Brian is currently a sophomore at FSU. He is 19, and is a jazz and philosophy dual major. He spends most of his time playing trumpet. The end goal, however, is politics. He joined the College Democrats last year. When I called him for the interview, he asked, “You want to do it now? You just caught me in between calling churches.”
Brian joined the College Democrats spring semester of last year. “I felt like,” he said, “there’s so much I could do. I could be making a difference. I feel like the organization is going uphill and I want to be apart of that.” Well, what kind of difference do you want to make? “First of all, I want to expand out outreach to the Tallahassee community not just FSU. We have to be more involved, and have a bigger impact. This campus is full of liberals, right? So there’s no reason the College Republicans should be bigger and more organized then us. The way we do that is with more ads, more canvassing, just getting out there more. When people think ‘organization,’ I don’t want them to think Chocolate Club or something. I want them to think College Democrats.”
What exactly are the College Democrats? “Well, they help the Democratic party in many ways.” Some examples were events like a phone call group where they called senators to defend DACA. They raise money, have voter registration booths, have rallies, etc. “I only joined in the spring semester, so unfortunately I haven’t been able to attend many events… They’re also kind of bad at communication. It’s pretty hard to know when stuff is going on.” However, there’s supposed to be some changes going on next year, with the new leadership coming in. Meeting times are going to be moved to Tuesday to fit people’s schedules. I heard from Nathan Davis on this subject, “ .” From Brian, “I’m excited for next year though. I really feel like it’s going to change. Don’t quote me on that though.” Don’t quote you on it? “I mean, you can put it in the interview. But don’t quote me on it.”
Members of the College Democrats are obviously very passionate about what’s going on under our current administration. I asked Brian, How do you feel about the Trump administration? “Well, I don’t feel too good about it!” Why’s that? “The way he’s handling foreign affairs is atrocious. I mean, social issues, economic issues, foreign policy, it’s just awful.” At some point, the words “actual vomit worthy” were thrown around. “I almost hate the cabinet more than the man himself. They genuinely don’t know what they’re doing.” Do you want to go into politics yourself? “Yeah. There’s so much that could be done. I want to live my life knowing I helped people, whether it’s nation, county, whatever.” What do you want to do in politics. “That’s a tough question. I don’t think I could answer that right now. I do know, that the first thing I want to fix is the education system. I want the same level of schooling, rich neighborhood or poor neighborhood. Everyone deserves the same level of education.”
How do you get involved in the College Democrats? “Last year I tried running for an executive position. I didn’t get it, I had only joined in the spring, but I wanted to get my face out there. I also plan on joining caucuses. I’m also working on my own project… I want the Dems to look at it and think, ‘look at what we could be doing.’” As stated in the beginning, I actually caught him in the act of calling local churches. When I asked why, he explained that he was teaming up with a church to give a class full of students school supplies. “They’re going to set it up with the school. I don’t know exactly what school it is, but they’re gonna have some people help me, and I think I’m going to get to go in person.” There’s actually gofundme page out there on the internet, called “Schools and Voter Registration Drive.” The goal is to help low income students by giving them any school supplies they might need. “The backpacks come in Friday. They all come with pencils, crayons, highlighters, and a pencil pouch. My mom is helping too, she found these notebooks and she’s buying 25 of them. I think we’re gonna make patches with little animals as well, and they can pick which one they want on their bag.” “I’m really excited… to think there’s gonna be a classroom full of kids with all the school supplies they need. It’s exciting.”