I found these words from Biden’s Memorial day speech so inspirational, I thought I would use them instead of writing my own intro. Enjoy:
“Democracy is more than a form of government,” Biden said. “It’s a way of being; it’s a way of seeing the world. Democracy means the rule of the people—the rule of the people. Not the rule of monarchs, not the rule of the moneyed, not the rule of the mighty—literally, the rule of the people.”
Democracy, he said, is in peril as authoritarians around the world try to destroy it. But while our democracy is imperfect, Americans “of all backgrounds, races, creeds, gender identities, sexual orientations, have long spilled their blood to defend our democracy… because they understand the truth that lives in every American heart: that liberation, opportunity, justice are far more likely to come to pass in a democracy than an autocracy.”
Biden called today’s Americans to repay their sacrifice by making America live up to the ideals laid out in the Declaration of Independence. “We owe them the work of our hands and our hearts, to make real the promise of a nation founded on the proposition that all of us—all of us—all of us are created equal and deserve to be treated that way throughout our lives.”
Thanks Joe!! Now onto the good news
With hard work, we can win in 2022
the big push on the right now is to fight on crime and fear (so original). We saw this in New Mexico and now we have a template for dealing with it — make it clear that we don’t support lawlessness but also that we will not back down from addressing very real issues of systemic racism and bias in policing
An ugly new GOP attack line is prompting a useful rethink among Democrats
With crime rising in U.S. cities, Republicans are confident that they can win the midterms by tying it to Democrats and the “defund the police” movement.
The party is elaborating an approach that defies easy characterization, and could, if successful, defuse GOP attacks and resolve tensions inside the Democratic coalition in a constructive way.
This response demonstrated success this week, when Melanie Stansbury won a special House election in New Mexico by 25 points. Her GOP challenger sought to make the race all about crime and supposed Democratic disdain for law enforcement.
“We believe that Melanie Stansbury created a template for how to respond,” Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told me. “Respond aggressively, and talk about what you support.”
This template is nuanced. It doesn’t constitute merely denouncing the excesses of “defund,” as some have called for. Instead, it combines a forthright declaration of the facts about what the candidate actually supports on policing with a refusal to retreat on discussing systemic racism
The more they cling to Trump, the better our chances get:
Republicans clinging to Trump gives us a fighting chance in 22
Objectively speaking, Donald Trump is about as irrelevant as any ex-president could be. His laughably stupid attempt at a blog (what his spokesman promised would “completely redefine the game, and everybody is going to be waiting and watching to see what exactly President Trump does”) is dead less than a month after its launch. It’s dead because no one visited it. Trump measures success by one metric and one metric only: ratings. He was so much a flop that even he couldn’t pretend otherwise. The humiliation was simply too much to bear.
And what do Republicans House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell do? They continue to genuflect to this impotent loser, no matter how much damage he continues to do to their party.
And thus emerges a ray of hope for Democratic chances in 2022.
Republicans are pretty much surrendering on going after Biden. Instead, they’ve pivoted to attacking—get ready for this—House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and The Squad, i.e., Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, and Ayanna Pressley. What do they all have in common? They’re women, and they’re mostly women of color. After years of honing their racist and sexist attacks on Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama, they’re at a total loss when faced with an old white guy.
But we know that attacks on Pelosi and company have failed in the past. They failed in 2018 when Democrats won a stunning wave election. And they failed in 2020 when Republican gains in marginal districts were fueled by the turnout of Trump partisans, not by any anti-Pelosi messaging. A scary president is a huge get-out-the-vote motivator in a midterm election. Republicans have already taken that off the table.
But what’s more is that by letting loser Trump call the shots and by letting him insert himself into the political debate, Republicans very well risk turning 2022 into a referendum on … Donald Trump. We already know how those go—they goose the liberal base vote without any corresponding Republican vote unless Trump is on the ballot. And he isn’t.
More on that New Mexico race:
Dems breathe sigh of relief after New Mexico blowout
After months of disappointing retirements, redistricting fears and a high-profile electoral shutout, House Democrats got some good news on Tuesday: They’re still in the fight for 2022.
