Despite the overwhelming odds against him achieving his lofty goal to become the commander-in-chief of the most powerful nation in the world Donald J. Trump is now the President Elect and poised to be the 45th president of the United States of America. This occurred despite the fact that he insulted veterans, women, people with disabilities, religious groups, almost every ethnic group in America and belittled leaders in our government while praising Russian President Vladimir Putin and leaders in China. It occurred despite the fact that he refused to accept the determination by 17 intelligence agencies that it was the Russians who hacked the DNC’s and Hillary Clinton emails. It occurred despite the fact that he made matters worse by defending Russia throughout the entire course of his campaign and even encouraged them to continue to hack Secretary Clinton’s email.

I have said before that Mr. Trump wants to put America in reverse, by destroying Roe v. Wade, defunding Planned Parenthood, working to repeal the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare), dismantle treaties and other agreements with our allies, and the list goes on. He wants to do all of this to, from his perspective, “make America great again.” Many of the people that he selected to run his campaign espouse ideals that would make people of color second class citizens. When he says that he wants to “make America great ‘again’”, does that mean that he wants to push people who look like me back to the ‘good ole days’ of Jim Crow?

I hope that this is not the case but with the people that he selected to lead his campaign it is hard to believe otherwise. America has been a divided nation for a while now, but it was divided as a rainbow coalition. However, at first blush, it appears that those who swept Mr. Trump into office are a solid block of suburban and rural white voters and not a mixture of races. This does not make those supporters bad people; it simply indicates, at least initially, that our country is strongly divided based on race. And from my perspective, that is definitely a step backwards; a step in the wrong direction, which seems to be the direction that Mr. Trump wants to take America. It is frightening! As Eugene Robinson said on MSNBC yesterday, it seems that it is an America of the future versus an America of yesterday and the America of yesterday is winning.

The late author and poet, Maya Angelou said that “if someone shows you who they are, believe them…” Donald Trump has showed America who he is and I believe him. But I do not believe that by electing Mr. Trump that, as Americans, we have showed the world who we are. I refuse to believe that Mr. Trump represents who we are as Americans because I do not believe that he represents how the great majority of Americans feel. I believe that America is much bigger and much better than the one envisioned by Mr. Trump in the rhetoric of hatred and divisiveness that he spouted during his whole campaign.

Although Donald J. Trump personifies the substance of America’s timeless nightmare of every sort of prejudice and hate that exists in America and is the evidence of how far we have not come, he is also the unwitting catalyst of the perpetuation of the knowledge and hope that all Americans have and must stubbornly cling to. That knowledge is that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” And that hope is that America will always continue to welcome those “huddled masses yearning to breathe free” and remain the premier example of democracy while we always strive to “form a more perfect union.”

Because America is by choice a melting pot of peoples, to sustain this knowledge and hope will likely mean that at times we will struggle to do so. But that is okay; we must embrace our diversity, realize that as Americans we are one, and always know that we are stronger together. The America that Mr. Trump envisions and is advocating through his message of divisiveness and hate is not the kind of America that the great majority of Americans want. To divide us and pit us against one another portends a dark future for America that can only culminate in chaos and destruction.

Election Day has come and gone and Americans have made what was, from the beginning of this election, a stark and serious choice as to who they want to lead America forward beginning in 2017. They have now answered the question as to who they want that person to be. It is Donald J. Trump. It is now too late for all of those who could have voted but stayed home, for whatever reason, to have any impact on the race. By electing not to do their civic duty they allowed others to make their choice for them. If they find that they do not like the direction in which Mr. Trump decides to take our country – out of embarrassment, they should not gripe and complain. They should remain mum and reflect on what might have been had they simply remembered the slogan “your vote is the most important one of all…unless you don’t use it!” and voted.

Eulus Dennis – author, Operation Rubik’s Cube and Living Between The Line