Roughly 30 local progressives gathered at Shakespeare’s Pizza to watch a live stream of a Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) town hall on Monday night.
Sanders, who moderated the nationally broadcasted town hall, was joined by Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, progressive filmmaker Michael Moore, and economist Darrick Hamilton. The trio was also joined on stage by other guests.
The town hall focused on income inequality in America. The panelists discussed the current state of the issue, and Sanders and Warren advocated for increased policy intervention in order to help mitigate it.
“I’m glad he’s focusing attention on that issue,” attendee Paul Rainsberger said. Rainsberger found out about the event through a progressive email list he’s on. “Questions of class are one of the fundamental problems of American society right now, so I think this is a good time [to discuss it]. It’s been pushed to the background way too often, so I think it’s good that they’re doing this.”
People in the crowd clapped along with the in-studio audience when they heard something that particularly pleased them. The group gathered in one of the private event rooms at Shakespeare’s.
Heather Mulligan, a nurse in Columbia, was at the event because she was interested in the subject matter and had followed Sanders since his run for president.
“Bernie Sanders inspired me to get involved in politics and trying to better our country,” she said.
The watch party was organized by Kevin EarthSoul, vice and acting chair of Our Revolution: Mid-Missouri.
“Our Revolution is an organization that was founded by Sanders’ campaign staffers after they closed up the campaign as a political action committee to promote progressive politics throughout the country, to promote progressive politicians at every level and work our way back towards another attempt to get a progressive in the White House,” EarthSoul said.
Although he originally became involved as a volunteer in a campaign field office for the Sanders campaign in August 2015, EarthSoul joined Our Revolution following the conclusion of the 2016 presidential election.
“[Our Revolution is] trying to do a phone bank to recruit more local candidates in districts around the area where we don’t have a Democrat or somebody on the left running,” EarthSoul said. “We have three local candidates in mid-Missouri that we have already endorsed because we raised them up through our organization. There’s a couple other candidates that are here, one already that we haven’t yet endorsed, but only because we’re waiting for the filing deadline.”
The mid-Missouri chapter holds meetings on the first Wednesday of every month at Carpenters Local Union, located at 404 Tiger Lane.
_Edited by Skyler Rossi | srossi@themaneater.com_