“Look, man, I’m just saying.” “You know what?” Alex says. “You think y'all are off the hook for institutional bigotry because you come from a blue state. Not every white supremacist is a meth-head in Bumfuck, Mississippi—there are plenty of them at Duke or UPenn on Daddy’s money.” WASPy Hunter looks startled but not convinced. “None of that changes that red states have been red forever,” he says, laughing, like it’s something to joke about, “and none of those populations seem to care enough about what’s good for them to vote.” “Maybe those populations might be more motivated to vote if we made an actual effort to campaign to them and showed them that we care, and how our platform is designed to help them, not leave them behind,” Alex says hotly. “Imagine if nobody who claims to have your interests at heart ever came to your state and tried to talk to you, man. Or if you were a felon, or—fucking voter ID laws, people who can’t access polls, who can’t leave work to get to one?” “Yeah, I mean, it’d be great if we could magically mobilize every eligible marginalized voter in red states, but political campaigns have a finite amount of time and resources, and we have to prioritize based on projections,” WASPy Hunter says, as if Alex, the First Son of the United States, is unfamiliar with how campaigns work. “There just aren’t the same number of bigots in blue states. If they don’t want to be left behind, maybe people in red states should do something about it.” And Alex has, quite frankly, had it. “Did you forget that you’re working on the campaign of someone Texas fucking created?” he says, and his voice has officially risen to the point where staffers in the neighboring cubicles are staring, but he doesn’t care. “Why don’t we talk about how there’s a chapter of the Klan in every state? You think there aren’t racists and homophobes growing up in Vermont? Man, I appreciate that you’re doing the work here, but you’re not special. You don’t get to sit up here and pretend like it’s someone else’s problem. None of us do.” He takes his bag and his binder and storms out. The minute he’s outside the building, he pulls out his phone on impulse, opens up Google. There are test dates this month. He knows there are. LSAT washington dc area test center, he types. 3 Geniuses and Alex June 23, 2020, 12:34 PM juniper BUG Not my name, not anyone’s name, stop leading member of korean pop band bts kim nam-june BUG I’m blocking your number HRH Prince Dickhead Alex, please don’t tell me Pez has indoctrinated you with K-pop. well you let nora get you into drag race so irl chaos demon [latrice royale eat it.gif] BUG What did you want Alex???? where’s my speech for milwaukee? i know you took it HRH Prince Dickhead Must you have this conversation in the group chat? BUG Part of it needed to be rewritten!!! I put it back with edits in the outside pocket of your messenger bag davis is gonna kill you if you keep doing this BUG Davis saw how well my tweaks to the talking points went over on Seth Meyers last week so he knows better why is there a rock in here too BUG That is a clear quartz crystal for clarity and good vibes do not @ me. We need all the help we can get right now stop putting SPELLS on my STUFF irl chaos demon BURN THE WITCH irl chaos demon