The Babies of the Trump Election

Forty-nine minutes after the polls closed along the Eastern Seaboard on November 8, 2016, I gave birth to my second child, a boy, in Rochester, New York. “Election Day Eddie,” the nurses called him. Many Americans think of that day, two years ago, as stunning and historic, overwhelming and exhausting—for good or for bad. But for the mothers and fathers of some 11,000 babies—more, if you count those born on November 9, when the election was finally decided—Donald Trump’s presidential victory was only the second most life-changing event that day.

I’ve since wondered: Did those parents, like me, spend the past two years juggling bottles with TV remotes, watching a whole new era of American politics unfold as their infants grew into toddlers? How did they, and their children, handle it? This spring, I decided to search for other families who had babies on or within days of Election Day 2016. I scrolled through newspaper birth announcements online, joined Facebook groups, and reached out to synagogues, mosques, temples and churches, as well as doulas and midwives. Although I knew I wouldn’t be able to capture every facet of the American experience, I sought people from different backgrounds, and in the end, I spoke with 15 families from across the country, eight of whom were photographed by Politico’s director of photography, M. Scott Mahaskey.

Many parents told me of dramatic moments in the hospital two years ago. Jess Wholey of San Diego found out the election results just after being wheeled out of the operating room with her newborn twin boys, Marleau and Boh, early on November 9. “It was such a crazy mix of emotions,” she recalls. Chastity Romero-Latham of Lawrence, Kansas, refers to her November 8 son, Bowie—the first child she and her husband, Jonathan, were able to conceive after almost a decade of marriage—as her “saving grace” while the voting results were rolling in. Other parents, from Wyoming to Maine, saw the birth of a new baby and the election of Trump as a double blessing.

Far beyond the births themselves, these families offer a window into what it means to raise a child in Trump’s America. Regardless of their politics, just about every set of parents I spoke with had concerns about the world their toddlers are growing up in—struggling school systems, gun violence, discrimination, the cost of college and the effects of climate change. But while some parents are shielding their young children from the news of the day, others are actively initiating them into the political process. Beth and TJ Vargas, for instance, encountered an anti-Trump rally in Sacramento as they left the hospital with their newborn son, Owen, in November 2016; since then, Owen has attended four marches. What’s clear is that being a toddler today—perhaps especially for these November 2016 “Trump babies”—is not what it used to be.

The first time Jimmy Erickson, 40, voted in a presidential election, it was to cast his ballot for Trump on November 8, 2016. And he did so while his wife was five centimeters dilated, laboring to deliver their first child. Marisa Erickson, 38, a customer service supervisor for a fire alarm company, is not registered to vote and considers herself politically apathetic. She says she wasn’t mad about her husband stepping out to vote—and, indeed, Jimmy returned in time to help deliver their daughter, Ryleigh, whom they call their “rainbow” baby after having previously suffered three miscarriages. Jimmy, an airline mechanic, mostly continues to support Trump today, but he disapproves of the president’s decision to exit the Paris climate accord because he worries about the impact that global warming will have on his daughter’s life in the years to come. He has high hopes for Ryleigh, after all—nothing short of occupying the White House. “Push her in the stroller,” Jimmy says, “and she has the wave going already.”

“I didn’t want to have my baby on that time only because of who the president [would be], and where I’m from, and his opinions of people with my skin color,” says Shantel Armstrong, 25, a green card holder from Jamaica. Her first child, Annastasia (“Anna”), nonetheless was born on November 8. Shantel’s fiancé, Chad Humbert, 29, who calls himself a progressive Democrat and voted for Clinton, works on an assembly line, and while his politics might be unusual in the family’s rural Pennsylvania community, he says, “If I’m at work and I hear someone make a racist comment, I always call them out on it.” Shantel, who is enrolled in nursing school, hopes that Anna, who was born without irises, making her sensitive to light, won’t be judged for her skin color or for speaking Jamaican Patwah. “She’s half-black, half-white, half-Jamaican, she’s American, and she has a disability,” Chad adds. “I hope she has all the opportunities that a straight, white guy like me has.”

Steven Flinner and Vanessa Morazan took well to the results on Election Day—both supported Trump. “I’m not big on hunting, but I like guns,” says Steven, 31, an operator at an oil refinery. “And I just liked how forthcoming he was.” Vanessa, 25, a permanent U.S. resident from Costa Rica, did not vote but explains, “I’m an immigrant, and I came to this country legally.” November 8 was harrowing for the engaged couple for other reasons: Vanessa went into labor 15 weeks early, and their son, William, weighed 1 pound at birth. A veterinary technician, Vanessa now stays home with William, who has had health complications during his infancy but today is “healthy and heavy,” according to his mother. “My big concern about his growing up would be bullying and discrimination, because he comes from a Spanish mom,” Vanessa says. Steven is more concerned about making sure his son stays “on the right path and around the right people.” As he puts it: “I think the challenge is keeping your son safe, and that’s not just physically but mentally from society.”

