Ayanna Pressley

On this second episode of PATRIOTISM IS A VERB, Pressley discusses the verbs that are most patriotic to her: things like lawmaking, protest, and dissent. She also talks about the ways Black people have pushed America to be better since its founding.

The following is a lightly edited transcript of the July 9 episode of “Say More.”

Anna Kusmer: On Friday, two New Yorkers, two stark messages about the country on its big birthday.

Mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani, and U.S. President Donald Trump. It’s like these two guys are having a boss battle for the soul of America. And it does feel like a battle, doesn’t it?

That’s the mess and the majesty of American democracy. It is the battleground for America’s soul, and the battle can be between the left and the right, but it can also be between activists and lawmakers.

I think at its most robust, democracy is rife with engaged activists reacting to the ways the country is falling short of its ideals.

This is “Say More” from Boston Globe Opinion. I’m Anna Kusmer. This three-part series is called “Patriotism is a Verb.” It’s a journey through my feelings of despair for my country to something else, some version of patriotism.

When thinking about the verbs of patriotism, democracy encapsulates so many: voting, lawmaking, campaigning. It’s so cliché, but I really try to remember not to lose sight of how lucky we are to have this system, as imperfect as it may be. And voting is important, but I think activists are the real engine of change.

There’s this moment from 2013 when President Barack Obama was giving a speech about immigration reform in San Francisco. From the risers behind the president, a man was yelling about record-high deportations happening under Obama. Obama asked security to let the protesters stay.

In the end, the immigration bill Obama spent years trying to pass died in Congress, and Obama shifted entirely to executive action, including more protections for Dreamers, undocumented people who came to the United States as kids. So I think those protesters were right to shout at Obama, and I’m glad he let them stay. I think Obama was right that reform takes more than shouting. But I also think the shouting helped push Obama to do more.

And of course, activism exists on the left and right side of the political divide, and within parties. I may not agree with the values of the right, but I do respect their right to protest. I want to believe that in a robust, self-realized society, the values of justice and equality will win out. For the second episode of “Patriotism is a Verb,” I knew I wanted to talk to a lawmaker who also embodies the spirit of activism.

Ayanna Pressley: We should hold elected officials accountable, but it’s not for us just to make demands. We have to do our part, too. And so part of that relationship, that symbiotic partnership, begins at that ballot box, but it doesn’t end there.

Kusmer: When I told Massachusetts Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley the idea for my series, she got it right away.

Pressley: I do believe it is a practice. It is a verb. Patriotism ultimately is something that exists not because of the legacy and history of this country, but in spite of it.

Kusmer: Pressley lives and breathes the values of democracy. She literally sells T-shirts on her website that say, “Policy is my love language.”

Lucky for her, she grew up in Chicago in the 1970s and 1980s, a hotbed of inspiring politicians.

Pressley: Growing up in Chicago exposed me to the likes of the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Harold Washington, the first Black mayor elected in the city of Chicago.

Female mayors to Black mayors, to ultimately Illinois’ election of the first Black woman elected to the United States Senate in Carol Moseley Braun.

Kusmer: But like so many children, her number one political role model was at home.

Pressley: If I’m being honest, my president was always my mother.

Kusmer: Pressley’s early worldview swirled around her mom, Sandra Pressley, and her neighborhood in Chicago, which was centered around mutual aid and Black pride.

Pressley: My first coloring books, my first flag that I ever had a relationship with was the Pan-African flag. My coloring books as a child were produced by “The Chicago Defender,” our Black newspaper. I was coloring in the images of children with Afros with solidarity fists raised.

Kusmer: Pressley says she got a great education at one of the best schools in Chicago, despite being one of the only Black students there. In U.S. history class, it was hard to feel proud of the country, considering nearly all the Founding Fathers owned slaves. When Pressley got a bit older, she developed her own ideas about what patriotism was all about.

Pressley: One of the most patriotic things I’ve ever bore witness to, that nearly brings me to tears every time I think about it, was Black custodians cleaning up the mess left behind by a white supremacist mob in the Capitol on the day of the insurrection.

We could not return to the House Chamber to finish our work. These so-called patriots that seized and stormed the Capitol to interrupt a peaceful transfer of power—so-called patriots, so-called. Those Black custodians cleaned up the mess left behind by this white supremacist mob, so my colleagues and I could return to that chamber and finish what we started. They’re patriots.

This is what it is to be in a relationship with America, which is why it feels like more of a situationship, that your heart breaks and in the same minute is made whole.

Because I can be laudatory about that, and acknowledge, that Black people have been the defenders of democracy, the architects of progress. They’ve been the patriots. Every time Black people are more free, everyone else benefits. Even when Black folks have not enjoyed our full citizenship, we have fought to liberate others. That is a fact. So I can stand on that history, on that business, and be patriotic and prideful about that.

But also, why did they have to clean? Why was the mess created in the first place? What those Black custodians did is as literal as it is metaphorical for our relationship with this country. We have been cleaning up the mess left behind by violent white supremacists, for everyone’s benefit. Their action made it possible for us to do our job, for everyone’s benefit.

Kusmer: One of Pressley’s favorite lines is, “Dissent is patriotic,” and I find her love of country completely sincere. And with that, I wondered how it must have felt when President Trump specifically called her out, along with other members of “the Squad” in Congress, accusing them of hating America. [He] never used any names, but we all knew who he was talking about.

Pressley: Of course I love this country, which is why I reserve the right to criticize it.

Again, patriotism is dissent. Because I agitate, because I organize, because I mobilize, because I litigate, because I legislate to get us closer to the promise and the ideals that we’ve espoused, to make them an actual practice.

See, people misunderstand righteous indignation, especially when it is coming from a bald Black woman. The righteous indignation that I display is rooted in a patriotism. It’s rooted in a radical love for humanity.

