Revisiting Lisa King
EAST LANSING – Lisa King has a job, a husband, two kids, a suburban home with a camper parked beside the garage, a living room full of toys and a cat named Whiskers.
One thing she doesn’t have: friends or family who she knows are Trump supporters.
“I have a couple cousins who are conservative, but I’ve never asked if they voted for Trump,” King said. “I know I’m in a bubble.”
If anything, that bubble has hardened since the presidential inauguration in January. The 35-year-old self-employed communications specialist has always been a Democrat, but since the election of Donald Trump, she has become more of an activist, writing and calling politicians and reading news alerts on her phone.
“I struggle with it. There are days I just feel defeated,” she said. “Like, good God, how long do we have to put up with this? Like I don’t even see reason behind a lot of the things they’re doing. It just feels childish.”
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King has a good life, riding bicycles through her subdivision with her two young sons, camping on weekends, working on an online master’s degree. Yet she says she still finds herself upset when she thinks of life outside her home.
In January, King told Bridge she was angry at Republicans in a way she’d not felt in past elections. She worried about the widening gap between people.
Read how Lisa King felt in January.
Six months later, her feelings haven’t changed. “I’m trying to read other sources and trying to open my eyes (to other views), and then I see things like Trump sharing (on Twitter) this CNN thing (where it appears Trump is (at least metaphorically) beating up CNN), and I can’t even respect people who support him.
“I don’t think the gap has changed,” King said. “I don’t know of anyone who says they feel they’ve changed their mind. That’s the sad reality.”
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