End Citizens United-- Still A DSCC/DCCC Scam For The Corrupt DC Establishment

End Citizen United's very ironic logo

What does it signify when a candidate is endorsed by a scammy campaign group called "End Citizens United?" Nothing whatsoever to do with the crucial goal of actually ending Citizens United. The campaign organization that uses that name really just has one over-arching goal: raising grassroots money for DSCC and DCCC establishment candidates. Once grassroots/netroots small dollar donors started understanding that the DCCC and DSCC are rotten and corrupt organizations, pushing establishment, status quo candidates and never candidates representing fundamental change, the two organizations cooked up End Citizens United as a way to keep the small dollar contributions flowing in their direction. DSCC and DCCC staffers started End Citizens United-- a super PAC-- not to end anything, just to direct grassroots money towards ConservaDem candidates who would not normally get it-- even if that meant occasionally throwing in a few progressive names to make it look legit.

If you look at their endorsement pages, you will always see a few bright shining progressive stars-- among the piles of shit-- to mislead people. They've been doing this since inception and it works for them. The first time I wrote about them was in 2015 when they started up-- and when they used Russ Feingold as a front to raise money for a slate of vile New Dems and Blue Dogs who are generally hated by progressives: Cheri Bustos (Blue Dog-IL), Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA), Julia Brownley (New Dem-CA), Ami Bera (New Dem-CA), Annie Kuster (New Dem-NH), Raul Ruiz (New Dem-CA), hen-DSCC chair Michael Bennet (CO), Scott Peters (New Dem-CA), Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ)...

At the time, I wrote that the more I looked into their initial e-mail, the more I smelled a rat and the more I looked into the group itself, "the less grassroots or progressive credibility I found. Its website looks like a phishing operation to collect e-mail addresses for partisan Democratic Party operations like the aforementioned DCCC and DSCC. The website's domain registration is hidden from the public-- very suspicious for a 'grassroots organization.' It smells like a scam, a New Dem/Blue Dog/DCCC scam using Russ Feingold as bait to lure naive, uninformed progressives into sending unaccountable cash. I hit reply and sent them an e-mail about their list of endorsees, 9 out of 11 of whom are grotesque DINOs who have spent their time in Congress crossing the aisle and voting with the Republicans-- Blue Dog shitheads like Kyrsten Sinema and Cheri Bustos and utterly worthless New Dems like Pete Aguilar, Scott Peters, Ann Kuster and Ami Bera. And the only senator on the list is DSCC chair Michael Bennet, one of the worst Democrats in that body. Stinky! The reply was an automated plea for money, typical of what one would expect from grifters. Beware."


The next candidate the grifters endorsed was "ex"-Republican-- and no friend of reform-- Patrick Murphy, a right-of-center and über-corrupt Florida New Dem. Have they changed since then? Nope-- although instead of Bennet dictating which Senate candidates to endorse, it's Schumer. What "progressive" or "reform" or "grassroots" group would pick Hickenlooper over Romanoff in Colorado? Or Sara Gideon over Betsy Sweet in Maine? Schumer's handpicked candidates in Arizona, Iowa, Kansas, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, New Mexico and Texas are also on the list. What about Charles Booker in Kentucky? Don't make me laugh. They never endorse progressives fighting for fundamental change against establishment shills.

Among their House candidates, they think "ex"-Republican Blue Dog Tom O'Halleran is a better pick than Eva Putzova, whose entire career has been about reform! How about their endorsement of New Dem Eliot Engel instead of Jamaal Bowman? That should tell you how grassroots and legit they are! Another worthless Blue Dog-- Kendra Horn (OK City)-- got their nod instead of reformer Tom Guild. By the way, Guild and Putzova have been fighting for DC statehood while Horn and O'Halleran are among the tiny handful of House Democrats who refuse to co-sponsor the pending statehood bill.

The scam operation has also jumped into the New Hampshire gubernatorial primary that pits the kind of establishment hack "End Citizens United" loves against the kind of reformer they fear. They endorsed a pro-corporate money-- at least for himself-- Democrat, Dan Feltes instead of the guy who actually wants to end Citizens United, Andru Volinsky. It's worth noting that the "End Citizens United operation in New Hampshire is headed by Jeff Taylor, whose brother, Nick Taylor, is Feltes' campaign manager. But, more important is a look at how sleazy Feltes has been about campaign finance reform. He's exactly as crooked as "End Citizens United" itself!

Gubernatorial candidate Dan Feltes is running ads on Facebook that claim “he isn't taking corporate PAC or LLC contributions, so the public can be sure their governor is working for them-- not himself.”

That message is consistent with Feltes’ record in the state Senate, where he’s sponsored bills to outlaw corporate campaign donations and to limit political activities of limited liability corporations.

But a review of Feltes’ campaign filings show that in his run for governor, he’s collected thousands of dollars from political action committees tied to industries like banking, real estate, car dealers, trial attorneys, doctors, and dentists. Gambling interests, several Concord lobbying firms, and corporate entities like Federal Express and Liberty Utilities also show up as campaign donors in his filings.

Feltes’s campaign has also taken advantage of what he’s derided as “the LLC loophole” by banking cash from three LLCs controlled by Ben Kelley, his own campaign treasurer. Kelley used the LLC loophole to donate $11,200 to Feltes’ campaign over the course of the past year. The per-person legal limit is $7,000, though wealthy donors can skirt that limit by donating additional money through LLCs. Three of those contributions, from three separate Kelley-linked LLCs-- Jarbel Realty LLC, 21 Perley Street LLC and JP Irving LLC-- came into the campaign on the same day last November.

The source of the money could only be pieced together by cross-checking LLC registration filings with campaign finance reports. And the donations to Feltes’s campaign-- by his campaign's own treasurer-- are the precise sort of arrangement Feltes himself has decried as undercutting “transparency and accountability” in how campaigns are funded.

Feltes, a Democrat, has made ending the loophole a centerpiece of his criticism of Gov. Chris Sununu, the incumbent he’s seeking to replace in November. In July, when Sununu vetoed Feltes’ most recent attempt (and his third in three years) to limit the ability of individuals to use multiple LLCs to funnel money to candidates, on the grounds it would limit speech, Feltes was quick to chastise.

“The people of New Hampshire should know who is funding elections,” Feltes, the Senate majority leader, said at the time. “Unfortunately today Governor Sununu sided with corporate special interests rather than Granite State voters.”

