If Minneapolis therapist Emily Abeln could wave a magic wand, the political rhetoric flooding the airwaves this election season would likely look quite a bit different. 

“I might just have each human mind on the planet actually humanize one another. If we see everyone as human, then we don’t are likely to do all this hate, violence, discrimination and restriction,” said Abeln, MA, LP, who co-founded Transcend Psychotherapy with spouse Max Abeln, MA, LMFT.  

For a lot of in America, this yr’s election rhetoric has felt dehumanizing as parts of their identity are being discussed, often negatively, as political talking points. 

“Anytime that now we have individuals who need to justify their very own existence, (we’re) creating an environment for mental health problems and mental illness to form and be sustained,” said Shonda Craft PhD, LMFT, who runs Craft Psychotherapy and Consultation within the Twin Cities. 

Abeln and Craft are amongst the numerous providers with clients in Minnesota and across the U.S. who’ve had their identities – race, gender, or immigration status – invoked in various ways through the election. How they’re impacted, nonetheless, can vary greatly. 

“Some persons are desensitized to what’s happening. The constant exposure has caused them to emotionally disconnect and experience emotional fatigue, which could be a great coping mechanism (and) buffer for psychological distress,” said Fathi Kofiro, MSW, LICSW, who owns and practices at Daryeel Therapy within the Twin Cities. “For others, they’re terrified. They’re afraid for his or her lives. They’re afraid for his or her family’s lives. They’re afraid for the people who they care about.” 

Mental health providers use therapeutic techniques and practices while validating clients’ emotions and giving them an area to share their feelings. Providers working with clients from these communities also emphasize the importance of reference to a community that affirms their client’s identity and supports them. 

“The gap between (an individual’s ideal life and the life they live without delay) is oftentimes where mental illness lives. That gap between what I expect life to be and what I experience life (to) actually (be) could be filled in with depression. It may be filled in with anxiety, it will probably be filled in with hopelessness (and) loneliness,” Craft said, adding that she works with clients to shut the gap. “How can we construct connections with people who find themselves affirming of who you might be? How can we enable you to know your personal value and discover what makes you unique, and the way that uniqueness is definitely very needed on this world?” 

Along with individual therapy, some providers host support groups for members of targeted communities. But providers also acknowledge their very own limitations: While they may help clients cope with their identities being a part of political discussion, they can not stop these identities from being a part of the conversation. 

“We will support people in gaining insight and we are able to support people in restructuring the way in which that they’re pondering. But we cannot eliminate the indisputable fact that (stress and trauma) proceed to occur time and again and over,” said Candace Hanson, LPCC, and executive director of Cover Mental Health & Counseling in Minnesota.

Ghazel Tellawi, who has therapy clients in Minnesota, Kentucky and Wisconsin, hopes those whose identities usually are not subject to political attacks will understand that “the things which can be said have a real-life impact on people’s lives and other people’s wellbeing. It’s not only locker room talk.” 

Listed below are three examples of political rhetoric affecting marginalized communities this election:

“She was a DEI hire” – Tim Burchett, GOP congressman from Tennessee, to CNN reporter Manu Raju, of Vice President Kamala Harris

Mental health providers working with the Black community and other communities of color have noticed how right-wing backlash against diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives has been used to query Vice President Harris’s competency. 

“Whenever you add on this political environment, where we’re labeling certain forms of people as inherently not qualified for a job that they hold, that starts being something that plays out in workplaces. It reinforces that pressure to perform that a whole lot of BIPOC folks have within the workplace (and) dials up the pressure and the stress,” Hanson, of Cover Mental Health & Counseling, said. 

This stress can go on to negatively impact an individual’s mental health, resulting in a lack of self-confidence, together with signs of hysteria and depression. All of the microaggressions within the workplace, together with “DEI hire” rhetoric, said Hanson, builds as much as a “cumulative effect that may amount to racial trauma.”

Adriana Ines Quiñones Peña, a mental health practitioner and advocate based in Minnesota, also referenced a press release by Trump that immigrants were stealing “Black jobs” as something that was evocative of a history of colonization and racist perceptions of Black people. 

“There’s Black people in tech, there’s Black people in STEM, there’s Black doctors (and) there’s black people who are artists, so in relation to (the) idea (of) ‘Black people jobs,’ it feels as (if) we’re purported to return to those days once we (were) doing hard labor (and were) severely underpaid or not getting paid,” she said. 

Having one’s identity othered may result in distrust and isolation. 

“There may be this withdrawal that happens (in communities of color) because they don’t know who they will trust and so they don’t know who’s secure,” said Hanson, who noted that even while former President Barack Obama was running, clients would indicate that they were unsure of what their white neighbors were saying about them once they weren’t around, or what they considered racist rhetoric. 

“It’s type of like this day by day reminder that this hostility against who you might be as an individual exists and there’s nothing you’ll be able to do about it.”

