Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla: This Is the Year People Stood Up to Trump
“It’s becoming more and more important for regular citizens to get off the sidelines,” Ravi Bhalla, Hoboken's newly-elected mayor, told Cheddar on Monday. Just last Tuesday he became the first Sikh to be elected to the office in the state of New Jersey.
Prior to his victory, flyers that read “don’t let terrorism take over our town,” saturated his city. But Bhalla believes that Hoboken is not a city of hate, and the citizens showed that at the polls.
“That I’m sitting here talking to y’all as the first Sikh mayor is evidence of that fact,” he said. “The response of the poll was, ‘we don’t accept that type of conduct here in Hoboken.’”
But last Tuesday’s election represents an era in which people want to have their voices heard, a year that will go down in history as a time where people stood up to President Donald Trump, Bhalla said.
The two-term Hoboken City Councilman is not the only one to make history in the 2017 elections. Journalist Danica Roem, for example, became the first openly transgender person elected to the state house of Virginia, unseating a 13-term incumbent.
Bhalla, who’s lived in Hoboken for 17 years, remains hopeful that constituents can carry that spirit beyond this election season and effort change throughout the rest of President Trump’s tenure.
“I am hopeful that every time policies come out of the Trump administration that are inimical to our rights as Americans, that, that would further and further get more people more activated and involved,” Bhalla said.
Democratic Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and Republican Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves won reelection on Tuesday, while Ohio voters approved a constitutional amendment guaranteeing the right to an abortion and other forms of reproductive health care. In Virginia, Democrats swept legislative elections in a blow to GOP Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
A Jewish man in California has died after a confrontation during dueling protests over the Israel-Hamas war, and police said Tuesday they had identified a suspect who called 911 after the altercation.
The Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a case revolving around Second Amendment rights. The Biden administration is appealing a ruling that struck down a federal law that bans a person subject to a domestic violence protective order from possessing a firearm.
The Air Force is asking Congress to restrict further construction of the towering wind turbines that have edged closer to its nuclear missile sites in Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, Nebraska and Colorado.
Voters around the U.S. are heading to the polls Tuesday and some races could have major implications for how things turn out in the presidential election next year.
