Trump’s Victory Rally “reminded me of a rally I attended in 1990, on the eve of Bulgaria’s first free elections after the fall of the Berlin Wall”
[N]othing has more distinguished and dignified our age than the struggle for human rights and freedom in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. It was a campaign conducted against tremendous, sometimes overwhelming odds; it demanded courage and conviction of the highest order….
When freedom triumphed, it was with astonishing speed. Five months ago, we were protesting at your arrest. Two months ago, we were celebrating your election as President. Today, we welcome you here as leader of your country. Rarely in history can the power of ideals have been more convincingly demonstrated.
Margaret Thatcher’s memorable address to the Polish government and President Lech Wałęsa, delivered in March of 1990, has a special significance today, as we await President Trump’s second inauguration.
On January 19, 2025, I arrived near the Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C., in the hope of attending Trump’s Victory Rally. I naively assumed that reaching my destination five hours before the start of the rally would be sufficiently early in order to enter the 20,000-seat stadium on time. Upon nearing the Arena around 10 AM, our group was directed to find the end of the line. We walked all the way from 7th to 3rd Street, then back to 4th, until we finally managed to locate what looked like the end of one of several, seemingly endless, queues.
I can easily tolerate even tropical heat but have never been a fan of sub-freezing temperatures. Never in my entire life had I seen such a lengthy line, although I grew up under communism where interminable queues were a daily occurrence. We met people from all over the United States, including numerous Californians. Tourists flocked from around the world, some of whom had made, and paid for, their trip especially for the occasion. After seven hours of standing outdoors, assaulted by intermittent sleet, winds, and snow, we approached the Arena at last, but the entrance was already closed since the venue had been filled to capacity. Despite not being able to attend in person, we walked away with an exhilarating sense of optimism, joy, and belonging to something momentous.
Yesterday’s experience closely reminded me of a rally I attended in 1990, on the eve of Bulgaria’s first free elections after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Sofia’s biggest highway was brimming with people from all over the country, whose entire beings radiated a contagious sense of freedom and hopefulness. Both yesterday and 35 years ago, I was astonished by the patience, kindness, and euphoria of the rally-goers, who smilingly made room for passers-by and greeted strangers as though they were beloved long-lost friends and brothers.
I can’t help but compare the 1990s in Eastern Europe with the American revival we are presently witnessing, especially after last November’s elections. In both cases, it was a matter of a civilizational choice and the survival of Western values. In both cases, it was a battle against an insidious, all-encompassing, and highly deceptive leftist indoctrination. And in both cases, the battle for the soul of the West is still raging. It is not going to be brief or easy. But it is absolutely worth it.
Like Thatcher’s prophetic words in Poland in 1990, Churchill’s 1950 speech, titled “This Is Freedom,” is equally meaningful today, when applied to the fateful choice American people have made—a choice favoring common sense, sanity, and liberty:
The ordinary Briton wants nothing so much as to be left to go his own way, to get on with his job in life, to enjoy himself according to his own lights, to spend his own money as he thinks fit, to give his children a good home and a rather better start in life than he had himself, and to do his duty as a citizen to the community. This is the sort of life that our people seek. This is what they mean by freedom. This is what Conservatives and Liberals mean by freedom, and it is the basis of all our policies. It is commonsense. How far removed from this is the Socialists’ regimented Utopia of which we have had a foretaste during these past five years!However, we may rely on the good judgment and commonsense of the British people. Slowly, with great determination, they veer back into the natural way they want to go. It is only those societies in which the free way of life is predominant that have the will and the power to make sacrifices for the nation in the hour of danger…
It is no coincidence that today’s inauguration is going to be widely and warmly celebrated, despite the arctic freeze, both in America and in Eastern Europe. May it bring everything good that we voted for—both for America and the world at large!
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Nora D. Clinton was born and raised in Sofia, Bulgaria. She holds a PhD in Classics and has published extensively on ancient documents on stone. In 2020, she authored the popular memoir Quarantine Reflections Across Two Worlds. Nora is a co-founder of two partner charities dedicated to academic cooperation and American values. She lives in Northern Virginia with her husband and son.
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