Friend,

It’s Denzel, Rashida’s Communications Director. In the past few weeks in Congress, Rashida successfully secured funding for environmental and housing justice programs, while defunding programs that threaten Black and brown Americans.

Rashida introduced and successfully passed many amendments to the House of Representatives’ appropriations bills to fund federal departments. Now the House’s legislative packages await the Senate—and we have until September 30 for the full Congress to pass the federal government’s 2021 budget.

More info below!

Protecting water as a human right

• After recently introducing and passing a historic amendment that would provide $22.5 billion over 5 years to replace dangerous lead-contaminated pipes, we just authored and passed an additional amendment to add $500 million to fully replace lead drinking water pipes and protect our kids from poisonous exposure.
• These amendments prioritize communities facing environmental racism like those in Michigan’s 13th district, who’ve been hit the hardest and know it’s past time to address this massive public health crisis. For decades, this issue has disproportionately affected low-income communities and communities of color without being meaningfully addressed—until now.
• As part of the House’s Heroes Act, we introduced and passed the Emergency Water is a Human Right Act in May to protect people from water shutoffs and provide assistance for low-income families struggling to afford their water and utility bills. Now, Senators Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Jeff Merkley and others have introduced companion legislation in the Senate—the Emergency Water and Energy is a Human Right Act—to protect people’s access to clean water and electricity.

Defending Black and brown lives

• We introduced and passed an amendment to defund the Department of Justice’s (DOJ’s) “Operation Legend” and “Operation Relentless Pursuit,” which are using taxpayer dollars to send federal agents to cities across the country. This is a blatant attempt to sow fear and division in order to save the President’s poll numbers.
• After the Detroit U.S. Attorney’s recent announcement that dozens of federal agents are heading to Detroit to terrorize our community, Rashida joined local activists in protest (full speech here).
• As Rashida said: “Many communities in my district have been systematically overpoliced, and at a time when trust is low and people are crying out for justice, the presence of unidentified federal agents in our neighborhoods only serves to escalate conflict that will disproportionately harm our neighbors of color."

• We also successfully passed an amendment to defund the Trump administration’s new attempts to collect DNA from immigrant detainees, including people as young as 14 years old in Detroit.
• Rashida explained: “The forced collection of DNA from our immigrant neighbors is a blatant attempt to criminalize them, creating a permanent law enforcement record for those who may never have been accused or convicted of a crime, and we must stop it.”

Working toward housing justice

We secured $25 million in funding for housing repairs and revitalization, as well as homeownership and financing assistance to low-income households.

Rashida noted: “I pushed for this funding at the start of this pandemic and since then, a number of my residents have called in dire need of home repairs with few—if any—options for us to help them secure it. This $25 million is a ray of hope for our folks suffering with damaged roofs over their heads and other housing revitalization needs during one of the most difficult times our country has ever faced.”

Funding local governments

• Rashida led the fight in Congress for state and local financial relief and secured more than $10 billion for Michigan and the 13th district, as well as for states and local municipalities across the country, in the House’s Heroes Act that passed in May.
• Since then, we’ve forced the Federal Reserve to adjust their lending programs to financially support more local governments, and Rashida just led a group of House Democrats in urging the Federal Reserve to do more to ensure our local communities don’t go bankrupt. The Fed regularly bails out big banks and airlines, offering them friendlier loan terms than to local and state governments. It’s time to prioritize our communities, not corporations.

For too long, our government has failed us.

But Rashida has been standing up to corporate polluters and billionaire bullies—along with their allies in elected office—for decades.

Rashida ran for Congress to give marginalized communities like ours a voice, and she’s not backing down.

Thanks to your support and partnership, we get to continue fighting for people in Congress. And we’re just getting started. Together, we’re going to keep pushing for the real, bold change that we all deserve.

Always Fighting,

Denzel McCampbell
Communications Director, Rashida for Congress

P.S. Hope this was helpful to get a sense of what we’ve been up to in Washington, D.C.! Stay tuned for another email coming soon about what we’ve been up to in the community. And if you’d like to stay updated in between our email newsletters, you can follow our campaign on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.