Knocking Down the House

With the 2020 presidential campaign well underway, many students are following electoral storylines closely, engaging in Twitter wars, and even volunteering their time. Perhaps lost in the desire to connect to the national political moment are the multitude of opportunities to get involved in our community. A number of Wash U students have ambitions to get involved in politics and activism, but pathways offered or marketed at Wash U are very limited, skewing towards big campaigns and thinktanks rather than local politics or grassroots organization. Part of the responsibility to diversify political engagement lies with groups like the Gephardt Institute or Career Center. However, the onus is also on students step outside their comfort zones and take advantage of the many available opportunities. I talked to Jessie Thornton ’19 to learn about how working on Cori Bush’s grassroots congressional campaign here in St. Louis has inspired her development as an activist.

How is this campaign different from what people might imagine a political campaign to be?

Jessie Thornton: In popular media and imagination, [campaigning] is a lot of browbeating supervisors and control freak policy wonks. It’s a lot of white men. It’s a lot of the candidate’s ego. That could not be farther from my experience with Cori. I met Cori for the first time at a presidential debate watch party. I was completely starstruck. I told her about my interests, and she said “Great, can I sit down with you for a couple of hours? I want to hear more about what you care about.” I was stunned. That was so different from the ego-driven image of politicians and candidates that I had held. Immediately they onboarded me to help with town halls and they’ve remained very transparent with me and with all volunteers, which I think is an integral part of the campaign. 

What is your role with the campaign?

JT: I am the Communications Lead, meaning that I’m empowered to make decisions about our Comms strategy. I have also recruited, maintained, and supervised a volunteer team of researchers and writers who contribute to the content that we put out. I work very closely with Cori and her campaign manager on social media. I’ve been able to create significant portions of campaign strategy and messaging, and I think that’s the experience that a lot of people working on bigger campaigns are missing out on. My voice is heard, and my skill set is valued. That’s a work experience that some people don’t have for years and years. 

About 50% of my work is conceptual. What are we doing and why? Who are we telling stories about and who are we talking to? It has been so cool to combine my passionate support for Cori’s candidacy with my passion for storytelling. I get to write persuasive narratives, collaborate with people and supervise the volunteers. It’s also a lot of rapid response and a lot of close communication with Cori and that’s something I’m really grateful for.

How did you come to be interested in activism?

JT: Both my parents are environmentalists, so I was kind of indoctrinated into environmental ethics, which I really embraced. I went to public school for the first half of my life before getting financial aid to go to a private middle school. That was a huge shift from a diverse student population, and one in which my family had more money than most, to being in an environment that was characterized by extreme wealth and whiteness. My experiences with politics for a long time were associated with elitism, and I actually shied away from it. I was sick of the idea of working in politics being about power. That just didn’t sit well with me. 

Seriously engaging with how I could effect change in my community. Engaging with feminism. Coming out in high school and finding my queer community. Michael Brown’s murder in Ferguson. These events motivated me to come to Wash U, so I get a great education but also learn outside of the classroom. 

What experiences shaped your desire to work in American politics?

JT: I very much thought of myself as an activist from outside “the system” but my decision to study abroad in Scotland changed a lot for me. I was so disempowered [by American politics] but going to Scotland completely changed my life. I witnessed a government that actually cared about its constituents. People were not just repeating talking points. Instead, they were actively bringing up stories of their constituents and responding to their needs. I respect them more than people who get into Congress in the United States and hold their seats while repeating the same things. Following Senator Bernie Sanders’ campaign has also been really important in terms of understanding the value of grassroots and non-corporate campaigns.  

How would you describe Wash U as an environment for activism?

JT: There is an abundance of on-campus groups, many of which are dedicated to service and social and civic engagement. They’re very much done through these lines that are implicitly endorsed by Wash U. When you work through those lines, you get school funding and resources. That means you have more consistent membership; certain things like convenience or the availability of free food draw students in. I think it is also about comfort. How comfortable are people leaving campus and going to a neighborhood they have never been to? How comfortable are you taking up space on campus in a protest? Sometimes it takes people years to get comfortable with that, so then what about marching in St. Louis? Or driving your car somewhere off-campus? Accessibility is a big barrier for people. 

And then, what if there is something you can’t necessarily put on your resume? Maybe you’re a volunteer and you know you do a lot, but you don’t have a specific title because that’s not something the organization is concerned with? In grassroots activism it’s not about that professional veneer of official positions and formal professional development. It’s hard for Wash U students to leave their zone of comfort. I think a lot of Wash U students see themselves as benefitting from the status quo in politics. I also think it’s easier to choose a paid political internship. There are a lot of people who are ready and excited to offer their skills to a campaign like Cori’s, but other campaigns have more resources. 

What are the issues that animate voters you talk to in St. Louis?

JT: Medicare for All. A lot of people we talk to are underinsured or uninsured or they have insurance but are paying extremely high premiums. Also the Green New Deal because it is the only way we’ll get to a positive and sustainable future, but it also comes with jobs training programs, getting people certified for jobs that are already available in St. Louis, which would be huge for this people in the region.

How is Cori’s campaign different from other campaigns?

JT: There are a lot of “progressive” politicians and non-profits that claim to run grassroots campaigns but still take corporate donations. Cori does not, and it’s not from a lack of offers. Companies do come to the campaign and say “let us donate to you,” and the way she [Cori Bush] put it was, “on the 1% chance they think I can win the election, they want to know they can buy me” and she says “hell no!” 

What differentiates Cori Bush from her opponent, Congressman Lacy Clay?

JT: Cori’s a nurse, a mother, and an activist. She’s also a pastor. These are all things that form the pillars of who she is and inform her policy positions. Not only was she a single mother, but she was also a homeless single mother. She works with a lot of communities in need of hope as they struggle to put food on the table or to stay financially solvent. As a nurse, she sees people who are insured, uninsured, underinsured every day. She works with people coming out of prison so she’s really passionate about criminal justice reform.

The fundamental thing that differentiates her from Lacy Clay is the homegrown nature of her activism. She started out on the sidelines at the protests in Ferguson, helping people injured by tear gas and rubber bullets. She kept going back day after day and eventually started organizing protests on her own. That level of determination and sacrifice has never existed with Lacy Clay. 

In the last decade her opponent, Lacy Clay, had fewer than 1,000 individual donations. In this past calendar year alone, Cori has 7,000. That speaks to the magnitude of popular support that she has. It also highlights the emotional and literal financial investment that people are making in her. Most people donating to the campaign are not rich, they’re working people. Clay gets  donations from major corporations and their executives; payday loan companies, pharmaceuticals, Monsanto, etc.

Lacy Clay is still telling his constituents that things have gotten better in the last 50 years. I don’t know how you can say that. Things are not “good” in St. Louis. In my opinion, he’s extremely out of touch. It is difficult because people here are very loyal, which I think is a positive thing, but people are getting hurt by his inaction.  

Update: A week after this interview, the Cori Bush campaign hired Jessie full-time to help lead their communications team.