  like to get involved with the College Republicans club on campus so both of the clubs can have a debate. Overall, the club wants more opinionated people and hopes to double their participants in the near future.