Tamara Unleashed

I filed my paperwork with the TN Ethics and Campaign Finance Office which (I think) is the last official step to running. I have a PO Box, a bank account and am working on a domain for website and email address. I need to get access to VoteBuilder – the Democratic National Database of registered voters. I think I found a web platform that will be webpage, manage donations, volunteers, etc. I want to review this with James this afternoon.

People say you can run a campaign for less than $1000 using Social Media and that may be true for some elections but I don’t think it makes sense for a state level campaign where I am basically an unknown. I have a pretty good handle on the “mechanics” of a campaign.

I need to start writing down what I am going to communicate to the residents of Robertson County (District 66 for the TN House of Representatives).

Robertson County is a farming county, 25 miles north of Nashville. The city itself is 10 miles from freeway access. The southern and eastern parts of the county, near freeways are being developed as affordable housing for Nashville. The public schools here have been significantly harmed by voucher programs. The farmers are suffering with the tariffs.

So I thought I would free associate here a bit and get feedback from you if you are willing.

Who am I:

I am an angry frightened grandmother. I have 2 (step)grandsons in the military. One is in Marines and one in Air Force. So far they are not in harms way. A grandchild, due in August will be raised in TN, where the Republican supermajority wants to make abortion capital murder for woman and healthcare professionals. They want to make mRNA technology bioterrorism, remove fluoride from the water. They are in the process of creating a Secret Police in TN reporting to the Gov who reports to Stephen Miller.

I am the daughter of a farmer and public school teacher.

I am a retired surgeon and researcher with experience in private practice, academic medicine, pharmaceutical industry and National Institutes of Health. (My opponent, is a retired surgeon).

I am the ex-wife and fiancé of Vietnam War veterans and I know the long-term toll of sending young men off to fight for our country and what we owe them in return.

I am a feminist.

Why I running

The Republican supermajority is not healthy for this TN citizens. In a 2 party system, solutions need to come with both parties working together. There needs to be a progressive candidate running against the incumbent Republican. I am willing to be the opposition. Aside from being a recent transplant to Robertson County, my life experiences make me an excellent candidate to run on the Democratic ticket for District 66.

What are my Traits?

I am curious which is important to learning about Robertson County.

I am caring.

I am a change agent. I have a track record of bringing people together from different backgrounds (scientific) to work on a shared vision.

I am authentic

I make decisions based on information and my value system and I don’t get blown off course by pervailing winds. I can change my mind based on new, credible information.

Issues that I will not be campaigning on

There are hot button issues here that I will not be “campaigning on” but will certainly address as needed. These are things that fall into the category of Personal decisions (they do not directly impinge on anyone else’s health or safety): a woman’s right to make decisions about reproduction. Who people choose to love. How an individual wants to present themselves as (gender identity). A decision to gender transition prior to 18 is the responsibility of the child, the parents and health care professionals.

Issues I will be campaigning on (initial thinking). I am more used to thinking of things at a national level and need to adjust to state and county level:

Strengthening public education

Farm land preservation

Making living in Robertson County affordable (no grocery tax)

Healthcare for all (single Risk Pool – you can have more than one payer as long as all payers are assuming equal risk and everyone is required to have health care). Companies should not be able to profit from delivery of healthcare services. Incentives are upside down. In reality we have a Disease care system not a Health care system.

Thanks for reading and giving me feedback if you choose.

More to come.

Tomorrow I will turn in my petition (signatures) to run for TN House District 66. I need 25; I have 35, sort of. Some of the signatures are not in the correct format so I am not sure how much of a stickler they will be. I assume pretty strict so I may need to get a few more in the morning in case any are disqualified. I don’t want there to be any issues. I have an EIN, a PO Box and as soon as I find a Treasurer, I will open a bank account and then I can open an Act Blue account for Citizens for Bavendam.

