Last October, Ron, a 55-year-old construction analyst for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), was furloughed for 43 days as the Trump administration took a sledgehammer to federal agencies’ budgets under the Department of Government Efficiency, an initiative led by the world’s richest man, Elon Musk.
“We voted for Trump, not realizing that he was going to slam as hard as he did, but it was on day one when he sat down, right after inauguration, and started signing those executive orders and just trashed us federal employees, it was a kick in the teeth,” Ron said.
“If people would just listen and research and do something other than just listen to Fox News, we may all be better off, but it’s going to take an open mind and an ability to say, ‘I made a mistake,’ because once you say you made a mistake, you can turn the ship around,” said Chrissey Kelley, 50, a stay-at-home mom.
Speaking out against MAGA cost the Kelleys relationships with friends and family members who support Trump, but in sharing their story, they hope to inspire others having doubts about the GOP.
“It’s okay to be wrong. You made a mistake, it was a bad choice, but it’s not the end of the world. We can fix it. We just got to ride it out and hold strong and support each other through it,” Ron said.
. . . Chrissey said she became a Republican as soon as she started voting.
“You were just a conservative. There was no thought behind it. You listen to Fox News, and you listen to conservative outlets, and you’re spoon-fed,” Chrissey said.
Ron, who served in the military for 25 years, said the 2008 housing market crash left him “really disillusioned with the Democratic Party.”
When he couldn’t find work in Detroit, he moved to Georgia. He supported Republicans because he associated them with bigger spending on defense.
Ron said he supported Trump with donations, bumper stickers and the “whole nine yards” of MAGA.
“I bought into the lie about the stolen election and all that, and I thought January 6 insurrectionists were actually patriots,” Ron said.
“I just remember being content with thinking that he was what we needed, and he was going to drain the swamp in Washington until he got into office this third term, and realizing that I was dumb as a rock, and I believed everything that I was spoon fed.”
. . . “Just watching the policies of what’s happening in our world today unfold one by one by one, I just started drawing up very different conclusions and found out that I was clueless, and most people are today, but now I’m awake and looking at it for what it is, and I cannot believe that he had my support,” Chrissey said.
“It’s lie after lie after lie.”
Ron said he now votes for Democrats, and Chrissey said she considers herself an Independent but has voted for Democrats three times now, something she “never thought in my entire life” would happen.
“The road we’re headed down now, if we don’t turn this truck around, we’re so close to going off the edge of the cliff that we need to stick together,” Ron said.
“We need to put our country back together. It might take decades, but don’t give up. We need to be vocal. Stay strong, and follow our laws and Constitution, and hold strong with our values, not the values that the MAGA claims that we have, but the values that we’ve had in the past 250 years from the founding of the country til Joe Biden’s era.”
So he’s woke now?
I guess better late than never, if it sticks.
Do the type of people who are so easily fooled by Fox propaganda run back to Fox the next time the Dems do something distasteful to them like raising taxes to feed school children or trying to achieve energy independence by moving from oil to solar and wind?
So NOW he regrets it, now that it affects him. Well too late now the country is destroyed. Does he really think the next person coming in is going to give away all that power. Sure things will just go right back to normal.
Wait a minute, I hadn’t read it until now.
Ron, who served in the military for 25 years, said the 2008 housing market crash left him “really disillusioned with the Democratic Party.”
Who was in office when this happened, you stupid fuck? Was is a man named George W Bush? Was he a dem? I don’t appreciate the dems (they don’t do anything but perpetuate the status quo; I want socialism), but this man betrays his lack of thought with that quote.
Ron said he supported Trump with donations, bumper stickers and the “whole nine yards” of MAGA.
I always found it funny that stupid people sent money to “a rich guy” for the first campaign. Of course, his many failing businesses don’t matter after the graft of his second term. Whether he was close to insolvency or not, he’s got a lot of money now.
“I bought into the lie about the stolen election and all that, and I thought January 6 insurrectionists were actually patriots,” Ron said.
