A crowd of students eagerly awaited the arrival of Penn Badgley and Sean Pyfrom for two hours at an Obama rally in the lobby of the David Letterman Communication and Media Building on Saturday night.
The two actors were scheduled to speak at 6 p.m., but because of a plane delay they didn't take the stage until around 8:45 p.m. To fill time, members of Students for Barack Obama, sponsors of the rally, and the University Democrats held contests for free T-shirts, spoke about early voting, talked to students about local and state representatives and why students should vote Democrat in 2008. The rally was set up to allow supporters to sign up for times to vote early and find out what they can do for the campaign, Allison Nimtz said.
"This rally is about getting Obama supporters together to get the message out," Nimtz, a junior social studies education major and intern for the Campaign for Change, said. "We want to get a lot more people out to make calls and knock on doors."
After a few more speeches and a few rounds of Will.i.am's "Yes We Can" and Matchbox 20's "How Far We've Come" blasted through the P.A. system, Penn Badgley and Sean Pyfrom finally took the stage. As soon as the high-pitched screams and camera flashes had subsided, Badgley and Pyfrom spoke for a little over five minutes.
"Our mission is to motivate people to get their voices heard," Badgley, who plays Dan Humphrey on "Gossip Girl," said. "There has been so much negativity the past eight years and we think it's time for change."
Badgley also said that Barack Obama and the ideologies he represents are so positive and different than any other past candidate. After signing autographs and taking pictures for around an hour, the two actors said they were using their celebrity status to lend support.
"I had never been interested in politics before," Pyfrom, who plays Andrew Van de Kamp on "Desperate Housewives," said. "But I felt like thrusting myself into something I knew nothing about." The two actors' stop at Ball State University was one of seven in 24 hours they made in the Midwest in support of Obama.
"If I could get just one person to go out and vote and make difference," Badgley said, "I would be satisfied."
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