Princess Sparkle Goes to No Kings Day

No one calls me Sparkle without some sort of qualifier. Until recently I was always known as Princess Sparkle. Oh, I wish I could say that I was called Princess because of wide eyed innocent enthusiasm reminiscent of a Disney princess. Unfortunately that is not the case.

I am known as Princess Sparkle because I am a bit of a diva - to put it mildly. One of the good things about this run for office is that people have started calling me Governor Sparkle. That all went out the window at the No Kings Rally.

I had resolved to be on my very best behavior. As a trans candidate I really didn't want to be arrested for a number of reasons. I got to the Capitol a little after two only to find the Capitol Grounds were closed. The person giving us the information was not a decision maker nor did he particularly care to hear my opinion that this action constituted a violation of our right to freedom of speech and our right to freedom of assembly.

People in the crowd began to get concerned. DPS is not known for its commitment to the right to dissent. The crowd tried to separate me from the trooper. They did not appreciate that not only was I not grateful for the fact that they kept me from getting arrested but actually had the gall to lecture them for not being more concerned about the alleged violation of our constitutional rights.

Luckily at 3:00 PM the DPS opened the grounds. You would have thought that would have calmed me down but it didn't do so.

I managed to find my group Undoing White Supremacy which morphed into a group from Live Oak Unitarian church which later morphed into First Church.

The promiscuous protesting went well and Princess Sparkle appeared as the belle of the protestor's ball. As the day wound down I started to think about all the people in Austin who should have been inn the audience but were not there. I went to bed on Saturday convinced the event was a disappointment.

I woke up Sunday in a more realistic mood. Yes I thought that 500,000 should have been out in the streets but hat was an unrealistic expectation that was never going to happen.

The fact that 20,000 people showed up was incredibly significant. Particularly in light of similar numbers for Hands Off and the Women's March. The event on June 14th was not a tremendous success but it was a success, one we will build on in future days!