(Lorri Wilkening Jennings is the legislative liaison for MN Team Humanity, a group supporting and serving those harmed by the Covid vaccines.  For more information on Team Humanity visit https://teamhumanity.substack.com/p/team-humanity-a19. The following article is published with her permission.)

COVID has profoundly changed our lives. In my case, it got me out of my comfort zone and into the political arena. After my mom’s COVID vaccine reaction, I became a COVID vaccine injury advocate. I have been fortunate to be in a group that comes together exclusively around COVID vaccine reactions. We are politically red and blue. We come together purple and surround those impacted in love. We are Team Humanity.

As Team Humanity’s legislative liaison, I’ve worked diligently over the past three years to get lawmakers’ attention on the disconnect between public health policy and actual health outcomes. In my home state of Minnesota, we recently learned that our former public health commissioner developed blood clots and filed a vaccine reaction report, known as a VAERS report, a few months before she supported mandating state employees, healthcare workers, and college students.

Throughout the pandemic, citizens were told one thing but observed another. Americans seeking accurate information have been subject to censorship and our many legislators have refused to acknowledge the uncomfortable truth of vaccine injuries.

Lately, however, I’ve observed a shift among lawmakers that gives me cause for cautious optimism that things could begin to move in the right direction.

When I first started my work, I made the mistake of thinking lawmakers had a lack of data and barraged them with good-quality studies. To my surprise, they weren’t interested. They made it clear that they relied solely on the Minnesota State Department of Health, which in turn parroted the CDC. The few lawmakers who would meet showed little curiosity about any study that ran counter to the public health narrative. Worse, the CDC labeled my information “misinformation”, further hampering my efforts.

I switched tactics and decided to appeal to the humanitarian side of the leaders. I shared stories from the Team Humanity Substack which publishes high-quality, personal accounts of harms and lives shattered by COVID vaccines. Suffering Minnesotans –newsmen, healthcare workers, children, college students, and politicians among others. Conservative media had started to report on the rare side effects and injuries, and as a result, lawmakers on Team Red were willing to meet. In contrast, most lawmakers across the aisle remained unaware and would meet only if I had a demonstrably injured constituent in their district, and even then mostly begrudgingly.

Following advice from a prominent Minnesota senator and doctor, I started to request meetings with an offer of resources the lawmaker could provide their constituents. Our meager offerings consisted of a support group and a handful of doctors willing to acknowledge and diagnose a myriad of complex reactions. Lawmakers were interested and I started to get more meetings.

In the last two months, there has been a noticeable sea change. I’ve secured meetings with nearly 60 lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Contrast this with the two dozen meetings I was able to get in the two years prior. Most notable is the new willingness of blue lawmakers to meet. They are now ready to listen, and they are mostly receptive and compassionate. My ask is simple — acknowledge that the injured exist.

Last week, while meeting with a blue lawmaker, I shared the story of an injured constituent who was a 37-year-old nurse and a personal fitness trainer. Following her shot, she developed a heart arrhythmia. She was dismissed and gaslit by her doctors who insisted she was suffering from anxiety. I noticed the lawmaker had started to shake his head no. I paused and could not have been more surprised when he told me he had had new-onset vertigo and tinnitus from his shot that worsened with each subsequent shot. He has struggled to be acknowledged. I was able to share my meager resources with him and provide, I hope, some support and consolation.

I told him I have had several other blue lawmakers confirm vaccine reactions in their inner circle. He candidly said that behind closed doors they are all talking about it. They all know. They won’t go public because they don’t know how to “message” it. Meanwhile, the injured continue to go without resources, and shots continue to be administered without transparency. Long COVID rates are exploding, yet no one is asking how the vaccine fits into the sequence of disease.

I ended our meeting with a final ask. Can you identify lawmakers who can initiate meaningful change for the injured and promote public transparency around these shots? His answer was the same one I received from other lawmakers. A disappointing no, because no one is sure who would be able to create change if it does not come top-down from the CDC.

As I prepare for my calls this week, I note that the docket is two-thirds blue, something that was impossible to imagine even six months ago. I am thankful that I have a new audience but wonder how long it will take our legislators to do the right thing, like they asked us to do when they told us to roll up our sleeves.