Democratic presidential nominee, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign rally at the Wisconsin State Fair Park Exposition Center in West Allis, Wis. on Nov. 1, 2024. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images.

We know what you’re asking. What in the world is a local music publication doing endorsing a candidate for President of the United States? First, and most importantly, because we know the stakes. You’ve heard it before, and it may sound overdramatic, but it’s absolutely true: This election is a referendum on American democracy itself. Kamala Harris should be President.

Trump’s promises of everything from jailing his political enemies to vowing to replace taxes with tariffs even if it obliterates the economy to opening detention camps for races and nationalities he doesn’t like make it clear what we’re getting if he’s elected. But he also promises a return to a world we’ve thankfully evolved away from; a world where white men are the only ones with rights and everyone else is either a servant or a possession. He wants to return us to a world where women need permission from their husband or father to get a credit card—a practice that only ended in 1974, meaning there are millions of women alive today who remember being allowed to get a credit card in their name. And that appeals to a lot of men who can’t or don’t want to navigate society on their own merits.

This is a campaign in which one candidate is running viciously bigoted anti-trans ads during every major sporting event, ads that would be considered too extreme 20 years ago. Ads in which one candidate makes racist, sexist or otherwise extreme insults about his opponent during every public appearance, but clutches his metaphorical pearls when someone calls him garbage in response to his rally calling an entire nationality of people garbage. In which the only solutions proposed by one candidate for any problem are cruelty and violence.

There is no single issue big enough to be worth giving up the foundations of our country, and in fact no single issue in which Trump is not worse.

That’s all most important of course, but there’s a second, more selfish reason a music publication would make an endorsement: Because we’re music journalists.

Trump will harm music itself. One of the defining features of the modern extreme right that Trump represents is repression and censorship. They burn books they don’t like, they threaten artists they don’t like, they do anything they can to ensure that the only media or entertainment available is what they approve. Trump has promised to put these people in his cabinet, in the courts and in federal law enforcement. Trump and his supporters have said that their plan is for any music by people they find undesirable—Latino artists, Black artists, LGBTQIA+ artists—to be deemed profane and censored or banned. Fear will push record labels even farther toward timid conformity. Some of our favorite artists may even be punished for opposing Trump during the campaign, a promise Trump has reiterated many times. And, obviously, we love music. We don’t want to lose that.

Trump will also harm journalism and journalists specifically. He’s sued news outlets for billions because they weren’t deferential or supportive enough, told his supporters to physically attack journalists covering his rallies, and even promised to send journalists to detention camps. Ideally the major newspapers like the Los Angeles Times, Washington Post or USA Today would stand up for us and our profession, but those three have decided to obey in advance, putting fear of retribution ahead of their own safety and that of their employees. The owners of those organizations would rather see the journalists who work for them sent to camps than risk any consequences for themselves.

So, because of those factors and more, the staff of RIFF Magazine endorses Kamala Harris for President of the United States of America.