Dr. Adora Obi Nweze, NAACP Florida State Conference president, center, flanked by Transformative Justice Coalition Board Chair Daryl Jones, left, and Barbara Arnwine, TJC president and founder, during the “rolling protest” Thursday in West Palm Beach. The South Florida segment of the five-day, 15-city Votercade began the day in Miami and also stopped in Fort Lauderdale. Organizers are gearing to make the combination of national and local energy infectious, to counter Gov. Ron DeSantis’ policies deemed “openly hostile.” Right, Bishop Oshea Granger of Mount Calvary Baptist Church in West Palm Beach, host minister, underscored the solemn integrity of the occasion in the context of the historical African American and human struggle.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – The organizers call it “the Blackest Bus in America.” Their stated intention is to keep it rolling throughout the nation, making “Good Trouble.”

Hello Florida.

Recent headlines suggest Republican Gov. and presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, who unabashedly has designated his state as “where woke goes to die,” is fueling new energy among Floridians and others opposed to his policies widely viewed as “openly hostile” to and specifically targeting African Americans and other people of color.

Confirmation came with the “Stay Woke Florida!” Votercade and “Good Trouble” Rolling Protest bus that reached South Florida last week. It was part of a five-day,15-city, statewide pushback to register, educate, empower and motivate Florida voters.

South Florida’s itinerary began Thursday with rallies at Mt. Olive Missionary Baptist Church in Miami, where participants also attended a school board meeting. Next stop was the African American Research Library and Cultural Center in Fort Lauderdale, before concluding at Mount Calvary Baptist Church in West Palm Beach.

Each stop drew hundreds of participants and ubiquitous chants of “Stay Woke Florida!” in scenes reminiscent of Civil Rights Movement-era demonstrations.

And the organizers said that is their intent, nationwide: to recapture and refocus that energy, and amplify the humanitarian agenda articulated by the late U.S. Rep. and civil-rights activist John Lewis, for whom the “Good Trouble” Votercade bus was named.

It’s part of the “New Southern Strategy” of faith and resolve, social justice and integrity, that in the face of mounting voter suppression efforts, motivated African American voters in record numbers to elect Georgia’s first African American senator, Raphael Warnock, and other Democrats, organizers said.

Cliff Albright, co-founder of Black Voters Matter, said “What we and Black Voters Matter, along with the Transformative Justice Coalition, the NAACP and other organizations have been doing, is going around from city to city, spreading the word about what’s been going on in this state, what’s going on with the governor, and all of his anti-Black policies –everything from his attacks on (the teaching of) Black history, to his attacks on voting rights and gerrymandering, health care and tenants’ rights.”

“You name it, and they’ve been antianything that would benefit our community,” said Albright. “So we’re going around talking to people about that, and hearing what people are feeling, and most importantly, letting folks know that they are not alone. We just want to send a very clear message that, as it says on our bus, ‘We won’t Black Down.’”

Albright stressed that no city or organization can succeed alone, “but when we work together, that’s how you build a state movement. That’s how we changed things in Georgia,” a reference to the recent elections of two Democratic U.S. senators.

“What happened in Georgia isn’t a miracle,” said Albright. “It’s work. It’s consistent work. And it’s strategy. And it’s pulling people together. That can happen here, in Florida, and that’s part of the message that we’re sending: When we work together, we win.”

The coalition of partner organizations – which included state NAACP branches, the American Federation of Teachers, Rainbow Push Coalition and others – evinced a level of organization and attention to detail rarely seen of late in the state.

For example, free “Black Voters Matter” and “John Lewis Juneteenth” Tshirts were flying off tables into the hands of attendees who eagerly scanned or texted their contact info into the organizational database.

As in other Votercade events around the state, the “Celebration Village” included banned-book giveaways, teacher recognitions, voter registration opportunities, education on new voting laws, petitions circulating, and free food, amidst ubiquitous chants of “Stay WOKE Florida!”

Perhaps most significant was an unmistakable youth movement, not only involving the dancers, drummers, youth groups and poet who performed. The organizers also have trained scores of millennials in voter registration, who were busy plying their skills. Others were working the Tshirt giveaways, crowd-sourcing, holding signs, standing firm.

Host minister Bishop Oshea Granger of Mount Calvary Baptist Church set the tone – invoking the best tradition of African American preachers and the spirit of the Civil Rights Movement – in opening the official program.

“Woke is alive and well,” he said. “I listened the other day and I heard someone suggest something that can come, or go, somewhere to die. When a person makes that kind of a statement, it’s a de facto admission, that Woke is alive and well.

“Brothers and sisters, our hearts are still palpitating,” Granger said. “Our collective blood is still circulating. Our collective minds are still concentrating. And now our collective strategy, is activating, for voter participating. We are Woke. And we commit this moment, to a movement. Our steps, and people of faith’s steps, are ordered by the Lord. … “So today I call upon every one of us, to step out, and vote for availability,” he said. “To step up, participate, with your activity. To step in, and uphold the arms of others, through advocacy. For the least, for the last, and for the left behind. And then step away, from negativity, from corruption, prejudice and discrimination.

“And last of all, step to powers, the powers that be. When they deny justice, when they deny equality, when they deny fairness, and when they deny diversity, we won’t be still. We won’t be silent. We will, stay Woke, and vote.”

Daryl Jones, Transformative Justice Coalition board chair, said “We had 27 Freedom Rider volunteers come down to Florida to participate in this rolling protest.” Introducing them and citing the cities and states in which the Freedom Riders have volunteered, he said “I think that Gov. DeSilly must have something to do with this.”

Jones also introduced members of Ahmaud Arbury’s family who were present, and emphasized that their efforts, against the former Georgia prosecutor charged with hindering the police investigation into the 2020 killing of the African American jogger, resulted in the first time in county history that an incumbent prosecutor was defeated, and the prosecutor now being prosecuted.

Dr. Adora Obi Nweze, NAACP Florida State Conference president, carried the refrain:

“We don’t want anybody to think, that they can come and tell us what to do, and threaten us. I understand he’s mighty upset with us right about now. … We’re not going to take America and try to make it like those other countries that don’t allow their people do anything other than what they are told [to] do. … We’re gonna come out again, and again, and again, until we get what we want.”

Local media personality Kitty Lundun and noted attorney Lynn Whitfield kept the program on track. Whitfield particularly expressed appreciation for the young people’s presence, and urged: “West Palm Beach, let this not be the last time that we get together to talk about being Woke. We’re going to do this, all the way through 2024. We’re going to ‘Stay Woke,’ and we’re going to vote.”

Local activist and former elected official Lynn Hubbard, Palm Beach Chapter NAACP organizer, said the chapter is reactivating and soon to hold an election.

Upon leaving West Palm the Votercade headed the next day to Cocoa Beach, Daytona Beach, St. Augustine, and a Jacksonville closing reception and celebration.

Before that, Jessica Mote of the LiT tv Network – one of the African American production companies sourced by the effort in another sign of the apparent sophistication of the initiative – said while packing up her equipment Thursday:

“This is what I want to be able to film. I want to be the person to take the picture that’s in the history books.”

For more information: blackvotersmatterfund.org tjcoalition.org naacp.org votingrightsalliance.org

Blackwomenforpositivechange.org southdadenaacp.org