Year in Review: Trump’s election shocks, challenges North Coast’s left-leaning majority

It was a historic upset few on the left-leaning North Coast saw coming - Donald Trump’s stunning victory in the presidential election, the triumph of a brash and polarizing political outsider whose unconventional campaign appealed to a tide of overlooked voters fed up with establishment forces.

The outcome once again marked California and its most liberal enclaves as a place politically apart from the rest of the nation. Sonoma County voted more than 3 to 1 for Democrat Hillary Clinton, who stacked up a 4 million vote edge on Trump in the state, fueling her more than 2-million vote advantage in the final popular vote tally.

But the nation handed a solid Electoral College majority to Trump and unilateral control of Congress to the Republican Party, thrilling Trump supporters while setting off a wave of protests in cities across the country.

In Santa Rosa, at Sonoma State University and elsewhere across the North Coast, hundreds of demonstrators rallied against an outcome they say elevated a man unqualified and unfit to be president, citing demeaning comments he made about Mexican immigrants on the campaign trail and a pattern of offensive behavior toward women, among other concerns.

The public outcry reflected widespread fear about the outlook for immigrants, Muslims, people of color, the environment and various social issues a majority of Californians have long championed at the ballot box - but which could be threatened under the next presidential administration.

Shocking aftermath

In the aftermath of Election Day, Rep. Jared Huffman, the San Rafael Democrat soon to begin his third term representing the North Coast in Congress, said he heard that shock and unease echoed throughout his sprawling district.

“Everywhere I went - at schools, every part of the community I represent - I found widespread fear and anxiety over what had just happened, and an inability to really process and explain it,” said Huffman, one of the many elected officials to pledge in recent weeks that California would act as a progressive counterweight to Trump’s agenda.

“What I’ve found most often is that kids, young people, just can’t understand how someone with the values and the temperament of Donald Trump could become the president of the United States,” Huffman said. “And parents and educators don’t really know how to explain it to young people, or to assure them how we’re going to get through it, because I think they’re having trouble with it, too.”

Sense of relief

Yet for many in the small minority on the North Coast who voted for Trump - he earned 22 percent of the vote in Sonoma County - the outcome represents a long-awaited pivot from eight years of Democratic leadership under President Barack Obama.

They pointed to Trump’s calls for beefed-up border security, the end of trade deals that offshore American jobs and muscular measures to combat the Islamic State as some of the key proposals that garnered their support.

“We’re very excited,” said Edelweiss Geary, chairwoman of the Sonoma County Republican Party.

“People who’ve never voted before have been coming into the headquarters saying how excited they are that they voted for Trump and how hopeful they are,” she said. “The hope of many people is that we can cut back on the incredible regulations of the government and the intrusion of government into our daily lives.”

John Reyes, a Cloverdale resident and registered Republican, said he voted for Trump largely because of his business background.

“I would prefer he not speak at times, but I am looking forward to Trump. I am hopeful that he’s going to bring back jobs,” said Reyes, an auto salesman involved in several local nonprofits, including the Council on Aging. “I’m hopeful he’s going to take a scalpel to the federal budget and stop spending money that we don’t have. And the other thing I would like to see is restoration of our military and our place in the world. I want people to respect the United States again.”

State of despondency

On the other side, local Clinton supporters voiced a level of despondency unmatched by almost any other election loss.

“I’ve been pretty depressed since Nov. 8,” said Chris Snyder, assistant political director of the Operating Engineers Local 3 union and a delegate for Clinton at the Democratic National Convention in July.

Snyder said he thought the American public would be able to see past internal Democratic Party rifts that arose between Clinton backers and supporters of her primary challenger, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, whose springtime visits to Cloverdale and Vallejo drew massive crowds.

Sanders beat Clinton in Sonoma County with 52 percent of the vote but came up well short in the statewide tally, where Clinton prevailed with nearly 56 percent of the vote.

