The fight for Democracy
From Monday evening to Tuesday evening, Cory Booker stood on his two feet in the Senate Chambers, with 15 binders of information, calling out everything that’s happened under this New Administration over the past 72 days. At the same time, this alone is extremely important and historical. He broke Storm Thruman’s 24-hour record, who, 68 years ago, stood in favor of segregation in America, someone who never would’ve wanted a person like Cory Booker to become Senator to begin with. With the aid of social media, Senator Booker was able to get the attention of listeners across the country, and people around the world cheered him on.
Who is Senator Booker?
Cory Booker is from Northern New Jersey. As far as education, he attended Stanford University, and has always had a history of being involved in the community. He then attended the University of Oxford and Yale Law School, where he graduated in 1997. Post-college, he started a nonprofit out of Newark to provide legal services for low-income families. Cory served as Newark mayor from 2006 until 2013. In October 2013, Cory won a special election to represent New Jersey in the United States Senate. In November 2014, he was re-elected to a full six-year term.
The importance of reaching out to your representatives, especially as young people is beyond important. As someone who has reached out to Senator Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand a million times, it feels as though your voice is useless, and never acknowledged. However, Senator Booker was like a little ray of hope. He read emails and letters from people writing out of frustration. While he alone can not change the effects of the current administration, the acknowledgment of the people’s struggle is a step forward. Seeing the way people’s lives were changed in the past 72 days should be an eyeopener for many people. Don’t think that because these people are politicians, they’re out of reach; they’re your representatives for a reason, to be the voice for the people.
The preparAtion
A task like this isn’t only intellectually and emotionally draining, but it takes a huge toll on the human body. Our bodies aren’t built to stand in one place for 25 hours straight without eating and being able to use the restroom. When asked, Senator Booker said he began fasting on Friday night and stopped drinking water on Sunday to intentionally dehydrate himself, as he prepared to spend a day without a restroom break. I don’t know about you, but I definitely can barely stand for five minutes, never mind 25 hours. I think in preparation for this, his team was extremely smart for streaming this on TikTok; this team has always been internet savvy, and using a predominantly younger platform only worked in their favor.
With the age of the internet, getting bad attention isn’t hard, and Cory Booker himself even said, “Let’s get in good trouble.” he wanted to get people worked up, talking, agitated; he brought the issues to the discussion. But what does this mean going forward? Many Americans have expressed frustration with their democratic representatives, as they seemed to be watching from the sidelines. Due to a minority in either the House or the Senate, congressional Democrats have few legislative options to block or implement change, but the actions of Senator Booker are hopefully going to inspire his colleagues to try and do more as the people call for. While this administration’s actions are harming many people, Booker’s speech gave a glimmer of hope to the people. He did what no one has dared to do: CALL THEM OUT.
How to reach your representatives
I want to end this article by again emphasizing the importance of reaching out to your representatives. They’re fairly easy to find on Find Your Members in the U.S. Congress and United States House of Representatives; all it takes is typing in your zip code. And there’s nothing wrong with sending them a message; the worst that could happen is not getting a response, but they wouldn’t have pursued their careers if they didn’t care about representing the people.