STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
As the inauguration approaches, we placed a call to Ohio and reached Ennis Tait, a pastor at the Church of Living God in Avondale, which is a neighborhood in Cincinnati. He's also one of the voters we met last fall, during our project Divided States. We're calling them back during this inauguration week. When we reached him via Skype, he was just starting his busy day.
ENNIS TAIT: I'm meeting with Public and Law Committee for City Council today to talk about community-police relations. I am meeting with the concerned people of Avondale to talk about the condition of our community. And then I'm meeting tonight with a group of people to talk about poverty in the city.
INSKEEP: You get a sense of the range of his concerns. Now, Tait told us last October that the Affordable Care Act was a big reason he was supporting Hillary Clinton.
TAIT: We are benefactors of the Affordable Care Act. My family and I didn't have health care for five years. And any attack or any attempts to repeal it without a replacement is going to impact us directly.
INSKEEP: And he says members of his church are looking to him for advice.
TAIT: People in the community now - and I'm in a predominantly African-American community - and so there is great concern just because a lot of the programs and the policies that impact African-Americans and minorities are being threatened. And as a result of that, people are really afraid that the life in which they've come to enjoy is going to be, somehow or another, taken away from them because of this administration.
INSKEEP: So now on Sundays, Tait's preaching about the importance of hope - not fear.
TAIT: For me as a pastor, there's an encouragement to the people who are believers to really step up and to step out and know that your voice is important in this season and that it's critical that we stay engaged - not only in the politics, but also in the activities that take place within our communities.
INSKEEP: That's Pastor Ennis Tait, a Democrat from Ohio we met last year as part of our Divided States voter series. We're hearing from a number of those voices as the inauguration approaches. NPR News and reporters from public radio stations across this country will be live on Friday, reporting on the inauguration. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.