By Matthew Villanueva, Features Assignment Editor
This past week, American composer Lin-Manuel Miranda announced that Disney would release a full feature of his hit Broadway musical, “Hamilton,” with the original cast. Throughout the historical hip-hop opera, the title founding father beseeches the audience to remember, “History has its eyes on you.”
The past week of political turmoil may seem irrelevant at the moment, but our children’s history books may remember this week as one of the most pivotal weeks in American history— especially if the incumbent Republican is victorious again this November.
On Monday, Iowa kicked off the 2020 election season with technical difficulties and controversy. On Tuesday, Donald Trump delivered his third annual State of the Union Address. Wednesday, for only the third time in our country’s history, the Senate voted on whether or not to remove the president from his position.
At Monday’s Iowa Caucus, technical difficulties involving a new voting app delayed the disclosure of results to the public. The delay caused outrage amongst cable news outlets and political analysts begging Iowa for content. Senator Bernie Sanders and Mayor Pete Buttigieg ended up putting up strong showings as former Vice President Joe Biden came out of Iowa with zero delegates.
Trump’s third State of the Union Address on Tuesday went with only a few hiccups; including many deliberate lies and the ongoing dispute between Trump and the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. Some of his fabricated statements included those involving ICE and sanctuary cities, health care and the economy.
Preceding the speech, Trump refused to shake the Speaker’s hand. In retaliation Pelosi visibly ripped a copy of the speech in half.
While the week may have started with as much drama as, “The Bachelor,” Wednesday’s vote in the Senate was undoubtedly expected. There were only 48 of the 67 necessary votes to remove Trump from office, with only one Republican— Mitt Romney— crossing party lines.
While the outcome was expected, the actions of the 116th U.S. Senate may be seen as foolish in future history books.
In a period where our country seems to be the most divided it has been since the Civil War, the vote to acquit Trump of his wrongdoings will shine a negative light onto this currently cloudy political landscape.
In Rep. Adam Schiff’s (D) closing arguments to the Senate on whether or not to persecute the president he beseeched, “History will not be kind to Donald Trump. Not because it was written by ‘Never-Trumpers,’ but because whenever we have departed from the values of our nation, we have come to regret it, and that regret is written all over the pages of our history… If you choose to acquit, your name will be tied to his, for all of history.”
While the 52 Republican senators that voted to acquit Trump may get endorsed by the incumbent when they run for re-election, history will not remember them fondly.
History has its eyes on you. And if we do not vote correctly this year, history will continue to shine a dim light on this epoch.
villanjv18@bonaventure.edu
