What's Happening With Florida Today? Plus-- A Note From Matt Haggman

Politico: "The general consensus among Republicans is that they will lose the House, and end up in at least a five-seat minority-- that would correspond to a 28-seat loss. Senior Republicans tell us that even in a worst-case scenario, they do not expect to lose 40 seats. A prescient prediction or famous last words?"

Of all the senior Republican lawmakers they spoke with over the weekend, "only one made the case that the GOP will keep the House." If it's who I think it was, he was staggering drunk for the entire weekend. Many Republicans expected the House races to tighten up by election day. Instead the generic ballot polls have gotten even worse for them. The last one for CNN by SSRS shows an absolutely massive 55% to 42% preference for Democrats among likely voters. As I've said before, the pollsters' likely vote modeling is wrong because it is not taking increased Latino and millennial voting into account. Polls predicting less than 30 flipped seats will all be off by as much as 100% tonight.

Let's look at Florida. Yesterday's Marist poll shows Andrew Gillum leading Ron DeSantis in the gubernatorial race-- 50% to 46%-- and Bill Nelson leading Scott in the Senate race by the same 50% to 46%. Democrats are very lucky to have Gillum at the head of the ticket instead of dull conservative Gwen Graham, who had been the establishment candidate and who would have dragged the party down the toilet with her. But it's a shame Florida doesn't have any good congressional candidates who could ride the wave and Andrew's coattails into office. Instead, it's a bunch of DCCC-recruited backs from the Republican wing of the party-- New Dems and Blue Dogs. This is the key today: "Democrats in both races are performing better than their Republican counterparts with likely voters who are independents, minorities and women."

Stoking domestic terrorism goes over especially badly with independent voters

Results from Quinnipiac are nearly identical: seven point leads for both Gillum and Nelson, entirely because of double-digit leads for both among women, minorities and independent voters. Writing Sunday for the Miami Herald Steve Bousquet reported on the surge in early voting for Democrats. On Sunday, "Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Hillsborough and Orange, the five biggest 'blue' counties, all reported their highest one-day early voting totals of the 2018 campaign. As a result, on a day when President Donald Trump rallied thousands of Republicans in Pensacola, the GOP’s ballot advantage over the Democrats shrank to six-tenths of 1 percentage point (0.6), with GOP ballots at 40.8 percent of the statewide total and Democrats at 40.2 percent." By Monday morning Dems had a +0.5% lead over Republicans in ballots cast. In 2014 Republicans held almost a 6% lead over Dems going into election day.

So how many Democratic candidates will Gillum's coattails and the anti-red wave drag to victory in Florida today? Most of the candidates are so terrible that it's hard to say-- but even the worst of them are less horrible than the Republicans they're opposing. Donna Shalala, as bad a candidate as you'll find anywhere, will probably beat Maria Salazar in bright blue FL-27 (PVI- D+5) despite herself. Nate Silver gives her a 6 in 7 chance to win (84.7%). Next door in Carlos Curbelo's district (FL-26-- where the DCCC and Pelosi's PAC have spent $7,175,066 attacking Curbelo-- another weak Democrat, Debbie Mucarsel-Powell looks like she'll take the seat (PVI is D+6). Silver gives her a 5 in 9 chance (55.6%). The other Republican-held Miami-Dade seat, Mario Diaz-Balart's 25th district (PVI- R+4) has the best of the 3 Democratic challengers, Mary Barzee Flores, but in the toughest race. Silver gives her a 2 in 7 chance (27.8%) to beat Diaz-Balart. The wave will have had to have turned into a tsunami tonight for her to win.

Silver gives Wasserman Schultz a 99.9% chance of retaining her seat in a 3-way contest against progressive Tim Canova and some Republican sacrificial lamb, more or less the same chance Joe Crowley had in beating Congresswoman-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The only polling in the district-- by a GOP firm-- shows Wasserman Schultz exactly tied with Canova.

