Next time won't be the same, in fact my prep starts now. I WILL be on the ballot for 2028!

My efforts are focused on improving the Democratic experience here in Illinois District 15 so that we can reinstate effective and sensible governance.

With gratitude and hope,
Anthony Barnes

To be clear, this shortcoming is entirely due to my hesitation to run. These political times are complex and often scary, so those with a passion for seeing our world improve MUST step up sooner rather than later.

Learn that lesson from me.

💡Sign up and work with me so that OUR future here in Central Illinois can be stable and fruitful for everyone!

www.AnthonyBarnesForCongress.com

🙏I'm asking YOU to help me get my Ballot Petition signatures.
- Do you have friends and family? I'd love to earn their signature.
Are you part of a religious or fraternal group?
- I want to meet the congregation, to hear their needs.
Know people outside of Jacksonville?
- GREAT! Connect me!

🗳️There's MUCH more for me to say and do for you and all of IL-15, but MOST IMPORTANTLY I need to get my name on the ballot.

1) Modernize education to keep up with massive technological shifts we're seeing in the economy.
2) Enhance worker and employer protections so working Illinoisans can have more stable lives.
3) Ensure our taxes go toward projects that DELIVER on the promises and do so WITHOUT running over budget.

My #hypothetical illustrates the immense power of social participation and how we allow ourselves and our communities to understand the world.

Single issue voting is archaic.
Vibes voting is foolish.
Party line voting is lazy.
Avoiding voting is cowardly.

Being engaged is power.

With that dissent is all but crushed, anything pulling on the military strength of the federal government will be justifiably put down without restraint.

For why would any true patriot of the great #UnitedStatesOfAmerica choose to risk weakening its country in a time of strife?

Of course this martyrizes Trump, pushing #MAGA to fight for revenge of their now-cemented veneration of Trump. His death manifests an undeniable distraction and enemy for the #USA to focus on entirely. Paramount.

This is the justification for a countrywide state of emergency and wartime powers.

Then when he dies and the #Republicans refuse to let the truth you, Putin pulls real #supervillain shit and broadcasts to the world to take credit for the hit.

He taunts us, gloating how he's so powerful not even Trump himself could defend against his will.

#JDVance makes a rallying cry, to fight!

We're gonna go with the #LongStoryLessLong sorta approach now because further details are effectively irrelevant.

<3 🛏️

I hate it.
I resent it so fucking much.
I am the cause, the one to be held accountable.

This is the natural outcome of #Boomers being allowed to believe "Do as I say, not as I do." was an appropriate parental attitude.

Ego protection is all their attitudes have ever been focused on.

I've spent years trying to get them to pay enough attention to realize how I (all but literally) haven't brought up politics in YEARS.

I'm constantly on defense with him.
Best part is when I remind him, he argues and presses me all the same.

I'm forced to decide if we'll fight and upset Mom.

"Hey Dad, remember, we agreed we wouldn't talk politics?"

I had to be the one to say that.

The expectations agreed upon between him, Mom and myself were that it must be me who says it. It was clearly framed as my responsibility because the political discourse was primarily because of me.

I found out because I'd go on to learn in the coming years that he had become so incessant that Mom had to directly ask him to tone down his complaining about work, and then politics.

By this time I'd all but been forced to swear to them I would gently remind Dad, whenever politics came up...