Democrat Melanie Stansbury trounced her GOP opponent by two dozen points in a special election for a traditionally blue district in New Mexico. And while it’s hard to draw sweeping conclusions from a single race — especially in a safe seat — Democrats say the fact that Stansbury actually outperformed Joe Biden in the district has offered them a sliver of hope ahead of a midterm election that is typically brutal for the party in power.
“We’re very excited about what this race suggests — nothing is certain for 2022,” Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said of his party’s long odds going into the president’s first midterms.
“If there’s a backlash to Biden coming, there’s no visible evidence of it," he added. "To the contrary, it sure seems like people like the president’s agenda because that was the core of our candidate’s message.”
And Harris is working on voting rights which will help
With voting rights role, Harris takes on weightiest challenge yet as vice president
In early May, Vice President Harris sat down with members of several civil rights groups, including the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, to discuss what they saw as an assault on the right to vote in America. The meeting came amid rumblings by many in the civil rights community that Biden and his administration weren’t doing enough to thwart what activists fear could become the greatest disenfranchisement since Reconstruction.
According to an aide who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, Harris emerged from that meeting with a request for Biden: Let me spearhead the administration’s battle against Republican voting restrictions.
Harris will lobby her former Senate colleagues to push through two voting rights bills now stalled in the Senate, according to three White House aides who requested anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. She will also travel around the country in coming weeks and meet with activists fighting for greater voting access while encouraging corporations, celebrities and cultural figures to exert whatever influence they have to defeat GOP voting restrictions.
a robust economy will do wonders for us 🤞🏻
U.S. economy adds 559,000 jobs in May, as the recovery shows signs of strength
The U.S. economy added 559,000 jobs in May, the latest sign of a strengthening recovery as vaccinations rise and covid restrictions ease nationwide.
The unemployment rate dropped slightly from 6.1 percent to 5.8 percent, according to the monthly report, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Wages continued to rise, a reflection of what many employers say is a surprisingly tight jobs market, increasing an average of 15 cents per hour to $30.33, following an increase of 21 cents in April. In the food service sector, those gains have been particularly pronounced.
keeping people from voting isn’t as easy as they think it is
this is good news → Biden is getting a big bounce with Hispanics
Hispanic voters were one of President Joe Biden's biggest weaknesses in the 2020 election. Although sources differ on his exact margin, Biden's advantage with Hispanics was the worst for a Democratic presidential nominee since 2004 -- even as he had the strongest performance overall for a Democrat since 2008.
A look at recent history and polling reveals, however, that Biden may be primed for a comeback among Hispanics for a simple reason: He's now the incumbent.
Take a look at
Gallup polling during the Biden presidency. Aggregating all the polls it has conducted so far (in order to get a large sample size), Biden's approval rating with Hispanics stands at 72% compared to a 55% overall approval rating.
That 72% is a clear improvement from how Biden did in the election with Hispanics. Biden won 65% of Hispanics, according to the
network exit polls. An estimate from the Democratic firm
Catalist (which lines up well with what we saw in pre-election polls) had Biden taking 61% of Hispanics. So this Gallup data suggests Biden's support may be up anywhere from 7 to 11 points from the election.
Biden is awesome
Biden continues his tour of exceeding everyone’s expectations (well not everyone. some of us saw this coming 😘😉😂)
Biden vows his support for the ‘critical role’ the arts play in America
President Biden celebrated the role of the arts and artists in American society on Friday, using the Kennedy Center Honors as a moment to reflect on the arts’ powerful contributions, which he said were especially evident this year.
“In this year of profound loss and pain, repair and renewal, the artist’s vision is as important as ever in the search for greater meaning in our lives. We discovered and rediscovered the power of art in every form,” Biden said in a video saluting the 43rd class of Kennedy Center honorees.
“As part of a great tradition in our country, Jill and I will continue to celebrate and appreciate the critical role arts play in our nation,” he said. “We look forward to working with art and cultural organizations in big cities, small towns and rural communities, to make art more accessible for people at every age and every background, to lift up more voices and stories.”
