Progressives fight back in the reddest states
And more good news
Welcome to a Sunday night edition of Progress Report.
Since this is a good news edition of the newsletter, I will not be mentioning the New York Mets, a lifeless wreck of a team that has now lost 11 games in a row. Nope, no Mets tonight.
I’m headed to DC in the morning for a retreat with my coworkers at More Perfect Union. I’ll let you know if I see Kash Patel or Pete Hegseth out at the bars.
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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On a more positive NYC-related note: Mayor Zohran Mamdani endorsed my friend (and friend of the newsletter) Lindsey Boylan in her special election campaign for city council. Lindsey, who was the first woman to publicly accuse Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment, spent most of last year working to defeat the disgraced governor and get Mamdani elected, braving the countless slings and arrows from Cuomo’s dirty PR operation.
Mayor Mamdani returned the favor on Saturday at a rally in Chelsea, just as early voting begins in the April 28th election. I was at the rally, where former comptroller and current Congressional candidate Brad Lander also spoke and endorsed Lindsey. Lander lingered afterwards meeting with supporters, but the mayor made a quick exit. Next on his to-do list? A meeting in the Bronx with former President Barack Obama, who gave a crucial boost to his universal childcare program.
This was the first time that Obama and Mamdani, both considered generational politicians, had met, though they spoke on the phone last summer. I’m not too concerned about their personal relationship, but symbolically, their appearance together, especially at a Bronx pre-k, matters a lot.
The circumstances have certainly changed over the last year, with establishment Democrats shifting from apocalyptic warnings about nominating Zohran to swiping his focus on “affordability” (even if just in messaging), but there is still a portion of the party that treats the young mayor and his democratic socialist movement with disdain. Obama’s friendly appearance was a seal of approval both for the mayor and for his childcare program, essentially making it the standard for Democrats going forward.
Idaho: The people of Idaho are proving to be legitimately more progressive than I could have ever expected.
