Aiden Lutjen, staff writer

Before I get into this, quick disclaimer: I’m not a Democrat, because Democrats are just the “lesser of two evils” option in our effectively two-party system. You know, unfortunately, that’s just how the ‘Merican cookie crumbles. But the election results are in from the 2022 Midterms, and there’s a lot to cover.

At the time of writing this, there’s plenty of bad news. Former Pres. Trump has announced his second rerun for president in 2024, which gives me a headache. After being impeached, you really shouldn’t be allowed to run again. And you’d think after 2020 he would get the message that people are done with him. There are rumors that former Vice Pres. Mike Pence will also run in 2024, which I’m less than excited about. At least since the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol he hates Trump. Along with this, the Republicans have unfortunately won a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, which Democrats were hoping to keep.

Several states also had ballot measures about slavery and abortion. Yeah, you read that right — slavery. Five states considered whether or not to outlaw slavery, and apparently Louisiana isn’t ready to let go of it. Of the five states with reproductive rights on the ballot, Kentucky and Montana voters decided to enact varying restrictions, which seriously doesn’t look good.

However, this election wasn’t all bad, and we have young voters to thank for that. Turnout of voters between 18- and 29-years-old has become a consistent and increasing pattern now seen in the last handful of elections. Because of this — and sensible voters over 30-years-old — Democrats were able to at least secure their majority in the U.S. Senate, protections on abortion were approved in three states (Vt., Mich. and Calif.) and slavery in all cases was outlawed completely in four states (Ala., Ore., Tenn. and Vt.).

Quick shoutout to Maryland, who voted in favor of recreational marijuana usage. Along with this, Florida elected the very first Gen Z politician to Congress, Maxwell Frost. He also apparently still runs a pop music stan account on Twitter — truly iconic. On top of this, Los Angeles elected Karen Bass to be the first Black woman serving as mayor — no less the first woman at all. Also, I’m proud to say that Minnesota now has our own first transgender lawmaker, Leigh Finke, who was elected to the state House of Representatives.

I would like to thank every individual who exercised their right to vote — especially the young people of this country. Without using our voice this midterm, we wouldn’t have gotten this far. We are both the present and the future, and we are the ones who will kick the aging bigots from the past out of power. We are going to be the reason for the betterment of this country after so many horrific years of taking step after step backwards. I hope all of the selfish, undeserving degenerates in every part of our government are nothing but terrified — they should be. It’s our time. It’s our turn. And this is only the beginning.