Chop Wood, Carry Water 2/2 🪓🪣
Hi, all, and happy Thursday!
I’m fighting off a bit of a cold this morning, so will keep this brief.
Cold or no, I’ll be phonebanking into Pennsylvania later today, and I do hope to see some of you there. I had the pleasant surprise of seeing a reader at the Wisconsin phonebank I led yesterday—delightful! There’s something about running into you all “out in the wild” that I find very touching. Hope those of you who do show up to make calls find it as fun as I do, but even if it’s not your favorite thing to do, please know what a difference it’s making.
In Wisconsin, especially, calling voters is CRITICAL. Why? Because, from what I’ve learned on my phonebanks so far, folks there are largely clueless about the critical election they have coming up. Even if they have a foggy notion that there’s a Supreme Court race somewhere in their future, they don’t know there’s a primary on February 21st, (with early voting starting on 2/7) and a general election on April 4th; they have no clue who the two Democrats running are (Dane County Judge Everett Mitchell and Milwaukee County Judge Janet Protasiewicz); they don’t know that there will be no party affiliations listed on the ballot, and definitely don’t realize how high the stakes are (for abortion rights, gerrymandering, and possibly the outcome of the 2024 Presidential election). So these phonebanks really couldn’t be more important.
I’ll be leading one on Wednesday afternoons until April. Hope some of you will join me!
OK. Let’s do some wood chopping and water carrying. It’s how we win, AND how we thrive.
Call Your Senators (find yours here) 📲
Hi, I'm a constituent calling from [zip]. My name is ______.
I want the Senator to vote to confirm Gigi Sohn to the FCC. She is a supremely qualified and prepared nominee. She has garnered support from progressive organizations, consumer watchdogs, privacy advocates, and even some industry groups.1 Her confirmation has been delayed long enough. The Senate needs to confirm her now. Thanks.
Call Your House Rep (find yours here) 📲
Hi, I'm a constituent calling from [zip]. My name is _______.
[To GOP members only] First, I want to say that I’m extremely disappointed that Republican House members voted to oust Rep. Ilhan Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee. This sort of petty vengeance has no place in Congress. Americans don’t want it—they want governance, and the GOP is showing they aren’t capable of it.
[To all] I understand that a bipartisan group of House lawmakers have just re-introduced legislation to designate Russian mercenary company Wagner Group as a foreign terrorist organization. The bill, which is as yet unnumbered, is called the Holding Accountable Russian Mercenaries (HARM) Act, and it would require the State Department to designate the Wagner Group an FTO within 90 days of becoming law. They’re responsible for atrocities in Ukraine and elsewhere, including the abduction of children, sexual violence, torture, and murdering journalists. If they’re not a foreign terrorist organization I don’t know who is. Please ask the Congressmember to co-sponsor this bill and urge its swift passage. Thanks. [H/T and more info Rogan’s List]
Extra Credit
If you haven’t yet read Judd Legum’s new post about the College Board’s capitulation to Ron DeSantis on their AP Black History course curriculum, please do. Status Kuo has a great piece about it too. In short, it’s an outrage. Let’s call or send them an email and let them know how we feel about it.
You can send a written comment through their webform here, or call them at 866-630-9305. My letter is below—I lifted some of
’s language because it was so good, then added my own. Feel free to use it, but please change it slightly so they don’t discard it. I will likely call also, because I’m that mad.I'm writing to say that I find the College Board's capitulation to Ron DeSantis and other right-wing extremists absolutely appalling. What happened to academic rigor? Or freedom? Conservatives’ insistence that AP African American studies teach only half the Black experience is sheer politicization. Changes to the curriculum in response to that pressure is craven capitulation. Worse still, by appeasing the concerns of the right in the conservative states, students across the rest of America are being impoverished educationally. What a sad statement on the state of American education--and on the College Board's credibility--that you gave in to the worst, most racist, and least educated among us. You should be ashamed of yourselves. You've robbed not just Black Americans but all of us of a valuable education, all in the pursuit of political expediency and the almighty dollar. History will not judge you kindly.
Extra Extra Credit ✅
Yesterday the Department of interior issued a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) on the Willow arctic oil project. The decision isn’t good, and allows the oil company ConocoPhillips to move forward. But it’s also not a final decision. And in the Statement, the Department of Interior makes it clear that they have concerns about the climate and environmental impacts of the project.
The law says that a final decision on Willow will be finalized “no sooner than 30 days” after Feb 1. So we have until March 3 to convince President Biden and Secretary Haaland to say no to the Willow Arctic oil project. Click here to send Climate Hawks Vote’s letter asking them to shut this project down.
Get Smart! 📚
Please join Simon Rosenberg’s organization NDN this Friday at 1pm ET for a live discussion with Simon about the current national political landscape. He will open up with 10-15 minutes of remarks, and then take questions up until 2pm ET.
You can RSVP here. Invite others – all are welcome!
Spread the Word! 📣
Anti-Choice Extremists Make National Abortion Bans A 2024 Litmus Test:
New reporting from the Associated Press shows that as potential 2024 GOP candidates push for extreme anti-abortion restrictions, a major anti-abortion group is giving 2024 Republicans two options: Support an extreme national abortion ban or risk losing their support. Read more from the DNC War Roomand read the full article here.
Win Races! 🗳
Friendly reminder: I’ve signed up to make calls with Turn PA Blue today at 3:30 PM PT / 6:30 PM ET. Are you free to join me? The election is in 6 days!
Resistbot Letter (new to Resistbot? Go here! And then here.) 💻
[to all 3 reps] [This petition was inspired by this great article in USA Today that my friend Casey’s organization Each Step Home was featured in. The petition itself was started by her.] [Quick send text SIGN PQXJEY to 50409]
Every day asylum-seeking children are separated at the border from their caregivers when that caregiver is a grandmother, aunt, uncle, or sibling. I’m against family separation, and you should be too. This policy causes unnecessary trauma to children fleeing danger when the government could instead place trained social workers at the border to vet the caregivers there at the border to make sure children are entering our country with trusted, caring relatives. A pilot program exists called the Trusted Adult Relative program to do just that. I urge you to expand the Trusted Adult Relative program and keep families together.
OK, you did it again! You helped save democracy! You’re amazing.
Talk soon.
Jess
Verbiage from a Daily Kos petition
BTW. lest I do not say this enough, thank you thank you thank you Jessica for the extremely valuable work you are doing that benefits us all (even if we can't do as much as you do). Take care of yourself.
Suggest writing to State University systems too regarding the AP curriculum. If AP US history was accurate & complete that would be one thing, but it's not, and maybe we should go on the offense to work on that too.