“She happened to show Black…Is she Indian or is she Black?” – former President Trump in an interview on the convention for the National Association of Black Journalists 

What has also been concerning and harmful to communities of color, specifically mixed-race people, has been the periodic questioning of Harris’ racial identity. Harris is multiracial, a gaggle that comprises the fastest growing a part of the U.S. population, in line with probably the most recent U.S. census in 2020. But simply because the numbers of mixed-race persons are growing doesn’t mean that there’s a greater understanding of mixed identities. 

The struggle for determining one’s identity as a mixed-race person stays “a very complicated dynamic,” said Hanson, who noted that individuals from different groups may not “claim” individuals who’re mixed race as a part of their group. 

“Having that change into this public and ugly kind of dialogue and criticism could be very difficult to deal with for some folks,” Hanson added. 

Craft said the rhetoric “does cause some anxiety since it’s almost like telling them, ‘You’re not allowed to know who you’re thinking that you might be.”

“Kamala’s agenda is they/them, not you” – commercial paid for by Donald J. Trump for President 2024

When speaking in regards to the mental toll on the trans community through the election cycle, Michelle Kerno, LICSW, a trans mental health provider who also serves trans clients, referenced the quote above, noting that it was clearly a reference to trans and nonbinary people using they/them pronouns. 

“There’s a whole lot of fear of what is going to occur if Trump wins the presidency,” Kerno said, adding there’s also concern about what a Republican-controlled Congress would do. State laws in Minnesota protecting trans rights, “will help, but it surely won’t protect us completely,” Kerno said.

“The rights of trans folks are very much getting used as this political tool (and) talking point to sway certain people,” Tellawi said. “(They) use fear-based tactics to make people afraid of trans people.”

While coping with anxiety, fear and depression ahead of the election, some members of the trans community are attempting to arrange for a way the election results could affect them, Max Abeln of Transcend Psychotherapy said. 

“I definitely hear in regards to the specifics of individuals getting legal documents so as and ensuring they’ve their passports for fear of what might occur, or hurrying up their gender-affirming care, ensuring they’re getting on hormones or stockpiling hormones,” they said. 

“We’re going to have the biggest deportation within the history of this country…what they’ve done to our country, consider it!” – Donald Trump, interviewed by Elon Musk on X

For undocumented immigrants, being the topic of election discourse is nothing recent. In line with mental health provider Mayra Barragan-O’Brien, the mental health senior manager at Immigrants Rising, nonetheless, things are different from “the primary time around,” through the 2016 election. 

“The way in which that the past president was talking in regards to the communities that we’re an element of, the way in which he described our communities, described who we’re was very violent,” Barragan-O’Brien said. “There remains to be a whole lot of fear, a whole lot of anxiety, a whole lot of sadness, frustration, rage that comes along (with) this election. But there’s also a whole lot of feeling numb – feeling prefer it’s the identical thing, just a distinct yr.” 

While some have change into numb, others are afraid. 

For undocumented immigrants, talk of deportation “has definitely increased a fear and perhaps some distrust within the system,” Quiñones Peña said. “They’re coming here pondering that they’re looking for that American dream – that they’re going to have a greater quality of life for themselves and their family. After which once they come here, they’ve this reality check that not everyone’s going to be welcoming of them. That not everyone’s going to be accepting of them. And (even) in the event that they’re accepted here, that doesn’t mean that they belong here.” 

An undocumented immigrant in Minnesota, who asked to be referenced using only their last name, Flores, said that they were, for their very own mental health, attempting to avoid hearing in regards to the election cycle as much as possible while still maintaining so far. 

“(Growing up, the perception was that undocumented immigrants were) only older folks or folks who were smuggled in (and) they (were) here to take your jobs or  get handouts or all these other things. That’s not the fact. Sometimes it just appears like we’re like still within the shadows because even when we did talk about coming out with our stories and sharing our experiences, I just feel so scared about people calling ICE, or feeling justified to let local authorities know my whereabouts,” said Flores, who described their life as one among “uncertainty.” 

Though Trump has often been criticized for his rhetoric regarding undocumented immigrants, Flores added that Harris’ response has also been lacking.

“Although (Harris) is receptive to listening to people’s stories and does hear them out, she just comes back to stricter borders. It’s disheartening to listen to, but it surely’s nothing recent,” Flores said. 

While they’ve coping mechanisms, comparable to nature walks, journaling and finding community with other undocumented immigrants online through Immigrant Risings’ wellness support groups, “sometimes I feel I’m drowning within the stress,” Flores said.

Barragan-O’Brien said she hopes more non-immigrants would empathize with those fleeing to the US. 

“There’s this poem that claims, ‘No one puts their children on the boat unless the water is safer than the land,’” she said. “I wish people could hear that and take it in and understand that in the event that they were in an analogous situation (as undocumented immigrants) they might attempt to survive (and do) whatever could be possible for themselves and for his or her children and their family members.”