Donald Trump announced his re-election bid in Orlando, Florida this week. It’s been a difficult month for Trump as polls for 2020 begin to trickle in. His re-election team sought a large arena in a key state, both in an effort to show political strength, but also surely to boost Trump’s mood and lessen his tantrums.
On Tuesday, The Orlando Sentinel editorial board published a scathing anti-endorsement. Later, news broke that the city of Orlando was asking for payment from the re-election rally upfront, as the President has a nasty tendency of not paying his bills. These are the acts of a bold place, unorthodox and brave, and to me, textbook Orlando.
As I watched the coverage from the rally I was overcome with a sick feeling that I'd grown accustomed to: post-2016 nausea. The twinge of a migraine. The tight shoulders. All heightened as I disassociated from a reality that I still struggle to process. It’s one thing to see him in the White House, it’s a different thing altogether seeing him in a place I called home.
Few people understand Florida. I grew up there, and I still struggle to understand it. But narrower still is people’s understanding of Orlando. A place that for many is part of the quintessential American experience. Nationwide, many feel a sense of ownership to Orlando yet few know anything beyond the theme parks and punchlines. In many ways, Florida is the laughingstock of the nation, and Orlando an infantile sub-section where tourists flock. It’s a place that exists for amusement, so Trump making a giant sideshow makes almost poetic sense. After all, what could be more Florida Man than “Deranged Reality Show Star Decides to Run For President Again?”
Normally, I can stomach the jokes and by no means am I arguing that Florida is not an absurd place. But his arrival in Orlando comes days after the anniversary of the Pulse shooting -- a time when the world gets to see a depth and complexity about Orlando they usually don't.
As I saw the lines of MAGA hats and conservative outlets describing the city as a political monolith I grew more and more enraged. I kept thinking that I so wished to know what the mood on the ground was as Orlando awaited Trump’s official announcement rally. I thought of Anna Eskamani.
Representative Anna Eskamani was elected to Florida’s 47th state house district. She’s one of the class of exciting progressive candidates who got elected nationwide in November of last year. Anna is young. Smart. A first-generation Iranian-American, born and raised in the Orlando area. She worked for Planned Parenthood for years and isn’t afraid to grab a bullhorn at any protest. She also happens to be my pal from college.
Anna not only is an elected official from the area temporarily withstanding the squalls of Trumpism she also has come to exemplify the side of Florida that I know and love. Impulsively I DM her on Twitter and not ten minutes later we’re talking on the phone.
As soon as she answers she says “Hey queen!” and I’m reminded of her leading College Democrats meetings at the University of Central Florida in 2012 with her unparalleled energy and down-to-earth-millenialness. For a second, it’s like we’re both 21 again. Through the phone, I can hear the noise from the counterprotest she was attending in the background.
“I’m in Downtown Orlando at the Win With Love rally against Trump!” she says to me. She describes the live music and jubilant atmosphere. She biked to the event.
She knows what so many Floridian organizers know: It’s important to foster the progressive community to really understand their needs. It’s important to show up because Floridians show up. Florida has been the frontline of American politics for twenty years and may be the most politically engaged state in the country. Not by the percentage of people who vote, but by sheer osmosis of constantly being in the front lines of history.
Orlando isn’t reacting to Trump, she explains to me, it’s taking pride in leading with love and joy. The rally to counter president Trump was titled “Win With Love” and it was planned that way with intention. “We wanted to craft a picture where you’re embraced [in Orlando] no matter what your background is. No matter who you love, who you worship, your documentation status, your disability. We really want to create that environment and lead with our values every step of the way.”
Leading with values is what countless Floridians do. There’s a lesson in the way that Floridians are able to exist in a place of contradicting multitudes. To ignore the presence of people like Representative Eskamani, Mayor Andrew Gillum, and the Parkland students is to ignore a community that rises from every storm, stronger than before.
Mayor Andrew Gillum, long thought to be the primary underdog, secured the Democratic nomination for governor as the only non-millionaire in the race. He was also the first black nominee running for governor in the history of Florida. He went on to lose the governorship by less than 30,000 votes. But unlike seemingly every high-profile local politician in the country, Mayor Gillum is not embarking on a presidential campaign, but instead, is choosing to help grow and nurture the grassroots organizers his candidacy helped to create.
The work that the Parkland students have done has galvanized the national discussion regarding gun violence prevention. And while many grow forever cynical that nothing has changed that cynicism isn’t based on the facts. Within three weeks of the shooting at Parkland, legislation was passed in Florida that extended the waiting period for purchasing guns, banned bump stocks, and raised the age to own a rifle from 18 to 21. Just today, the House voted to fund gun violence research for the first time in American history.
We will fail in 2020 if we continue to play into micro-aggressions, rooted in classism, spouted by oh-so-woke liberals drawing broad generalizations about regions that they can only see as backwards. In doing so, in decrying and exclusively highlighting the area’s troubles, we all too often hide and stifle the triumphant struggle. To ignore the celebration that can come from a potent resistance is a reactionary defensive tactic not rooted in Winning With Love.
The Trump team choosing Orlando as the kick-off for his 2020 re-election campaign is intentional. The GOP is nothing if not good at getting their way and winning elections. They are counting on us to fall for their meticulously generated chaos and then forget the best among us. We can’t let them.