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You’ve probably seen the news about Dems’ losses in Virginia last night.
That was a blow, but here’s the thing: We still have the House, the
Senate, and Presidency. The opportunity in front of us is to pass Biden’s
economic agenda and big reforms to save our republic. This fight is
heating up, and we’re in it. (Remember, the Affordable Care Act was passed
after Dems lost VA in 2009!) Read on to hear from Ezra about what we do
next.
Indivisibles,
Your resident democracy obsessive, Ezra, here again. Whenever there’s a
major turn in the legislative fight to save our republic, I sit down to
write one of these emails to try to put it in context and give you a sense
of where we are and what the pathway forward is. I’m writing now because
McConnell and his caucus just filibustered the John Lewis Voting Rights
Advancement Act in the Senate. What does this mean and what do we do next?
How does the VRA relate to the Freedom to Vote Act? They go together. The
VRA and the big democracy reform bill -- the Freedom to Vote Act -- are
mutually reinforcing. The Freedom to Vote Act would roll back the voter
suppression, gerrymandering, and election subversion that has already been
passed in GOP-run states from Arizona to Texas to Florida to Georgia. The
VRA is forward-looking -- it would prevent new voter suppression laws from
being implemented in these states. Our ultimate goal is to get both of
these pieces of legislation passed.
Why did Democrats bring up the VRA for McConnell to veto it? For Manchin.
We knew this was coming. We knew there would be an attempted vote on the
VRA. We knew Mitch McConnell and his crew would filibuster it. We knew the
only Republican voting with Democrats for it would be Lisa Murkowski from
Alaska. We knew there would be nowhere near the 10 Republicans necessary
to overcome the filibuster. And we also knew that there would be no
attempt by Democrats today to eliminate or amend the filibuster.
Why hold the vote at all on the VRA then? Compared with the Freedom to
Vote Act, the VRA is seen as much more bipartisan-friendly legislation in
the democracy reform world. Since enactment in 1965, the VRA has been
updated five times -- each time with wide bipartisan support. Most
recently in 2006, the updated version got 98 Senate votes in favor, and
zero -- ZERO! -- against. George W. Bush of all people signed it into law.
What today’s filibuster by McConnell proves is that no democracy
legislation of any substance will win Republican support. McConnell won’t
allow a vote on the Freedom to Vote Act. He won’t allow a vote on D.C.
statehood. And he won’t even allow a vote on the VRA. Today’s vote makes
as clear as it can possibly be that we will not get any sort of democracy
reform unless the Senate ends or amends the filibuster.
The audience for this lesson was one single senator: Joe Manchin. And
we’ll find out pretty soon if he was paying attention.
What happens next? A legislative pivot back to democracy. As I wrote a
couple weeks ago, the biggest news is that [ [link removed] ]Biden himself blessed our
plan for getting democracy reform done. He said he would put his shoulder
into pushing key senators to reform the filibuster and pass democracy
reform after his economic agenda gets through. That’s why Indivisible has
been fighting so hard to pass the Build Back Better agenda -- it’s good
for the country, it’s good for 2022, and it clears the way for legislative
action on democracy. As of this week, it looks likely that the fight over
Biden’s economic agenda is coming to a close soon, which means Congress
will soon have the opportunity to take up democracy reform with the
President’s undivided attention.
Our role in this moment is to make as clear as possible to political and
media ecosystems that the public is paying attention and expects action.
By bringing heat and light to the issue, we make it easier for a final
deal on filibuster to be reached. That’s not just my analysis -- our
allies in the Senate are asking us to produce this pressure.
What can you do? Make some noise. Every week, the Senate Democrats have a
lunch discussion together. We want every individual senator in those
lunches talking about how they’re getting flack back home about the
filibuster and democracy reform. We need that pressure starting soon and
building until the showdown on filibuster comes this month or next month.
Remember, heat and light is the goal. Here are three specific things you
can do:
1. Show up in person the week of November 8th. Together with our partners
and local groups across the country, we’ve got the Time to Act Week of
Action coming up next week: While senators are on recess, activists
will be hosting events to tell them we can’t wait any longer for the
reforms they promised. The filibuster isn’t only standing in the way
of democracy legislation, it’s also complicating efforts on everything
we expect from Dems -- from real climate action to health care reforms
to immigration, tax justice, and more. The more pressure we put on
them the better, so [ [link removed] ]click here to see if there’s a Time to Act
event in your area and sign up to attend. If there’s not, get one
together and let us know about it. You can ping me on twitter -
[ [link removed] ]@ezralevin.
2. Calls, yes calls. Whether or not you can attend an event next week,
calls to Congress also make a huge impact to show senators we demand a
fix to the filibuster and action on democracy. [ [link removed] ]Call your senators
today, and keep calling until they clear the filibuster hurdle and
pass democracy reform. Competent Senate staff total these calls up
every day for the boss -- so don’t think this type of pressure doesn’t
matter. Ask for a written response, and if you don’t get one -- call
back again and ask what’s up.
3. Give us money. I know nobody wants to be treated like an ATM. Here’s
all I’ll say: This campaign has lasted longer than expected, which
means we have to spend more money than expected to pay for organizers,
swag, ads, events, and cool actions on the ground. We’re committed to
doing that as long as we have the money to do it. It’s why when we
wrote our book on democracy after Trump, Leah and I didn’t take one
dime of the royalties -- all $305,000 went to this democracy campaign.
You know Indivisible doesn’t take donations from corporations or
political figures, and our largest source of support is grassroots
dollars from emails like this. So if you can, [ [link removed] ]click here to make a
$25 donation to Indivisible to help us finish the democracy campaign
strong. And if you want to send more (or less), that’s totally cool
too.
This is a live legislative fight that could go either way. The Speaker of
the House is with us. The Senate Majority Leader is with us. The President
of the United States is with us. All of us in this movement have a role to
play to make it easier for our allies in D.C. to reach a deal. If you can
host a local event that gets media attention -- awesome. If you can show
up at one of those events next week -- fantastic. If you can be annoying
and repeatedly call your senators to push them on filibuster reform --
amazing. If you can toss us a few bucks to fund this work -- incredible.
All we can do is all we can do, so that’s what we’re going to do to save
this republic.
In solidarity,
Ezra Levin
Co-founder and Co-Executive Director, Indivisible
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