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It was last month in Minnesota, June 17th, when the St. Louis Park City Council voted in an embarrassing 5-0 decison to remove the Pledge of Allegiance from its official agenda. There was a valiant and admirable piranha-like frenzy as a result headed by patriotic community organizer, Marni Hockenberg. These protesters showed up promptly at the next meeting on July 8th in full American garb to voice their repudiation of this extraordinary government-enjoined act of cultural and historical treason. Ms. Hockenberg has cited this as an important “exercise in civilian activism” which saw over 100 faithful protesters turn out to voice their reasoned dissent.

This rather charged event in July began with councilwoman Anne Mavity apologizing to the city staff for higher than ordinary call volume their office received related to the pledge. This disgraceful and arrogant act was met with notable disgust from the protesters. After all, the city staff “work for us” as Ms. Hockenberg told LauraLoomer.US in a candid interview. It must be noted that it is the St. Louis Park taxpayers who city staff works for, and to whom they should be apologizing. Why do the caretakers of local Minnesota government deserve an apology for being forced to do their jobs?

The protesters, anxious to take up the patriotic burden that the city’s government has laid at their feet, stood up in full American glory and recited the glorious pledge of allegiance in its entirety. Hockenberg told me that the whole of the council stayed seated during the citizen’s imposed pro tempore pledge. It seems this should arouse some questions from the people and some shame from the council.

In terms of the council’s attitude, they seemed to not want to address this issue at all and showed an extreme reticence to come to any sort of resolution. As Hockenberg wittily pointed out they, “we’re burning a lot of calories with their backpedaling”. Ms Hockenberg further stated that, while people have the choice to abstain from taking the pledge, they have “no right to take away my right to say the pledge”. Such is the explicit effect of removing the pledge entirely from the meeting’s agenda.

By far the most exciting and uplifting note on this story has been the doubled-down show of support by Mr. 45 himself, President Donald Trump. The entire soiree bubbled to national attention once President Trump took notice of the humble Midwestern state. His legendary Twitter account has shown its support for this all-important Minnesotan cause on no less than two occasions. It was a rather welcomed one-two punch of patriotism.

The first came on July 9th with Trump tweeting,

Outrage is growing in the Great State of Minnesota where our Patriots are now having to fight for the right to say the Pledge of Allegiance. I will be fighting with you!“.

The second show of local solidarity was on July 11th. He tweeted that

“The Pledge of Allegiance to our great Country, in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, is under siege. That is why I am going to win the Great State of Minnesota in the 2020 Election. People are sick and tired of this stupidity and disloyalty to our wonderful USA!”.

To have the national backing of the single most powerful man in the free world when trying to revivify a streak of true patriotism in local government is no small thing. That could well be the turbo-charged engine that may drive this movement to success. After all, what really is occurring here is the cultural and historical evacuation of traditional American values, and they should be fought for.

A single damning piece of information to note here is that controversial congresswoman Ilhan Omar was present at a St. Louis Park Council meeting no less than two weeks before the egregious vote to squeeze American sentiment from this entirely American convening. While nothing on the agenda here explicitly states Omar was to address the question of the pledge, it seems more than slightly suspect that the notoriously anti-American Omar was present at said meeting prior to the ultimately anti-American decree of banning the pledge of allegiance in their hallowed halls.

One area of special concern is in regards to the availability the Council made of their May 31st meeting with Omar. The St. Louis Park city council publishes every meeting’s agenda, minutes, and agenda recap on its website. Every single meeting since April 2, 2018 has had its agenda and minutes published for public dissemination, EXCEPT the May 31st meeting which a concerned citizen will only see “unavailable” under “Agenda”!

This is a developing story and the next meeting will be on July 15th, which Ms. Hockenberg says should entice upward of 300 people to their cause.

WATCH: Second Pledge Protest Rally at St Louis Park City Council Planned for July 15th!

https://youtu.be/MBC3Lqd27JI

A video of the council meeting where they voted to remove the pledge with no discussion or citizen input can be seen here. Pertinent knowledge begins at 50:00.

Anyone wishing to show social or civic solidarity with this noble cause may go to savethepledge.com, which garnered over 3,000 signatures in just two days.

Josh Cohen