How Jamaal Bowman Lost My Vote | Opinion [Video]

My first interaction with Jamaal Bowman was in 2021. I was advocating for schools to fully re-open after they closed in the early days of the pandemic. A year later, many were still closed or operating with dysfunctional hybrid schedules, yet it was no longer possible to ignore the detrimental toll remote “learning” was having on the most vulnerable children in our communities. Many other countries and states had already reopened schools, or had never closed them, and as an essential worker, I was well aware that the risk of COVID-19 to kids was minimal. I joined a group of parents desperately trying to get vulnerable kids back to school.

We repeatedly reached out to our congressman, Jamaal Bowman. But he was the opposite of receptive. When he did respond to our queries, it was with a flippant tone, like many other progressives. He would sometimes reply to us on Twitter, and I remember him saying …