Derrick Crowe is a longtime DailyKos community member running for Congress in Texas' 21st Congressional District. Crowe is a former Democratic congressional staffer, small business owner, and climate change action organizer endorsed by environmental leader Bill McKibben and Democracy for America. His platform includes support for real climate change action, Medicare For All, a $15/hour minimum wage, and College for All. Learn more: https://electcrowe.com.
From talking to seniors in a Johnson City housing project, to winning the Bexar County Democrats straw poll for the primary election, to a fantastic block walk in Kerrville--we had a packed weekend on the campaign, and I wanted to tell you about it.
On Friday, I spent time blockwalking in Johnson City. I spent a good portion of the evening in a local housing project, talking to seniors about their anxieties about President Trump’s cuts to Medicare and Medicaid.
I ended my evening in Johnson City with a Democratic activist, Marian, who introduced me to the key lime pie at The Old Lumber Yard restaurant. Ridiculously good.
Yesterday, we started the day in San Antonio with the Bexar County Democrats at their first-ever Primary Straw Poll event. (Bexar County includes San Antonio, and is the second-largest bucket of Democratic votes in the primary and the biggest source of votes in the general election.) I had a great time meeting more local Democrats and hearing candidate speeches, many of which focused on Veterans Day, mine included. The focus of the event was a dry run for the 2018 primary election vote. Every candidate whose representation includes Bexar County was on a ballot. More than 400 ballots were cast as local Democrats declared their preferences for the March 6 races.
I’m honored to report that we won the straw poll for TX21 in a big way! We got nearly double the votes of the second-place candidate. The vote total shows the power of running on solid progressive values and showing up in person to ask people for their votes. That’s exactly the kind of campaign we’re running, and it’s exactly the kind of campaign that can seize the opportunity created by Lamar Smith’s retirement and the oncoming progressive wave.
After winning the straw poll, we immediately jumped into the car to head to Kerrville to go knock on doors. Our volunteer leads for the area, Wendy and Tammy, brought together more than a dozen volunteers to go into the neighborhoods and tell people about our campaign to stop corporate control of our politics.
As we got started on our first target precinct, a woman driving by halted her car and yelled out of her window, “Are you Derrick Crowe? I know you from Facebook!” I ran over to her car and shook her hand, and she immediately described how stopping Trump was important to her because of the damage the GOP is doing to a trans member of her family.
Afterwards, we came back to the Pint & Plow for some pizza and “war stories” from the walk. Several folks had block-walked for the first time that day, and it was awesome to hear them excitedly describe overcoming that vague fear of knocking on a stranger’s door and finding someone who agreed with them on the other side.
Several folks conveyed funny--but friendly!--interactions with Republicans they met, and the civility of those discussions was a great reminder that despite the ugly hostility in which we often find ourselves in thanks to today’s politics, the people with whom we disagree are rarely the monsters we can imagine if we never leave Twitter or Facebook.
Right now, I’m about to head back out to knock on more doors and meet more future constituents. After spending the weekend so far with committed, energized people fighting for change in their neighborhoods, I can’t wait to talk to more people about our campaign. The encouragement and commitment of the supporters I spent time with this weekend mean so much to me.
Thank you for everything you are doing to take our country back.