Progressives Every Day: Brewing civil wars in big blue states
Blue, but it matters who
Welcome to a Friday edition of Progressives Everywhere!
Before we get going, a quick note: Tonight I’ll be a guest on Sirius XM Progress, the satellite radio network’s progressive politics channel. At 10:15pm EST, I’ll be joining Joe Sudabay, who is sitting in for John Fugelsang as the host of Tell Me Everything. We’ll be talking about the big legislative elections happening in swing states, voting rights battles, and other important matters that you read about here. Let me know if you tune in!
Oh, also: On Sunday, I’ll have a big state analysis and then on Wednesday, I’ll have a new candidate. Just a little flip based on scheduling!
Elections (and Future Elections) and Voting Rights
Instead of focusing on the hottest swing states tonight in the newsletter, I want to look at the two biggest blue states and how a pronounced split is forming within the Democratic Party.
In New York, the left’s ascent has been nothing short of overwhelming. From real Democrats taking back the State Senate from the “Independent Democrats” who caucused with Republicans in 2018 to this June’s wave of progressive challengers either unseating incumbents or winning open seats, the state has undergone a massive political transformation. I’ve documented (and done my part to assist) much of that here at Progressives Everywhere, but I haven’t really focused on the troubling aspects of what has been going on here.
Organized labor has been stalwart Democratic supporters and foot soldiers for almost a century, since FDR championed their cause during the Great Depression. I grew up in a labor household and learned many of my values from these organizations. But the people who lead labor unions know their political power and often wind up caring more about maintaining that power than fighting to create a more just society for their neighbors. That’s been the case in New York politics over the last few years, as the big unions have almost always sided with moderate, corporate-friendly incumbents than the candidates who are focused on helping regular union members.
Today, Labor Notes has a great story about that friction and the battles that will need to play out sooner rather than later. Here is a choice quote that sums it all up:
At a candidate forum in Central Brooklyn for a New York state senate race, the moderator asked a simple yes or no question: “Do you support charter schools?”
It was no surprise that public school teacher, union member, and democratic socialist Jabari Brisport answered with a terse “nope”—unions rightly see charters as an effort to privatize and deunionize the teaching profession.
It’s also sadly not much of a surprise that his opponent, sitting Democratic Assemblywoman Tremaine Wright, answered with a “yes.” Charter schools are backed by deep-pocketed corporate interests, many of them major donors to the Democratic establishment. During the primary campaign, Wright received $7,500 from Democrats for Education Reform, a pro-charter group funded by the likes of Walmart heiress Alice Walton and hedge fund titan Dan Loeb.
The real surprise is that the statewide teachers union (NYSUT), which is largely controlled by its New York City local, the United Federation of Teachers (UFT), decided to endorse Assemblywoman Wright, the candidate who explicitly opposes the union’s own legislative agenda, over one of its own members.
Brisport still won the election and I can only assume that the union will now suck up to him as much as possible, championing the fact that one of their own members is going to Albany. That’s what happens when people win elections — people come around and support them afterward, a cowardly political backwardsness that drags out changes.
During the 2018 election, the big unions that supported the progressive Working Families Party withdrew from the coalition over the WFP’s support for Cynthia Nixon’s primary challenge of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Today, Cuomo adamantly refuses to raise taxes on millionaires even as the state faces crippling budget deficits and cuts. He’s too concerned with his friends in the Hamptons — those are the people who really have his ear.
Speaking of a battle between establishment Democrats and progressive challengers, BlackRock’s favorite member of Congress, Rep. Carolyn Maloney (NY-12), was declared the winner of her super-tight primary earlier this week.
But there was a big asterisk, as a whopping 12,000 mailed ballots — a full quarter of them! — were discounted due to largely erroneous technicalities. A federal judge ordered that the state must count at least 1,000 of the ballots because their lack of postmarks was not the fault of the voters, and after initially appealing, the Board of Elections is no longer fighting that decision.
