
News in a Rush Presents:
CANDIDATE CONVERSATIONS
Twice a week, we're bringing a candidate for office right to you on Instagram Live to answer YOUR questions, tell you about themselves, and help you get involved, even if you can't vote yet.
Together, we'll support candidates for office we care about and build a future for us all.
CALENDAR
Candidate Conversations — News in a Rush
All Candidate Conversations will be hosted live on
Instagram Live @JoshuaRush and will remain hosted there
for 24 hours.
Date | Name | District | Location |
---|---|---|---|
✓ | Mondaire Jones | NY-17 | White Plains, Westchester and Rockland Counties |
4/20, 8:30pET | Jerry Dickinson | PA-18 | Pittsburgh |
4/24, 8:30pET | Garrett Blad | Indiana-6 State House | South Bend |
4/27, 8:30pET | Andom Ghebreghiorgis | NY-16 | Northern Bronx, Mt. Vernon, Yonkers |
5/1, 8:30pET | McKayla Wilkes | MD-5 | Calvert, Charles, St. Mary's Counties |
FEATURED CANDIDATES
Candidate Conversations — News in a Rush
UPCOMING CANDIDATES

Jerry Dickinson
April 20 — PA-18
Jerry is a professor of constitutional law, a housing rights activist, a husband, and a father. He is running for Congress because "for too long government and our politicians have been run for the benefit of the privileged few." He was born into the Allegheny county foster system and grew up in Shaler, PA with ten other foster and adoptive siblings. Together, they struggled through many of the same difficulties that ordinary Pennsylvanians face every day: joblessness, homelessness, illness, addiction, and incarceration. Jerry has been inside prison walls pleading for fair treatment for my siblings, helped them struggle with addiction, and has watched as they worked two and three jobs at a time trying to make ends meet. Jerry understands that we need to act boldly and urgently to confront the crises we face. He has committed to fighting each and every day for a better tomorrow for all, through healthcare reform, combating the climate crisis, and working for a more equal, more just tomorrow.

Garrett Blad
April 24 — Indiana-6 State House
Growing up in North Liberty, Indiana to a working-class farming family going back three generations, Garrett Blad measured success by how far you moved from home. So he worked hard, won a scholarship to Notre Dame, and traveled to Paris in 2015 to help forge the most ambitious climate agreement ever. I went on to lead America's youth delegations at the UN Climate Talks.
He has spearheaded some of the most innovative and effective campaigns in history to halt climate change. In 2018, he helped lead a mass demonstration for the Green New Deal that went viral and set climate change as a top political priority in the US for the first time in history, and has spearheaded forcing candidates to take the no-fossil-fuel money pledge.
Garrett Blad is a community organizer, climate advocate, and the son of a farming family. He's taught students, waited tables, and led social movements, and he is running for State Rep to be a leader who knows the problems everyday people face.

Andom Ghebreghiorgis
April 27 — NY-16
The child of Eritrean immigrants, the Eritrean–Ethiopian War in the late 90s deeply affected Ghebreghiorgis. Today, his opposition to unnecessary and illegal war is a product of its unfortunate fixture in his family’s history and US history. When Andom was a high school senior, America invaded Iraq, and he, along with millions of other Americans, quickly became active voices in a growing anti-war movement.
Andom graduated from Yale with degrees in Political Science and Economics, and recieved his masters from the City College of New York in Secondary Special Education. He worked at a public school in the Bronx before moving the the Equity Project, a Washington Heights middle school with a restorative justice model.
Andom is running in the itnerest of reducing inequality in the US and to be a moral leader internationally, to pull money and resources away from war and towards investment in public education, affordable housing, Medicare for All, and the Green New Deal.

McKayla Wilkes
May 4 — MD-5
Website
Bio Incoming
CANDIDATES INTERVIEWED

Mondaire Jones
✓ April 13 — NY-17
Mondaire is an attorney, nonprofit leader, and activist. He was born and raised in NY-17, where he saw firsthand how working families like his have been shut out of the American Dream by the failure of members of Congress to fight for the people they represent. Mondaire will be a different kind of leader. Mondaire grew up in the Village of Spring Valley to a young, single mother who worked multiple jobs just to provide for their family, even with the help of section 8 housing and food stamps. He followed his mother's advice to dream big, earning degrees from Stanford University and Harvard Law School. He worked in President Obama's administration at the Department of Justice, vetting candidates for federal judgeships and working on criminal justice reform. Mondaire is the co-founder of a nonprofit that teaches professional skills to underserved middle-school students in three American cities.