At a San Diego poster-making party, the Trump elephant in the corner

刘颖

“Who do you side with: scientific community or Donald Trump?” read the Facebook headline of a 15 March article in the San Diego Union-Tribune.
In a comment, “March for Science SD” wrote that the headline “unfortunately does very little to help our nonpartisan message.”

Many organizers of March for Science events around the world have gone to some lengths to stress that the event is not about U.S. President Donald Trump, and the issues at the fore obviously transcend political parties. But there’s an inconvenient truth: Had Trump not been elected; filled U.S. government slots with people hostile to climate change, evolution, and environmental protection; and crafted a budget that proposes slashing funding for traditional bipartisan darlings like the National Institutes of Health, there would not be more than 600 cities in 69 countries marching for science tomorrow. And clearly there was a Trump elephant in the corner at a small poster-making event held in San Diego on the evening of 20 April.