🚨UPDATE🚨 Attorney General @TishJames has decided NOT to appeal Judge Torres’ preliminary injunction on non-postmark ballots! Thank you Tish for standing with the voters and ensuring these votes will be counted as soon as possible! @j_remy_green @em4assembly @surajpatelnycIt’s unclear whether this will make a difference — Maloney is up by 3700 votes at the moment. But this race isn’t quite over and regardless of the outcome, it’s important to work out all these issues before November. I should also note that I have lived in this district for five years and the election flyers I got in June were the only time I ever heard from Maloney, who really only cares about people on Park Avenue and eastward. I’m not a big fan of her challenger, Suraj Patel, but I certainly want my member of Congress to win their primary fair and square, regardless of who winds up on top.
The dynamic happening in New York’s Democratic Party is also playing out in California, where a massive budget shortfall has highlighted the schism between moderates and progressives. In this case, labor unions have for the most part sided with the many activist groups on the left who have called for higher taxes on millionaires. From CalMatters:
Gallardo’s group is fueled by outsider energy and, of late, first-hand knowledge of communities ravaged by the pandemic. But 99Rootz has also joined a coalition of powerful labor unions and other left-leaning groups, the United Front, in campaigning for a new 1%-3.5% millionaire tax proposal, AB 1253, plus this fall’s “split roll” ballot measure to raise taxes on commercial property, Prop 15.
Much like the national Democratic party’s divide along Biden and Bernie lines, there is broad agreement among California Democrats about things that are bad — record unemployment, unaffordable housing, police brutality — but stark disagreement about what to do next. A group of moderate Democrats led by Senate Majority Leader Bob Hertzberg has proposed a $100 billion stimulus package with no new taxes, instead relying on federal loans, complex financial mechanisms and vouchers that encourage taxpayers to pay taxes early.
This idea that multi-millionaires can’t pay another 3% in taxes right now, as the country sinks into an abyss, is alternately absurd and depressing. Then again, now that the stock market has been divorced from the actual economy, I could see some wealthy people moving away or hiding their money. I hope we’re better than that.
In 2019, a federal judge ruled that Georgia had to replace its old, crappy voting machines. Georgia had already dropped $104 million on crappy new voting machines, and US District Judge Amy Totenberg said that if they weren’t ready for the March primary, the state would have to use paper ballots.
Georgia wound up using the terrible machines in June, which was an abject disaster. Judge Totenberg ruled against requiring the state to go back to paper ballots during the general election, but she is allowing a lawsuit to go forward… so I really have no idea what’s going to happen. But I’ll keep my eye on it!
Speaking of Georgia, GOP Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who refuses to again send absentee ballot applications to all voters, is complaining about poor training and problems at voting sites. There’s a way to mitigate that!!!
COVID-19 and Related Drama
Texas Gov. Greg Abbot has taken power away from local cities and counties who want to shut schools down. Texas is an absolute mess — the governor gave some flexibility to school districts to delay in-person opening by eight weeks, but now seems to be pulling back on that?
After about 18 local health authorities issued orders delaying in-person instruction because of coronavirus concerns, Abbott said last week that those health officials cannot issue blanket orders preventing all schools in their jurisdictions from opening classrooms before the academic year begins.
Ostensibly, school districts can delay further with special permission, but they have to make up the time in-person. Unless they can’t? I just hope things go smoother there than in Georgia.
New employment numbers are out. And while they’re somewhat positive, there are a lot of important caveats, as Dean Baker notes in this analysis. Also notable is this nugget, which proves yet again that extended unemployment benefits don’t discourage people from seeking out more permanent work:
It is worth noting that the loss of jobs in this low-paying sector does not appear to be due to being discouraged from working by generous unemployment benefits. The average hourly wage for production workers in the sector fell by 0.2 percent in July. It fell by 3.4 percent for production workers in retail, and 0.4 percent for production workers overall.
Turns out Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine does not have COVID-19, which is good.
This technically has nothing to do with COVID-19 but this guy is a virus and I want to highlight it anyway.
Wait, before you go!
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