While it initially seemed so absurd to do this, it is starting to feel like it sort of makes sense. If there is a BLUE wave in November, I will be on the ticket if “lightning strikes” in Robertson County. I know I can do the job. While I initially thought I couldn’t do this with Baby B as an important part of my life, but then it seemed like I should do it FOR Baby B who will be raised in TN. Hopefully this campaign will energize others to “primary me” in 2028. Notice the glass half full notion that we will have free and fair elections in 2028.

This new adventure begins.

I am going to use this space to process a decision am trying to make. After the last post in early December, I drove to Iowa for a family funeral getting caught in the snow storm giving me extra time with family. This was not bad except Craig was back in TN with a miserable virus. His symptoms were just starting as I left and I, for once, did not get infected. I got back to prep for the December Robertson County Democratic meeting. Following the meeting Tony, our chair asked Craig and I out for dinner. He wanted to see if I would consider running for a seat in the TN House of Representatives. It would be running against a 10 year incumbent (Sabi Kumar) with very little chance of winning. Craig and I spent the week of Christmas and New Year’s trying to make sense of this opportunity.

I am a transplant to Robertson County and have been involved in the community for less than a year. I am 70 years old. I am living in sin and I do not go to church (not going to church is the bigger problem). It appealed to me because for the challenge and the opportunity to help bring RC voters out of hiding – the awareness and community building aspects of a campaign. Craig struggled with the investment (money and time) and risks knowing I was not going to win.

Then lightning struck. James and Natalie told us she was 7 weeks pregnant after a long journey of “trying”. We were all in shock and I immediately said I could not run. It became real after her first OB appointment on February 2nd. All was well on ultrasound and the genetics blood tests came back good. So my move to Nashville to become a hands on Gigi, like my mom was for me is now a reality.

Then we started to be aware that the Tennessee Republicans, that have a supermajority, had worked with Stephen Miller to create a Tennessee ICE reporting only to the governor. TN learned from ICE challenges in MN and have written into the bills that ICE can do its own investigations and that they do not have to release any information about their actions to the public. Also, all state officials (including teachers, doctors and nurses) will be required to check on immigration status and report it to TN ICE. Essentially they are creating a state Gestapo justified by the existence of “criminal” illegal immigrants. The rep from our district (TN House 66) Sabi Kumar is the cosponsor of the bill to mandate reporting of illegal immigrants.

TN District 66 is Robertson County where I have been leading outreach efforts for the past 8 months. Sabi has not had any public forums for years. We feel this man MUST be challenged to help bring what is going on in the State Legislature to the awareness of Robertson County residents. I tried really hard to get Craig to run but after careful consideration, he turned all my talking points back on me. Now, given the stakes for TN, he is less concerned about the risks of investing our lives in a losing campaign.

My potential opponent, Sabi Kumar, MD http://www.sabikumar.com is an immigrant from India. He was the surgeon in Springfield for decades and by all accounts he was a good surgeon. He operated on someone in everyone’s family and was easily elected in 2016 as a Republican. Currently, he gets in line with MAGA leadership every step of the way. His supporters feel he changed in office.

This picture is of Sabi Kumar, his wife Linda, Craig and I after the 2025 Veteran’s Day program at the local middle school. He gave a very meandering talk not targeted to the occasion and Craig knocked it out of the park https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqGwVc8b2V0.

“Baby B”, sex not yet known, is doing well at 14 weeks is not due until August 24th after a Democratic Primary if someone runs. After Baby B is born, I can campaign around whatever the parents’ and my needs are with respect to a newborn.

I have until March 10 to file. I need 25 signatures on the petition which will be easy to get. On the positive side, my credentials will stack up well with his. If I do this, my campaign will have to be authentic and fun. We have a podcast studio on our third floor and I can largely run a Social media campaign with video commentary. I look forward to canvassing and can go to fairs and festivals as they get started. I do not have a business to protect or family or friends that I would risk losing which is a major challenge for RC natives. I don’t think there would be much on opposition research that could come out but who knows what spinning could be done.

Practical challenges – Tamara Bavendam on a yard sign???

Let me know what you think!!

