An aggressive start to the new year for populist Democrats
Policymakers start their engines
Welcome to a Tuesday edition of Progress Report.
Today marked the fifth anniversary of the Capitol Insurrection, which, according to a new White House website, was actually a meeting of peaceful patriots who were tricked into rioting by dastardly Democrats. At the time, it felt like the last desperate gasp of a defeated extremist movement, but half a decade later, it’s clear that the nation was in far worse shape than we even realized.
The United States has followed the darkest possible timeline since that attempted coup, driven by a toxic combination of right-wing media, oligarch money, and the unique amnesia of an overwhelmed citizenry. Just this evening, the new Trump administration (which feels like a bad joke from a Back to the Future sequel) suggested that the US could use military force to annex Greenland, and the media dutifully reported it like it was normal news item. Stenographers, all of them.
Now that we’ve recognized this dubious “holiday,” let’s get to the newsletter — lots to cover tonight!
Note: The far-right’s fascist takeover of this country is being aided by the media’s total capitulation to Trump’s extortion. It’s never been more critical to have a bold independent media willing to speak up against the powerful. That’s what I’m trying to do here at Progress Report.
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State legislatures are returning to work this week, kicking off what should be a busy few months of policymaking before focus in most places turn to the midterm elections. I’ll have a deep dive later this week into a number of exciting policy proposals and fights on the horizon, but here’s a look at some of what’s happening right out of the gate.
Voting, Redistricting, and Rights
Virginia: Democrats won control of Richmond by overwhelming margins in November and plan to take advantage of that mandate, with the legislature signaling a spirited approach to redistricting and other progressive constitutional amendments.
First on the list is an amendment that would allow the legislature to redraw the state’s congressional map in the middle of the decade. Doing so would permit Democrats to draw themselves more seats and counter the GOP’s gerrymandering in Texas and several other states.
Democrats have already completed the first of several required steps, having passed the amendment through the legislature in November. If they pass it again in the next month or two, voters will get a chance to weigh in during a special election this spring.
Just how aggressive a map they’ll propose is unclear; right now, Democrats control six of the state’s eleven congressional districts, and some members are teasing a redraw that could give them a 10-1 in a good election year. Newly elected Gov. Abigail Spanberger is said to favor a more moderate approach, in keeping with her more milquetoast politics, though her office says that she’ll ultimately support whatever the legislature decides.
It’s unlikely that Democrats would formally reveal a new map until after voters go to the polls, though potential permutations will likely leak out in the next few months.
In other redistricting news: Republicans in Kansas are giving up on their gerrymandering ambitions. According to House Speaker Dan Hawkins, they simply “do not have the votes” to slice and dice Rep. Sharice Davids’ third Congressional seat into GOP territory.
Republicans control the legislature, but Hawkins say they are about 20 votes shy of the 84 needed to override Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s threatened veto. The lack of support is especially noteworthy after the Indiana GOP also resisted Trump’s demands, a sign that lawmakers understand that local anger can still supersede national issues, especially when Trump isn’t on the ballot. It’s also a reminder that Kansas’s gubernatorial election this fall will be one of the most important non-federal elections in the country.
Up in Washington State, the House majority leader filed legislation to authorize mid-decade redistricting — but there’s a catch: The legislation isn’t expected to pass this year, but it lays the groundwork for a redistricting next term if Democrats can win a 2/3 supermajority in the legislature (they’re only a few seats away). This may not seem like such a big development, but it comes after legislative leaders in Washington spent all summer and fall insisting that they had no appetite for a Congressional redraw.
Back to Virginia: Legislators are also moving forward with constitutional amendments that would codify the right to abortion, repeal the state’s (for now) defunct ban on same-sex marriage, and automatically restore voting rights of ex-felons once they complete their sentences.
Virginia is one of the few states that don’t automatically restore voting rights, a policy that was a key tool during the Jim Crow era. Right now, restoration is at the governors’ discretion, and efforts to reform the process by Democratic predecessors stalled after former Gov. Glenn Youngkin all but paused the process. There are now 300,000 Virginians who cannot vote despite having completed their prison sentences.
Also: Elections, voting rights, and access will be on the ballot in a number of major swing states this year. Here’s a good breakdown of the biggest ones to watch going into the year.