The DCCC has 4 other Democratic candidates on their Red to Blue page-- Nancy Soderberg (FL-06, Ron DiSantis' open seat with an R+7 PVI), Kristen Carlsen (FL-15, Dennis Ross' open seat stretching from the Tampa suburbs to the Orlando area with an R+6 PVI), David Shapiro (FL-16, Vern Buchanan's Sarasota, Bradenton seat with an R+7 PVI) and Lauren Baer (FL-18, Brian Mast's Treasure Coast district with an R+5 PVI). Silver doesn't give any of them much of a chance to win. Soderberg 1 in 4, Carlsen 3 in 7, Shapiro 1 in 7, and Baer 1 in 12. Soderberg, Baer and Shapiro (as well as Mucarsel-Powell) are all New Dems. The 2 Florida candidates in red districts with the best shot are 2 normal Dems, Kristen Carlsen and Mary Barzee Flores. The DCCC has spent modestly in a few of the races-- $499,932 in FL-06, $146,362 in FL-16, $868,290 in FL-18, and $694,360 in FL-15
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Matt Haggman is one of the progressive Democrats Blue America endorsed this cycle but who didn't win his primary, losing out, in this case, to an establishment nothing with lots of name recognition and money but with nothing to offer the voters except that she's not a Trumpist. Tragic waste of a blue seat but Matt has been good sport about it, endorsed her and has been working to help elect her. He agreed to catch us up on what he's been up to down in South Florida. He reiterated that "This is the most important mid-term election in our lifetimes. It’s a moment when we will decide as a country who we are and who we are not. Here in Florida I have been working to help Andrew Gillum, Donna Shalala, Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, Mary Barzee Flores and Bill Nelson all win. Just this weekend I was out canvassing. But, before this, I was a candidate. I was one of the many across the country who left good jobs to up and run for Congress following the 2016 presidential election. For me, it didn’t go as hoped. I lost to Donna Shalala in Florida’s Congressional District 27. Howie asked that I share a blog post I wrote in the weeks after the Aug. 28 Florida primary. It’s a reminder of the reasons why this mid-term is so important. Why each of us can have a big impact even if we’re not on the ballot. And why, whether a candidate or supporter, we must do all we can to ensure everyone gets out to vote this Election Day to turn a new page in our politics."

Until Next Time, Thank you

It’s been a few weeks since the primary election. Obviously, for me, it was a disappointment. But the many great wishes since election night from friends and supporters has been wonderful. I wanted to write a post and say thank you. And also reflect a bit on the past 13 months campaigning for US Congress.

Before doing that, I again congratulate Donna Shalala on her victory. This is a moment in our politics that is bigger than any individual and it’s critical that the Democratic party take control of the U.S. House of Representatives. We must unite behind her. In addition, we have to elect Andrew Gillum as our next Governor! His campaign has energized us all, and it’s time to bring it home.

Looking back on the primary, my overriding feeling is gratitude. I’m extremely thankful to my wife Danet, who supported me in this effort, and thankful to all of the people who propelled our campaign--  the volunteers, fellows, staff, donors and, ultimately, voters. I had never run for any elected office, yet so many went all-in supporting our campaign. Thank you very, very much.

Our fellows were, in particular, an inspiration to me. We recruited more than 50. Most were in college, some still in high school. Working on the campaign after class or full-time during summer break. Weekends, nights. Calling voters, knocking on doors. They were passionate and dedicated. Now, they are back on campus. At schools from Miami Dade College and Michigan to Boston University and Palmetto Senior High School. At a time when our political system badly needs a reset, they showed what it means to take hold of our democracy. With them, our future is so blazingly bright.

Along with our fellows, what I loved about being a candidate was talking with voters and being out in the community. I loved it. Going door to door on sweltering summer afternoons in Kendall, or Little Havana, or Richmond Heights. Evenings canvassing in Westchester or Palmetto Bay. Unfiltered and alone, it was just us; talking about our community and country. On those days and nights there was no place I would rather be.

Life revealed itself in its many forms on these unannounced visits. The couple celebrating their daughter who was headed to college. The single mom working three jobs to keep current on her mortgage. The middle-aged woman who tried to chat amiably but, after a time, couldn’t hold it back any longer, sharing that she’d just been diagnosed with cancer. “I need a hug,” she said, a tear running down her cheek, which she quickly and defiantly wiped away.

The conversations were always so real--  standing at front doors, sitting in living rooms, meeting people where they are, learning about their hopes and concerns, aspirations and struggles. At a time when Washington has so fundamentally and collectively lost its way, at the grassroots people are making sense. We need to spend more time listening to them.

Indeed, throughout the campaign I often said the best ideas come from the community, not candidates. I really meant it. Change happens from the ground up, and that’s never been more true than today. From start to finish, our campaign sought to stay true to that ethos. Namely, we focused on voters, rather than cutting down competitors as a means to win.

We visited every precinct, we knocked on some 45,000 doors. Again and again, I found a sincerity, thoughtfulness and a belief that things will get better. I always thought we lived in a special community, but over the last year I’ve vividly seen it with my own eyes in one neighborhood after another. Those thousands of conversations leave me today more hopeful and optimistic than ever.

If only our politics can be as good as them. I think it can, but we are going to have to change in big ways.

To me, election night 2016 was a shattering moment--  and it’s what ultimately prompted me to run. I had believed that America would never elect a person who said and did the things that Donald Trump said and did. I believed that America today would never elect a bully, a liar, someone who preyed upon our worst fears and sought to divide us to win support. We might come close to electing such a demagogue, but at this stage in our country’s history we would never actually do it. I was obviously wrong.

