WU Political Review
Knocking Down the House Rohan Palacios staff editor
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ith 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 think tanks rather than local politics or grassroots organizations. 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
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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. 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 affect 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