We turned our disappointment about the Special Election into ACTION. Craig turned his car trailer into a structure for a float. This took him several days of planning and constructing. It was designed to have a red, white and blue table skirt surrounding the wooden frame and a LED American Flag for the front but the skirt and flag were delayed. So we ended up using wrapping paper for the skirt and suspending a real American flag with fishing line from the frame – with spotlights.

Friday we had a gathering of people at the garden so see the basic structure and talk through the plan for construction on Saturday. Many contributed to wrapping of presents and we came up with the present tags including coal for billionaires. We started building the float at 1045 yesterday morning and stopped at 445 when we had to check in. It was chilly and overcast but a dedicated group of a dozen people worked together and got it done. There were 95 entries in the parade. Ours was one of the best and certainly much better than the one from the Republican Party.

Our reception along the parade route (less than a mile) was mostly positive to enthusiastic. A fair amount of glares, a couple of thumbs down, but no verbal taunts. While we shifted 7 points to left in Robertson County, there is still a lot of hesitancy paricularly by the long-standing residents to identify themselves as not supporting the GOP even if they do not support the direction they are taking this country. Most of our most active members are transplants or natives who lived elsewhere for many years and came back.

We accomplished our goal of being proudly present in our community. We are here to stay.

The result of the Special Election, the focus our lives since July, “STINKS” but it does not negate all of the progress we made in Robertson County and throughout District 7 to build of community of people who want to see change and now KNOW it can happen.

IT IS WORTH THE EFFORT.

We have learned a lot through the Special Election process and are now in a much better position for the 2026 elections.

Being a Precinct worker was seeing Democracy in action. We had a steady flow all day long which was surprising to the experienced precinct workers. As a voting machine operator yesterday. I arrived at 6 AM, stood all day, didn’t drink enough water and was exhausted when I left the precinct at 730 PM. I enjoyed it and will do it again but will manage my fluid intake differently next time. The last minute GOP get out the vote efforts were more successful than Democrats. My take is that much of the turnout was driven from the pulpit from hundreds of churches on Sunday. Voters showed up who hadn’t voted in for years and were clearing voting against Aftyn and not for a person. They didn’t know a thing about the election, just that they had to vote.

Next up is a RCDP Float in the Springfield Christmas parade this Saturday at 530 PM (it is all about the lights after dark). We got a large (12 foot) Christmas tree for the float on Marketplace. It was a great deal and will the centerpiece on our Float. With the trailer will be 6 inches too tall to clear the overhead wires/traffic lights on the parade route. Fortunately it looks great with one section removed. We now have a 10 foot tree. RCDP will be out in our community, loud and proud this weekend – celebrating the fact that the 22 point GOP margin was cut to 8. We will continue to grow our community.

Aftyn won the Democratic Primary in October. We have 3 more days to motivate Democratic/Independent/disenfranchised Trump voters to get out and vote. While Robertson County went for Trump by 22%, the last poll had Aftyn at 46% and her opponent at 48%. Suddenly, there is a Republican get out of the vote. It has been an amazing journey. Robertson County voter turnout rate is very low. There is no sense your vote will matter – the GOP candidates always win so why bother.

The first few weeks after she won the primary were VERY SLOW. It was all fundraising, canvassing and phone banking. There were very few public appearances. It didn’t make any sense to Craig and I. Our working hypothesis was that the DNC needed to get through the November 4th elections to see how much they wanted to invest in this solidly GOP district in TN. After the November sweep, our little District seemed more interesting. I think the campaign was told to keep a very LOW profile, i.e. do not create anything that could possible be NEGATIVE in the sprint to December 2. Do not commit to any appearances in the rural counties in case something more valuable comes along. Aftyn needed to spend all her time fundraising since she was not accepting corporate PAC money.

