"I would love to make a difference and I feel like I am": Girl Scouts lobby for bridge to be renamed
ATLANTA - Ariella Ayenesazan, a sixth-grade Girl Scout, put the squeeze on Georgia state Rep. Brooks Coleman. Inside the Georgia statehouse, more than 400 little lobbyists, Girl Scouts from across Georgia, roamed the hallways of power looking for supporters.
"I would love to make a difference and I feel like I am," Ayenesazan said.
At issue is a bridge that spans Savannah Harbor. It honors Eugene Talmadge, a former Georgia governor and white supremacist who died in 1946. Girl Scouts want lawmakers to name it instead for Juliette Gordon Low, the Savannah native who founded the group in 1912. The Girl Scouts were open to "all of America" and became integrated decades before much of the country.
The lobbyists even gave out bribes -- Girl Scout cookies. We asked 11-year-old Sauyer Stewart if lawmakers are saying no.
"Yes," she replied. "They're like saying no, straight up. They're just like, no you can't do this, no you can't do that."
"Still, no is not a boundary. I can reach the sky and if you say no, that just wants me to try harder," she adds.
Meanwhile, Coleman told us the bill has a good chance of passing.
"I think that being a daddy and a granddaddy, it's hard to turn down your granddaughters and your daughters," he said.