Jayapal: ‘I think that this has been a shock for many people’
Nov 10, 2016, 8:40 AM | Updated: 10:00 pm
"We have to hope for the best that Donald Trump will understand the significance of the role he is about to assume," Pramila Jayapal told KIRO Radio's Jason and Burns. (AP)
(AP)
Around the country, including here in Seattle yesterday, distraught demonstrators spilled into the streets to protest the election of Donald J. Trump.
CBS’s Michelle Miller was outside Trump tower in New York.
“Trump Tower is now lined with sanitation trucks filled with sand as a protective barrier for this building,” she reported.
And Wednesday night’s protests are just the beginning. More protests are expected as we head into the weekend.
Kshama Sawant warns of a larger anti-Trump protest
In Seattle, Pramila Jayapal, who was elected to Congress over her opponent, Brady Walkinshaw, was among those participating in Mayor Ed Murray’s rally at City Hall.
Jayapal founded Hate Free Zone and ran One America. She says she hopes for the best in a country led by Donald Trump.
“I have this disease — you might call it — of believing the best of everybody,” she told KIRO Radio’s Jason and Burns. “We have to hope for the best that Donald Trump will understand the significance of the role he is about to assume. Not only for the United States of America but for the entire world. And I am going to hold out every hope that he can be a good president and I am going to be ready at every level to make sure that he is a good president if that is not where he is going.”
Jayapal is taking over for Jim McDermott in Seattle’s 7th District. She came to the US as a 16-year-old immigrant, and she understands the anxiety people have now.
“I think that this has been a shock for many people … and I think we don’t yet know what all of it means,” she said.
But it’s not all bad. In fact, she says she’s encouraged by House Speaker Paul Ryan.
“Paul Ryan has actually been very good — relatively speaking — on immigration issues,” she said.
And she’s also encouraged by the four states — including Washington — that passed a higher minimum wage.
“If we look at minimum wage as an example and if they were to say that is something we have to address, I would be there to support them,” she said. “If they are going to try and deport 11 million undocumented immigrants — which by the way would collapse our economy — then I am going to be standing up against those things.”
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