It's funny how people can clearly see what Trump is, and yet argue on an abstract level as if he was just like any other candidate. Staying neutral now could mean fighting an endless uphill battle later on when science and intellectuals are attacked for stating studied facts, and nonsense is served from the highest office.

Endorsing a candidate isn't a factual stance. It's politics. There's a factual answer to Abortion is right or wrong? Or we should have more immigrants or fewer? We should spend money stop global warming or not? Unearned capital gains should be taxed?

Facts are used for all of those things because they all devolve into arguments and facts are handy in an argument. That's not what they're really about though. They're about trade offs and preferences. They're about deciding what's right and wrong.

SA or Science in general gets involved in that and they won't be helping to win an argument. They'll be destroying trust.

> Endorsing a candidate isn't a factual stance.

Rejecting an obscurantist, anti-science candidate is in line with supporting and defending basic science.

You are not defending the importance of evidence-based science if you do not call out the candidate with a blatant obscurantist and anti-intelectual agenda, which already negatively impacted millions of people.

And I'm not even touching on the systematic threats against basic education.

If I say candidate X is an idiot whose policies will impoverish millions then everyone understands I'm making a value judgement. I can use facts to back up that judgment but at heart it's not about facts, it's about goals. It's politics.

I think there's a plausible argument that Science shouldn't be value neutral but the opposite of that is just as dangerous. Historically it's not to think that a lot of harm has been caused by people with an agenda who either claimed or even genuinely believed they were just looking at facts.