By Araceli Mingura
Web Editor
Sunday, Oct. 27, the Veritas Society gathered a large crowd in the J.C. William’s atrium to discuss whether students should vote for Donald Trump in the upcoming 2024 election.
“The intellectual life is truly a non-negotiable in people, but especially Catholics. It’s crucial to everyday living in evangelization,” said Andrew Carmody, a junior industrial organizational psychology major and president of the Veritas Society.
Elijah Marculewicz, a sophomore economics major, and Joe Prendergast, a graduate theology major, both spoke in affirmation of voting for Trump. While Emmanuel Marculewicz, freshman political science and philosophy major, and Michael Sirilla, professor of theology, opposed the motion.
The opposing team opened the discussion with Sirilla criticizing Trump on his stance on pro-life issues. He shared the example of Trump’s vice president candidate, JD Vance claiming that their team supports state access to abortion pills. Sirilla argued that to get Trump pro-life again, voters must use their votes and “Lobby hard to get a better pro-life advocacy.”
Predergast then took the floor and began with a disclaimer “I’m not giving a campaign for Trump … Christ will be the one to save America, not Trump.” He further stated that voters must take what has been given to them while acknowledging that Trump isn’t perfect, but still vote for him as the better candidate of the two.
Emmanuel Marculewicz, younger brother of the affirming member, Elijah Marculewicz, began his statements saying that he liked Trump in 2016. “Donald Trump changed the game,” he said. “He’s also fundamentally changed since 2016.”
Emmanuel Marculewicz then argued that Trump is worse than the democratic candidate, Kamala Harris, when it comes to foreign policy, a statement which received copious amounts of disapproving hisses from the audience.
He continued to argue that foreign policy is the most important issue and that Trump is more likely to support Israel and Harris would oppose foreign war. Once again receiving hisses from the attendees.
Elijah Marculewicz then argued in affirmation that, under Trump’s presidency, no new wars were started and that his policies were better than those of Harris, receiving a slew of approving snaps. Trump, he claimed, has authority and intimidation with foreign diplomats, whereas Harris has neither and is prone to start rather than prevent or end wars.
After the four debaters presented, the floor was opened for audience members to share their thoughts. While most remained anonymous, students primarily shared varying opinions on the use of votes.
Several supporting the opposing team advocated voting for a third party or not at all. Others favoring the motion argued that not voting supports Harris in this tight election race. One student prompted voters to choose Trump, the lesser of two evils.
Following the attendees’ comments, a rebuttal session began with Emmanuel Marculewicz, who spoke of Trump’s failure to take troops out of Afghanistan as promised. He then claimed that Trump started the foreign war, because Hamas attacked Israel after the embassy moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem under his administration.
Elijah Marculewicz refuted his brother by commenting that Hamas didn’t attack while Trump was in office, but under President Joe Biden’s term. He also added that Trump is more likely to listen to Catholics and is thus the better candidate.
Prendergast then made the final argument that Catholics “Gotta get our act together” and be unified on our voting positions. He asserts that we need to live in the present reality and vote for Trump, who is more receptive to pro-life pressure.
A final lightning round commenced with students taking the mic and focusing on issues of abortion, IVF, foreign war, national debt and illegal immigration. Most seemed to agree that Trump may not be the best candidate for all Catholic stances, however, he is the better option compared to Harris.
To conclude the debate, a final poll was cast to determine the efficacy of the debater’s remarks. A grand total of 66 votes for the affirming team was tallied with 24 disagreeing and at least three abstaining. A final round of applause was given for the Veritas members as the night came to a close.
Afterward, Elijah Marculewicz stated regarding Trump’s likelihood of pushing for policies in favor of Catholic values, “I think (Trump) is genuinely trying to get elected again, and unfortunately that does mean running to the center on several issues, but I do think that if we are prudent … we could get him to sign a federal abortion ban under the right circumstances.”
“With this debate,” said Carmody, “Our main focus was to get people to think about forming those questions in their minds, like ‘Who should I vote for?’ ‘Who is the Catholic candidate?’ ‘How do I vote as a Catholic?'”
“I think I was actually more convinced that you shouldn’t vote for Trump,” said junior history and political science major, Anna Myron, an attendee and lightning round speaker. “Although, I just think (Trump) is a better candidate than Kamala.”
The Veritas Society is a community of students dedicated to spreading intellectual Catholic culture through debate, apologetics, community and discourse, and will continue to host debates throughout the semester, encouraging students to pursue Catholic excellence.