<b>By MIKE McCOMBS</b>

Working Families Party National Director Maurice Mitchell made a trip to Beaufort County last week to campaign for Elizabeth Warren for president, making stops on Hilton Head Island, in Bluffton and Beaufort.

Mitchell spoke to Beaufort County residents about Warren’s plans to fight climate change, guarantee a great public school education for every student and provide universal child care.

“She has experience as an everyday person. She was an educator, a mom, an actual person, not a politician, who has experienced all of the ups and downs,” Mitchell said of Warren. “All her programs are created, not just to solve problems, but to help everyday Americans take back this country.”

He also said Warren’s biggest asset may be her “ability to listen, to learn about people’s struggles.”

Mitchell said he was “excited” to be on the road supporting Warren, where he was building relationships and spending time with a lot of different groups of people.

Of all of the issues on the table for the 2020 election, Mitchell said universal child care may be the one he hears the most about on the campaign trail.

“So many people deal with how expensive child care is,” Mitchell said. “It’s such a significant expense, it’s so hard to start a family, to build a family to expand a family. (Universal child care) would have such a significant impact on so many families. It’s pretty remarkable what it would mean to people’s everyday lives.”

In April 2018, Mitchell became the first African American to hold the position of National Director of the Working Families Party. He has two decades of experience in political and community organizing including the Movement for Black Lives, the global network behind the Black Lives Matter movement.

Most recently, Maurice co-founded Blackbird, a movement-building organization that offers communications services and has worked closely with Black Lives Matter Global Network.

"I'm grateful to have the support of grassroots leaders like Maurice and the Working Families Party," Elizabeth Warren said in an email. "Maurice has been fighting for a long time for the same issues that we have worked to elevate throughout our campaign. Together, we will continue to fight for big, structural change in South Carolina and across our country."