From the outside, it may seem like Florida and California are nothing alike. But between things like climate change and an affordability crisis, people in both states have a lot of things in common.
Alexis Madrigal, host of “Forum” at KQED in San Francisco, joined Tom Hudson on “The Florida Roundup” for a live simulcast following Election Day.
Responses to COVID-19
In terms of differences, Florida and California have had distinct responses to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
“I mean, here, I think it seems that we have never really recovered. You know, many of our restaurants are still closed down. Our downtowns are still empty. You all did something totally different, opened up way earlier,” Madrigal said.
Marisa Lagos, a correspondent for KQED’s California Politics and Government Desk, said there have also been positive impacts in neighborhoods, such as people spending more time with other members of their communities.
“I do think that certainly a lot of what we saw happen this week is still related to what COVID did to the economy, and then the perceptions, to your point, Alexis, of how different leaders handled it. And I also think some amnesia about what things were like that final year of the Trump term,” Lagos said during the simulcast.
Democrats and Republicans
Lagos noted Tuesday’s results show the gap between the Democratic Party and the American people.
“And I do think that Trump exploited a lot of anxiety around some of the sort of social changes we're seeing, particularly around the transgender community.”
Lagos added the rightward shift of the nation speaks to that deep anxiety.
“… we've seen this over the course of history, that when people don't feel secure, when people feel like the system isn't fair, they tend to sort of go inward and have a lot of fear about people who are different than them. And so you can kind of tie that economic anxiety to maybe what I think a lot of people in our region would see as attacks on people who don't have a lot, and it doesn't really make sense, I think, to a lot of people who are LGBTQ. Why is this the issue in an election? But I think it's part of a bigger narrative.”
"… we've seen this over the course of history, that when people don't feel secure, when people feel like the system isn't fair, they tend to sort of go inward and have a lot of fear about people who are different than them."Marisa Lagos
While people don’t trust the status quo and feel the system isn’t working for them, Lagos said Trump “really did run as the outsider,” while Democrats ran as defenders of the current order.
“So even if you think that what (Trump is) saying doesn't totally make sense, it's like, well, he's saying the system's broken, and I agree with that premise. So how can I vote for a party that says everything's fine, right?”
Climate change
Like Florida, California is also experiencing the effects of the climate crisis. Madrigal and Lagos pointed out politicians in the Golden State do believe in and talk about climate change.
“Even the sort of furthest right folks in Sacramento, they may be saying different things in their districts, but when you look at the debate on the floor, it's less about the underlying belief and whether this is happening, it's more about, how does it affect the economy, industry, businesses, is this the right sort of way to go? Is there overregulation?” Lagos said.
Similarly, she noted politicians may speak about issues differently in the state legislature versus on the national stage due to where the center is in California.
This story was compiled off interviews conducted by Tom Hudson for “The Florida Roundup.”
