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Input: A scene from  Hillary Clinton 's 2016 Election Night event. Photo by Win McNamee/Getty
Susan Sarandon is about to get a large tax cut for her role in saving the US from a  Hillary Clinton  presidency; so is Colin Kaepernick. Thatâs 2017 in a nutshell: The country is beginning to experience the fruits of a misguided hatred of  Clinton  that helped make Donald Trump president.
I single Kaepernick and Sarandon out not because they are bad people  but because even conscientious Americans like them made a grave mistake when they allowed their distaste for  Clinton  and an imperfect Democratic Party to blind them to the threat of Trump. As the country continues to grapple with the consequences of his presidency  we should remember that we are here in part because some underestimated the threat he posed.
In June 2016  Sarandon (who supported Bernie Sanders in the primary before endorsing Jill Stein) said on the Young Turks that âin a wayâ  Clinton  was more dangerous than Trump. âTheyâre both talking to Henry Kissinger  apparently â she said. âShe did not learn from Iraq  and she is an interventionist  and she has done horrible things  and very callously. I donât know if she is overcompensating or what her trip is. That scares me. I think weâll be in Iran in two seconds.â
Well   Clinton  lostâand many observers are worried that the US is inching closer to war with Iran.
Kaepernick has used his voice to raise incredibly important issues even while being ridiculed and jeopardizing his professional football career. But he bought into a false narrative in September 2016 when he claimed there was little difference between  Clinton  and Trump  saying it was embarrassing to see the US have two âproven liarsâ as the presidential nominees. âYou have to pick the lesser of two evils. But in the end  itâs still evil â he said.
He couldnât even stick to that and didnât vote in the end  claiming that either Trump or  Clinton  would just be âanother face thatâs going to be the face of that system of oppression. And to me  it didnât really matter who went in there  the system still remains intact that oppresses people of color.â
Neither is this an attempt to absolve  Clinton  of  her  flaws and faults.  She  was one of the least popular presidential nominees in American history because of choices  she  made.  She  should have anticipated the potential ramifications of setting up a private server for  her  emails while secretary of State.  She  could have mustered the courage or had the foresight to vote against the Iraq war.  She  and  her  husband could have decided against making high-dollar Wall Street speeches and other dubious choices that haunted  her  during the campaign.  She  used the term âsuper predator â popularized by an Ivy League criminologist who wrongly anticipated a surge in violent crime among young men  particularly young men of color  to argue in favor of  her  husbandâs 1994 crime bill. As secretary of state   she  argued in favor of a robust military role in parts of the Middle East  policies that are still playing out in ugly ways in places such as Yemen and Libya and Syria.
It is also true that  her  high level of unpopularity was partially built upon conspiracies  the sins of  her  husband  and double standards.  She  had been in the sights of America's right wing for decades and was accused of murder and being involved in a supposed secret child sex scheme.  She  was criticized for staying with  her  husband after his well-publicized affairs  but surely would have been criticized had  she  left him.  She  took the lionâs share of criticism about policiesâlike the Iraq War and crime billâthat had widespread bipartisan support. The crime bill  for instance  was backed by most of the Congressional Black Caucus and many black activists concerned by drug-fueled gang wars in their communities. Bernie Sanders voted for it too.
There were honest critiques of  Clinton . But there was also a caricature of  her  as a liar and a fraud that ultimately helped Trump.
And despite the claims that  Clinton  did not do enough for vulnerable and people of color  after college  she  did not head to Wall Street when  she  could haveâ she  went to the Childrenâs Defense Fund instead. And  she  went undercover to expose racial discrimination in Alabama. And  she  was an important figure in the formation of a program that still provides health insurance for millions of poor children. And  she   like so many other talented women  often sacrificed  her  own ambitions to help further  her  husbandâs. When  she  was a senator  she  was praised by colleagues from both parties for  her  ability to get things done.  She  was not in favor of going into Libya because  she  wanted another war;  she  believed it would help prevent what some believed was a pending massacre. No   she  is not from the anti-war wing of the Democratic Party  but neither is  she  an amoral warmonger. If  she  seemed likely to continue Obamaâs interventionist policies and continue to use dronesâwell  Sanders said he would use drones to fight terrorism as well.
There were honest critiques of  Clinton . But there was also a caricature of  her  as a liar and a fraud that ultimately helped Trumpâwho didnât have  her  record of public service or  her  experience. The narrative that both candidates were equally tainted by scandal was pushed by many disillusioned leftists and helped along by a media that gave a disproportionate amount of coverage to  Clinton âs emails. Voters looking for an excuse to cast a ballot for Trump or stay home in disgust were given one by the anti-Clinton brigade.
There were many other reasons why  Clinton  lost by a razor-thin margin  including James Comeyâs last-minute decision to announce a reopening of the email investigation and  her  campaignâs own poor decision not to aggressively campaign in the upper Midwest.
Sarandon and Kaepernick likely have real empathy for 800 000 or so DACA recipients whose future is uncertain. They may cry for the record number of civilian casualties that have resulted from the way Trump has prosecuted long-simmering wars in the Middle East. They probably hate that the Justice Department has rolled back the police oversight policies from the Obama administration. Iâm sure they are terrified by how emboldened white supremacists are in the Trump era. But the decision made by voters like them in Novemberâto prioritize their disdain for  Clinton  over everything elseâhelped pave the way for all of that  and more.
It wasnât just 63 million mostly white voters who put Trump in office; he was helped by Americans who deluded themselves into thinking there would be no material difference between a Trump and  Clinton  presidency.
Had  Clinton  been president this year instead of Trump  DACA recipients and their supporters would not have to wonder whether they would face deportation come March and could be pushing for actual immigration reform. Had  Clinton  been president  2017 would have been spent debating how best to improve and expand the Affordable Care Act rather than by a desperate attempt to save it. Democrats would have had a fifth vote on the Supreme Court to shore up womenâs rights and voting rights. If there was a tax reform bill  it would have been better constructed to help the poor and middle class. Kaepernick and Sarandon were wrong: There was a big difference between  Clinton  and Trump  and weâve been seeing it all year.

Let's Not Forget the Apathy That Made Trump's Presidency Possible