We are all connected by our stories. The lived experiences of the people on Team Anna are what make this work so meaningful and our impact so lasting well beyond election season. We recognize that power is not a scarce resource, but instead something that we build together, and it begins with vulnerability and bravery. When we share a little piece of our world, we invite others in and only there can we create community. We are proud and humbled to highlight this post by Rhea Maniar, who just completed an internship with our legislative team. Read on to learn more about how this young student plugged into politics and into our movement.
The phone rang, an unknown number. My mom picked up.
“Hi, may I speak with Rhea Maniar?”
“You can…but she’s nine and already in bed.”
“Uhhh… I’m calling from the Orlando campaign team for Hillary Clinton. Your daughter signed up to call registered voters with us and volunteer.”
“She did what?”
Needless to say, this strange call prompted my mom to ask some questions. The truth spilled out: I had snuck onto her computer past bedtime, wrote a message to Hillary Clinton on her website, and signed up to volunteer with the campaign.
During the 2016 election, it wasn’t hard to know what was going on. It was unprecedented and shocking that Trump had even made it this far in the race. Ads ran all around; it was the subject of almost every adult conversation and even made it to the playgrounds of Lake Whitney Elementary School, where misinformation ran rampant.
On the wall of my fourth-grade classroom, there was a poster with the names and portraits of each president before 2008. And whenever I stared at that poster in boredom, I saw the same thing: white man after white man to the point where they were all looking the same.
Clinton would change that poster, and make history.
The first hopeful female president meant a lot to me as a little girl because it was proof that there was space for people like me in positions of power.
After a little bit of persuading and a lot of pleading, I got my mom to drive my fourth-grade self to a house in my neighborhood hosting phone banks, still surprised that she agreed because my parents had never been too politically active.
As first-generation immigrants from India, they were grateful for the opportunities this country had given them, but they had also seen firsthand the harsh realities of the immigration system and felt like they shouldn’t be asking for more when America had given them so much.
But after 9/11, as America gradually became increasingly xenophobic and Islamophobic, my parents began to see why fighting for change mattered. When I asked to volunteer, it became their catalyst; their frustration with the lengthy, painful immigration system and the hardships they endured growing up in a marginalized community began to channel into action, and now they were calling up people with me almost every day of the week.
After three months of endless volunteering, the Orlando campaign team took me me in as one of their own. I was no longer Rhea, the kid who volunteered with her mom; I was Rhea, the kid who had more volunteer hours than anyone else. I was there at almost every event, every volunteer opportunity, and every meeting with my mom.
When Secretary Clinton was slated to make a visit to Orlando for a rally the week of the election, I begged my mom to take me. We would be witnessing history. Half the volunteer team was going, and I wanted to see our potential president more than anything in the world.
Watching that rally was a pivotal experience for my life. Every word Secretary Clinton uttered resonated with me. It felt as though she was speaking to me directly while addressing a crowd of 2,000 people. From that day on, little wide-eyed 9-year-old me decided that I had found my path. That experience will stay with me forever.
The picture I took that day has remained on my nightstand for seven years, and it’ll stay for more. That day, I proved to myself that you don’t need to be an adult to advocate for yourself and the community around you.
Stealing my mom’s computer as a 9-year-old ended up being one of the most pivotal moments of my life.
It also led me to intern with Representative Eskamani, where I garnered more interaction with the people in Central Florida this summer than in my entire life. The first step to involvement in your community is volunteering and I am grateful to my parents for letting me take my first steps into the world of policymaking eight years ago.
Eight years ago, Secretary Clinton showed me the true faith of America, the faith in the simple dreams of its people, and the magic in small miracles. That we can send kids to school safely. That we can say and write what we think without fear. That we can participate in making decisions that affect us. And that our voice matters.
I want to urge people to make the right choices and face our challenges head-on because nothing was ever accomplished alone. It takes the power of teamwork to fuels progress, and we together can unite and shift the story. When we take initiative to join something bigger than ourselves, we become part of the change, and you can start by canvassing with Team Anna this Saturday.