RCDP planned an Early Voting Kick-Off event on November 8th. All the candidates were notified prior to the Primary. After Aftyn won, we were told she had a conflict for the 8th and would not be able to attend. So we invited one of the other primary candidates that did well in Robertson County to the Kick-Off event. All candidates pledged to support the winner. The candidate, Darden, accepted our invitation. At our event, we had a Bake Sale, a decorated car rally, speeches, small goats to pet, a music circle around a fire pit AND a POP up Food Drive for United Ministries Food Bank of Robertson County. The weather was great.

Imagine our surprise when Aftyn showed up for our event. While our attendance was pretty good, it would have been much greater if we could have said she would be there.

I have led some canvassing groups in Springfield and phone banking of. Robertson County residents. The majority of the Campaign efforts were allocated to the 3 populace counties. I have been on a roller coaster of feeling pissed of how “unimportant” the rural counties were and understanding of the complexities of running an election with few paid people and the need to reserve money for commercials. The campaign team were so busy, they could not communicate with people or organize all of the potential volunteer help that was available. Frustrating but Special Elections take place over weeks to months rather than months to years.

Early on, Aftyn consistently posted on Facebook but many Robertson County residents are not on Facebook. It was hard to keep people engaged in trying to help her get elected. As the National attention grew as the polls showed her within 10 points.

I think my hypothesis was correct. Since November 4th, Aftyn has been everywhere and the National and Global (BBC story) attention to the possible UPSET of this incredibly gerrymandered district has skyrocketed. The DNC Chair, Ken Martin was here. Kamala Harris canvassed when she was here on her book tour. I got a postcard from a New Jersey woman which I greatly appreciated.

As of 3 days ago, Aftyn had narrowed the gap to 2 which is in the margin of error. I think Aftyn is a great candidate and will make a great legislator. The challenges associated with trying to “help” from a nonprioritized rural area will fade and if she wins will go away. I

will be out canvassing Saturday and Sunday. I will take Monday off because I will be a voting machine operator on the Tuesday for Election Day. We have to be there at 6 and have to stay until everyone in line at 7 PM votes.

We are supposed to go to Aftyn’s Election Watch party in Nashville – hopefully I will have the energy for it.

Go Aftyn.

https://www.aftynforcongress.com

The Robertson County Democratic Town Hall was a success. Aftyn Behn won the primary for District 7, but came in 3rd in Robertson County. The Primary was 2 weeks ago and the campaign is still trying to get everything in place to run General Election campaign against Matt Van Epps, a Trump endorsed West Point grad and Army helicopter pilot. Early voting starts November 12 with Election Day December 2. It will be an expensive TOUGH fight.

As I was went to sign up for the No Kings Protest in Nashville on September 17, I wondered if Robertson County was ready for its own protest. So I called my “partner in outreach” for RCDP, Donna and she said “maybe”. So we went about planning a protest in Springfield. We decided to have a “visibility” protest rather than a “rally” (planned line up of speakers). We planned it for around the Robertson County Courthouse in downtown Springfield from 11AM-1PM. I registered a new Indivisible group as well RobCoTN Indivisible as a co-sponsor with the RCDP. This protest was on NO Kings website and we advertised it on RCDP Facebook and directly to RCDP distribution list. I ordered bull horns and yellow safety vests. We took Safety Training sponsored by Move On. We contacted the city and county Mayors offices and visited the Springfield PD and RC Sherif’s office. As we were not planning on closing a street, we did not need a permit.

Registrations came in a few at a time and interestingly the vast majority were not names that I recognized from the RCDP. Craig made signs to advertise the event and protests signs for people who came without signs.

On Saturday, the weather was beautiful. We arrived early as did the other organizers and those who agreed to be Safety Officers. About 1030 a few people arrived and sat in the share around the periphery. By 1050 we had a small group on the major street starting the protest and people just kept coming. I heard many attendees say they were afraid they would be the only ones there. Some were concerned about safety (that someone would drive a car into the crowd). We ended up with nearly 200 protesters – most were first time protesters. It was joyous. The only thing that could be construed as counter protest was a couple of loud trucks going by drowning out the chants for about 3 minutes.