The better angels of our nature had given way to our most base sensibilities. A presidency built on hope was followed by one grounded in our worst fears.

In early January, as President Obama prepared to leave office, he gave his farewell address, warning that we can’t take democracy for granted. That it “falls on each of us to be anxious, jealous guardians of our democracy.” What the speech said to me is that, yes, America is a special place. But it’s only special because generation after generation has continually engaged in making it so--  even as there are setbacks, sometimes dramatic setbacks, along the way.

Then, at Danet’s urging, on January 21st we attended the Women’s March in Washington, D.C. My sister Meghan and our friend Lissette went too. It was an extraordinary day as millions around the world rose up. It was there that I thought to myself that this remarkable moment of protest must also be a moment of real and lasting change--  and wondered how to try and live that. It was there that I decided to run.

The reason I decided to drop everything, leave my job at Knight Foundation and do something I’d never done before was because I believed we were--  and are--  at a pivotal moment. This is not a normal election year.

I firmly believe that years from now people will ask about this time, what did we do?

What did we do when a President--  along with a compliant Republican-controlled Congress--  called for border walls, Muslim bans, tore thousands of immigrant children from their parents, bowed to a foreign power that meddled in our election, sympathized with neo-Nazis, sought to use law enforcement as a means to settle political scores, and declared the press an enemy of the state.

This election is our moment to reaffirm and declare who we are-- and who we are not--  as a country.

But, in doing so, we have to realize that this election is about what’s next. It can’t just be about what we’re against, but it has to be about what we’re for. Indeed, while Donald Trump has contributed much to our dysfunctional politics, the truth is that he’s the result of a dysfunctional system that has been spiraling for some time.

We are only going to achieve the change we need if we dispense with the incrementalism that has defined our politics for so long and think--  and do--  in dramatic new ways. And allow new leaders to emerge in a political system that’s long become stuck.

Put another way, it’s a two-part challenge: ensure that today does not become the new normal, and provide a vision for what tomorrow will look like. With that in mind, we sought to run a campaign that actually represented the change we seek.

At a time when money is undermining our democracy, we didn’t accept any funding from political action committees, federal lobbyists or special interests like big sugar.

At a time when so many have given up on politics, our campaign was powered by extraordinary campaign fellows who were the heart and soul of our effort.

At a time when so many are disconnected from our government, we built a field program that sought to personally engage voters in every neighborhood in every part of the district.

At a time when the leadership in Congress hasn’t changed in years, we called for an entirely new slate of people in leadership roles in the House. The new faces in the next Congress must not be just newly elected members, but the leaders at the top too.

Of course, our efforts did not result in a victory. But I have no regrets. After all, this is a moment to take chances. And throughout my life I’ve always sought to take chances by diving into entirely new things; and going all-in when I do.

Whether it was going to New Orleans to write a biography on Professor Longhair (still unfinished). Or moving to Miami-- where I didn’t know a soul (but met my soulmate)--  to become a journalist (where I had a great run that lasted nearly a decade). Or leaving the Miami Herald to join Knight Foundation (where I had an even better run), in which I launched an entirely new program that planted the seeds and propelled Miami’s rapidly emerging startup and entrepreneurial community.

I want to stretch myself, test boundaries and be willing to do entirely new things. Incumbent to that approach will be wins and losses. It’s the in-between that I want to avoid.

Make no mistake, I dearly wish I was part of the Blue Wave at this critical point in our country’s history. But I’m not. This moment belongs to candidates with names like Gillum, O’Rourke, Pressley, Lamb, Ocasio-Cortez, and so many others. I will be cheering every one of them on, and support in any way I can. We need them to win and be good leaders when a new Congress is sworn in in January.

And, each in our own way, we all need to lean in and help. The moment is too important. The challenges are too great. The stakes too high. No one can sit this out.

So what’s next? The short answer is, I don’t know.

I do know that I have many people to thank. I remember when I decided to run, a friend advised that people look at you differently when you’re a political candidate. He cautioned that you’ll be disappointed by friends you thought would be there. But he also said you’ll be surprised by the support from those you didn’t know before or never expected. Focus and delight in the latter, he said. And I will.

(One quick note: Danet and I took some time away after the election. If you haven’t heard from me yet, you’ll be hearing from me soon.)

After such an all-consuming period I also have many friendships to renew, which I am looking forward to doing.

Life is about chapters and seasons. The thing about political campaigns is the chapter ends so suddenly. After such an intense period, it’s quickly and suddenly over. It’s a crash landing. But a new chapter begins. There is power in blank canvases. I’ve experienced it before. It’s at moments like these when you can edit your life and think completely anew. It’s often at these moments when the unimagined happens, when you follow completely new paths and find unexpected success.