This week, the Feltes campaign offered varying explanations for the discrepancy between his campaign finance records, his advertising claims and his apparent change of heart on the role of corporate and LLC money in New Hampshire politics. In response to inquiries from NHPR Thursday, his campaign said it was returning up to $11,000 in LLC and other corporate contributions received after his official campaign announcement-- Sept. 3, 2019-- but would keep those collected before that date.

“People are increasingly concerned about corporate money in politics,” Feltes said in a statement to NHPR Thursday. “Which is why in this campaign we are not accepting corporate contributions, we’ve returned any and all such contributions received to date.”

Later in the day, Feltes campaign manager Nick Taylor said the collection of corporate and LLC donations was, in fact, intentional: “The reality is, we made a decision at the start of this campaign to not unilaterally disarm and tie one hand behind our back,” he said. Taylor did not explain how that view squared with Feltes’ multiple efforts to outlaw LLC loophole contributions over the years.

The video of Andru Volinsky tearing up an unsolicited corporate PAC check (directly above) wasn't good enough or compelling enough for the End Citizens United grifters. But I guess this was just fine for them:

Blue America's First June Endorsement-- Andru Volinsky For Governor

Blue America hasn't endorsed many candidates for governor this year. Governors, like senators, tend to be a little too establishment, a little too conservative-- and not leaders so much as managers. We just added a third-- Andru Volinsky of New Hampshire-- to our short list. This is for a late primary, September 8, in which Andru is being opposed by a establishment conservative Dan Feltes, a weak, tepid, dishonest and utterly useless minority leader of the state Senate. The winner will face off against GOP incumbent Chris Sununu. Bernie hasn't endorsed many candidates for governor either, but Volinksky was a sure bet for him too.

“Real change comes from the bottom up, not the top down,” Sanders said in the news release announcing the endorsement. “This is why we need candidates who champion the people and the issues at every level, in every state.”

Calling Volinsky a “progressive beacon in New Hampshire,” the news release cites his work as an attorney advocating for more equitable school funding and efforts on public-sector pensions and health care premiums.

"It is my honor and privilege to be endorsed by the next president of the United States, Bernie Sanders," Volinsky said in a statement emailed Thursday morning. "I endorsed Bernie Sanders for president twice because he’s been fighting for decades against the corrupting influence of money in politics, for robust public education funding, commuter rail, climate action, healthcare access, and addressing income inequality."

I was impressed at the way Volinsky has been taking on Sununu already, by, for example, calling for masks to be required by businesses for customers and employees, something Sununu refuses to do. Unlike the weak-knee-ed and complacent Feltes, Volinsky has been fearless when it comes to taking on Sununu, who he referred to as a "fake" and a "coward" for his power grab in spending COVID federal funds.

Governor Veto has blocked 57 bills passed by the legislature, many of them bipartisan, 4 times as many as any other governor, including renewable energy/net metering, campaign finance reform, independent redistricting, raising the minimum wage, paid family leave... Feltes is still too scared to take him on directly. Volinsky can beat this guy; Feitis doesn't have any chance at all in November.

New Hampshire has towns now with no science teachers, even no elementary schools, because of their wack ass tax system that relies exclusively on property taxes. There is no income tax and there are no sales taxes. If you ask me, Andru is running for governor primarily because he sued the state in 1997 in what was known  as the landmark "Claremont decision" which said the state has a broken taxation and funding system that shortchanges children who live in property-poor towns. Since that time,  governors of both parties have refused to reform the taxation system, agreeing with what's known in New Hampshire as "The Pledge" meaning you will NEVER consider a broadbased tax-- neither income nor sales. Any Democrat who doesn't take "The Pledge" scares the hell out of the establishment which assumes it's a political loser. Feltes, of course, eagerly took The Pledge. Andru Volinsky is even prouder to have not and it is a quality Blue America ultimately judges progressive candidates on: political courageousness. I asked André to address it when introducing himself. Please read on and then consider contributing to his campaign by clicking on the Blue America 2020 gubernatorial thermometer above.


I'll Bring Progressive, Principled Leadership to NH
-by Andru Volinsky





The COVID-19 pandemic has created waves of fear and uncertainty across New Hampshire. It’s also exposed just how important governors are. Too often, progressives have overlooked the importance of State Houses. With redistricting just around the corner, New Hampshire offers the best opportunity for Democrats to win back a state house. Governors make life or death decisions and they are the best bulwark to stand up against President Trump. The current governor of New Hampshire, Chris Sununu, is part of a political dynasty. His father was governor and President George H.W. Bush’s chief of staff, a position he used to single-handedly stall progress on climate change. His brother was a senator while another brother works at a climate denial think tank. And Sununu has his sights set on a U.S. Senate seat in 2022 challenging Senator Maggie Hassan. Progressives must do everything we can to stop him now.

As the only candidate for governor endorsed by Bernie Sanders so far in 2020, I believe the only way we win this race is by having the courage to lead. I went to a struggling high school in Levittown, Pennsylvania, a town where the mill failed. I watched my father work as a mechanic and maintenance man. I am still the only person in my family to attend college, which I did on scholarship and by working as a carpenter. I became a lawyer and worked against the death penalty because I wanted to make a difference and fight for justice.

I became the lead lawyer in the Claremont School Funding Case, which in 1997 established a constitutional right to an adequate state-funded public education for every child in New Hampshire. Because our state has no sales or income tax, we rely solely on ever crushing property taxes to fund education. Because too many state leaders live in fear of reforming our broken revenue system, the state isn’t living up to its responsibilities. And we’re passing down more fear to the next generation, which already has the deck stacked against them. In Berlin, a struggling town in the North Country, I met a 4th grader named Aurora who wants to be a doctor. She’s already behind her peers who live in districts funded by property-rich ski hill mansions because Berlin has no chemistry teachers. I won’t take what’s known in New Hampshire as “The Pledge” to never change our revenue system, because we need an honest conversation about our tax structure, which will never change as long as we lack the courage to challenge the conventional wisdom both parties adhere to.

Here’s another place we need more courage: the corrupting influence of money in politics. Too many politicians, Republican and Democratic alike, fear losing re-election if they don’t sell out to the highest bidder. They exploit the LLC loophole that here in New Hampshire, allows wealthy individuals to contribute more than the individual limit through multiple limited liability companies. I’m running my campaign in a different way: tearing up corporate checks from companies trying to buy my vote. I’ve never had to return corporate or LLC checks from this campaign, because I’ve refused them in the first place. I’m the only candidate to specifically take the No Fossil Fuel Money pledge and sadly the only candidate who opposes dangerous fracked-gas pipelines like the controversial Granite Bridge pipeline. For my stance against pipelines, I earned the Sierra Club’s endorsement.

