Today I voted for myself for the United States House of Representatives in #NY11. It was an incredibly surreal feeling but what I was really voting for was our movement for justice and dignity for all. THREAD /1
I’m the daughter of a loving mother who worked full-time with a baby and ROTC requirements to pay her way through college and ensure I was taken care of. She taught me compassion, determination, and joy in the face of adversity and abuse. /2
I’m the biological daughter of a man raised and abused in orphanages in Puerto Rico because his family was too poor to care for him after his grandmother died. He lived a traumatic life on the streets and passed on so much of that pain to our family. But he taught me to fight. /3
I’m the daughter of a man who chose me like we chose him. He claimed as his own from day one. He pushed me and he showed what it means to love in action, always doing whatever it took to take care of us, picking up extra jobs and sacrificing when things were tight. /4
I’m the granddaughter of a woman who drank from “colored only” water fountains as a child and a man who was 19 serving in the Air Force when Ruby Bridges had to be escorted to a forcibly desegregated school by armed federal marshals. They paved the way. /5
I’m the wife of a man who has loved me so well for 12 years. He held me as I woke up screaming from nightmares after war. Stood by me as I risked prison to speak out against them. And has been there as I’ve laughed, cried, and worked on this campaign 551 days. /6
As I think about the recent Supreme Court rulings affirming Puerto Rico’s colony status, the stripping of my equal protections under the law and so much more - I know that I am completely ordinary and yet I am also my ancestors’ wildest dreams.
This movement will always be personal for me. We’re fighting for liberation from the 1% whose greed is so consuming they buy our politicians and don’t care if the rest of us live or die. This campaign is a love letter to us. We are the majority and we are so powerful together 🔥
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