“President Biden’s words are so significant, recognizing the role art will play culturally and economically in rebuilding our communities in the aftermath of the pandemic,” Kate Shindle, president of Actors’ Equity Association, said in an email. “More importantly, there is action behind his words. His recent proposal for record-breaking NEA funding means more middle-class arts jobs in large and small communities in every state. We fervently hope Congress will support his historic vision.”
Offering beer, babysitting and barbershop outreach, the White House launches new initiatives to boost vaccinations
President Biden announced a raft of new private-sector initiatives on Wednesday to encourage Americans to get vaccinated, as his administration increasingly looks to outside partners to help meet its goal of 70 percent of adult Americans with at least one shot of a coronavirus vaccine by the Fourth of July.
Declaring June a “national month of action,” the administration wants to incentivize Americans who are hesitant about getting vaccinated with a range of perks, including free food delivery, baseball tickets, Xboxes and chances to win cruise tickets, groceries for a year and free airline flights.
Biden’s anti-corruption plan appears to have some teeth.
President Biden introduced a big idea into the global debate Thursday when he declared that combating corruption is a “core U.S. national security interest” and “essential to the preservation of our democracy.” He directed every agency of the U.S. government to mobilize for this battle against the kleptocrats — including the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Treasury Department and the military.
Warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin and the dozens of other klepto-dictators around the world: This means you. The U.S. intelligence community has just been tasked to investigate how and where you hide your money.
Biden administration suspends oil and gas leases in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
The Biden administration on Tuesday suspended oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, targeting one of President Donald Trump’s most significant environmental acts during his last days in office.
not just Biden but also his VP
Kamala Harris steps up focus on small business
Vice President Harris is increasingly emphasizing policies supporting small businesses and entrepreneurship, from engaging bank CEOs, to working with Treasury Secretary Yellen on increasing capital for underserved small business owners, officials tell me.
and his DHS
DHS formally bans family separations for illicit border crossings
Homeland Security officials on Friday formally banned separating children from parents who are caught illegally crossing U.S. border, as part of an effort by the Biden administration to revert the effects of former President Trump's "zero tolerance" policy.
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Acting Commissioner Troy Miller issued a memo to the heads of Border Patrol and CBP's Office of Field Operations prohibiting the separation of children from their parents or guardians for convictions on illegal entry to the United States, and banning the referral of parents for prosecution exclusively on the grounds of illegal entry to the country.
and his AG
U.S. Attorney General Garland expands resources to combat hate crimes
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland on Thursday directed the Justice Department to expand funding and other resources to states and municipalities to help track and investigate hate crimes, and ordered prosecutors to step up both criminal and civil investigations into hate incidents.
In a memo to Justice Department employees, Garland said that Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta will assign someone to coordinate and serve as a central "hub" on hate crimes by working with prosecutors, law enforcement and community groups to ensure there are adequate resources to investigate and track hate crimes.
"Hate crimes and other bias-related incidents instill fear across entire communities and undermine the principles upon which our democracy stands," Garland said in his memo.
"All people in this country should be able to live without fear of being attacked or harassed because of where they are from, what they look like, whom they love, or how they worship."
Democrats are doing great things
House Democrats unveil $547 billion transportation bill, a boost that highlights partisan divide
Democrats on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee unveiled a $547 billion transportation funding package Friday that would ramp up spending on rail and transit, while encouraging states to repair existing roads rather than build new ones.
Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.), chairman of the committee, said the proposed legislation embodies a core piece of President Biden’s infrastructure plans, “seizing this once-in-a-generation opportunity to move our transportation planning out of the 1950s and toward our clean energy future.”
“The benefits of transformative investments in our infrastructure are far-ranging: We can create and sustain good-paying jobs, many of which don’t require a college degree, restore our global competitiveness, tackle climate change head-on, and improve the lives of all Americans through modern infrastructure that emphasizes mobility and access, and spurs our country’s long-term economic growth,” DeFazio said.
House Democrats introduce legislation to protect military dependents who are transgender
Rep. Jimmy Panetta of California and 40 other House Democrats introduced legislation on Tuesday that would prevent military service members with family members or spouses who are transgender or gender-nonconforming from being stationed in a state or country that prohibits or limits gender affirming health care and treatments.