I have no idea what this next chapter will bring, but I’m excited to find out.

After the race, I spoke with Reggie, who is a great friend and the father of Joshua, my little through Big Brother Big Sister for more than a decade. Reggie said to me: “You gotta keep pressing on my man. It’s all good.”

That pretty much says it all. Keep pressing on.

A Progressive Foreign Policy?

How do you define a progressive foreign policy agenda? It's touchy, when you go beyond peace. Want to step on Jewish toes? Try it if you're a politicians and see how quickly you get turned into Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) or Earl Hilliard (D-AL). How about Armenian toes? There are around half a million Armenian-Americans, almost half of whom are concentrated in California with significant enough populations in Boston and NYC told wield some real political clout. It may be popular among Trump supporters to denigrate Muslim-Americans but there are about 3.5 million of them-- and they're better educated and wealthier than the average non-Muslim American-- and they vote... especially in New York City, Dearborn Michigan, Patterson, New Jersey, Philly, L.A., with significant numbers in Arkansas, Maine, Texas, Virginia, Illinois and Delaware. Politicians-- who are likely more interested in healthcare, education, the economy, climate change, gun violence, equality or other domestic issues-- have to be careful about the minefield around foreign policy. Stumbling can be fatal.

This week at In These Times, Phyllis Bennis, is asking for a bold foreign policy platform for the left, demanding that socialists and other progressives align their domestic programs with a progressive foreign policy vision. There was always grumbling among foreign policy-obsessed folks about Bernie. Bennis, however, starts with Alexandria Ocasio (NY) and Rashida Tlaib (MI), neither of whom is in Congress yet but both whom are guaranteed to be there in January. They are other super-progressives, she asserts, are not showing a clear enough link between domestic issues and... well she starts off with the easy stuff for most progressives-- challenging war and militarism and the war economy. Almost all progressive candidates I talk are passionately for peace and against what Eisenhower warned is the military-industrial complex.

But that isn't really what the complaint is. It's when demands are made about specific issues that divide constituencies that things start to get hairy. "It’s not," wrote Bennis, "that progressive leaders don’t care about international issues, or that our movements are divided. Despite too many common assumptions, it is not political suicide for candidates or elected officials to stake out progressive anti-war, anti-militarism positions. Quite the contrary: Those positions actually have broad support within both our movements and public opinion. It’s just that it’s hard to figure out the strategies that work to connect internationally focused issues, anti-war efforts, or challenges to militarism, with the wide array of activists working on locally grounded issues. Some of those strategies seem like they should be easy-- like talking about slashing the 53 cents of every discretionary federal dollar that now goes to the military as the easiest source to fund Medicare-for-all or free college education. It should be easy, but somehow it’s not: Too often, foreign policy feels remote from the urgency of domestic issues facing such crises. When our movements do figure out those strategies, candidates can easily follow suit." Yep that's the (relatively) easy part. Now comes the less easy stuff, especially what it's not just a principal but an actual policy that touches countries and people.

Candidates coming out of our movements into elected office will need clear positions on foreign policy. Here are several core principles that should shape those positions.

A progressive foreign policy must reject U.S. military and economic domination and instead be grounded in global cooperation, human rights, respect for international law and privileging diplomacy over war. That does not mean isolationism, but instead a strategy of diplomatic engagement rather than-- not as political cover for-- destructive U.S. military interventions that have so often defined the U.S. role in the world.

Looking at the political pretexts for what the U.S. empire is doing around the world today, a principled foreign policy might start by recognizing that there is no military solution to terrorism and that the global war on terror must be ended.

More broadly, the militarization of foreign policy must be reversed and diplomacy must replace military action in every venue, with professional diplomats rather than the White House’s political appointees in charge. Aspiring and elected progressive and socialist office-holders should keep in mind the distinction between the successes and failures of Obama’s foreign policy. The victories were all diplomatic: moving towards normalization with Cuba, the Paris climate accord and especially the Iran nuclear deal. Obama’s greatest failures-- in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen-- all occurred because the administration chose military action over robust diplomacy.

Certainly, diplomacy has been a tool in the arsenal of empires, including the United States. But when we are talking about official policies governing relations between countries, diplomacy-- meaning talking, negotiating and engaging across a table-- is always, always better than engaging across a battlefield.

A principled foreign policy must recognize how the war economy has distorted our society at home-- and commit to reverse it. The $717 billion of the military budget is desperately needed for jobs, healthcare and education here at home-- and for a diplomatic surge and humanitarian and reconstruction assistance to people of countries devastated by U.S. wars and sanctions.

A principled foreign policy must acknowledge how U.S. actions-- military, economic and climate-related-- have been a driving force in displacing people around the world. We therefore have an enormous moral as well as legal obligation to take the lead in providing humanitarian support and refuge for those displaced-- so immigration and refugee rights are central to foreign policy.

