Is it better to be patronized from a yacht or ignored entirely?
Is it better to be patronized from a yacht or ignored entirely?
A philosophical quandary with real implications
Welcome to a premium Thursday evening edition of Progressives Everywhere!
It’s been a pretty head-spinning few days in Washington and it’s hard to feel optimistic about the chances that Democrats pass a Build Back Better reconciliation bill that does anything more than Make Incremental Tweaks To An Unsustainably Horrible Status Quo.
The silver lining, however, is that the false narrative that has driven internal politics as well as media coverage for years has been entirely discredited. The new fault lines have been drawn, the cynical and corrupt have been unmasked, and the war for the soul and future of the Democratic Party is officially underway. Progressives now have the higher ground with the public, and should Congress really fail on delivering on Biden’s agenda, the press will have no choice but to reorient how it covers the agendas and dynamics within the Democratic Party.
There is a lot to discuss tonight on both the national and more local levels, so off we go!
Heroes
Progressives in Arizona: After the Arizona Democratic Party overwhelmingly authorized an official vote of no confidence against Sen. Kyrsten Sinema should she not bend on the filibuster or the most important provisions in the Build Back Better legislative package, a number of party officials and activists on Wednesday launched a prospective primary campaign against the troll masquerading as a senator. They’re raising money right now that they plan to split between a primary candidate and grassroots organizations that would do the groundwork necessary to topple Sinema.
As it so happens, I spoke on Tuesday night with Stephanie Maldonado, the organizing director of LUCHA, one of the most effective and powerful progressive organizations in Arizona, about the Sinema situation. I’ll publish the whole piece in the big Sunday newsletter, but there are a few key notes from that conversation that I want to share now.
Perhaps not wanting to give away the bomb that was dropping the next morning, Maldonado demurred a bit when I asked about LUCHA’s interest in supporting a primary challenge, saying that they wanted to keep focusing on the filibuster and reconciliation for now.
Still, it wasn’t hard to read in between the lines; Maldonado disappointment in and frustration with Sinema was palpable and personal, and on the subject of the primary challenge, it wasn’t all that hard to game out what’s going to happen given what’s happened all year. “Based on how she shows up and votes, I think that that's going to be very telling for where groups like ours will be,” Maldonado said. “I think at that point, we will identify whether that’s primary challenge. But for now we still are remaining hopeful that the senator will show up and she will vote for our communities.”
A lot of the frustration with Sinema stems from her total refusal to even pretend to care about the people who worked for years to put her in office. Much has been made of Sinema’s transformation from leftist activist to corrupt conservative goblin, but I don’t think there’s been enough coverage of how Sinema won her seat in the Senate.
Becoming the first Democratic senator from Arizona since the 1960s wasn’t a matter of Sinema running a perfect campaign or utilizing transcendent political skills; she was instead the beneficiary of a powerful grassroots outside political movement that began when she was in the state legislature. It was groups like LUCHA knocked on hundreds of thousands of doors in 110+ degree heat that turned Arizona blue and Sinema was all too happy to pay lip service to some of their concerns in order to ride their wave.
Now that she’s ensconced in her seat until 2024, Sinema has ignored the people who put her in office entirely.
“We have not been able to have a sit down conversation with the senator this entire year,” Maldonado said. “There has been the ability to have conversations with her staff, but there has not been success in getting to meet with her and have a conversation. We have had rallies and actions outside of her office when we know she's here in state during her recess; there have been thousands of calls, we have been driven to her office and sent endless amounts of emails and letters. We’ve used all of the strategies to engage with her, and like many of the groups we engage with, we have yet to have a sit down conversation with the senator.”
One thing they haven’t tried yet: Posing as corporate lobbyists and inviting her to a “fundraiser” in between bargaining sessions at the White House.
More this weekend…
Kayaktavists from West Virginia: On Tuesday, I expressed my admiration for the committed activists who paddled canoes and kayaks to Joe Manchin’s giant houseboat in an effort to convince him to vote for the Democrats’ big reconciliation bill. Today, they were back on the water and actually made contact with the big guy.
Part of me wants to give Manchin credit for actually talking with constituents, given what we know about Sinema’s royal procession act, but this is his job. And Manchin speaking down from his yacht at his constituents, who are begging him to help their impoverished neighbors, just about sums up all of 2021.
Villains
Chuck Schumer: Really! The Democratic Senate Majority Leader has said all the right things about voting rights and passing a bold reconciliation bill that’s stuffed with half of the party’s major policy promises, but it was revealed today that he literally signed away any leverage in an actual contract agreement with Joe Manchin back in June.
After days of vague posturing about spending, Manchin circulated a one-page term sheet that guaranteed that the small town coal magnate was not obligated to vote for a budget that surpassed $1.5 trillion, or a full $2 trillion less than the compromise number on which Democrats ultimately settled. I understand that it was probably getting Manchin to even agree to move forward on any budget resolution framework and it’s very clear that Schumer always intended to try to nudge him higher over time, but putting the agreement in writing was still a total boneheaded move. Never leave a paper trail!
