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Mauricio Ortiz stands on a patch of grass at UNLV, a few yards behind a throng of people shouting and foisting signs in front of a live CNN broadcast.
It’s debate night. The 22-year-old sociology senior spools up the film on a small Nikon camera and snaps a few photos while his friends John Dang and Damon Reis mill around.
Click. A gaggle of Clinton supporters angrily tries to crowd out signs of nearby Trump supporters.
Click. One person screams “Bill Clinton is a rapist!” at the top of his lungs.
Click. The pundits onstage chatter away, oblivious to what’s going on behind them.
“It’s all a big joke,” says Dang, a former UNLV chemistry student.
He holds up a sign but it has nothing to do with the election. It’s a line from a "Spongebob Squarepants" cartoon, a reference only fellow millennials will likely get. It’s absurd, but it reflects how many young college students, saddled by student loan debt and faced with a dismal job market and stagnant wages upon graduation, see the election.
“I’m just waiting to wake up from the simulation,” Dang laughs.
This trio, who first met each other at Schofield Middle School, are poster children for this generation of college students.
Dang, 22, owes a few thousand dollars in student loans. When he transferred his UNLV credits to CSN and earned an associate’s degree earlier this year, he couldn’t find a job in chemistry, so he went to work delivering goods for Postmates. Reis, also 22, who earned an associate’s degree in music from an Arizona college three years ago, has around $20,000 in loans. He also couldn’t find a job with his degree, so he uses his own car to deliver goods for Postmates, GrubHub and Amazon Flex.
“Going to school was the worst decision of my life!” said Reis. “I wish I would’ve waited.”
Student loan debt exceeded $1 trillion in 2012, prompting one official to call the industry “too big to fail,” the same way officials described banks who gambled on subprime mortgages and crashed the economy in 2008.
As a result, Dang enlisted in the Navy. He is off to the East Coast next month to train to work with nuclear reactors on aircraft carriers, a job he says will give him good experience and G.I. Bill money he can use to further his education debt free.
Meanwhile, the debate was arguably UNLV’s biggest break. It brought more than $50 million in free publicity for the university, with around 5,000 journalists converging on the campus to cover the event. Administrators have been working around the clock for almost a year to ensure the debate went off without a hitch. UNLV President Len Jessup’s appearance on the debate stage, pointing out the UNLV pennants hanging in the Thomas & Mack Center, was icing on the cake.
But while UNLV got a public relations boost, many of its students have been left behind. The graduation rate of the college is a dismal 40 percent. A large number of UNLV students are the first in their family to attend college, many are older than the average college age and many are forced to work several jobs just to afford classes.
The students all hesitated when asked whether the university has helped them graduate faster, or take the right classes, or even get a job in their field.
“I think you know the answer to that,” said Ortiz.
As the night wore on, the trio retreated to the Dive Bar on Flamingo Road and Maryland Parkway, where students and locals watched the debate on television.
The conversation turned to Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator and presidential candidate that these students supported passionately. Dang caucused for Sanders, even though he was the youngest one at his polling spot.
“If you’re rich you have less obstacles,” said Dang. “All the millennials I know were for Bernie.”
“He made politics relevant to us,” Reis chimed in.
Sanders, who campaigned partly on lowering student loan interest rates and making tuition free at public colleges, lost the nomination for the Democratic Party to Hillary Clinton.
“[Trump and Clinton] have been in the same game for so long they don’t know what reality is,” said Reis.
“If things go the same direction they are going now, how is our climate going to be? How is our economy going to be? How high is tuition going to be?” he continued.
Ortiz took a sip from a rum and coke, his favorite drink.
“Whatever. I’m alive and that’s the most important thing.” said Reis.
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