Governor Sununu has halted all progress in the state on important issues such as raising our woeful $7.25 minimum wage, on campaign finance reform, independent redistricting, and renewable energy. His 57 vetoes this past term were a record for a governor. I’ve worked tirelessly to hold him accountable in my role on the Executive Council, which serves as a New Hampshire board of directors. We approve state contracts over $10,000, approve or deny nominees to state department heads and judges, and start the state’s 10-year transportation plan. I’ve vetoed Sununu’s unqualified nominees to environmental posts who had no plan for addressing climate change (Peter Kujawski), and who claimed fracking was environmentally safe (Michael Vose). I’ve kept Attorney General Gordon MacDonald, who had no experience as a judge and a 30-year documented history of antagonism toward reproductive rights, from being New Hampshire’s Chief Justice for our Supreme Court. And where I’ve been unable to veto Frank Edelblut, our equivalent of Betsy DeVos who is in charge of education, I’ve been able to deny him a raise and keep him from using grants to open new charter schools at the expense of our already-struggling public schools.

Here’s the truth: New Hampshire can raise its embarrassingly low $7.25 minimum wage to at least $15 an hour. New Hampshire can be a leader in ushering in new jobs in solar and wind, and retraining fossil fuel workers- i.e. the Green New Deal. New Hampshire can make healthcare more affordable, make voting by mail accessible to all, and become a place that retains young people. It’s time for political courage: it’s the only way we’ll beat Sununu and stop his rise. Bernie won New Hampshire twice by sticking to his vision and I know with your help and support, we can elect a progressive governor here.

71 Pro-Labor Candidates Just Filed to Run in West Virginia…Together

At the very end of last year, reporting for the American Prospect, David Dayen explained why he thinks the West Virginia gubernatorial election is the most important race in the country, with "implications that endure the farthest into the future." Dayen wrote that the election "just might inaugurate a new kind of people-centered politics in the heart of what’s assumed to be Trump country... Smith’s bet, that building a people’s movement will generate a deeper well of support to take back West Virginia from a corrupt political structure, would be transformational. It would deliver a roadmap for how to organize in rural towns thought to be lost to the right wing forever. It would identify how to bring in infrequent voters who have given up on politics. It would lay out how to break a corrupt establishment and return government to its people, on principles that bring people together rather than driving them apart. If this can work, it opens up an entirely new style of politics, one rooted in something so simple it’s absurd that it seems so novel: respecting the wishes and needs of the electorate. 'My whole life, I’ve been told that voters are the problem, they vote against their own interests,' Smith says. 'We believe the opposite. Voters are the answer to the problem, not the problem themselves. We think the people closest to the problem should solve it.'"

In 2019 we endorsed Stephen Smith for governor of West Virginia and introduced you to the West Virginia Can't Wait movement. That movement has almost morphed into a political party now, replacing the moribund state Democratic Party, which is little more than a political machine for Joe Manchin. "This has never happened before in our nation," Stephen told me a couple of days ago, "let alone in a place like West Virginia. The wealthy Good Old Boys hate it. But there aren’t nearly enough of them to stop us if we join together and demand what West Virginia has never had before: government by and for our people, not just the powerful."

I asked Stephen to expand those sentiments into a guest post. Please read it-- and if you like what he has to say, consider contributing to his campaign by clicking on the 2020 Blue America gubernatorial thermometer above. David Dayen is right about how important this race really could be for the whole country.

Guest Post
-by Stephen Smith

Two years ago, West Virginia educators sparked a nationwide strike movement. Now, the state’s working class is leading the nation again. On Saturday, a coalition called West Virginia Can’t Wait gathered more than 200 supporters outside the state House chambers to announce that 71 candidates.

Candidates include 11 teachers and school service personnel, like Brittney Barlett (an English teacher running for Delegate in Lewis County) and Johnny Nick Hager (a school bus driver running for Mingo County Commission). Tina Russell is a Black social worker who’s running against an incumbent who suggested that if he discovered his children were gay, he would drown them. Rosemary Ketchum is running a vibrant grassroots campaign for Wheeling City Council; when she wins, she will become the first openly transgender person to hold elected office in West Virginia. The vast majority of candidates are running for the first time.

In a state where less than 20 percent of the legislature are women, less than 10 percent are working class, and less than 5 percent are people of color, the West Virginia Can’t Wait candidates represent the state across race, county, gender, and class lines. And every one of them has signed a pledge, which was read on Saturday at the Capitol by Congressional candidate Cathy Kunkel: “I promise not to take corporate cash… I promise never to cross a picket line… I promise never to hide from a debate… I promise never to punch down.”

Dozens of the WV Can’t Wait candidates filed for office at the Capitol, posing for photos with friends and family who never could have imagined being in this spot. “I’ve never been to the Capitol. I didn’t know where I was supposed to go. But I knew I needed to fight for a state where my kid could grow up and make a living,” said veteran David Childers, a first-time candidate for the state senate in the rural 14th district.

Candidates also delivered their “People’s State of the State” address, unveiling the WV Can’t Wait policy platform which had been crowd-sourced during 156 Town Halls. 47 “Platform Parties” and more than 11,000 face-to-face conversations with voters. It includes the first state-level Wealth Tax in the nation, a massive shift from corporate tax giveaways to local businesses and entrepreneurship, full cannabis legalization, aggressive caps on drug prices, public financing of elections, and more-- 32 plans in all, which are being rolled out at wvcantwait.com.

Delegate Danielle Walker, from the 51st House District, was one of 8 candidates who delivered part of the People’s State of the State.

“We will choose the side of miners, by granting a state Black Lung Pension Fund and a jobs guarantee. We will choose the side of women, and advance the nation’s most ambitious guarantee of child care, health care, education, reproductive rights, and economic opportunity. We will choose the side of Black and Brown people, and pass the nation’s most ambitious plan to end mass incarceration and attack the racial discrimination that persists in education, hiring, and health care. We will choose the side of the LGBTQ+ community, and pass the nation’s strongest EHNDA laws, ban conversion therapy, and recognize the dignity of every human being. We will choose the side of homeless people, fighting for a homes guarantee. We will choose the side of veterans by guaranteeing not only higher education and job opportunities, but also our country’s most ambitious mental health care plan, a veterans nursing home in Beckley, and a tax credit for those who have served. And we will choose the side of people with disabilities, by clearing the IDD/Waiver waiting list, ending discrimination in pay and transportation, implementing the Olmstead Act, and growing a disability jobs program.” (View other detailed plans on small business, wages, the overdose crisis, and more at wvcantwait.com.)

