Citizens of Jefferson County Indiana came together on November 11 to place their votes on the 2016 County and Presidential election. Polls across Madison were filled with voters, in hopes that their candidates would win.  At the old Anderson Elementary school, campaigners and voters showed up to place their vote and support their candidates. Representatives were there to support Jeanne Dugle, Darlissa Davis, and other school board candidates.  

Madison resident David Shafer stated, “I’d like to see the ISTEP+ out of the school system, which is what I’m hoping will change with the new members of school board.”

Senior Catherine Fisher stated, “We need our school system to focus more on what is in the best interest of the students, which is why I think someone who has once been a teacher should be on the school board.”

Fisher was there to represent Mrs. Jeanne Dugle and encourage voters to vote for her for the 2017 school board position. Dugle went on to win the candidacy.

Not only was this a big year for the county in which new candidates were running for school board, a new coroner was being elected, and other high profile positions, but it was also a big election year for the country in which a new president of the United States was being elected with voters largely placing their vote against Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or past business man Donald Trump.

A Madison resident who declined to give their name said, “I really feel our primary process kind of disappointed us this time, and we ended up with candidates that I feel were not good representatives of what a lot of people would have liked to have seen. We had a failure in the primary system.”

Franklin College student Kyle Sauley stated that making education affordable is important to him and he would like to see whoever becomes President to work on improving the financial status of college, while Jefferson County resident Elizabeth Garvey stated, “I feel like who I vote for needs to take care of the future generation. I would like to see that there is more employment (and) less unemployment. Just that there’s peace in the world. I mean less hate, less crime, less drugs for sure.”

One historical aspect of this election was the very serious and competitive effort of a female candidate running for president.

“I love that a woman is running for president, I think it’s great. I think she’ll do a good job,” Garvey said.

Ryan Connors stated, “It’s no different from two men running; it doesn’t matter to me what sex is running for president. It is what it is.“

“I think it’s wonderful that a female is running for president. I’m a history major in college and we just went through the suffrage movement in all of my classes, and it’s just really interesting to see how America has progressed over the last 90 some years,” Sauley said.

All of the interviewees agreed on one thing: they could not wait for the election to be over. The voters claimed that this election has been very diverse, stressful, and long; however, it has definitely been entertaining. The results of the 2016 election were made final the next day in which Dugle went on to win school board along with incumbent Joyce Imel and Republican Donald Trump became President elect of The United States.