400 people packed the hall, 250 signed up to get active, 9 speakers explained what we do next. We have a plan of action emerging. Complete video of each speaker and details on the meeting…

We Are The Ones We Are Waiting For!  

Report on the Town Hall. The Town Hall meeting was overwhelming. On Friday, we had 125 RSVPs guaranteeing a good turnout. On Sunday, we had 250 RSVPs, but on Sunday afternoon over 400 people showed up, filling the auditorium and the adjacent cafeteria where audio was streamed. And scores of people listened from the parking lot. Thank you to all who endured the cramped, crammed space. But I think everyone there will acknowledge that the size and enthusiasm of the crowd said volumes as to Santa Fe’s desire to resist Trump and to continue building a progressive agenda in New Mexico.

Nine speakers gave brief talks on how people can get involved, whether in local politics, lobbying, protecting our community’s immigrants, running for political office, or conducting civil disobedience to resist Trump and his initiatives. In the coming days, we will obtain links to handouts that were prepared by our speakers and make them available online. At the bottom of this blog are complete video of each speaker’s remarks.  Thank you Andy Fertal for your incredible work on this.

More than 250 people signed up to become involved in group actions.  We have redesigned the Sign Up form to allow you to sign up for a wide range of group actions or to be active from home.  Click here to see what is being planned and sign-up.  At the Town Hall, we also introduced the Personal Action Tool Kit. The Tool Kit includes about a dozen actions you can do from home. Some are one-time actions and others are ongoing actions with many being  actions you can take at home, on your own and in only a few minutes. Click here to take a look and to get active. Perhaps the single most important action you can take is to share this blog and the toolkit with a few friends. Forward this email and encourage your friends and family to get active. We can’t stop Trump’s initiatives if we don’t resist and we can’t advance a progressive agenda without a mass movement. It is time.

At the Town Hall we also asked participants to write their ideas, suggestions, and questions on post-its. It may take a few days or a week to organize this information and get back to people who offered to volunteer or who had questions, but we promise to do so as soon as possible. We are a very small, entirely volunteer operation and suddenly have 250 people to coordinate.

At the end of the meeting, the room erupted into a thunderous roar that lasted at least two minutes. It is now our job to capture and channel that energy into sustained activism.

Below, we are providing full video coverage of the Town Hall Meeting organized into separate clips that cover the complete remarks of each of the speakers.

I wanted to also let you know that we are planning another Organizing Meeting, tentatively scheduled for January 14, 9-5pm at the Santa Fe Convention Center, where we will have considerably more space. We have a Planning Team in place and will announce speakers, breakouts and trainings, hopefully in the next two weeks

For weeks, I have been sending out a blog that allows for comments and replies. You are reading the blog right now. I have also sent out an e-blast using Mail Chimp, an email program. Up until now, the blog and the e-blast have had essentially the same content. But going forward they will differ significantly. For those of you reading this blog, within a few days you will be automatically subscribed to the Mail Chimp e-blast, but the vast majority of you are already subscribed and had been receiving essentially duplicate communications. Going forward they will differ, as described below:

• The Retake Blog will be a personal commentary like the recent “Owl and the Hawk,”  “What Went Wrong.”or “Understanding Trump,” blogs that were especially well received, each blog will end with a question to generate conversation. Of course you don’t have to participate, but it will be an option.
• The e-blast will not include that commentary as the email program does not allow for comments and replies, but the e-blast will have twice weekly updates on events, as well as in-depth analysis of policy and legislative initiatives, movements, and other political-social activity and activism.
• Retake the Roundhouse has already changed its masthead to Retake Our Democracy, and within a week those who go to RetakeTheRoundhouse.org or RetakeOurDemocracy.org will be at the same current site where you will find a growing number of tools and resources.

In closing, I want to thank you for subscribing to this blog and more importantly getting active. On this day before Thanksgiving, it may seem like we live in a political reality that offers very little to be thankful for. But the silver lining is you, us. And for that I am ever so grateful. Thank you. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for and we are going to take this on.  See the playlist below and have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

In solidarity,

Paul

Retake Our Democracy Kickoff (Playlist)

Categories: Actions, Activist Organizations, Activists Websites, Civil Disobedience, Criminal Justice, Immigrant Rights, State Budget, State Elections, Ward Politics

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