I was in Minneapolis yesterday hosting a rally for Sophie Cunningham.

I went to Minneapolis to host a rally for Sophie Cunningham, a shooting guard for the Indiana Fever. Best known for “the point.” Now also known for being the first active pro athlete to take a stand for the protection of women’s sports.

Here we were prepping for the rally, blowing up balloons and making We love Sophie signs.

Amy Sousa (holding balloons) initiated this whole rally thing (along with Brandi Kruse, a Seattle journalist) in Seattle, then Portland. If you don’t know who Amy is, you should. This is her Substack. She goes by @knownheretic on Substack and everywhere else too (X, IG, etc). She’s got some of the smartest takes around on this whole thing.

We gathered outside the Target Center about an hour before the game. We were joined by Minnesota Senate candidate and former NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya.

We were joyous. We gave out t-shirts. We had signs thanking Sophie. We gave out gummy bracelets. We took photos and smiled.

We were met with more hostility than you can fathom. There were very few of them — the trans activists. There were only about 4-5. But they had megaphones and just shouted us down. They said nothing of substance. Just shouted so we couldn’t be heard.

One man, who seemed to be the ringleader, and appears to be a paid traveling activist, called the women there (which was most of us) “cunts” and “bitches.”

And sometimes “dirty cunt.” Nice. Listen up.

This is him. He travels around doing this.

He says “Protect the Dolls” while calling actual women “cunts.” This is trans. This is the civil rights movement of our time.

When we tried to pull our group together to thank them for coming to support Sophie, Derek wouldn’t allow it. He just screamed obscenities in our faces.

We just chanted “Let Women Speak” (thank you Kellie-Jay Keen). He also enjoyed telling me I was old and ugly and had too much filler in my lips (note: I don’t have any).

Here is he again saying “fuck you bitch.”

The rally ended at about 11:40 am and those of us who were attending the game headed inside. I went in with Riley Gaines, to find our seats on the floor. Our friend Derek accosted her verbally as we headed in.

Riley was instantly recognized inside. People flocked to her for photos and to say thank you. Some had even hoped they’d see her there and brought her book for her to sign.

A few were hostile but honestly, most people were excited to see her. To see us. I’d estimate maybe half of the folks that recognized Riley also recognized me and thanked us both for our advocacy.

We found our seats. We cheered for the Fever. For Sophie. Sophie did get boo-ed when she entered the game and when she was passed the ball. We tried to outshout the entire arena.

The entire broadcast and jumbo-tron was edited to NOT show us, to NOT show any Sophie fans. But we were there.

During half-time Riley was told by security that she couldn’t hold her sign up that said Sophie Thank you, A Girl Mom.

Before the game we’d looked up the rules about signs on line. We followed them. The sizing and the “no politics” rule. The security guard told Riley that she couldn’t hold the sign up because it had a name on it, which of course was not listed in the rules. And is not a rule. And there were lots of signs with names on them. Including this one.

Which I guess was just fine. After pushing back a tad, Riley held the sign on her lap. And a nice guy right in front of us bought us drinks.

The Fever lost which was a bummer but they’d won the last five and you can’t win ‘em all.

We waited around after to see if we could meet Sophie and thank her. Thanks to Riley that happened.

The sign Riley was told she could not hold, was held in the end, by Sophie herself.