Contact Federal Government Officials
Find senator’s contact info here: https://goo.gl/RLiotu
Find representative’s contact info here: https://goo.gl/5i7SXC
********************************
Many newspapers,
including New York Times and Washington Post require
subscriptions, but without one we can see a few articles each month. We can also check with our local libraries to
find out how to get online access through them.
1.
Late
last night, the Commerce Department announced they would be including a
question about citizenship in the 2020 census (https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/26/politics/census-citizenship-question/). The census is meant to count the
entire population, not just U.S. citizens, and including this question is
likely to cause many immigrants not to answer and produce inaccurate counts –
with serious consequences for the distribution of federal funds and
congressional redistricting. Let’s join the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and tell our MoCs we want them to
overturn this error in judgment.
2.
This
time, Trump did his job, and joined our allies in expelling Russian diplomats
to respond to their poisoning of a former Russian spy in the United Kingdom (https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/26/politics/us-expel-russian-diplomats/index.html). But Trump’s reaction to this
violent, dangerous act has left much to be desired, and we still cannot trust
him to act appropriately when Russia threatens our country. That’s why a bipartisan coalition introduced the
DETER Act (S. 2313 and H.R. 4884), which would automatically impose severe sanctions on
Russia if Putin meddles in our elections – so there’s no question of
whether we’ll fight back. Let’s call our MoCs and demand action on this
legislation.
3.
Although it is easy to get caught
up in the salacious details of the Stormy Daniels story, the important pieces
relate to the threats, pay-offs, and potential campaign finance violations (http://thehill.com/homenews/the-memo/380227-five-takeaways-from-stormy-daniels-big-interview). Let’s let our MoC know that
we expect answers on those fronts. (And if we hear anything interesting from
them on how they plan to get those answers, let’s let Conor Friedersdorf of the Atlantic
know at conor@theatlantic.com.)
4.
Almost
a third of transgender Americans lack regular access to health care
already, and the Trump administration is
trying to make the barriers even higher for them. They’ve proposed a rule that
would let hospitals, insurance plans, health care providers and even
receptionists turn away patients in need of health care on religious grounds (https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/11/21/564817975/health-care-system-fails-many-transgender-americans). Today is the FINAL DAY we can submit public comments against this plan
and tell Trump to #PutPatientsFirst. We can make our voices heard here.
5.
It is beyond time for Congress to
protect Robert Mueller and his investigation. Last September, Sen.
Tillis (R-NC) and Chris Coons (D-DE) introduced the Special Counsel
Integrity Act (S.
1741),
but it has gone nowhere (https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/18/politics/mueller-trump-congress/index.html).
Let's call our senators and ask that they co-sponsor this bill and get it make
sure it gets passed.
6.
Slate legal analyst Mark Joseph Stern reports that Attorney
General Jeff Sessions may be considering ending protections that allow domestic
abuse victims to receive asylum in the United States (https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/03/jeff-sessions-looks-poised-to-bar-domestic-abuse-victims-from-getting-asylum-in-america.html). This would cruelly ensure they are returned to dangerous
situations and would do no one any good. Let’s contact our Members of Congress
and urge them to reach out to the Attorney General as he considers this move
and lobby him to preserve asylum for the domestically abused, and let’s ask
them to commit to passing new legal standards explicitly giving these women
protection if Sessions moves forward despite their efforts.
7.
Trump
continues to rush to fill federal court seats with reactionary nominees. He’s
picked John Nalbandian, a darling of the ultraconservative Federal Society who
has actively sought to roll back worked to roll back voting rights, and Michael
Scudder, who worked for the Bush Department of Justice at a time when they were
purging U.S. attorneys and violating civil liberties (https://abovethelaw.com/2018/01/the-latest-and-greatest-in-president-trumps-judicial-nominations-part-2/). Alarm bells should be going off about these two picks, and we should
read the Alliance for Justice reports on Nalbandian and Scudder and insist our senators hold them to the highest possible
standards.
8.
With our reps on spring
recess through April 9, now is a great time to make our voices heard in person.
Indivisible has a Spring Recess resource guide we can use to brush up on major
policy issues, register and sign up for scheduled town halls or district office
visits, and download town hall questions to help guide our events. Let's check
it out, and make sure that our MoCs are meeting with their constituents: https://recess.indivisible.org/.
9.
Since town halls are one of the best ways to hold our MoCs
accountable, many of them have chosen since the early days of the Resistance
not to hold them (https://www.politico.com/tipsheets/politico-pulse/2017/05/most-gop-members-not-holding-town-halls-220183). We can check if our
MoCs are holding events here: http://www.townhallproject.com. If they’re not, the Parkland March For Our Lives kids are
teaming up with the Town Hall Project for a day of town halls on April 7. Let's call our reps and ask for an event on that day.
