The truth is, our democracy is stronger when more people participate and when everyone's views are heard. More participation not only leads to a more representative government, but also more thoughtful policies that better leverage the strengths - and better address the challenges - of the American mosaic.
Does being practical mean we prop up a legal system that's unfair, that bears its weight down on black men and black women, and by extension if you are Hispanic or indigenous or poor? Does being practical mean you don't say to the American people you deserve better than you're getting? That's not the practical we want.
I don't want our white working class sisters and brothers to feel as though their pain is not important because it is. But at the same time, I want my white sisters and brothers to understand that when we talk about income and wealth inequality, that disproportionately African Americans suffer a little more.
My mother raised me herself, along with my six younger siblings, in Cleveland, and life wasn't easy even in the best of times. At age 42, she died, and it fell on me, then aged 22 and working minimum wage, to take care of all of us. At the time, I was newly married with a baby son. And I was deeply afraid for our future.
I'll never forget when I was running, when I was knocking on doors for my first office as I served as a Cleveland city councilwoman and to have older men say to me, 'Can you do this and be a wife and a mother?' Excuse me? Women make the world go round. We multitask... But to have that kind of condescending question asked of me in modern times.