The WV Can’t Wait strategy is having some early successes. In addition to recruiting and training 71 candidates and defining many of the key issues in the race, many of those candidates are getting early traction. In my own race, we have an early lead in the polls and we have outraised every other candidate in the race-- on both sides of the aisle! Our campaign has more than doubled the previous record for small dollar donations in a West Virginia governor’s race.

Movements are not led by candidates… those people get the most credit. But they are not the ones who sacrifice the most or work the hardest. The most crucial leaders in any movement are the people who do the most work for the least recognition. These people come from every walk of life, but they tend to be mostly women, mostly working class, mostly young people. These people sacrifice what’s most precious to them-- money, security, time with their families-- because they believe in something bigger than any one of us. Our movement is no different. This is the first union campaign staff in West Virginia history.

West Virginia’s primary is May 12th. Follow the West Virginia Can’t Wait movement at facebook.com/wvcantwait.

Saturday Night Live Has It's Fingers Crossed, But Does Arkansas Deserve Governor Sarah Huckabee?

Most Americans see Sarah Huckabee Sanders as a professional liar. She’s a regular Saturday Night Live character always sure to earn some laughs. But if her native state of Arkansas, people see her not as a pathetic liar and a walking joke, but as their next governor. When Trumpanzee accepted her resignation, he suggested she run for governor or one of the poorest and least educated states in the country. The daughter of governor, she was already looking into that by then.

Today CBS News reported that her team had already polled the state and found it a slam dunk— both in the GOP primary and in the general election. Remember, Arkansas is now one of the reddest states in the union. Trump beat the state’s former First Lady in 2016, 684,872 (60.5%) to 380,494 (33.6%) Hillary won only 8 of the state’s 75 counties. The PVI is R+15, even worse than Alabama and Tennessee. Once of the bluest states in the Union, only Republicans get elected there now and the Democratic Party is moribund and withered. Of the 35 state senators, just 9 are Democrats and the House is now 76 Republican to 24 Democrats. The state’s entire delegation to Washington is also Republican.

CBS News reported that “The results of the poll, conducted several weeks ago, showed Sanders ‘crushing’ any potential Republican rivals, including current Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin who has been eyeing a run, according to sources. Those close to Sanders confirm she is ‘seriously considering’ a run for political office, and specifically the governor's seat after Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson's term ends. However, Sanders is adamant she will not make a final decision on whether to run for the seat that her father Mike Huckabee once for at least two years. The next gubernatorial race will be in 2022… If Sanders does decide to run for governor in 2022, she would have the support of President Trump and a network of formidable supporters waiting in the wings.” By then Trump is likely to be out of the White House and likely to be dealing with legal problems.

"Huckabee is still a magic name in Arkansas," said Rollins, who was President Ronald Reagan's campaign manager in the 1984 election and is currently co-chairman of the pro-Trump Great America PAC. "If she wants to run she will be tough to beat."

"She has 100% name ID, the strong backing of the president and deep ties back home," Raj Shah, Sanders' former principal deputy press secretary, told CBS News. "She would be an instant frontrunner the moment she jumped into the race."

"And having worked alongside her, I've seen her unique ability to connect and carry a message. Sarah would be very hard to beat," he added.

Leading up to Sanders' decision to leave the White House, the president had been asking Sanders whether she was going to run for governor, and had even playfully started calling her "governor."

Griffin, the current lieutenant governor and a likely 2022 gubernatorial candidate, has been angrily calling contacts in Washington and Arkansas, fuming over Sander's possible entrance into the race, according to sources who have received his calls.

"There are probably a number of Democrats who would love to step up and challenge Sarah Huckabee Sanders if she was going to be the nominee," state Democratic Party Chairman Michael John Gray told the Associated Press.

Sanders last day at the White House will be at the end of June. The very next day,  she and her young family will return home to Arkansas.

How Can California Help West Virginia?

Glad you asked. As you may know, the only gubernatorial candidate endorsed by Blue America so far this cycle is dedicated populist Stephen Smith. If that name is new to you, here's the guest post he did for us a month ago. In the post he tried to shatter common misconceptions about his state. "Some of you," he wrote "think we 'vote against our own interests.' But Good Old Boy Democrats held power here for 82 years, while wages fell, jobs vanished, and our divorce, obesity, and overdose rates soared. We’re not wrong to question whether the party has had our interests at heart. Some of you think we’re backwards. But it was our teachers and school service personnel who sparked a nationwide strike movement last year. And this February, our educators walked out again-- this time to reject an “education reform” bill that would have paid them the raise they were after-- because they knew the bill would make things worse for our kids by privatizing schools. Some of you call our home Trump Country. But more of us opted not to vote in 2016 than voted for the President. A 2017 poll of likely voters revealed that we favor Bernie over Trump, 48 to 46 percent. In West Virginia, we are rejecting a political establishment that rejected us long ago. We’re not foolish. We’re fed up."

Rumors are rampant-- both in West Virginia and in DC-- that conservative Democrat Joe Manchin will be announcing for governor next month. He doesn't have to give up his Senate seat to run and if he wins, he gets to pick the next senator (for about 9 months when there will be a special election a Republican would likely win). Manchin might beat Republican Jim Justice in a general election, but it would be a lot harder for him to win a Democratic primary against Stephen Smith. Smith is running one of the most exciting 2020 statewide campaigns in the country.

While Smith has his sights set on the governor’s mansion, the progressive-populist campaign he’s running isn’t just about that. Smith is setting out to build a statewide movement; his gubernatorial run is just the anchor.

“What we’re interested in is fundamentally changing who the government works for, and you can’t do that with one candidate, no matter what the office is,” Smith said in a phone interview with The Intercept. “So the way we do that-- the way we win that-- is by building an unprecedented political infrastructure in our state’s history.”

Operating with the battle cry of “West Virginia Can’t Wait,” the campaign is setting out to create a pipeline of progressive, working-class candidates to defeat the “good old boys.” The plan isn’t to get a new governor “and pat ourselves on the back,” Smith said.

The result is a broad political organizing effort: locally organized groups led by local “captains” and leaders dubbed “Constituency Captains” who volunteer to mobilize their communities. “This movement will be built by 1,000 leaders, not one,” says the campaign’s website. Key to these efforts are the small donors, who made up the rolls that broke the secretary of state’s software.