For too long the power of the U.S. empire has dominated international relations, led to the privileging of war over diplomacy on a global scale, and created a vast-- and invasive-- network of 800-plus military bases around the world.

Now, overall U.S. global domination is actually shrinking, and not only because of Trump’s actions. China’s economy is rapidly catching up, and its economic clout in Africa and elsewhere eclipses that of the United States. It’s a measure of the United States’ waning power that Europe, Russia and China are resisting U.S. efforts to impose new global sanctions on Iran. But the United States is still the world’s strongest military and economic power: Its military spending vastly surpasses that of the eight next strongest countries, it is sponsoring a dangerous anti-Iran alliance between Israel and the wealthy Gulf Arab states, it remains central to NATO decision-making, and powerful forces in Washington threaten new wars in North Korea and Iran. The United States remains dangerous.

Progressives in Congress have to navigate the tricky task of rejecting American exceptionalism. U.S global military and economic efforts are generally aimed at maintaining domination and control. Without that U.S. domination, the possibility arises of a new kind of internationalism: to prevent and solve crises that arise from current and potential wars, to promote nuclear disarmament, to come up with climate solutions and to protect refugees.

That effort is increasingly important because of the rapid rise of right-wing xenophobic authoritarians seeking and winning power. Trump is now leading and enabling an informal global grouping of such leaders, from Egypt’s Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to Victor Orban in Hungary and others. Progressive elected officials in the United States can pose an important challenge to that authoritarian axis by building ties with their like-minded counterparts in parliaments and governments-- possibilities include Jeremy Corbyn in the United Kingdom and Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Mexico, among others. And progressive and leftist members of Congress will need to be able to work together with social movements to build public pressure for diplomatic initiatives not grounded in the interests of U.S. empire.

In addition to these broad principles, candidates and elected officials need critical analyses of current U.S. engagement around the world, as well as nuanced prescriptions for how to de-escalate militarily, and ramp up a new commitment to serious diplomacy.

Russia: Relations with Russia will be a major challenge for the foreseeable future. With 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons in U.S. and Russian hands, and the two powers deploying military forces on opposite sides of active battlefronts in Syria, it is crucial that relations remain open—not least to derail potential escalations and ensure the ability to stand down from any accidental clash.

Progressives and leftists in Congress will need to promote a nuanced, careful approach to Russia policy. And they will face a daunting environment in which to do so. They will have to deal with loud cries from right-wing war-mongers, mainly Republicans, and from neo-con interventionists in both parties, demanding a one-sided anti-Russia policy focused on increased sanctions and potentially even military threats. But many moderate and liberal Democrats-- and much of the media-- are also joining the anti-Russia crusade. Some of those liberals and moderates have likely bought into the idea of American exceptionalism, accepting as legitimate or irrelevant the long history of U.S. election meddling around the world and viewing the Russian efforts as somehow reaching a whole different level of outrageousness. Others see the anti-Russia mobilization solely in the context of undermining Trump.

But at the same time, progressive Congress members should recognize that reports of Russian efforts to interfere with the 2016 and 2018 elections cannot be dismissed out of hand. They should continue to demand that more of the evidence be made public, and condemn the Russian meddling that has occurred, even while recognizing that the most serious threats to our elections come from voter suppression campaigns at home more than from Moscow. And they have to make clear that Trump’s opponents cannot be allowed to turn the president’s infatuation with Vladimir Putin into the basis for a new Cold War, simply to oppose Trump.

China: The broad frame of a progressive approach should be to end Washington’s provocative military and economic moves and encourage deeper levels of diplomatic engagement. This means replacing military threats with diplomacy in response to Chinese moves in the South China Sea, as well as significant cuts in the ramped-up military ties with U.S. allies in the region, such as Vietnam. Progressive and socialist members of Congress and other elected officials will no doubt be aware that the rise of China’s economic dominance across Africa, and its increasing influence in parts of Latin America, could endanger the independence of countries in those parts of the Global South. But they will also need to recognize that any U.S. response to what looks like Chinese exploitation must be grounded in humility, acknowledging the long history of U.S. colonial and neocolonial domination throughout those same regions. Efforts to compete with Chinese economic assistance by increasing Washington’s own humanitarian and development aid should mean directing all funds through the UN, rather than through USAID or the Pentagon. That will make U.S. assistance far less likely to be perceived as-- and to be-- an entry point for exploitation.

NATO: A progressive position on NATO flies straight into the face of the partisan component of the anti-Trump resistance-- the idea that if Trump is for it, we should be against it. For a host of bad reasons that have to do with personal enrichment and personal power, Trump sometimes takes positions that large parts of the U.S. and global anti-war and solidarity movements have long supported. One of those is NATO. During the Cold War, NATO was the European military face of U.S.-dominated Western anti-Communism and anti-Sovietism. With the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, peace activists from around the world called for the dissolution of NATO as an anachronistic relic whose raison d’etre was now gone.