Jamila Carver, 38, an operating-room nurse, was none too amused when a colleague jokingly suggested that she and her husband, AJ, adopt the nickname “Donny” for their November 8 baby, Adonis Cornelius James Carver—who is in fact named for the Greek god of beauty. Jamila, a Clinton supporter, believes Trump has “a lot of bigotry issues.” She worries about what might happen if her son were ever pulled over by the police. “Everybody gets mad and angry, but for African-Americans, you have to be mindful of your character,” she says. AJ, 31, a Democrat who delivers equipment for a medical supply company, describes his son as “full of energy,” an independent toddler who “knows how to get what he wants when he wants it.” Jamila’s hopes for Adonis, she says, include “going to college”—but also “not having issues with police” and “not running into too many white supremacist groups.”

Justine Treat, a preschool teacher, voted for Trump by absentee ballot about a week before the election, then gave birth to her daughter, Riley, on November 6 and was dispatched from the hospital on Election Day. Justine’s husband, Adam, a maintenance worker, went to cast his ballot for Gary Johnson, the libertarian candidate, once his wife and newborn were settled at home. It was really the local candidates who brought Adam, 29, to the polls, he says—he has serious concerns about the school system his daughter will be part of in a few years. “They’re shutting down schools, trying to cut the budget here,” he says. He is also worried about gun violence—“stuff when I was going to school I wasn’t thinking about.” Riley, whom her mother describes as a “jokester,” keeps the family in good spirits, however. “We always made a joke in her baby book,” says Justine, also 29. “‘Oh, Riley, you’re a Trump baby.’”

The first thing Mary Anne Alesci and her husband did when she was discharged from the hospital on Election Day—having given birth to their first child three days earlier via emergency C-section—was vote. Mary Anne cast her ballot for Clinton, and Joe wrote in Sanders. “We didn’t even make it home before going to the voting booth,” says Mary Anne, 35, a special education teacher who was born in Colombia and adopted and raised by an Irish-American family in Brooklyn. Trump’s presidency, particularly his administration’s separation of families at the U.S. border with Mexico, has prompted Joe, a handyman, to distance himself from some of his own family members. “When they ask, ‘Why don’t we see pictures of your son [on Facebook]?’ I say, ‘You support a president who persecutes people who look like my wife and look like my son.’” Joe, 36, says of TJ, “I don’t plan on my son being someone on the sidelines.” Indeed, the Alescis took TJ to the 2017 March for Science and the 2018 March for Our Lives in Manhattan. TJ’s sign read: “Change gun reform and then change my diaper.”

When Rick Ware, an elevator mechanic, went to vote for Trump on Election Day, following the birth of his son in the morning, his wife, Sara, initially balked. “I just didn’t want to be alone,” she says—plus, while she didn’t vote in 2016 due to the birth, she says she likely would have cast her ballot for Clinton. Rick, who voted for Barack Obama in 2012, agrees, in some respects, with his wife about Trump—“that he’s an idiot and doesn’t shut his mouth,” as Rick puts it. But he supports the president today, particularly on trade issues. Sara, 36, a pet sitter and dog walker, is concerned about saving enough money for Jackson and his 4-year-old sister, Madison, to go to college, but the Wares describe their son, who is working with a therapist to help him talk, as happy and outgoing. “He’s a wanderer, an outdoor kid,” Rick, also 36, says. “I don’t want them inside watching cartoons and playing video games all day.”

Clinton voters Lynn Cooper and Andrew Tripp, both 38, were already exhausted—Lynn had gone through three inductions and labor was stalling—before a nurse came in to check on them and broke the news about the election. Lynn, a Catholic chaplain at Tufts University, and Tripp, a Unitarian Universalist hospital chaplain and parish minister, decided on a C-section the following morning, November 9, and turned to prayer for solace as they also reeled from the election news. Their son, Rory, was born around noon that day. Today, Lynn and Andrew carefully control TV and radio around their toddler, whom they describe as eager to pick up language. “I never want him parroting Donald calling someone a loser or a dog,” Andrew says. As overwhelming as the news is today, Lynn says, “The thing about being around a toddler all day—they are constantly greeting the world, literally. ‘Hello, tree,’ ‘hello, bus,’ all day long. There’s a sense of hope and renewal in that.”