“I thought stupid, violent criminals were good people. Like the guy wearing the Auschwitz tshirt who was in a lot of media.”
realizing that I was dumb as a roc
Oh my fucking god, he said exactly the thing I said about some other right-wing assholes!
The wife:
I just started drawing up very different conclusions and found out that I was clueless, and most people are today, but now I’m awake and looking at it for what it is
No, most of us aren’t. You’re just a fucking dumbass. Others read and learn and check facts and verify what people say. I’m not clueless. There’s a lot that I don’t know, but I am not someone who just listens to a blowhard and nods my head like you did. Wait, let me put gauze on my ear to show support for some jackass who loots my country because I don’t know what’s real and what’s not. We need a ballroom!!!
Ron said he now votes for Democrats, and Chrissey said she considers herself an Independent but has voted for Democrats three times now, something she “never thought in my entire life” would happen.
Well, I’m sorry to say that the dems will disappoint and these people will return to fringe right-wing bullshit as a result. We need actual leadership and change. I voted for Bernie but he’s retiring and even he wouldn’t call out the genocide in Gaza (fuck israel). Give us people who want to upend the system to take care of people and tax billionaires, I promise they’ll get votes. Instead, Chuck Schumer will blah blah blah blah blah and Nany Pelosi will retire on a pile of money.
“One of the Greatest Wall Street Investors of All Time Announces Retirement”[0]
Is the Trump administration the worst fascist ever? Their policies are very anti-ordinary people. At least most other fascists have “socialist” policies to appease the population for as long as possible. The Trump regime’s broad policy, in every sense of the word, is “fuck you, got mine.” What a baffling buffoon. But my guess is that Trumpian fascism is more rooted from American individualism; which makes Trump an outlier.
They’re speed running fascism, but they never finished reading the history on how those kinds of regimes ended.
Long live Caesar.
they never finished reading the history on how those kinds of regimes ended.
Because it is all emotions. Fascism is the rejection of reason.
Who was in office when this happened, you stupid fuck? Was is a man named George W Bush? Was he a dem? I don’t appreciate the dems (they don’t do anything but perpetuate the status quo; I want socialism), but this man betrays his lack of thought with that quote.
To be fair, the response to the financial crisis happened in one of the brief times when Democrats had the presidency and a supermajority in Congress and the bailout didn’t really impact ordinary people very much. I think if they’d have gone full FDR they’d have had majorities for a long time after that, but they didn’t.
But, yeah, the rest of it is bullshit.
Yeah, yeah, it’s true. But you’re just repeating what they said and then adding “Duh!!”
I dunno, they’re agreeing to speak out, it’s not nothin’. Yes, they’ve enabled genocide and fascism but no more so than those who didn’t vote at all.
…and they’re speaking to fellow Trumpers saying “you’re not the only fools”.
I know we all want to shout “leopards ate your face!”, but this is what shifting opinions will look like.
It’s always “Not MY face!”
It’s never about actual values or morals or rights or principles. It’s never about concern for family, friends, neighbors, fellow citizens.
It’s always “This isn’t working out for ME.”
Maybe it’s the nature of the news business. Maybe there are some who are changing their minds more quietly, who don’t get profiled in the news.
Disillusioned by the subprime crisis?
That shit was driven by republican action and deliberate inaction.
Republican regulators prevented states from trying to crack down on predatory lenders and congress refused to impose oversight and pushed deregulation. The Bush administration allowed banks to begin “super leveraging”, iow they could lend even more than before yet have less in reserve, so when the crash happened there was no cushion. The repeal of the Glass-Stegall act got the ball rolling on creating these mega-banks that doubled down on bad lending, bought and sold bad loans, and then they all needed bailouts.
Republican deregulation and refusal to engage in oversight by both dems and repubs caused the crash.
I assume ‘disillusioned with the Democrat party’ after 2008 means the bank bailouts and lack of prosecution. Conservative brain is generally ok with businesses fucking the economy over, but they expect (at least ideologically) that companies will fail when that happens. Not their company, but nebulous companies that don’t employ them or their friends.
