This Is the America I Know

This is a country worth fighting for

My great-great-grandparents were enslaved.
Their granddaughter—my grandmother—earned a master’s degree at 23.
Her daughters all went to college; most have graduate degrees.
I am a lawyer.

Times are hard in this country right now, but I know enough about the past to be full of hope and optimism for the future.
In 2024, 75 million Americans voted for a half-Black, half-Indian woman for President. What other country can say that?

We’ve allowed conservatives—and the rest of the world—to own the American narrative.
But their story is not one I recognize.

This is the America I know.

My America is women fighting for—and winning—the right to vote, to own property, to be called Ms. (an American invention, by the way).

My America is Black and Native scholars founding their own universities when white and male institutions shut them out—schools that still stand proudly today.

My America is Native peoples reclaiming their language, their culture, and their sovereignty from centuries of colonization.

My America is the most generous nation in the world when it comes to foreign aid, a global leader in educating women, and home to medical and scientific breakthroughs that have saved millions of lives.

My America invented electricity, airplanes, the internet, smartphones, portable computers, barbecue, jazz, bluegrass, hip hop, running shoes, and cronuts.

My America is still the only nation to land on the moon.

It’s not perfect—far from it. No country is.

But America is far better than most people are willing to admit. It is a nation of rebels, innovators, activists, and workers. It’s not just worth fighting against.

It’s worth fighting for.

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Starting today, I’m launching a new series: Rebels, Renegades, and Revolutionaries.
It’s a progressive defense of America—an exploration of the people, movements, and ideas that have always pushed this country forward. Every few Mondays, I’ll bring you a story that reminds us what we’re fighting for. Because if we’re going to save this place, we have to remember why it’s worth saving.

We don’t quit, and we don’t run away,

Kat