Instead, NATO used its 50th anniversary in 1999 to rebrand itself as defending a set of amorphous, ostensibly “Western” values such as democracy, rather than having any identifiable enemy-- something like a military version of the EU, with the United States on board for clout. Unable to win UN Security Council support for war in Kosovo, the United States and its allies used NATO to provide so-called authorization for a major bombing campaign-- in complete violation of international law-- and began a rapid expansion of the NATO alliance right up to the borders of Russia. Anti-war forces across the world continued to rally around the call “No to NATO”-- a call to dissolve the alliance altogether.

But when Trump, however falsely, claims to call for an end to the alliance, or shows disdain for NATO, anti-Trump politicians and media lead the way in embracing the military alliance as if it really did represent some version of human rights and international law. It doesn’t-- and progressives in elected positions need to be willing to call out NATO as a militarized Cold War relic that shouldn’t be reconfigured to maintain U.S. domination in Europe or to mobilize against Russia or China or anyone else. It should be ended.

In fact, Trump’s claims to oppose NATO are belied by his actions. In his 2019 budget request he almost doubled the 2017 budget for the Pentagon’s “European Deterrence Initiative,” designed explicitly as a response to “threats from Russia.” There is a huge gap between Trump’s partisan base-pleasing condemnation of NATO and his administration’s actual support for strengthening the military alliance. That contradiction should make it easier for progressive candidates and officeholders to move to cut NATO funding and reduce its power-- not because Trump is against NATO but because the military alliance serves as a dangerous provocation toward war.

...Israel-Palestine: The most important thing for candidates to know is that there has been a massive shift in public opinion in recent years. It is no longer political suicide to criticize Israel. Yes, AIPAC and the rest of the right-wing Jewish, pro-Israel lobbies remain influential and have a lot of money to throw around. (The Christian Zionist lobbies are powerful too, but there is less political difficulty for progressives to challenge them.) But there are massive shifts underway in U.S. Jewish public opinion on the conflict, and the lobbies cannot credibly claim to speak for the Jewish community as a whole.

Outside the Jewish community, the shift is even more dramatic, and has become far more partisan: Uncritical support for Israel is now overwhelmingly a Republican position. Among Democrats, particularly young Democrats, support for Israel has fallen dramatically; among Republicans, support for Israel’s far-right government is sky-high. The shift is particularly noticeable among Democrats of color, where recognition of the parallels between Israeli oppression of Palestinians and the legacies of Jim Crow segregation in the United States and apartheid in South Africa is rising rapidly.

U.S. policy, unfortunately, has not kept up with that changing discourse. But modest gains are evident even there. When nearly 60 members of the House and Senate openly skipped Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech when he came to lobby Congress to vote against President Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran, the sky didn’t fall. The snub to the Israeli prime minister was unprecedented, but no one lost their seat because of it. Rep. Betty McCollum’s bill to protect Palestinian children from Israel’s vicious military juvenile detention system (the only one in the world) now has 29 co-sponsors, and the sky still isn’t falling. Members of Congress are responding more frequently to Israeli assaults on Gaza and the killing of protesters, often because of powerful movements among their constituents. When Trump moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, the Israeli daily Ha’aretz acknowledged the divide: “While members of the Republican Party overwhelmingly expressed support for the move, Democrats were split between those who congratulated Trump for it and those who called it a dangerous and irresponsible action.”

That creates space for candidates and newly elected officials to respond to the growing portion of their constituencies that supports Palestinian rights. Over time, they must establish a rights-based policy. That means acknowledging that the quarter-century-long U.S.-orchestrated “peace process” based on the never-serious pursuit of a solution, has failed. Instead, left and progressive political leaders can advocate for a policy that turns over real control of diplomacy to the UN, ends support for Israeli apartheid and occupation, and instead supports a policy based on international law, human rights and equality for all, without privileging Jews or discriminating against non-Jews.

To progress from cautiously urging that Israel abide by international law, to issuing a full-scale call to end or at least reduce the $3.8 billion per year that Congress sends straight to the Israeli military, might take some time. In the meantime, progressive candidates must prioritize powerful statements condemning the massacre of unarmed protesters in Gaza and massive Israeli settlement expansion, demands for real accountability for Israeli violations of human rights and international law (including reducing U.S. support in response), and calls for an end to the longstanding U.S. protection that keeps Israel from being held accountable in the UN.