Kusmer: Yeah. For a lot of people who are on board with you about the idea of patriotism as dissent and these ways that you’re expressing patriotism, I think it’s still specifically really hard to celebrate July Fourth, a holiday that remembers the signing of the Declaration of Independence, which was only agreed upon because Northern states tabled the issue of abolition and let Southern states keep the institution of slavery.

I just think that’s really hard to celebrate. Do you struggle to celebrate July Fourth? Do you think about it differently?

Pressley: I didn’t need the federal government to make Juneteenth a federal holiday to celebrate it. I’ve been celebrating it for decades. We’ve been celebrating it for generations in Franklin Park, in Roxbury, which has its own patriotic history.

So I think Juneteenth has always been more, from a celebratory standpoint. [It’s been] my, our, July Fourth.

It’s a celebration of emancipation and freedom, and acknowledging the history of my ancestors and a more accurate telling of our history. I think against the backdrop of what’s happening right now, that is especially true.

Kusmer: You’re saying that Juneteenth is much more of a celebration for you than July Fourth. That makes me wonder what your relationship is with America 250 as even a milestone. Is that something that—

Pressley: Well, I told you I’m in a situationship with this country. So what happens when you’re in a situationship? We’re not gonna all sit here and pretend we’ve never been in a situationship. We thought it was a relationship, but it was a situationship. And so when people would ask you, ‘Are you in a relationship? Are you dating anyone?’ What would you say? ‘It’s complicated.’

So when it comes to America 250, it’s complicated. It’s complicated. The fact that I can, again, practice dissent is in and of itself a tribute to the freedoms I enjoy in this country, that I’m the beneficiary of. It is a testament and a celebration of the founding of our country that I can do that.

But that’s why I can say I’m “free-ish.” The fact that I can vote, the fact that I can own property, the fact that I can open my own bank account, the fact that I do have bodily autonomy, the fact that I could run for public office. That is proof of a level of freedom.

But I’ll say I’m “free-ish” because of the attacks on Black bodies, Black workers, Black voters, Black power, and Black progress. The way to undo centuries of harm, to disrupt that, is through lawmaking. We know what it is to experience in real time, in a residual way, legislated hurt and harm. I know we can legislate equity, healing, and justice. So the next 250 have to look different.

Kusmer: I’m trying to put this all together. Tell me if I’m wrong, but it seems like America 250 for you is not necessarily gonna be this big happy party, but it is a time to reflect on the country and on this complicated relationship you have with American patriotism, American history, the American project. Is that right?

Pressley: Though my first introduction to a flag was a Pan-African flag, because of my mother and that coloring book produced by “The Chicago Defender,” a Black newspaper, I also am a Fannie Lou Hamer Democrat who said, “The blood of my ancestors is drenched in that American flag,” that red, white, and blue. So I also deserve to claim that.

Little piece of history if you didn’t know: The Juneteenth flag was created by a Boston Roxbury artist, Ben Haith. Boston Ben.

And it was controversial to some that he chose to use the colors red, white, and blue in that flag. It’s a star to represent Texas, the Lone Star. It’s bursting. It’s like a nova to speak to a new horizon, freedom and a future. But he uses red, white, and blue in that design because this is stolen land, a country built by stolen hands. So we have every right to that flag, to that patriotism.

Kusmer: When you say, ‘Stolen land, stolen hands,’ that is so upsetting. It’s such an upsetting, true, but upsetting framing of American history.

But there’s so much to celebrate, too, in terms of the freedom fighting and the progress. So are these moments for you all about sort of not turning away from either truth about America in these moments of reflection?

Pressley: Yeah, I mean, embrace the whole truth, our whole history, as complicated as it is. And we shouldn’t shy away from that, not at all. Again, what is controversial about the truth? That is the truth. This is the season of “call a thing a thing,” if nothing else.

The thing is, violence is not something that can be contained. The harm in this moment is coming for everyone, and that is exactly why the path forward to survive and for the work of reconstruction is solidarity.

You cannot see attacks on majority-Black seats being represented by Black members of Congress or the defense of voting rights — all of this that we’re managing when it comes to the racial gerrymandering of districts, the attacks to disenfranchise and silence Black voters and voices — as just a fight for Black people to take on or just for Black people in the South to take on.

You can’t see the fight to extend temporary protected status as just a fight for immigrants’ rights advocates and our immigrant neighbors to take on. You can’t see attacks on bodily autonomy as just something for women to take on. It must be the work of all of us. We have to have a stakeholder in one another’s freedom.

That is the ultimate patriotism: to be in pursuit of each other’s collective safety, dignity, and the centering of each other’s humanity so that we can all experience our full citizenship. I want everybody to be free. And I am audacious enough in my radical dreaming to believe it is possible. And that is patriotism. That’s how I show up with it. That’s how I practice it.

I love this country, and so I reserve the right to criticize it and to do the work and to agitate to get it to live up to its promise.

Kusmer: Yeah. It’s an act of love.

Pressley: It is an act of love. It is an act of patriotism.

Kusmer: Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley is the U.S. representative for Massachusetts’ 7th Congressional District.

Pressley: That’s right. Respect on my name. The MA 7th.

Kusmer: Congresswoman Pressley, it is such an honor to speak with you about this topic. Thank you so much for coming in and for taking the time.

Pressley: Thank you.

Kusmer: Next week on “Patriotism is a Verb.”

U.S. history teacher Byron Williams discusses how to help young people with the ugliest parts of American history, and the beautiful parts, too. Tune in next week to our final chapter.

Kara Mihm of the Globe staff contributed to this report.

Listen to more Say More episodes here and wherever you get your podcasts. If you like the show, please follow us and leave us a review. You can email us at [email protected].