Taking a few minutes to reflect

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.