Smith won't identify himeself as a 'progressive.' Yet his campaign draws inspiration from the Battle of Blair Mountain, an armed uprising of coal miners in West Virginia, widely considered to be the largest labor rebellion in American history. “In 1921, West Virginia mineworkers-- black, white, and immigrant-- marched together on Blair Mountain against corporate rule,” says a video [above] on Smith’s campaign site. “They wore red bandanas to identify themselves in battle.”

The video cuts to a West Virginia Can’t Wait event where red bandanas are being handed out, then showing a crowd of onlookers with the kerchiefs around their necks.

Though stopping short of taking up arms, Smith in fact takes a host of standard progressive positions. He is emphatic about rejecting corporate cash, unapologetically supports a single-payer health care system, and is in favor of free college. But he refers to his ground game as a “people’s campaign.” The outlook is based on the fundamental belief that the everyday people of West Virginia are far better suited to solve their problems than the out-of-state lobbyists, out-of-state landowners, and monopolies that dominate the state. Smith said, “Our government would work a whole lot better for all of us if all of us were in charge, instead of a handful of lobbyists.”

It’s not an exaggeration. In January, Justice, the Republican governor, handpicked a registered lobbyist who represents his own family’s companies to replace former state Sen. Richard Ojeda, an aggressively pro-labor Democrat who left his seat for a short-lived presidential run. Justice, who campaigned in 2016 as a political outsider, is the wealthiest person in West Virginia. He inherited his coal mining business from his father, which allowed him to build a massive business empire of more than 100 companies.

It was Justice who gave the Republican Party nearly full control of West Virginia, long a bastion of southern Democratic support that has turned increasingly red on the state level. Justice had switched to the Democratic Party to run for governor, only to switch back to the GOP less than seven months after taking office.

Smith’s campaign wants to turn the governor’s mansion blue again, despite the fact that West Virginia handed Donald Trump his second largest margin of victory in the 2016 presidential race. The state is not inherently red, Smith’s team contends, and their anti-establishment message paves a plausible path to victory. After all, it’s the same state that voted for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primary.

“What we’re seeing all across the country is that the government is failing our people and both parties are failing our people,” Smith said. “Our people are picking up the baton and saying, ‘You know what, we can govern ourselves.’”

West Virginia Can't Wait, the campaign, formally launched at the end of November 2018 and has since held 12 kickoff events across the state. But the campaign doesn’t want Smith to be the face of the movement; the movement is supposed to transcend a single candidate and build a lasting infrastructure of political power.

The roadmap is simple: Organize locally, recruit local candidates who know their neighbors’ needs, and run those candidates in local races. So far, Smith’s campaign has recruited an estimated 56 candidates and potential candidates who are mulling a run in 2020. They have their sights set on positions like city council memberships, magistrate judge seats, county commissioners, and delegates. Their candidate pipeline includes people who are ready to go-- and have their campaign website set already-- to others who are considering running for office for the first time and want go to a training to get a sense of what it takes.

Smith’s campaign will train candidates and their campaign staff. Perhaps most crucially, West Virginia Can’t Wait will grant these smaller campaigns access to their team and join them on the trail, opening up town halls and events to the local candidates.

“When the election rolls around, the 10 volunteers that you’re recruiting for your city council race combined with the 10 I’m getting from the governor’s race and the 10 someone else is getting for the delegate’s race means that we all have 40, instead of 10 each,” Smith said.

The other part of their strategy is to get at least two “County Captains” in each of the state’s 55 counties, a position intended to act as a community organizer rather than a campaign spokesperson. West Virginia Can’t Wait has recruited and trained more than 160 people to work as County Captains, who are then responsible for building their own volunteer team within the county.

Those county teams will receive support from the statewide campaign but will be given the latitude to craft their approaches to specific local issues and concerns. West Virginia Can’t Wait has laid out a number of steps toward this end: County teams are to identify local issues by talking to at least 1,000 voters; plan events and actions; recruit and train additional volunteers; identify community members who might want to run for office as part of a slate; and run a get-out-the-vote operation leading up to the primary and general elections.

Another prong of the organizing calls for “Constituency Captains” to build support within their communities, the campaign says. These organizers-- distinct from the “county” organizing groups because they instead find likeminded individuals-- are to develop an online presence, host meetups, plan public events, and recruit candidates from their crew.

“It’s more a movement than a campaign, to be honest with you, for the simple fact that he’s trying to get everybody involved in his campaign, such as the Muslim community, the youth, the African American community, the LGBTQ community, anybody and everybody,” said Ibtesam Barazi, who has a long history of advocating for immigrant and refugee rights in West Virginia and is an adviser to the campaign as well as a captain of the Muslim constituency team.

It isn't Jim Justice that frightens Manchin. It's Stephen Smith... and his movement. Please consider clicking on the thermometer on the right to contribute to the movement/campaign. "The West Virginia Can't Wait campaign," wrote Aída Chávez for The Intercept last month, "is building on a renaissance of populism. 'West Virginia has a long and deep history of bottom-up politics and distrust for both parties,' Smith said. 'And that energy was not invented by our campaign. It was invented, you know, a hundred years ago during the Mine Wars. And people have kept connected to it and building our state off of it for a long time.' The campaign is seeking to harness the momentum of a major organizing feat last year: a wildcat teachers’ strike. Thousands of public school teachers and staffers across the state had launched an illegal nine-day strike to rebel against years of stagnant wages, poor working conditions, and privatization of the school system. During the work stoppage, Smith joined a handful of other organizers in setting up a support fund to help the teachers and school service personnel make ends meet, raising more than $332,000, mostly from small donations. Not only did teachers win concessions, but the teachers’ victories helped spark a wave of strikes across Republican-led states, including Arizona, Kentucky, and Oklahoma. The resurgence of Appalachian populism might cut both ways: Many analysts think Trump’s election and the Republican takeover of the state legislature suggest that West Virginians are increasingly turning more conservative. Smith disagrees, suggesting that the problems that have left so many West Virginians behind are evident in both parties: “More people stayed home in 2016 than voted for the president in West Virginia.” He also cited polling that has found West Virginians prefer Sanders over Trump. According to a survey a Sanders pollster conducted in late 2017, the Vermont senator would beat Trump by 2 percentage points in the state."

Smith’s wariness of more centrist, establishment-oriented Democrats could become the major theme of his primary race. Sen. Joe Manchin, one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress and frequent Trump ally, may yet jump into the governor’s race: He told Politico earlier this month that he’s thinking about running for the “best job in the world” and will make a decision sometime this fall.

