GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — “Count every vote, Count every vote” dozens of people chanted as they marched from Rosa Parks Circle to Calder Plaza Wednesday evening.
“As we all know, COVID, it's already been a challenging year. We’ve already lost 300,000 of our friends and neighbors and, tensions are really high,” said Rickie Allen Kreuzer, organizer with Michigan United, a grassroots nonprofit that fights for justice for various communities. “We’ve seen different racial issues, different things like that going on. So we definitely want to make sure our voices are heard and that people have a say in their elected officials.”
Michigan United hosted the rally, alongside Justice for Black Lives. It began with a press conference at Calder Plaza in which organizers stated that the rally is to show support for all local and national clerks, and to make sure that every vote cast is counted.
“The record turnout is amazing. We did kind of expect it but I think at least for me, I spent a lot of time working on absentee voting and ensuring we try to eliminate some barriers to the polls and having that as an option,” Kreuzer said. “So for me seeing how high the absentee vote count is in cities like Detroit, Grand Rapids, places where sometimes it was harder for people to get out and vote with the different barriers in place, it’s definitely exciting to see all of those absentee votes rolling in.”
Tuesday afternoon, President Trump filed a lawsuit to stop the vote counting. Kreuzer said he and the team at Michigan United were prepared for that.
However by Tuesday evening, the Associated Press and Fox 17 reported that presidential candidate Joe Biden won the state of Michigan by more than 119,000 votes.
“Moving forward is a big deal and there’s a lot of things in our country that I care about that I think we need to work hard to improve on,” Kreuzer said. “Making sure we have elected officials in office who listen to the people, who are elected by the people is really vital and important and that means a lot to me to be a part of that process.”
***NOTE: Fox 17 reached out to the local and state GOPs for a comment about the vote counting, and the Kent County group said they weren't making any comments until all the votes were tallied.***
