An Oral History of Oregon's Rowdy Last Stand for Bernie

The delegates chanted over Elizabeth Warren. They walked out on Hillary Clinton. They sat down to protest Khizr Khan.

In the end, Oregon was Bernie or bust. And it was a very loud bust.

Last week's Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia will be remembered as historic: Hillary Rodham Clinton became the first woman nominated for the presidency by a major party.

But there was a noisily dissenting footnote: Oregon's contingent of 74 delegates, most of them pledged to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

Here's how the week went down, in their words.

Gregory McKelvey (Congressional District 3, pledged to Sanders): Going into the convention, people were ready to fight, ready to try and make Bernie the nominee. People had hope, even if it was a 1 percent chance.

Matthew Rock (Congressional District 2A, pledged to Sanders): On the first day, we were expecting there to be debate. We had no idea that we were going to be subjected to an entire day of Hillary being praised. It was just "Hillary, Hillary, Hillary!"

Nico Serra (At-Large, pledged to Sanders): We went in there pretty pissed off. When Sen. [Elizabeth] Warren [(D-Mass.)] was speaking, we were chanting, "We trusted you." [When] we were doing the roll call, everybody walked out.

Brittany MacPherson (At-Large, pledged to Clinton): We knew [the walkout] was going to happen. I don't know why they did it, honestly. They walked out, they talked to the press, they came back later. It's not like they walked out forever.

Oregon delegates walked out of the convention two times during the week.

Serra: We were all staying in touch with each other through various encrypted text applications. We wanted to keep things as private as we could. We knew that we were being photographed and watched from every angle possible.

MacPherson: [The protests] weren't frustrating until the last day, during Khizr Khan's speech. Everyone was on their feet, cheering this guy on, showing their respect. And then as soon as he said, "You must vote for Hillary Clinton," it felt like all of [the Bernie supporters] sat down. It felt incredibly disrespectful to me.

Oregon delegates cast their votes July 26, mostly for Sanders. When it became clear the convention would not be contested, Oregon delegates changed their goals.

McKelvey: On Thursday morning, we decided as an entire delegation that we wanted an apology from the Democratic National Committee. And we wanted Hillary Clinton to issue it sometime before her speech. We relayed that message to Jeff Merkley, and that if we didn't get that apology, we couldn't promise what our delegation's response would be to Hillary Clinton's speech.

Rock: Otherwise, we said, we have a couple of options—we have a peaceful option, and we have an option where maybe we're going to raise a little hell up in here and really disrupt this coronation. I believe Nebraska [was] able to get drums there. We were waiting for these drums, and we would stand up and hold up our signs [saying] "No Voice No Unity, No Vote No Unity."

McKelvey: We never heard a drum, but our delegates decided they wanted to walk out anyway.

Rock: [I had brought a] crown, I threw on my crown, and I said, "Boo to the queen!" Have you seen The Princess Bride? "Boo to the queen of garbage, boo to the queen of filth!"

McKelvey: If this election was eight years from now, and people that voted for Hillary started to die out, or whatever, we would've won.

MacPherson: The difference between our Bernie supporters and the rest of the country's Bernie supporters is that they will do anything. They believe in this man.

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