As you may know, the Presidential election is soon and the front-runners are Republican Donald Trump, and Democrat Hillary Clinton. The current New York Times poll shows Clinton leading Trump by five points (Clinton 44%-Trump 39%). While Trump and Clinton are the talk of the town, two other candidates are trying to make a strong showing and drum up support. Both Gary Johnson of the Libertarian Party and Jill Stein of the Green Party are doing better in the polls than any candidate from their party has done before in history.

However, our seventh grade has a slightly different opinion on the election. In the seventh grade election, including undecided votes, Clinton is still winning, but by a much wider margin (Clinton 33%-Trump 18%). While Jill Stein only has 2% in these polls, Johnson has 13%, very close to Trump and much higher than his real life polls. If the undecided votes are not counted, then Clinton is still far ahead with 51%, enough to win her the presidency. Johnson and Trump are still close, with 20% and 29% respectively. Stein is still far behind, winning only 3% of the votes (1 vote out of 37 with 20 undecideds). There were a number of seventh graders who said they would choose a candidate because it is who their parents are voting for. As many Gary Johnson voters said, “I do not like either Trump or Clinton, so I voted for Gary Johnson.” There were also a number of students who wanted to keep Obama in office, which is constitutionally impossible due to the twenty-second amendment, which limits presidents to two terms in office. Thirty-six percent of students decided not to vote, and as many of them said, “None of the candidates make sense, and I don’t agree with any of them.”