Chop Wood, Carry Water 7/26

A tidal wave of enthusiasm

Jul 26, 2024

Hi, all, and happy Friday!

And it does feel happy indeed.

Last night I, along with 160,000 other white women, attended the much talked about “Answer the Call” White Women For Harris Zoom event. It was planned, of course, in response to the Black Women for Harris call that happening at the beginning of the week. White women have typically not done the heavy lifting in Democratic politics, and too many of them, of course, voted for Trump. This call was an effort to confront and remedy that fact, especially in light of Kamala Harris’s candidacy. Attendees raised over 2 million dollars in a few hours. Over the next 12 hours that number rose to EIGHT AND A HALF MILLION dollars!! WHAT?

But wait, there’s more! My friend Amy was on the LGBTQ People for Harris call—she reported that there were about 8,000 people on it and they raised just over 250K. There was also a South Asian Women for Harris call with 10,000 attendees. And my husband Mike attended a hastily-thrown-together Men For Harris meeting that had 500 attendees. (They are meeting again next week, apparently, and hope to have greater attendance. Sign up info is below.)

The tone on the White Women’s Zoom was alternately jubilant, determined, plaintive, and uplifting. We heard from Mallory McMorrow, Glennon Doyle, Pink, and many others. I had to leave before it ended, but the part I caught was very helpful, and hopeful, indeed. I’m told the other calls were the same.

Folks, if the hundreds of thousands of attendees at these various meetings get their boots on the ground and do the work, we’re going to win. It’s just that simple. The Trump campaign has only its base to fall back on—that’s a narrow swath of volunteers which the campaign is doing nothing to increase. Certainly, they have money, and they’ll use it to hire paid door knockers, send a ton of mail, issue a cacophony of attack ads, and more.

But we all know that there is no replacement for actual, passionate volunteers—folks who are doing the work because they love their country, care about democracy, and know lives depend upon their winning. We’re just wildly more effective.

Again: the MANY will always be more powerful than the money. As long as we do the work!

Speaking of which, in the next week I’ll be giving you slightly more electoral volunteer opportunities than usual, and slightly fewer calls to your representatives. Congress is out of session at the moment, after all, and since the electoral iron is hot, I figure we should strike!

The week after that, believe it or not, I am going on vacation and will not publish a newsletter. It feels unnatural, but I have to try to get some rest before the real sprint to the finish begins. You should, too!

One last thing: I just got the great news that you guys have given $44,523 towards my matching campaign for Movement Voter Project! I am blown away! We have just over $5,000 to go to make our goal, and we did it in a couple of days! If anyone missed the first call and wants to help us get the rest of the way to our 50K match you can give here. And my God, seriously, thank you all so much.

Now it’s time to get to work. So let’s do that.

Extra Credit ✅

Read this, then tell major newspapers to report more on solar canals, a win-win innovation for America! Climate Action Now has made it so easy! Don’t forget to personalize your letter!

Get Smart! 📚

Indivisible Marin and the Bay Area Coalition are honored to host a virtual briefing, Stop Project 2025, with their Congressman, Jared Huffman, on Wednesday, July 31, at 4pm PT/7pm ET. Sign up here.

Congressman Huffman will lead a far-ranging conversation regarding Project 2025 with special guests Congressman Jamie Raskin and Joyce Vance, distinguished professor of practice at the University of Alabama School of Law, senior fellow at the Brennan Center, NBC and MSNBC legal analyst, and author of the Substack newsletter, "Civil Discourse."

Congressmen Huffman and Raskin along with their colleagues are collaborating with civil society, grassroots advocates, and affected communities to join forces to examine, highlight, preempt, and counteract this rightwing plot to undermine democracy. All citizens can play a role in supporting this crucial work.

Spread the Word! 📣

MERCH! MERCH! MERCH! It tells the world, to quote Hamilton, that this is more than a moment—it’s a movement! Get some if you can!

The Harris merch store is open! For the next 24 hours if you use the code OLYMPICS you get a discount.
The amazing women at Network NOVA have Cat Lady for Kamala merch that is just…awesome.

Give 💰!

Join Focus for Democracy’s next event this Sunday!

What messages resonate with young people and undecided voters about Kamala Harris? Join Focus for Democracy's next event to hear from leading experts in the field as they share insights from the latest data. They’ll tell you some great organizations to donate to—I believe one of them is Galvanize, which is the single best organization working to turn non-college-educated white women into Blue voters. Really worth checking out!

Sunday, July 28, 5:00pm PT / 8:00pm ET

Win Races—Write Postcards! 💌

Good news! Postcards to Swing States has resumed sign-ups for their postcard program to rally Democrats to vote in 56 competitive US House districts!

They need your help to make sure that Democrats win back control of the House this fall. Please grab some postcards if you can—bear in mind that while the postcards are free, the minimum order is 200. Once you write them you will hold them—they get mailed in October.

Win Races—Cat Ladies Unite! 🗳

Sister District is now holding “Childless Cat Lady & Friends Phonebanks” several times a week, starting today, to build progressive power in the states and turn out swing state voters. Tell a friend!

Sign up here

Win Races—Volunteer for Team Harris 🗳

I’m assuming everyone has done this, but if not, please consider signing up to volunteer through Harris’s campaign website..
If you’re a woman you could also sign up with Women For Kamala Harris. They’re having a huge organizing call on Monday night.
The DNC has trainings for phonebanks, relational organizing, and social media amplification. All are really good. Sign up here.
There’s also a Men For Harris! Sign up here!

Chop Wood, Save the Planet 🔥

Want to feel really good? Watch this 9-minute film from Evergreen Action about how one Biden Administration clean energy program (funded through the Inflation Reduction Act) is completely transforming communities in Detroit, MI.

Good government policy is so important, yet most people don’t know all the ways that a piece of legislation like the IRA is changing our country. Personal stories, like the one in the film, really help illustrate it! So please watch, and please share!

Resistbot Letter (new to Resistbot? Go here! And then here.) 💻

[To: all 3 reps] [H/T Take On Wall St.] [Text SIGN PCZZCV to Resistbot at 50409 or via Apple Messages / WHATSAPP / MESSENGER]

As your constituent, I’m writing today about Section 956 of the Dodd-Frank legislation, to ask that you pressure the Federal Reserve to finally take real action as it’s REQUIRED to by the Dodd-Frank Act.

It’s absurd and inexcusable that the Fed has, to date, issued only guidance that predates the congressional mandate and Chair Powell recently admitted is “not binding.” That’s NOT how congressional mandates work.

The 2023 banking crisis should have been a wake up call. You must not walk away from your duty to ensure that federal regulators – most notably, the Federal Reserve – fully implement Section 956. After all, in addition to the 2008 global economic crisis that precipitated the Dodd-Frank Act’s passage and the 2023 banking crisis that brought renewed attention to the issue, examples of connections between incentive-based pay and excessive risk-taking abound – including JP Morgan’s London Whale loss, Wells Fargo’s fake account scandal, and Goldman Sachs’ bribery case in Malaysia.

Implementation of a strong rule would go a long way in preventing systemic financial crises in the future by better aligning the incentives of executives with the interests of consumers, depositors, and the public. Wall Street banks cannot be trusted to regulate themselves.

I’m asking you to apply all the pressure you can in the coming weeks to compel the Fed to join the other agencies in moving forward with this critical rule, and I look forward to your response to my letter with your views on the topic.

OK, you did it again! You helped save democracy! You’re amazing.

Talk soon.

Jess

Chop Wood, Carry Water