The right consistently accuses supporters of Palestinian rights of holding Israel to a double standard. Progressives in Congress should turn that claim around on them and insist that U.S. policy towards Israel-- Washington’s closest ally in the region and the recipient of billions of dollars in military aid every year-- hold Israel to exactly the same standards that we want the United States to apply to every other country: human rights, adherence to international law and equality for all.

Many supporters of the new crop of progressive candidates, and many activists in the movements they come out of, are supporters of the increasingly powerful, Palestinian-led BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) movement, that aims to bring non-violent economic pressure to bear on Israel until it ends its violations of international law. This movement deserves credit for helping to mainstream key demands-- to end the siege of Gaza and the killing of protesters, to support investigations of Israeli violations by the International Criminal Court, to oppose Israel’s new “nation-state’ law-- that should all be on lawmakers’ immediate agenda.

Iran: With U.S. and Iranian military forces facing each other in Syria, the potential for an unintentional escalation is sky-high. Even a truly accidental clash between a few Iranian and U.S. troops, or an Iranian anti-aircraft system mistakenly locking on to a U.S. warplane plane even if it didn’t fire, could have catastrophic consequences without immediate military-to-military and quick political echelon discussions to defuse the crisis. And with tensions very high, those ties are not routinely available. Relations became very dangerous when Trump withdrew the United States from the multi-lateral nuclear deal in May. (At that time, a strong majority of people in the United States favored the deal, and less than one in three wanted to pull out of it.)

The United States continues to escalate threats against Iran. It is sponsoring a growing regional anti-Iran alliance, with Israel and Saudi Arabia now publicly allied and pushing strongly for military action. And Trump has surrounded himself with war-mongers for his top advisers, including John Bolton and Mike Pompeo, who have both supported regime change in Iran and urged military rather than diplomatic approaches to Iran.

Given all that, what progressive elected officials need to do is to keep fighting for diplomacy over war. That means challenging U.S. support for the anti-Iran alliance and opposing sanctions on Iran. It means developing direct ties with parliamentarians from the European and other signatories to the Iran nuclear deal, with the aim of collective opposition to new sanctions, re-legitimizing the nuclear deal in Washington and reestablishing diplomacy as the basis for U.S. relations with Iran.

It should also mean developing a congressional response to the weakening of international anti-nuclear norms caused by the pull-out from the Iran deal. That means not just supporting the nonproliferation goals of the Iran nuclear deal, but moving further towards real disarmament and ultimately the abolition of nuclear weapons. Progressives in and outside of Congress should make clear that nuclear nonproliferation (meaning no one else gets to have nukes) can’t work in the long run without nuclear disarmament (meaning that the existing nuclear weapons states have to give them up). That could start with a demand for full U.S. compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which calls for negotiations leading to “nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament.”

...Yemen and Saudi Arabia:

The ongoing Saudi-led war against Yemen reflects the most deadly front of Saudi Arabia’s competition with Iran for regional hegemony. The United States is providing indirect and direct support, including U.S. Air Force pilots providing in-air refueling so Saudi and UAE warplanes can bomb Yemen more efficiently, and Green Berets fighting alongside Saudi troops on the border, in what the New York Times called “a continuing escalation of America’s secret wars.”



The U.S.-backed Saudi war against Yemen has also created what the UN has declared the world’s most serious humanitarian crisis. Congress’ first action must be to immediately end all U.S. involvement in the war. Next, Congress must reject all approvals for arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the UAE as long as they continue to bomb and blockade Yemen.

Ending these arms sales may be a serious challenge, given the power of the arms manufacturers’ lobby, Israel’s strong support of Saudi Arabia against Iran and the fact that Saudi Arabia remains the top U.S. arms customer. But recent efforts and relatively close votes in both the House and Senate, while not successful, indicate that challenging the longstanding process of providing the Saudis with whatever weapons they want may be closer to reality than anticipated. The House called the U.S. military involvement in the Saudi war in Yemen “unauthorized.” Reps. Ro Khanna, Marc Pocan and others have introduced numerous House bills in recent months aimed at reducing U.S. arms sales and involvement in the Saudi-led assault. In the Senate, a March resolution to end U.S. military involvement in the Yemen war failed by only 11 votes, a much narrower margin than anticipated. Progressive candidates and new members of Congress should support all those efforts, and move further with a call for ending the longstanding U.S. alliance with Saudi Arabia, especially military sales and support for the Saudi-Israeli partnership against Iran.

Tim Canova, the stalwart progressive Democrat, running as an independent for the south Florida seat occupied by-- and, earlier, drawn by-- Debbie Wasserman Schultz, once got on the wrong side of the progressive foreign policy komissariat. I can't remember the exact details but often when I write about his campaign, some commenter comes howling into the comments section to denounce him. I didn't ask Tim about that nonsense. Instead, I asked him about the whole idea of a progressive foreign policy vision. This is what he told me:

I see our foreign policy as inextricably linked to our domestic agenda and political challenges. At home we seek a green and solar New Deal to provide work and meaning to a generation that’s been displaced by technology and hammered by austerity, privatizations and a global race to the bottom. Abroad, we want the same for people all over the world. We should be supporting and promoting democracy movements and progressive economic and social policies.