Joe Manchin: Now, just because he produced a hostage form letter doesn’t mean we should let Manchin off the hook. He didn’t tie his own hands on the matter and there’s nothing stopping him from going higher than $1.5 trillion. But not only is he not giving any leeway, he’s actually working hard to sabotage even the modest programs that he will ultimately allow to remain in the bill — even though his constituents overwhelmingly support them!
Manchin wants to institute means testing on just about all the public social spending that gets included, which is a way to cripple any usefulness — it takes a long time to set up means testing as compared to a universal program, peoples’ eligibility changes year to year, and it’s hard to even contact people who should be taking advantage of the program — and fundamentally discredit the entire premise of the government’s inherent interest and position in social good. This quote is right out of 1996:
Joe Manchin IV, scion of one of West Virginia’s most powerful political families whose children have earned tens of millions of dollars from his own government connections, is doggedly opposed to “handouts.”
Wonk Stuff
CFPB: A little bit of good news to report out of the Senate, which put aside its utter dysfunction for a moment to finally confirm Rohit Chopra as the new head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He was one of Elizabeth Warren’s top aides and served on the Federal Trade Commission before this. Chopra is a very vocal proponent of forcing corporations to follow the rules or suffer actual consequences for not doing so, which is an ongoing theme of Biden’s cabinet picks, even if his party in Congress seems disinterested pursuing that path.
Legislative updates
Ohio: Republicans, who just gerrymandered themselves at least another four years of absolute control of the state, are working to pass a bill that would just about full-on ban abortion if (when) the Supreme Court topples Roe v. Wade. Their bill is absolutely brutal:
Under the bill, people who cause or induce an abortion by using a drug or instrument would be guilty of a new crime -- criminal abortion, which would be a fourth-degree felony, punishable by up to two years imprisonment and a fine of up to $2,500.
The bill also creates the crime of promoting abortion, a first-degree misdemeanor, if a person manufactures, distributes or advertises drugs, medicine, instruments or devices to cause an abortion.
SB 123 would create the crime of abortion manslaughter, which would occur when someone purposely takes the life of a fetus that survives an abortion, a first-degree felony punishable by up to 25 years behind bars and a fine of up $10,000.
Physicians could lose their medical licenses under the bill.
Like the Texas law that the Supreme Court upheld last month, the Ohio bill wouldn’t penalize the woman who receives an abortion, but it would make it impossible for her to obtain one in-state. In this case, Ohio itself would enforce the law instead of Texas’s approach of empowering lunatic wing-nut bounty hunters with cash rewards. Not sure which one is worse.
Florida: Some good news! The minimum wage in the state went up to $10/hour today thanks to the successful ballot initiative approved by voters last fall. Some annoying news! Republican state Sen. Jeff Brandes just filed another bill that would allow businesses to delay paying workers $10 for up to six months!
Missouri: It’s happening! The hard-won, long-delayed Medicaid expansion is finally going into effect on Friday, giving over 275,000 working people access to health care.
Texas: lol Gov. Greg Abbott’s “fix” for the failed power grid that froze half the state last year is so corrupt and loophole-ridden that even Republicans in a state dominated by fossil fuel money are pissed!
Voter Suppression and Redistricting
Texas: Speaking of corrupt Republicans, they really one-upped themselves with the legislative maps they unveiled today. With permission from the Supreme Court, the first draft of the state House maps are so openly racist and partisan that you almost have to admire their brazenness:
Currently 83 of the chamber’s 150 districts are areas in which white residents make up a majority of eligible voters; 33 are districts where Hispanic voters make up the majority, while Black residents are the majority of eligible voters in seven districts.
Under the new proposal, the map adds six more districts where white residents make up the majority of eligible voters while the number of Hispanic and Black districts would each drop by three.
Currently, there are 76 districts that went to former President Donald Trump during the 2020 general election while 74 went to President Joe Biden. Among those, 50 districts voted 60% or more for Trump, — indicating the district is safely Republican — while 40 districts had more than 60% support for Biden — indicating strong Democratic support. Under the proposed new map, 86 districts would have gone for Trump, while 64 would have went for Biden. The number of districts that voted 60% or more for Trump or Biden would be tied at 46.
Just look at the gerrymanders in and around cities!
Hearings begin next week. I will be reporting on this issue as it develops!
Colorado: It took all night but the state’s first independent redistricting commission finalized its congressional maps on Tuesday. They’re not great for Democrats, who won the state by 13 points in 2020, but will hopefully still result in a 5-3 advantage (assuming the party doesn’t full commit suicide next year). Unfortunately, by shoring up every incumbent’s district, they likely guaranteed us many more years of Lauren Boebert (so long as she doesn’t resign for a lucrative opportunity and/or jail).
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