Tonight is the Dem primaries for AL, CA, IA, MT, MS NJ, NM and CA. The state being watched most closely is the largest one, California, especially in the house, senate and governor’s races. From Politico: Democrats are more assured of getting general election candidates through the primary in four other Clinton-won, Republican-held districts in California. And in the governor’s race, it could be Republicans who end up without a candidate. That race is a battle for second place. Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom has led public polling, but former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and state Treasurer John Chiang, both …Continue reading →
Sen. Bernie Sanders returned to Lansing on Sunday as part of a tour aimed at energizing his base from the 2016 Democratic primary, urging progressives to get involved.
“If I said it once, I’ve said it a million times, and that is real change never, ever takes place from the top on down,” Sanders told a crowd of more than 1,600 at the Lansing Center. “It is always from the bottom up.”
Change can happen only when “millions of people look around them and say loudly and clearly, ‘the status quo is not good enough, we demand change,'” Sanders said.
The rally was part of a 100-day “Repeal the Trump Tax” tour organized by Not One Penny, a coalition opposing President Donald Trump’s tax plan.
In a wide-ranging speech that mirrored his messaging in 2016, Sanders pointedly criticized Trump and the Republican president’s agenda, calling Trump “a pathological liar” and “the least-qualified president” in the nation’s history.
The independent senator from Vermont touched on health care reform, gun control, race and gender inequality, income inequality, immigration, climate change, tuition-free college, paid family and medical leave and other topics during his 45-minute speech.
Trump promised tax reform that benefited the middle class, he said. “Well, it turns out that the bill he supported and passed will provide 83 percent of the benefits at the end of 10 years to the top 1 percent. And at the end of 10 years, 93 million middle-class Americans will be paying more in taxes, not less.”
(Nina Turner speaks around the 37 minute mark and Bernie @ 45 minutes)
Sen. Bernie Sanders will join progressive groups in Iowa, Wisconsin and Michigan next week as part of a nationwide campaign to drum up grassroots opposition against the new Republican-backed tax law ahead of the midterm elections.
The Vermont independent will take direct aim at Trump-era Republicans’ signature legislative achievement in those three key states, two of which, Michigan and Wisconsin, were instrumental in the President’s 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton.
Sanders, who already announced plans to stump for Pete D’Alessandro, a 2016 aide now running for Congress, on February 23 in Des Moines, Iowa, is scheduled to headline an event in Cedar Rapids that evening, before leading rallies the next two days in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and Lansing, Michigan. He will also host a rally for Democrat Randy Bryce, who is running in Wisconsin’s first congressional district, home to House Speaker Paul Ryan, during his time in the state.
The tax law has seen an uptick in popularity since it was passed by Republicans in the House and Senate and signed by President Donald Trump in December. According to a Monmouth University poll released in January, 44% of Americans approve of the plan and 44% disapprove of it.
In a statement, Sanders ripped the tax bill, calling it “one of the worst pieces of legislation in the modern history of our country.”
Bernie Sanders spoke in Des Moines, Iowa on Saturday where he issued a rallying cry for “a vibrant American democracy,” and took aim at the Republicans’ healthcare bill, which he called “the most anti-working class legislation” in modern history.
The Vermont senator made the remarks at the Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement (CCI) Action Fund’s annual convention called “Revolution Iowa: From Protest to Power,” where he delivered the keynote address.
Sanders said that “we’re in a pivotal moment of American history.”
he trend toward having a handful of billionaire families with unlimited resources controlling our political process will only get worse. The trend toward a handful of conglomerates owning and controlling our economy will only get worse.”
“And what our job is,” he continued, “is to create a vibrant democracy where one person, one vote is what dominates the political system, not billionaires buying the election.”
“Democracy is facing an enormous challenge,” Sanders said.
Threats to a “vibrant democracy,” he said, come not only from the “disastrous” Citizens United Supreme Court ruling, but also “Republican governors, cowardly governors, who don’t have the guts to run for office based on their ideas but who are attempting to suppress the vote to keep low-income people or people of color or working people or older people from participating in the political process.”