Smith’s supporters note Manchin did a similar dance in 2016 and ultimately decided against trying to get into the governor’s mansion. Manchin barely won his Senate reelection last year-- the toughest race of his career-- against GOP Attorney General Patrick Morrisey. And despite Manchin’s decisive victory in the primary, that race offered a ray of hope for campaigns like Smith’s: The incumbent senator’s progressive primary challenger, Paula Jean Swearengin, pulled in 30 percent of the vote despite having a fraction of the name recognition and campaign cash. National politics might, however, keep Manchin out of the governor’s race entirely: In 2020, he would be giving up a seat that’s crucial to the Democratic Party’s uphill battle of retaking the Senate.

Smith is visiting family in California next week and former West Virginians here are hosting five FREE events for people to get to meet him in person.

• June 18 in L.A.
• June 20 in Santa Monica
• June 22 in San Francisco (morning)
• June 22 in Portola Valley (afternoon)
• June 22 in San Francisco (evening)

Blue America's First Gubernatorial Endorsement Of 2020: Stephen Smith, West Virginia

West Virginia gubernatorial candidate Stephen Smith is a West Virginia native, lifelong organizer, and public servant. And, as of today, Blue America's first endorsed candidate for governor for the 2020 election cycle. Last year, WV Living magazine named Stephen "West Virginian of the Year" for his consistent work in fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with poor and working families as the Director of the West Virginia Healthy Kids and Families Coalition. He grew up in a tight-knit West Virginia family, one that had the means to support him to attend college at Harvard University. His experience at school quickly taught him about our rigged economic system-- and about how to fight for change. He tells us that the hallmark of his time at college was helping to organize a 21-day student sit-in that brought about a living wage for Harvard janitors, food service workers, and security guards. His track record has extended from there.

After moving back to his hometown in 2012, and prior to his bid for Governor, Stephen helped to build dozens of powerful local and statewide institutions. Under his leadership at the Healthy Kids and Families Coalition, the group organized hundreds of rural development projects and more than two dozen successful issue campaigns. When the national teachers strike started in West Virginia in 2018, Stephen helped build a Strike Fund that raised and distributed $332,000 to teachers and their families.

Smith, with his nose-to-the-grindstone work ethic, is running a massive field operation against the richest man in West Virginia, Jim Justice. A Trumpist coal baron and casino owner known for literally sitting down on the job. Justice, who was elected as a fake Democrat only to switch to the GOP almost immediately, was recently dubbed Forbes Magazine’s Deadbeat Billionaire.

Today, the stage is set. And don’t be fooled; West Virginia is a place that is ripe for revolution. Not only did the Teachers Strike start in West Virginia; Bernie outpolls Trump 48-46 in the Mountain State. When West Virginians voted in 2016, they didn’t pick a party, they picked a fight. And Smith and his team are poised to channel that righteous outrange into a winning people’s campaign. As Smith says, "we’ve done it before." In fact, the thing we like most about Smith’s campaign is its connection to successful, multi-racial rebellions of the past: namely West Virginia's rich labor history. Check out his unique, inspiring campaign video above. If you’re not sold yet, keep an eye out for the more than 59 candidates who Smith and his team have already recruited as a part of a West Virginia Can’t Wait candidate pipeline. That’s right, the Smith team is building a slate to run alongside Stephen. West Virginia is preparing for the contest of a generation. Here’s our chance to get in and show solidarity.


Why I’m Running
-by Stephen Smith, stephen@wvcantwait.com

You can feel it. This is a moment. Every 50 years or so, the nation turns to West Virginia for leadership. The American revolution started here. The Civil War, the Mine Wars, the Teachers’ Strike-- it is in our blood to fight for our people, no matter their race, their accent, or who their father was.

My name is Stephen Smith and I’m running for Governor, because I want my sons to know whose side I was on.

West Virginians may have the least, but we give the most. In West Virginia, we always hear that we’re last. But we are near the top for charitable giving, for military service, for volunteer service. We’re #1 in the amount of time we spend with our neighbors.

That’s the kind of family I grew up in-– my dad helped start the WV Coalition for the Homeless and the Public Defender Services. My mom made our house the kind of place that always had extra people in it-- foster kids, neighbors, family members who were between jobs.

I took the values I learned at home to Harvard and raised hell for working families. For four years, students and workers fought together, and we won a living wage for the janitors, cooks, and security guards. Since then, I’ve spent my career shoulder to shoulder with people who are fighting for their dignity. Seven years ago, my wife Sara and I chose to move home to West Virginia, because we wanted to raise our family in a place that cares more about who you serve than what you own.

The West Virginia organization I led for the last six years helped pass more than two dozen pieces of legislation, using old fashioned people power: health insurance for 182,000, a raise in the minimum wage, 5.2 million more school breakfasts annually. Meanwhile we lifted-up more than 300 community projects. We helped build gardens, after-school programs, and small businesses. All this happened not because of me, or because we had a lot of money, but because we knew that no one is more capable or more creative than the people who are closest to a problem.

The idea of this campaign is simple: what if the values of generosity, common sense, and courage that guided our neighborhoods also governed our statehouse?

This is the richest time in West Virginia history. Our people deserve to have the best roads and safest water we have ever had. We deserve universal, single payer health care and child care and higher education for all. We deserve an economy rigged in favor of unions, small businesses, artists, family farms, and local entrepreneurs – not out-of-state landowners and monopolies.

I’m running because the only way we get that kind of government is if we take it. No outside company or billionaire politician will save us.

We need a thousand leaders, not one.

Here’s the thing. The people of West Virginia are not America’s problem. We are her solution.

Some of you think we “vote against our own interests.” But Good Old Boy Democrats held power here for 82 years, while wages fell, jobs vanished, and our divorce, obesity, and overdose rates soared. We’re not wrong to question whether the party has had our interests at heart.

Some of you think we’re backwards. But it was our teachers and school service personnel who sparked a nationwide strike movement last year. And this February, our educators walked out again-- this time to reject an “education reform” bill that would have paid them the raise they were after-- because they knew the bill would make things worse for our kids by privatizing schools.

Some of you call our home Trump Country. But more of us opted not to vote in 2016 than voted for the President. A 2017 poll of likely voters revealed that we favor Bernie over Trump, 48 to 46 percent. In West Virginia, we are rejecting a political establishment that rejected us long ago.

We’re not foolish. We’re fed up.