If they won't, we can hold our own "empty chair" town hall.
Instructions on how to do that here: https://www.indivisible.org/resource/not-empty-chair-town-hall-action-planning-guide/.
Election 2018 – General
1. We’re just days away from a vote in
Anchorage, Alaska on a transphobic “bathroom bill” called Proposition 1. This
initiative, which is on the ballot on April 3rd, would strip away rights and
protections from transgender people in public spaces by doing away with the
city’s non-discrimination law (https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/anchorage/2018/03/03/god-gender-identity-and-public-restrooms-at-play-in-anchorages-proposition-1-debate/). We can help fairness and equality
win. The National Equality Action Team is recruiting people nationwide to
phonebank voters to oppose this bigoted ballot proposition. We can sign up to
make calls here.
Election 2018 – By State
Other Actions
1.
Now
that we’ve all been energized by the amazing students across the globe in last
weekend’s March for Our Lives, it’s time to renew our pressure on companies who
are still selling assault weapons and have not raised the gun-buying age to 21
and tell them to follow the lead of Dick’s and Walmart. Thanks to Jen
Hoffman’s Activism Checklist for these contacts: (1) CEO John Morris, Bass Pro
Shops and Cabela's, 2500 E. Kearney, Springfield, MO
65898; (2) CEO John Schaefer, Sportsman’s
Warehouse, 7035 S. High Tech Drive,
Midvale, UT 84047; (3) CEO David Pratt, Freedom
Roads/Camping World, 250 Parkway Drive Suite 270,
Lincolnshire, IL 60069.
2.
As is typical of these times, the Parkland students
who organized the March for Our Lives last Saturday are being viciously
attacked on and offline, and none more than 18-year-old Latina Emma Gonzalez,
whose eloquence —and, one fears, her name or her looks—have made her a particular
target for the Right (https://www.washingtonpost.
3.
In
a published op-ed, a group of nearly a dozen mayors from across the country called
on state legislatures to lift laws that bar municipalities from enacting local
gun restrictions. We can read about this at The Hill and read the op-ed itself at USA Today. Let's use this information as inspiration as we contact our own local
mayors to ask them to join the call to lift laws banning local gun
control.
4.
Doctors and surgeons had an important message for former
Republican senator Rick Santorum on Sunday: CPR does not save people who are bleeding to death from
AR-15 wounds. The news flash directed at Santorum came after he suggested live
on CNN that learning CPR was a better way for young people to take action in
response to a mass shooting than asking “someone else to solve their problem” (https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/25/politics/rick-santorum-guns-cnntv/index.html).” Santorum
took $115,942 from the NRA while serving in Congress (https://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/gun-lobbying-spending-in-america-congress/?query=Santorum). Let’s tell Santorum that our “young people” can and
will vote in the right people and solve that problem themselves with common
sense gun regulations instead of taking his advice. Tweet him here @RickSantorum.
5.
To
win a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives when districts are so
heavily gerrymandered, Democrats would need a electoral wave bigger than any in
more than 40 years according to this article from the
Associated Press. Let's do our part to help the blue
tsunami. One thing we can do is sign a "pledge to vote" with the Environmental Voter Project which will then send us election reminders. According to
Environmental Voter Project research, 20.1 million environmentalists are
registered to vote but most of us don't actually show up on Election Day. Let's
spread the word and change that.
6.
As the Facebook privacy story continues to build, we are finding
even more ways that Facebook has accessed our data, including phone calls and
texts. After reading about this disturbing incursion, we can find out just how much our privacy has been invaded and take steps to
protect ourselves in the future. We can turn to Lifehacker and learn how to
find all the data that Facebook has collected on us: https://lifehacker.com/how-to-
7.
In 1954, the Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown v. Board of Education
struck at the heart of legalized racial segregation in America. Linda Brown,
whose father Oliver sued when she was not allowed to attend an all-white school
in her neighborhood in Topeka, Kansas, died on Sunday at age 76 (https://www.nbcnewyork.com/
8.
A Michigan ice cream shop has taken it upon itself to rename
the "Red Hot Cinnamon" flavor ice cream from its distributor to
"Red Indian" (http://hillsdalecollegian.com/2018/03/red-indian-udder-side-flavor-stirs-community-controversy/). No matter
where we live, let's let this establishment know what we think about the
insensitivity of the name change: The Udder Side, 121 W Chicago
St., Jonesville, MI 49250 or (517) 849-9666.
