Indivisibles --

You’ve already received Indivisible’s celebratory email on the American
Recovery Plan. It’s huge. It’s progressive. It’s historic. And we’ll be
spreading the word about all the good stuff in it through the 2022
elections. This month’s newsletter is about what comes next... and it’s
what we’ve been preparing for years now: saving this damn democracy.

If you read to the end, you’ll not only get to weigh in on the democracy
work, you’ll also get a pic or two of Zeke at 5 months. Of course feel
free to reach out to us on Twitter at [ [link removed] ]@ezralevin and [ [link removed] ]@leahgreenb to
tell us how cute he is. Without further ado:

What we’re reading and watching

While national coverage is focused on the incredible American Rescue Plan,
something very, very scary is happening in the states. Republican
legislators are mounting an attack on voting rights that is staggering in
its scope and intensity. They’re fueled by the Big Lie that Trump won the
election -- or at least, they’re pretending to be so that they can
suppress as many votes as possible.

To get a sense of exactly how scary this is, [ [link removed] ]click here to check out
the Washington Post’s review of approximately 250 state voter suppression
bills that have been introduced in state legislatures already this year.
This is an avalanche of voter suppression legislation -- far more than
we’ve seen even in the recent Trump era. And, as is almost always the
case, this attack targets Black and brown voters with surgical precision.
It should come as no surprise that the attacks on democracy are
particularly popular in states with a GOP trifecta -- where Republicans
control the state legislature and governorship. From Arizona to Texas to
Georgia to even New Hampshire (yes there’s a GOP trifecta there), voter
suppression bills are moving at a dizzying pace. We can expect similar
power grabs when the GOP trifectas get the chance to redraw (i.e.
gerrymander) districts later this year. 

This is the state of the Republican Party in 2021: committed to getting
power by any means necessary, and ready to burn our democracy to the
ground in order to do it. But as scary as this is, we are actually
optimistic right now -- because we have the power to act. And while
success is not foreordained, it is possible. 

And if you’re looking for optimism grounded in trenchant political
analysis, look no further than [ [link removed] ]clicking here to watch Stacey Abrams’s
interview with Rachel Maddow. Abrams has been on a crusade for democracy
since the Georgia governorship was stolen from her through anti-Black
voter suppression in 2018. She describes the voter suppression laws
championed by reactionary electeds in Georgia and other GOP trifecta
states as “[ [link removed] ]Jim Crow in a suit and tie.”

To repel these attacks and save our democracy, we need congressional
action. And the name of that action is the John Lewis Voting Rights Act,
the For the People Act, and (we would add) D.C. statehood. This is all
legislation that has passed the House before. Enacting these policies is
within our reach, but we must actively fight back to do it.

Do not despair! This is indeed possible. As Abrams tells Maddow, “We’ve
done it before. Time and again, when voter suppression has taken hold of
our nation, we have found ways to fight back.” But what about Manchin?
What Sinema? What about other holdouts like Feinstein in California or
Hickenlooper in Colorado? The votes aren’t yet there, but it’s a mistake
to believe that a politician’s positions today will be their positions
tomorrow. Mehdi Hasan made this astute point eloquently on his show
[ [link removed] ]here: “‘Never' isn't in a politician's vocabulary." To turn “I’ll never
change my position on the filibuster,” into “I support passing these
democracy-saving reforms by amending the filibuster” requires us -- ALL of
us -- to work toward changing the politicians’ minds. And that’s exactly
what we see Indivisibles doing right now across the country.

In the last couple months, Indivisibles have held more than 300 events
nationwide focusing on the fight to save our democracy. Indivisibles in
California just held a town hall with Senator Padilla where he came out
against the filibuster, and they’re making plans to get Senator Feinstein
onboard with filibuster reform. In January over 400 Indivisible activists
joined Senator Schumer for a town hall specifically focused on democracy
reform. Indivisibles across Arizona are working with progressive partners
and coming up with creative tactics to pressure Senator Sinema on the
filibuster and the For the People Act -- just last week, we joined over
100 Indivisible leaders from Arizona, and they turned right around and
filled up Sinema’s voicemail boxes in D.C., Tucson, and Phoenix. 

This is the tool we have at this moment: making it as clear as possible to
senators that we need a full-blown democracy-saving agenda, and we need to
get rid of the filibuster to do it. The choice is clear, and we need to
know which side they’re on.

Already we’re seeing some politicians move. Amy Klobuchar, Tina Smith,
Dick Durbin, Alex Padilla and more have come out for filibuster reform in
order to pass a democracy agenda in the last month. Senator Manchin,
meanwhile, is starting to make noises about reform. Are we there yet? No.
But the dominoes are falling, and that’s exactly what we’d want to see
happen on the way to victory.

It was never guaranteed that we would all get ourselves off the floor in
2016. In 2017, we were never guaranteed to defeat the repeal of the
Affordable Care Act. Winning the House wasn’t a sure thing in 2018.
Neither was getting the House to impeach the president in 2019. And in
2020, we couldn’t guarantee that we could make Trump the first one-term
president in a generation. And few people bet on taking both Georgia
senate seats, delivering Democrats a trifecta in January. We engaged with
our hearts and souls in each of these campaigns -- not because we knew we
would win, but because we knew we had to win. And as a result of those
victories, we have not saved our democracy, but we have won the
opportunity to save our democracy.

Reflections from last month, question for this month

Last month we wrote a long newsletter about D.C. statehood and racial
justice, and asked what your Indivisible group was doing to advance racial
justice in your own community. We heard from Heather T. that Indivisible
Grapevine in Texas has started a monthly project involving education,
action and discussion centered on racial equity. Joanna C. tells us that
North Boulder Indivisible voted in January to include discussion and
problem-solving of “racial and economic inequality issues and policing
reform” as an ongoing part of their weekly meetings. Indivisible Sisters
in Oregon is one of many local Indivisible groups who wrote us about
partnering with their local Movement for Black Lives chapter since the
murder of George Floyd. 

This month, the theme of the newsletter is voter suppression at the state
level. So we want to ask you a simple yes/no question, and then give you a
chance to provide more details if you’re willing. The question is this:
within your own state, do you see Republicans advancing anti-democracy or
voter suppression bills through your state legislature right now?

* [ [link removed] ]Yes, GOP elected officials are advancing anti-democracy bills
through my state legislature.
* [ [link removed] ]No, I don’t know of any anti-democracy bills being advanced in my
state.

Feel free to just click one of those options and leave it at that, but
we’d love details of what you’re seeing on the ground too. For example, in
Arizona, one GOP legislator defended the voter suppression bills by saying
“everybody shouldn't be voting... Quantity is important, but we have to
look at the quality of votes as well.” That’s a direct quote ([ [link removed] ]here). If
you have stories of similarly egregious, dishonest, and racist behavior by
these anti-democracy zealots, we want to hear from you -- this will help
fuel the fire for pro-democracy legislation in Congress.

Clicking either of those two options above will take you to a form where
you can submit more info to help out with this project.

Until next month

That’s it for this month’s newsletter! Again, feel free to reach out to us
directly with any questions/comments/concerns. As always, we are 100%
committed to building this movement for democracy with you because we know
that’s how we will win.

In solidarity,
Ezra and Leah
Co-Founders and Co-Executive Directors, Indivisible

PS: You made it to the end! Here are a couple of recent Zeke pics. He’s 5
months old now and so big!

[10]A photo of leah sitting on a couch and holding baby Zeke who is
smiling at the camera.

[11]A photo of Ezra standing in front of a window with baby Zeke balanced
on his shoulder. They are both looking at the camera and Zeke is smiling.

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