Economic populism
Junked: Lina Khan may no longer head the FTC, and many of her flagship rules may have been repealed by the Trump administration, but her pro-consumer policy revolution lives on in state and municipal government.
We begin here in New York City, where Khan is acting as an adviser for new Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Following a blitz of executive order repeals, erasing Eric Adams’s last year or so of dictates, the mayor is now working to implement his affordability agenda (while not dealing with pressing pavement issues and bad corporate landlords).
On Monday, Mamdani issued an executive order that bans many junk fees and outlines how the city will enforce it, including a citywide junk fee task force led by former Biden DOL acting secretary Julie Su. The mayor also issued a related executive order that cracks down on subscription traps, like software that secretly subscribes you to their services or gyms and other businesses that make it difficult to cancel memberships.
Now, it isn’t exactly shocking that the democratic socialist Mayor of New York City launched a crackdown on junk fees, but how about bipartisan lawmakers in Ohio?
Republican Sen. Louis Blessing and Democratic Sen. Willis Blackshear each introduced bills that would tackle hidden fees that burden consumers. Blackshear’s bill would require disclosure of all fees and surcharges on credit card transactions — swipe fees for customers, essentially — while Blessing’s bill would require disclosure of mandatory fees and surcharges on all consumer products. Blackshear is also the author of legislation that would ban algorithmic price fixing on real estate, though that hasn’t gone anywhere yet.
Legislation proposed by from Republican Ohio state Rep. Mark Hiner would ban ticket-sellers from stacking on secret fees, requiring them to show their all-in price — complete with service fees and other grifts — from the start. It would also apply to third party sales sites, which frequently scalp tickets and lard them up with extra fees.
This comes months after Democratic state Rep. Bill DeMora, a very pro-consumer lawmaker who has also fought for access to TV sporting events, introduced a bill that would ban third party re-sellers from charging more than $5 on top of a ticket charge.
Washington: Back to the Pacific Northwest for a minute, where Democratic Gov. Bob Ferguson has thrown his support behind finally establishing an income tax — on millionaires.
Yes, progressive bastion Washington State does not have an income tax, a product of an oddball 1933 state Supreme Court decision and ten subsequent failed ballot initiatives. But Ferguson is confident that the ruling could be circumvented, so the governor has proposed a new 9.9% tax on individuals who make more than a million dollars. Right now, sales taxes provide the bulk of the state’s budget, which allows the top 1% of earners to get away with paying an average of 4.1% of their annual income to the state; the bottom 20th percentile of earners pay more than 13% in taxes.
Should it pass, the proceeds of the millionaire tax would go toward reducing some sales taxes, increasing school funding, expanding the working families tax credit, and other worthy progressive initiatives. It wouldn’t begin until 2029, but could bring in $3 billion a year.
New York: Big news out of NY-12, where former Republican-turned-Trump-antagonist George Conway officially announced his campaign to represent Manhattan in Congress. Later in the day, one of Conway’s rivals for the Democratic nomination, Cameron Kasky, put out this video about his secret (and then high-profile) trip to the West Bank to observe the apartheid against Palestinian residents.
In full disclosure, I’m working with Cameron and scripted and produced the video. I’m proud that he’s the one candidate in this race willing to not only take such a bold stance, but risk his own safety to call attention to an issue that many Democrats (including Rep. Dan Goldman) would rather bury.
Elsewhere in New York, the Queens Democratic Party nominated Mayor Mamdani’s preferred candidate to succeed him in the state Assembly. Organizer and DSA-endorsee Diana Moreno will be on the official Democratic line in the upcoming special election, but she’ll face two other DSA-aligned candidates running on third party ballot lines. This may be the more socialist election in modern memory, though there should be a few other ultra-leftist contests in New York later this year.
A few quick election hits:
Former Alaska Rep. Mary Peltola is looking likely to run for Senate
Don’t count controversial Maine Democratic candidate Graham Platner out of the race just yet, as the firebrand oyster farmer and military vet with a questionable tattoo history raised $5 million in this past quarter alone.
The aforementioned Rep. Dan Goldman came out swinging today, touting endorsements from a host of establishment Democrats and trashing activists against Trump and ICE.
Democrat Mike Jones handily won a special election in Virginia to represent a Richmond-area district vacated by newly minted Lt. Gov. Ghazala Hashmi.
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