Let's also contact the distributor and ask them to stop supplying ice cream to
the store if they do not change the name: http://www.nationalflavors.com/contact-us.html.
Marches/events/webinars/Tweetstorms to attend/organize
States
1.
ALL
STATES: If we have not yet watched the nearly seven minutes of Emma Gonzalez’s
speech on Saturday at the March for Our Lives, let’s take the time: https://mobile.twitter.com/MichaelSkolnik/status/977655096740851713 And then let’s contact our state representatives to ask for them to
follow the lead of Massachusetts and pass gun laws that will save lives: http://apps.bostonglobe.com/opinion/graphics/2018/03/seven-steps/. If your state reps are telling you
that gun laws don’t make a difference because “people kill people,” send them
this map from Fortune, a right-center leaning source, that shows a clear
correlation between gun laws and gun deaths: http://fortune.com/2018/03/20/gun-laws-gun-crimes-state-gun-regulations/. Stats don’t lie. States with
more restrictive gun laws consistently have a lower gun death rate.
2.
MOST STATES: Voter disenfranchisement is rampant in
the disability community. In many states, people with disabilities who undergo
a conservatorship or guardianship process are stripped of their voting rights,
and held to higher standards to determine competency than people without
disabilities (https://bit.ly/2FPDZBQ). State laws on competency are often
outdated and feature archaic, discriminatory language, and are highly varied.
The American Bar Association (ABA) has recommended that state laws should have
language explicitly stating that a person's voting rights are retained except
by court order and when certain criteria are met (http://disabilityjustice.org/right-to-vote/). Let's contact our state legislators and ask
them to introduce legislation which protects the voting rights of people with
disabilities, using the recommendations offered by the ABA.
3.
MA (From Badass Activists): Two gun control
bills – H3610, which would enable family members, mental health professionals
and law enforcement to get protective orders and suspend gun licenses for
at-risk individuals, and H1283, which would require background checks for
private gun sales – are both stuck in the Committee on Public Safety and Homeland Security (http://www.berkshireeagle.com/stories/massachusetts-students-take-case-to-lawmakers-keep-pressing-for-gun-legislation,535167).
Let’s contact the committee chair and vice chair, along with our
legislators,
and ask that these be brought to a floor vote as soon as possible.
4.
MI: State Senator Mike Shirkey
(R-Clark Lake) has introduced SB 897 (https://bit.ly/2I70bnL), which would amend the
Social Welfare Act to include work requirements in order to receive Healthy
Michigan Medicaid services (https://bit.ly/2G0k0AD). The Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) has detailed the many ways that
Medicaid work requirements can be harmful and unrealistic: https://kaiserf.am/2DnnsDK. Let's read through the information, then cite it as we call our
state senators, and ask them to oppose SB 897. Let's also be sure to call
Senator Shirkey (517-373-5932 ) and let him know that we do not support
Medicaid work requirements.
5.
GA: With all the insights into election
hacking, the need for a paper trail for voting is essential. The pending
election bill, S.B.
403, will not
provide that (https://www.wabe.org/paper-ballot-bill-doubt-ga-lawmaker-proposes-voting-technology-study/). Let's
watch this: https://vimeo.com/261779972. Now let's make those calls to tell our
state senators to vote no.
6. VA: Late last week, the
Virginia Department of Environmental Quality issued a Notice of
Violation to the Atlantic Coast Pipeline alleging its failure to protect
streams and wetlands on 15 different sites during tree felling
operations (https://www.tidewaternews.com/2018/03/24/deq-takes-action-against-atlantic-coast-pipeline/). Let's read more at
the National Resources
Defense Council and follow their
advice to contact Gov. Ralph
Northam to ask him to
fulfill his campaign promises to hold these pipelines to the highest
environmental standards and conduct rigorous, science-based, site-specific
analysis to prevent these dangerous efforts to rush the process and undermine
the law.
Reading/Watching
1.
“Expect More Shutdowns… And 4 Other Major
Takeaways From Last Week’s Spending Chaos.” - https://www.forbes.com/sites/stancollender/2018/03/25/expect-more-shutdowns-and-4-other-major-takeaways-from-last-weeks-spending-chaos/#5f329695173b
2.
“Polling
Shows Running on Progressive Policies Would Work in Swing Districts.” - https://theintercept.com/2018/03/21/democrats-progressive-policies-swing-districts/
3. The Atlantic spoke to survivors of
mass shootings and those victims left behind about their lives in the aftermath
and their reaction to the new wave of gun control activism. We can read more
here: https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/03/march-gun-violence/556418.
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