Pelosi floats Democrat-led probe into January 6 after GOP derails outside commission
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is already making plans to find a new path to investigate the January 6 Capitol insurrection, after Republicans in the Senate blocked the legislation to form an independent bipartisan commission.
In her first virtual meeting with her fellow members of the House Democratic Caucus since the Senate vote Friday, Pelosi prepared to initiate a House-led investigation despite the stiff GOP resistance, promising her colleagues she would keeping going until they find the truth.
Why Democrats Are Cheering for a Month of Senate Failure
After a busy beginning to the year—during which Democrats passed a $1.9 trillion COVID relief bill, confirmed Biden’s cabinet, and wrote into law a bipartisan hate crimes measure—liberal lawmakers are finally bracing for impact. With the Senate split 50-50, the longstanding filibuster has become the brick wall standing between Democrats and their top goals.
The next month, then, could be the toughest stretch yet for Democrats. In a letter to senators last week, Schumer said as much, forecasting an “extremely challenging” June that will “test our resolve.”
Schumer seems to be setting up his party for failure for a couple of reasons. Many Democrats believe—or, at least, hope—he is trying to force a gut check for some individual members, like centrist Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV). Demonstrating to Manchin that Democrats can’t succeed while the filibuster persists could produce some momentum toward ending the 60-vote threshold. And, at the very least, Schumer could be giving Democrats a political cudgel to beat Republicans in 2022 and beyond.
Call it The Month of Taking the L—in hopes that those losses eventually turn into wins. Democrats have little choice but to trust the process, even if some big dominoes have to fall in the right direction quickly.
more on that:
Democrats plot Medicaid expansion backdoor in red states refusing program
Democratic lawmakers are rallying around an effort to extend health insurance in states that have refused to expand Medicaid, believing they have a limited window to help millions who’ve been unable to get coverage because of intractable GOP opposition to the Obamacare program.
Democrats had hoped that President Joe Biden’s election, along with the promise of new federal cash from the recent Covid relief package for states to expand Medicaid, would move at least some of the dozen remaining holdout states. But there’s little indication those states are budging, which is energizing a push among Democratic lawmakers for a new federal program guaranteeing coverage for low-income adults long shut out of Medicaid expansion.
Other Good News
Facebook suspends Trump for 2 years in response to Oversight Board ruling
Facebook said Friday that it plans to suspend Trump for two years following his comments in the wake of the Capitol insurrection on January 6th, and will only reinstate him” if the risk to public safety has receded.“
it will no longer automatically give politicians a pass when they break the company’s hate speech rules, a major reversal after years of criticism that it was too deferential to powerful figures during the Trump presidency.
Watch the 'We the People' trailer: Animated series is like a modern 'Schoolhouse Rock'
Netflix is serving up some educational fun with its new animated series "We the People."
The show, which hits the streaming service on July 4, features 10 episodes (aka animated music videos) that each address a different U.S. civics lesson in a fun way. Each video runs three minutes long and packs in a whole lot of knowledge.
According to a press release, "We the People" combines music and animation to "educate a new generation of young Americans about the power of the people." After the trailer for the series premiered this week, many YouTube users are comparing it to "Schoolhouse Rock," an animated series of musical educational short films that was originally released in the 1970s.
Another lawsuit challenges amended Montana campaign bill
Another lawsuit has been filed to challenge a new law that bans voter registration and get-out-the-vote efforts on college campuses in Montana and also requires judges to recuse themselves from cases if they have received campaign donations from anyone involved in the case.
Forward Montana, The Montana Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Lewis and Clark County Attorney Leo Gallagher and other attorneys filed the complaint Tuesday against the state of Montana in District Court in Helena.
On The Lighter Side
Want to help us win in 2022 (you’d better — we need you!)
Here are some things you can do NOW
Most important: DON'T LOSE HOPE. This is a giant and important fight for us but, win or lose, we keep fighting and voting and organizing and spreading truth and light. We never give up.
I’ll be away from the computer this morning but will pop in later.
I am so lucky and so proud to be in this with you ✊🏾✊🏻♥💙💚💛💜🧡✊🏽✊🏻