In the runoff, Snyder worked hard to close ranks among Democrats and elect Clinton, traveling to Reno with some 50 others for 10 weekends leading up to the election to tip Nevada in her favor.

Clinton won Nevada, but that wasn’t enough to overcome the group of Rust Belt and battleground states she lost, defying most pre-election projections.

“It was devastating,” Snyder said. “It was just complete disbelief. I was crushed.”

Community support

The divisive presidential campaign hit home in other hurtful ways, too. About two weeks before Election Day, Cali Calmecac Language Academy, a bilingual Spanish language immersion school in Windsor, was defaced by graffiti invoking Trump’s name and a message that called to “build the wall higher” - referencing the president-elect’s campaign promise to erect a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Following the incident, community members rallied outside Cali Calmecac holding signs with messages of support for the school, which serves kindergarten through eighth grade. And earlier this month, students from Santa Rosa Junior College helped organize community artists to paint a vibrant, pro-immigrant mural along a wall by an entrance to the school where some of the graffiti had been sprayed.

The election had a visceral impact on the school’s young students, three-quarters of whom are Latino, according to principal Jeanne Acuña.

“There were a lot of tears. There were a lot of very frightened children,” Acuña said in early December. “We’ve worked really hard to make kids feel safe, to reassure them as best we can that they are in a safe place and that a person in charge of the country doesn’t get to make decisions all by himself.”

Of particular concern to thousands of residents in Sonoma County and beyond is how the Trump administration will handle immigration policy, given the president-elect’s stated intention to rapidly deport millions of undocumented immigrants.

Advocates have called on Santa Rosa and other local municipalities to declare themselves sanctuaries for immigrants, following the lead of San Francisco and other cities by affirming they won’t help the federal government with mass deportation.

“What we’re seeing with Trump’s America is a lot of fear, and I don’t think people should be fearful,” said Courtney Cox, of Santa Rosa, before a Dec. 22 pro-sanctuary march from Roseland to Santa Rosa City Hall.

“I think we should use it as motivation to continue our fight.”

Trump has vowed to punish declared sanctuary cities by cutting federal funding, and so far no local governments have stepped forward to make such pledges. But many have sought to send a message of reassurance to immigrants.

Sanctuary cities

Outgoing Santa Rosa Mayor John Sawyer said after the election that it was premature for Santa Rosa to consider sanctuary status, but the city “supports her residents,” Sawyer said in a statement read aloud at City Hall, and would not “take part in identifying people solely on the basis of their religion, sexual orientation or immigration status.”

In a recent interview, Shaun McCaffery, Healdsburg’s new mayor, called the city a “de facto sanctuary” and said it was “pretty unlikely” that local law enforcement would “become a deportation force.”

Rather, “local elected officials are looking out for everyone’s best interests, including those who are undocumented,” McCaffery said.

Law enforcement officials struck a similar tune after the election. Sonoma County Sheriff Steve Freitas, joined at a public forum by police chiefs in Santa Rosa and Petaluma, explained that local officers do not initiate enforcement action solely based on a person’s immigration status and don’t plan to change that.

Political battle plans

Meanwhile, state and local elected officials have touted what amount to political battle plans, indicating they will resist extreme shifts by the Trump administration on environmental policy, health care, education and marijuana enforcement.

State Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, launched a pre-emptive political counterpunch, teaming up with a San Francisco lawmaker to announce they would introduce legislation to require future presidential and vice-presidential candidates to disclose their tax returns - something Trump refused to do during the campaign - in order to get on the California ballot.

“No. 1, the work we do locally and throughout the state is more important than ever. And then, No. 2, California is proudly different - and it’s our difference that makes us so successful,” McGuire said. “So while the federal government may try to throw up roadblocks, California and local leaders need to be united in continuing our progress and our prosperity.”

Staff Writer Angela Hart contributed to this report. You can reach Staff Writer J.D. Morris at 707-521-5337 or jd.morris@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter ?@thejdmorris.