The photo that went viral in October 2017 showed Juli Briskman riding her bike and giving Trump the middle finger as the presidential motorcade passed by, transporting the president from his golf course back to the White House.
The photo of Briskman flipping off Trump’s motorcade brought her Internet fame, However, it also got her fired from her job at holding company Akima LLC, which claimed she had violated their social media policy. She later sued the company and won a severance claim, according to Time.
Two years later, Juli Briskman has won her race to become a supervisor for the Algonkian District in Loudoun County, Virginia. And looking back on the incident that went viral, speaking to CNN’s Jeanne Moos in 2017, Briskman contended she’s “really not” the bird-flipping type, but still made her feelings toward Trump clear.
Briskman, the mother of two teenagers, quickly found a new job. Soon after, she was asked to run for county supervisor, a local office, on the Democratic ticket. It didn’t take long for her to decide. Political engagement felt obvious to her since she has been involved in her community for a long time.
In October this year, she said, “I did feel a little bit of responsibility, (because) I was handed a megaphone,” she explained. “I can’t run against Trump, but I can run for this seat and make a difference right here.”
She ran her campaign to show her views have substance – education, women’s rights, transportation, and environmental issues — and that she wasn’t “just the person that rode my bike one day and flipped off the president.”
And the gesture apparently made a difference to voters in her district. It was a history-making election night in Virginia, with Democrats gaining control of both houses of the legislature for the first time in two decades, and Briskman rode that wave.
Briskman defeated eight-year incumbent Suzanne Volpe for the seat with about 52 percent of the vote. In a tweet, she wrote she was “looking forward to representing my friends and neighbors.”