TBH, I would have liked to see a lot more fraud cases come out of 2008. I would have liked to see banks get ‘right sized’ so there’s no more “too big to fail.”
I know we gotta support people ammending their mistakes and all, but it’s hard when he speaks like “Now we can turn the ship around and fix everything.”
ICE already killed people, they aren’t getting revived.
We can reverse his monetary problems at most and he talks as if that’s the entire thing.It’s well known that conservatives empathy is socially shallow (has to affect me or my family) and because of that trait I never really thought there would be a big shift in their thinking. But goddamn it if trump’s fuck ups haven’t done a speed run on changing views. When the man who is supposed to be looking out for the American people says “I don’t think about how much the American people are hurting” and then acts accordingly you’re going to get more MAGA people hitting that socially shallow empathy level.
Typical myopic stance. “I had no idea it was bad until it started to impact me.” The complete and total lack of empathy from people is a core problem I don’t care what political side you are on. How can you be so selfish to not think about impactful others around you? Do you live on an island of one? Are your fellow citizens nothing to you?
Social media has allowed us to slip even more into a solipsist mindset.
They’ll be back. They’ll vote Republican. They can’t learn.
I get why you are frustrated with them. We’ve been burned so many times.
But, I think this type of attitude makes some people push harder into MAGA. I feel that most people don’t vote red because they believe in it, they do it to spite people on the left who talk down to them.
I think this type of attitude makes some people push harder into MAGA
Nice try, FBI
I don’t see why we have to be so mean to each other. Even here on Lemmy, where we all are on the left, we do it to each other.
They do it to spite. You could have stopped there.
Good for them.
I can’t believe things have actually gotten so bad that people are getting directly affected and realizing they fell for the propaganda machine. I had hoped this might help counteract the regime. Let’s see if it does.
I knew the leopard was eating people’s faces, but it wasnt until it started eating my face that i realised what an idiot i was.
Everyone kept telling me they ate people’s faces. They told me this for 8 years. But despite there being documented evidence and first hand witness accounts, I didn’t think it was that bad until they started eating mine.
Never, ever, underestimate Americans ability to turn lemonade into lemons.
If these morons really wanted to do some good they’d shut the fuck up, stop forming opinions, and stop voting. Encourage their peers to do the same.They’ve clearly demonstrated that they’re too fucking stupid to participate in the democratic process.
Six million Democrats sat out the last election, they have taken your words to heart
Zero forgiveness. Ignorance in this day and age should be made a felony.
Fuck them.
Good for them for trying to get through to the cultists and good on them for snapping out of it. That’s not easy to do on your own in an identity cult. I still find them repulsive and have no desire to associate with them or people like them.
Well that at least makes them more intelligent than most Trump voters. A very low bar. An extremely low bar if they still plan to vote for republicans.
Not sure I believe that’s true. They were NEVER going to change but were slapped in the face and directly impacted, They will not ever naturally care about other people. They don’t like trump because he hurt THEM. I bet they’re still perfectly ok with Alligator Alcatraz, because those people are getting what they deserve.
They’re not awake, they’re blindly voting ‘blue’ because ‘red’ hurt them.
They will not ever naturally care about other people.
I don’t know believe that. I don’t believe that empathy is some inherent trait that cannot be learned. People change, but momentum can be hard to overcome. They’ve just been handed an opportunity by having their momentum disrupted.
They’ve been slapped personally enough to realize MAGA was terrible. They’re already talking about having been fed their opinions. That’s important, it means they’re now reflecting and thinking. Those are important steps.
And they’re still more intelligent than the ones that have been repeatedly dick slapped and still gladly voting red. It’s not high praise to say their mildly smarter than a single digit IQ average Mega voter.
I’m right there with you, I don’t think they’ve truly learned anything. They’re just recoiling like dumb animals. But then not voting for more direct abuse is still an improvement I will take.
