There were a lot of great speakers of this first night at the Republic National Convention.

Unlike the Democrats, the Republicans are making a Wuhan coronavirus restricted convention work by not flooding it with Hollywood celebrities or radical activists. They’re making it work with real Americans with real American stories, stories that touch the heart, tell us why America is great and why we need to protect it to preserve that last best hope on Earth.

People like Maximo Alvarez. We’ve written about him before, but perhaps no one is more important to listen to now in America than someone like Alvarez, who has endured the horrors of Communism in Cuba, and fled that country for freedom in the United States.

Because he knows what that oppressive hell was like, no one cares more than he does that we never have to face that here. But he’s warning that he sees the signs and we must stand up against it.

Maximo Alvarez, President of Sunshine Gasoline and a Cuban immigrant, warns against Joe Biden at #RepublicanConvention: "I've seen ideas like this before, and I am here to tell you, you cannot let them take over our country."#RNC2020 pic.twitter.com/zc5pNuiJly

— The Hill (@thehill) August 25, 2020

“When I hear the promises, I hear echoes of the former life I never wanted to hear again. I see shadows I thought I had outrun,” he warned.

“I may be Cuban-born, but I’m 100 percent American! This is the greatest country in the world. And I said this before: If I gave away everything that I have today, it would not equal 1% of what I was given when I came to this great country of ours. The gift of freedom.”

He continued, “Right now it is up to us, to decide our fate, and to choose. Freedom over oppression.”

He harkens back to Ronald Reagan’s famous speech, “A Time for Choosing.” Never, perhaps, has it had more stark implications for us now, when it seems there are so many working to lead us into darkness. We’ve stopped teaching about the evils of Communism in the schools and it’s clear that many among the young don’t begin to understand.

Alvarez said Trip is fighting those forces, but he “has no doubt” that the Democrats would hand the country over to those dangerous forces. “You and I will decide. And here’s what I’ve decided. My decision is very easy. I choose President Trump, because I choose America. I choose freedom. I still hear my dad: There is no other place to go. Thank you and may the good Lord bless America.”

We are the greatest nation, we are that beacon for and to the rest of the world, that shining city on the hill. But what if there was no U.S. as we understand it now? What if it all went away on the because people were too fearful to stand up to defend it? What if all the freedoms we have known were just set ablaze? We don’t think it can happen but we’ve already seen laws turned on their heads in 2020, we’ve already seen the rule of law melt away in Democratically-controlled cities where there are often no consequences for rioting. It can happen, as Maximo Alvarez knows. We must do all we can to stop it. It is again, that time for choosing.