‘I Feel Like I Got Beat Up’: San Franciscans React to Trump’s Win

It was a late election night for many San Franciscans, and many were still in shock when they woke up Wednesday morning, staring down a second Trump presidency.

“I’m feeling distraught,” Mission District resident Gabriella Maldonado said. “But at least I made it out of the house.”

Maldonado, a graduate student who voted for Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, stayed up to watch the results come in. She was shocked at the extreme rightward shift seen nationwide this election versus 2020.

“It was a tough night,” she said.

Many expressed dejection and disbelief at Trump’s decisive victory. California was called early in favor of Harris, and in San Francisco, the votes counted so far show that 80% of voters are going for Harris, with less than 17% for former President Donald Trump.

“I feel like I got beat up,” San Francisco resident Chris O’Dowd said. “It just seems like it’s a new era and it’s an uncomfortable future for a lot of people, including myself.”

O’Dowd usually votes for the Green Party but decided at the last minute to cast his ballot for Harris. Environmental issues are at the top of his mind, and he thought the Biden-Harris administration had made “incremental changes” in policies like green energy.

With Trump taking the White House, O’Dowd worries the environment will take a back seat.

“It feels like half the country doesn’t hear the other half, and that is not a great place to be,” he said.

For some, like Victoria Mendoza, this election hits close to home. This was her first time voting in a U.S. election after immigrating from Mexico with her mom in 2009.

“It’s just sad to see because this country has done so much for us in many ways. And now I just feel like it’s just going back in time,” she said.

Mendoza, who has a 7-month-old daughter, said she’s especially worried about the fate of reproductive rights under a second Trump term.

“It’s heartbreaking because now I have a daughter of my own. What can I expect from someone like him, to run a fair country for women?” she said.

For her mom, Erika Mendoza, Trump’s focus on immigration issues is concerning.

“As an immigrant, and a wife and mother of immigrants, I’m worried about my family,” she said in an interview in Spanish. “We have a life here, and [Trump] has rude policies toward people like us.”

Mendoza said Trump’s rhetoric toward immigrants is harmful and offensive. Immigrants are the working backbone of the U.S., she said.

“We love this country, and we do good things for it,” she said.

Elected officials and activists also reacted strongly to Trump’s return to office.

City Attorney David Chiu, whose office filed dozens of lawsuits and briefs against the last Trump administration, said officials were preparing to fight back.

“I’m sure we will be back in that role yet again as this nightmare comes back,” Chiu said.

Trump’s campaign promises, including the mass deportation of non-citizens, threaten many Bay Area communities, Chiu said, but he said his office gained experience challenging previous Trump policies.

Ellen Dumesnil, executive director of the Immigration Institute of the Bay Area, also said her organization’s past experience would inform how they approach a second Trump presidency.

“I think what we’re looking at now is, ‘What are our next steps?’ And a lot of that is unknown right now,” she said. “It’s not clear, but we are preparing and we are going to do everything we can to protect and support immigrants.”

But even in San Francisco, the former Republican president had some support. Lifelong resident Karla Morales, whose grandparents immigrated to the U.S. from Nicaragua, was relieved Trump won. She especially appreciated his stance on immigration.

“You see people from my country coming into the country now and they’re burning the American flag, they’re demanding this and that,” she said. “That’s not how it works.”

Morales cited numerous unfounded conspiracy theories that have been pushed by Trump and allies, including that Democrats are allowing immigrants to enter illegally to vote in their favor and that Democrats stole the 2020 election.

In Trump’s second term, Morales said she’s looking forward to him “cleaning house” by deporting people who are in the country illegally.

Trump’s win was also a relief for Bayview resident Arturo Hernandez, who voted for him based on his promise to stop the war in Ukraine, as well as for economic reasons.

“Ultimately, the economy is really bad right now. Everything is so expensive,” he said in an interview in Spanish.

Overall, though, San Franciscans — who inhabit one of the most progressive enclaves of a reliably blue state — seemed defeated and subdued. That’s in contrast to the reaction to Trump’s 2016 win, which touched off a week of mass protests and even some violent riots across the Bay Area.

Law enforcement officers were preparing for that possibility again, but so far, it doesn’t seem likely. Some demonstrations were in the works, including a Wednesday evening candlelight vigil in the city’s Harvey Milk Plaza.

For now, Mission resident and graduate student Gabriella Maldonado is leaning on her friends and family for support.

“I’ve seen a lot of group texts, like, ‘Sending love, take care of yourself today,’” she said. “That’s kind of all I think we have right now.”

KQED’s Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman contributed to this report.