And we’re taking action. Never in American history has a single person or politician won the sort of change we need and deserve. It has always required a movement, not a savior. That’s what we are building in West Virginia. It is called West Virginia Can’t Wait, and we need your help. Our movement already recruited and trained 160 County Captains across all 55 Counties-- who have executed 65 kickoffs and town halls, and more than 270 additional meetings in food pantries, clinics, small businesses, churches, and union halls.

We have recruited more than 120 Constituency Captains, who are leading 37 constituency teams-- Veterans Can’t Wait, Students Can’t Wait, Seniors Can’t Wait, LGBTQ Can’t Wait, Educators Can’t Wait People in Recovery Can’t Wait, and so on. Their building independent political power across the state, while also preparing us to govern. Because the people who are closest to the problem are also best equipped to solve it.

Finally, our movement is also recruiting candidates up and down the ballot who reject corporate cash and pledge never to cross a picket line. There are 57 in our pipeline, and we are adding more each week. We offer these mostly first-time, mostly women candidates free training, access to our network and staff, and the power of running together.

You need money to run for office. And our fundraising works. We raised more than $152,000 in our first quarter and literally broke the Secretary of State’s on-line software system because our file upload of individual donations was too large to handle. Furthermore, we have pledged that at least 1 out of every $10 we raise in this campaign will be spent on real projects that improve lives before election day-- so that voters get to know us by our actions, and not just our words.

I’ve never achieved anything in my life by myself, and I’m not starting now. I hope you’ll join us. West Virginia can’t wait.

Only Bernie Sanders Can Keep Ohio From Trump Again

-by Tim Russo

Listen....oooh wah oooh

Some folks know I used to have a pretty good Dem rolodex. Thus, in summer 2016 I tried in vain to raise the alarm with the highest-up Democrats I could reach, for months, that Ohio was trending heavily Trump. As a leading indicator in presidential elections my entire lifetime, Ohio trending Trump meant the entire Midwest was trending Trump, too. The response was always the same, "Ha! Eat it Bernie Bro! So what. We don't need Ohio."

Now, Ohio is most definitely Trump country, just as it was Obama country the previous two presidential elections. Trump's ugly chaos is at least...change. Swing voters, but especially non-voters in Ohio, have wanted dramatic change, of any kind, since the crash of 2008 (remember that? Ohio sure does). Ohio knows the game is rigged, knows who rigged it, and as Democrats flail away at their Putin matroshka dolls denying the reality before their own eyes, it is folly to think an establishment Democrat, even any Democrat, will deliver the change Ohio has been demanding for a decade. Absent a non-Democrat (read, Bernie Sanders) seizing the Democratic Party in 2020 the way Jeremy Corbyn has seized Labour in the UK, Ohio will no doubt re-elect Trump, who even though he's con-man's con, at least fucks shit up good.

Do you want to know a secret? oooh wah oooh

For decades, the Ohio Democratic Party has zombie-walked in Clintonian Third Way pointlessness as if they think no one notices. Five days before the 2018 midterm, Ohio U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown, cruising to re-election, reverted to his factory setting of knifing the left in the back once he knows his paycheck is secure. On Nov. 1, Brown reversed his own position on reimposing Glass Steagall and breaking up the banks, with the added flourish of doing so to CNBC. Cherry on top, Sherrod's Pulitzer prize winning wife no doubt immediately put her inside game spin into overdrive to keep her husband's total surrender to capital safely, deeply buried in an unread CNBC transcript. No headlines. No op-eds. No trending post at DailyKos. No pearl clutching MSNBC roundtables with Nicolle Wallace or Joy Ann Reid. Just fealty to Wall Street fundraising safely assured from the self-proclaimed guardian of Ohio's left. Off to Iowa!

If Brown's 2018 opponent Jim Rennaci had two brain cells to rub together, he'd have pummeled Sherrod to pieces on this about face in favor of keeping the game rigged. Alas, Sherrod Brown has been for 30 years the luckiest man in Ohio politics. Brown's re-election was assured when his 2012 opponent Josh Mandel dropped out suddenly in 2018, leaving a pointless millionaire TrumpBot Jim Rennaci to attempt to unseat, against a midterm headwind, what is one of the strongest last names in the history of Ohio politics. Sherrod Brown now preens like a peacock mulling over a 2020 presidential run, Wall Street's biggest fear now certain to be unspoken in Iowa or New Hampshire. Viva La Resistance!

Give Sherrod a break. He was only aping the top of his ticket, Rich Cordray, who ran hard right every day for months via millions spent on a TV ad starring a Republican cop in uniform declaring his undying love for Rich Cordray, just like all his Republican cop friends he tells us! In a year we were told the core of the Democratic Party base is black women, as Mike Dewine ran left on medicaid, Cordray's right wing cop love was sugary frosting on the base-turnout-depressing cake baked first by shoving two women out of his gubernatorial primary. #ThemToo

Meanwhile, in Ohio's largest Democratic county, Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish worked at nothing harder in 2017-2018 than assuring himself not only no primary, but no Republican opponent in the fall. Less turnout, hooray! This, Budish achieved, by bending over for every sports billionaire demand he could find from the day he took office in 2015. Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson backed up Budish, spitting in the face of 20,000 signatures demanding a referendum on Budish's 2017 giveaway to Cavs owner Dan Gilbert. Jackson literally refused to accept the boxes in which the piles and piles of signature forms were presented.

Before Cleveland Congresswoman Marcia Fudge floated her name for House Speaker after the 2018 midterm, Fudge was instrumental in the back room guarantees to renovate Gilbert's Quicken Loans Arena at taxpayer expense. This latest sports billionaire largesse relies heavily on playoff game revenue. Anyone think the Cavs will be in the playoffs anytime soon now that Lebron James is a Laker? Taxpayers are still on the hook, alas. Marcia Fudge gets a chair's gavel.

Do you promise not to tell?

Down ballot, Ohio Democrats for decades have been a musical chairs rigged game for the sole purpose of their own state pensions. Former Cleveland City Council President and serial groper Marty Sweeney cooked up a move from City Council to state rep. a few years ago. Then, for 2018, Sweeney made an attempt to shift his pension...oops I mean public service...to the state senate. Defeated in that 2018 primary by an identity politics goldmine, Nickie Antonio (female, plus gay-- jackpot), Sweeney still cashed in by slotting his own daughter into his old state rep. seat. She's now my state representative. No one knows a damn thing she stands for, or her father stands for, or any other elected Democrat in Ohio, stands for, except their pensions.