We took a group photo at 1 PM as it ended and sang “We shall Overcome”. Several attendees made sure we left the Courthouse grounds clean and the event was over. All of the signs Craig made were used by those that did not bring signs. I had my moment of fame being interviewed by local online publication which is not known to be friendly to Robertson County Democrats. SWAT is Smart Women Against Trump.

We had our RCDP monthly meeting last night and we had over 60 people attending – the largest group since we have been going. The RCDP distribution list has grown from just over 200 to just over 400 since June.

Now I have the RobCoTN Indivisible group to get off the ground. I started this hoping, if “I built it”, “people will come” who know the community better and want to actually lead it. Time will tell. So far my instincts about bringing Democrats and those wishing to preserve democracy out from hiding have been working out pretty well. Fingers crossed.

Charlie Kirk was killed the day of our Democratic Candidate Town Hall. The Democratic Party office in an adjoining county had a visit from an angry man who threatened the volunteer in the office. I got a call around 3 PM from the RCDP Chair asking if I thought we should cancel our Town Hall. I said HELL NO and waited anxiously while he checked with the TNDP who was providing the liability insurance for the event. Fortunately, they were OK with us holding the event. The Town Hall was at a Middle School that was having a sporting event which took up quite a bit of the parking which was not ideal. All of the volunteers showed up to help get set up and new people were personally welcomed as they came in. The only detail I missed was that I should have had a jar for Undecided for the Straw Poll as many people were not able to pick a favorite. There are 4 strong candidates.

There were nearly 150 attendees. One person said they had not seen that many Democrats in the same place in Robertson County in decades. There were 45 people who signed in that were not on our email list which was GREAT. Craig recorded the event so we were able to post it for those that could not attend.

We had a private security person at the door which we planned prior to the Kirk assassination. There were no disruptions. Some audience members did choose to sit in the back on the side out of view of a potential shooter.

The Straw Poll was won by Aftyn Behn who is a passionate young woman in her first term in the TN State Assembly. She is the candidate with the most “fire” and she seems to be consistently appealing to those attending the Town Halls across District 7. I like her a great deal but we will not be able to win the General with a typical Democratic electorate. We are going to need to appeal to Independents and disenfranchised Republicans and it is hard to know if her “fire” will appeal to those voters.

The person who came in second in the Straw Poll, Darden Copeland. is a business man who has never run for office. His life experience is as a consensus builder and he does not have any record in the State Assembly to target by the Republican candidate. He has great confidence that he is the one who can get the votes by Independents and disenfranchised Republicans. I really don’t know who I am going to vote for at this point.

We had a man post a threat on our RCDP Facebook page later on Wednesday so we will now need to have security at our monthly meetings. This is truly hard to believe but that is our current reality.

I was really hoping for at least 200 people to attend the Town Hall but with the parking situation and the fear of a threatening situation, I am satisfied with the attendance. Now to figure out what our next event will be to keep people engaged.

What does it take to get the Democrats in Robertson County TN to poke their heads out and engage? I am not sure, but I am willing to try about anything. I think I make a pretty good Donkey. This may go up on the RCDP FB page if those in charge (not me) think it might help.

I canvassed both Saturday and Sunday (without the costume) and am headed out now on my bicycle. Again without the ears.

Canvassing is mostly dropping a flyer about the Town Hall on Wednesday but about a third of the time someone comes to the door and is willing to engage. Most continue to be unaware of the Special Election and the opportunity it provides. With the typical low turnout for Special Elections, the people I am reaching through canvassing may be enough to make a difference.

At the Workers over Billionaires protest yesterday we saw the 3 women who cared for Craig at the John Lewis parade just over a month ago when Craig suffered from heat exhaustion. Mandy and Julie, left and center are partners. Andrea, on the right was the ER nurse that recognized how compromised Craig was. They met over Craig and have remained friends. I wanted to get a picture of them and they wanted to make sure they got a picture with Craig. We are so grateful to them and look forward to seeing them at future protests.