Last week’s election of Donald Trump to the highest office in the land was, for me, a sign of vindication.

I live in Chicago’s democratic bastion and its influence is even stronger on the South Side of Chicago, where my church is located. Democrat policies have strangled our society for the last 70 years. We have been given dependency policy after policy without asking for anything in return. Many of us have lived off government labor from cradle to coffin, and that’s what they believe America is. It is said that we are victims with no expiration date.

But victim of what? White supremacy? I’ve never seen the KKK march down King Drive. I only saw Democrats around. I’ve seen how they say sweet things that lead to more addiction. I have seen them tell us that we need this because we are victims. I have seen how members of my community are demanding justice, which means more funding for addiction policies.

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I refused to be blinded or corrupted in the process. I also refused to ignore the fact that it was the Democrats who were truly victimizing us.

That’s why I’ve always taken as my guide the conservative values ​​of author and columnist Shelby Steele (a native of my area) and economist and commentator Thomas Sowell. I applied their principles of universal uplift, personal agency, responsibility, and accountability to my daily teachings in my neighborhood. The results were remarkable, but really should come as no surprise.

After all, how can one elevate oneself by following the following? democratic principles? I have not met such a person yet.

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The price I paid for maintaining conservatism was enormous. That’s why it was gratifying that America elected Trump as our president.

I’m not the only one on the South Side who noticed this. 12.41% in 2016 Chicagoans voted for Trump. In 2024, this number increased to 22.01%.

Not only that, but no one in my community believes the Democrat lie that Trump is a racist, a bigot, or a white supremacist. If we go there we’ll just laugh. Instead we are now discussing serious issues: increasing education, reducing violence, the welfare of small businesses, etc.

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Most of all, we talk about how much the Democrats’ dependency culture has stolen our soul, and how proving our self-worth through work, supporting a family, and being a good neighbor enriches our soul even more.

Today, I have become a leading voice for conservatism in my community and across America. I didn’t ask for this. I believed that this was the right path forward and that the change we were seeing was slow but quite noticeable.

Just the other day, we raised our first steel beam—a 20,000-pound symbol of hope and transformation—for our $40 million community center that will open next summer. To most this might not seem like a big deal, but for a community that hasn’t seen any buildings in the last 70 years, this is simply facing the collapse of the human spirit and building infrastructure.

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Again Trump is now presidentOur work is not done yet. A president is only as good as his people, and I promise to continue my work on Chicago’s South Side.

I hope that by the end of Trump’s term, I will be able to say that we have changed every aspect of the South Side for the better. This is my promise and I intend to keep it.

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