In OH-12's heavily watched 2-round special election this midterm, Danny O'Connor still blames the Green Party for losing his utterly predictable 50-50 race, twice. Instead of moving left to make a Green Party candidate irrelevant, O'Connor aped Cordray's only other "message"-- he's cool. You see, being "cool" is supposed to be a message to the Ohio Democratic Party, just like Ted Strickland's message was something about good ol' boys in 2010. Despite knowing full well a Green would be in his race, both times, moving a single nanometer leftward was total heresy to O'Connor. Better to have the Green Party to slag off, anyway.

Not to be outdone, Youngstown Congressman Tim Ryan mulls running for president on the "yoga vote." The Zen Congressman Ryan is the most reliable NRA stooge in the entire Ohio congressional delegation, just as Cordray has been statewide, just as Ted Strickland before him. It's only a matter of time before one of the AR-15's Tim Ryan has built his congressional record defending sprays a yoga studio with the blood of innocents. Ryan must meditate in downward dog praying to his Third Eye that such a predictable horror doesn't occur before the Iowa State Fair in August, 2019.

Did I mention the Ohio Democratic Party ran a guy for governor 4 years ago who drove without a license for 10 years? Former FBI man Ed FitzGerald, whose only worse gubernatorial predecessor was the catastrophic Rob Burch of 1994, has predictably failed upward into six figures at the corporate law firm of Walter & Haverfield, doing god knows what. Immediately after 2014's meltdown, every single Ohio Democratic Party apparatchik carbuncled themselves onto the 2015 marijuana monopoly attempt not just as staff, but as shareholders-- neoliberalism! In a cut and paste of Dan Gilbert's 2009 casino gambling cash grab, ODP's great and good constitutionally attempted to seize legalized marijuana profits for themselves. Ohio's young voters ain't nobody's fool, so they mobilized to crush it. Ohio Democrats ignored that 2015 lesson, too.

  ...Ohio remains a predictive swing state.

These are just some of the reasons you hear nothing in today's media about a "blue wave" in Ohio. Ohio didn't irrevocably "turn red," Ohio was abandoned by Ohio Democrats to, for the benefit of, the rigged game. In the March 2016 Ohio primary, Hillary Clinton benefited from nothing more than Trump being on the other ticket, thereby splitting the radical change vote between Bernie Sanders and Trump. Ohio Democrats even mounted a campaign during that primary to get Bernie-leaning Democrats to switch to the Republican primary to vote for John Kasich, in what is now clearly the first pathetic attempt of Ohio Democrats to "stop Trump." Kasich's Ohio primary "win" is largely due to those Democrats. Bet Kasich himself has no idea.

Nothing establishment Democrats do will stop Trump in Ohio in 2020, unless it is Bernie Sanders forcing them to do it. Bernie is popular in Ohio and nationally, with both voters and non-voters alike, precisely because he is NOT a Democrat, who Democrats screwed over. Just like themselves. Average folks identify with Bernie for this reason, so if Bernie seizes the Democratic nomination in spite of all that, non-voters will be inspired to return to voting, and Obama-Obama-Trump voters will have someplace to go once they realize Trump's con game was no different. Unless Bernie Sanders drags the Ohio Democratic Party by their hair kicking and screaming the way Blairites do now as Corbyn inevitably approaches 10 Downing Street, the Ohio Democratic Party will once again hand Trump four years of power, con game or not.

 

Kentucky Legislature Passed A Tax Hike For 95% Of Kentuckians-- But At Least The Rich Get Cuts

Beshear and Bevin

A Democratic campaign operative friend of mine does so well that he generally gets to pick any race he wants to run and he can avoid races that have been infiltrated-- even body-snatched-- by the DCCC or EMILY’s List. And unlike them, he wins, even in long shot match-ups. He loves Kentucky-- it must be the bourbon-- and he may run Andy Beshear’s campaign for governor in 2020. Lucky for him-- and Beshear-- the Republican-dominated state legislature just handed the Democrats a winning issue. The new tax cut they passed on this week and sent to the Republican governor, Matt Bevin, Thursday reduces taxes for the rich and races it for the bottom 95%. Jeff Stein reported some reticence on the part of a wary Bevin:

The proposal arrives on the Republican governor's desk at a charged moment in Kentucky politics: The bill flew through the legislature on short notice, and thousands of teachers went to the State Capitol building earlier this week to protest cuts to their pension system.

Bevin's position on the tax overhaul, Kentucky's biggest in more than a decade, remains unknown. He said in a statement that the bill and the state budget, which was also passed by the legislature and is awaiting his signature, may not be “fiscally responsible.” Bevin has until April 13 to sign or veto the bill or send it back to the legislature with modifications.

The plan would flatten Kentucky's corporate and personal income-tax rates, setting both at 5 percent. Currently, Kentucky's corporate tax rate runs between 4 and 6 percent, while its income-tax rate ranges from 2 to 6 percent. The new flat rate of 5 percent for everyone means that small companies and Kentuckians with below-average incomes will face tax hikes, and higher earners will get tax cuts.

The bill attempts to make up for those cuts by nearly doubling the cigarette tax and imposing sales taxes on 17 additional services, including landscaping, janitorial work, golf courses and pet grooming. The state's nonpartisan legislative staff estimated the plan will, on net, raise money, although other experts are skeptical.

Residents of Kentucky, like everyone else in the country, are also affected by the federal GOP tax law passed in December. The Kentucky plan shares some characteristics of that overhaul, including the proposal to lower taxes faced by some businesses. But in contrast with the congressional GOP effort, Kentucky Republicans are aiming to avoid dramatically increasing the deficit.

That is one reason the Kentucky plan includes an expansion of the sales tax, which is expected to hit most state residents. Overall, the plan would give an average $7,000 tax cut to the richest 1 percent of Kentuckians, who average more than $1 million of annual income, according to a report released Wednesday by the nonpartisan Kentucky Center for Economic Policy. But 95 percent of the state's taxpayers would see a tax increase, and those earning between $55,000 and $92,000 a year would face the largest tax increases-- about $213 a year, the analysis found.

Meanwhile, someone earning $8 million a year-- such as John Calipari, the head coach of the University of Kentucky men's basketball team-- would receive a tax cut of close to $80,000 a year, said Jason Bailey, the executive director of the center. As a share of their income, the poorest Kentucky residents would face the biggest tax hikes, in part because of the increase in the cigarette tax, according to Bailey.

The plan would generate an additional $239 million in state revenue in 2019 and an extra $248 million in 2020, according to the legislature's nonpartisan scorekeeper.