After World War II, the greatest generation benefitted greatly from the G.I. Bill of Rights that invested in the people. At the same time, U.S. foreign policy promoted New Deals in Western Europe through the Marshall Plan. Today, in the US and abroad, we see democracy losing out to corporate oligarchy. Instead of full employment policies, we see pressures from big banks, international institutions, and market forces to cut public budgets, cut taxes on the rich, privatize all state functions, and liberalize trade to insane degrees. It’s created a massive amount of human suffering throughout much of the world in sky high levels of joblessness and underemployment, and stagnant incomes, however hidden or ignored.

These are the kinds of conditions that contribute to large migration flows, xenophobic backlashes, and mercenary armies for brutal and perpetual Middle East wars and for Central American street gangs. The world that we want restores the balance at home and abroad, puts people first, reins in the corporate oligarchs, ends their huge subsidies and lawlessness, taxes their offshore accounts. A New Deal at home and as good neighbors, New Deals in our foreign policies.

Another progressive Florida candidate, Matt Haggman, running for the open Miami seat that Ileana Ros Lehtinen is abandoning, told us that "it’s imperative we continue to move away from a militaristic approach when it comes to negotiations and more towards a humanitarian solution. The U.S. has always been the beacon in providing support for refuge-- especially when it comes to immigration and refugee rights-- and we must continue to lead globally in this area."

GOP Tax Scam-- Just More Failed Trickle Down

The GOP thought that at least they'd have one "achievement" to run on in the midterms-- the massive taxcut. But the tax cut-- which many call "the tax scam"-- has turned out to not be that popular, not popular enough to run on. Over the weekend, the NY Times reported that Republicans aren't barging about and aren't even bragging about the continuation of the Obama economic expansion Trump takes credit for. "Republicans have reason to doubt the efficacy of an economic message in hotly contested midterm campaigns, which have historically been referendums on the sitting president. The last time the economy grew 4 percent in a quarter was in the middle of 2014, under President Barack Obama, just before Senate Democrats lost nine seats-- and their majority-- that fall... For their part, Democrats are weaponizing the tax law-- which is mired in only middling popularity-- against Republican opponents in some key races. Their critiques have been fed by government statistics showing that wages for typical American workers have not risen over the past year, after adjusting for inflation, even though Republicans promised the tax cuts would unleash rapid wage growth."

Polling has shown that voters are skeptical of the tax cut. Six months after its passage only 34% of voters approved-- a 6 point decline from the previous month. Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute said that "Public opinion on the Republican lawmakers’ signature accomplishment has never been positive, but potentially growing uncertainty about how American taxpayers will be affected does not seem to be helping the GOP’s prospects for November."

So where's the beef dough? Early yesterday morning Politico reported that it's been gobbled up the kinds of stock buy backs that make CEOs and corporate executives very rich.

Yesterday, I spent a couple of hours being interviewed for a book. It brought me back to thinking about long-forgotten incidents in my life in corporate America. I had to recall an incident when I was arguing about freedom of expression with 4 of Time-Warners highest ranking executives-- the kinds of guys who got millions of dollars in stock options annually. These are people whose net worth went up and down based on rises and drops in the company stock. And a record I had been executive producer on, "Cop Killer" by Ice-T's Body Count was causing the stock to go down-- a lot. I was arguing about freedom of expression. They were arguing about their personal wealth. At one point they rose from the table as one and walked out of the room snarling, sure they would never see me again. (At the time I was an obscure employee at Sire Records, someone whose name they didn't know and would never have to know. When they saw me next I had just been named president of Reprise and they walked into a party and saw me, thought about it in their hive brain and nearly fainted.)



Anyway, the gist of the Politico feature was that the biggest winners from Señor Trumpanzee’s new tax law "are corporate executives who have reaped gains as their companies buy back a record amount of stock, a practice that rewards shareholders by boosting the value of existing shares." These executives "have been profiting handsomely by selling shares since Trump signed the law on Dec. 22 and slashed corporate tax rates to 21 percent. That trend is likely to increase as Wall Street analysts expect buyback activity to accelerate in the coming weeks."

“It is going to be a parade of eye-popping numbers,” said Pat McGurn, the head of strategic research and analysis at Institutional Shareholder Services, a shareholder advisory firm.

That could undercut the political messaging value of the tax cuts in the Republican campaign to maintain control of Congress in the midterm elections.

Since the tax cuts were enacted, Oracle Corp. CEO Safra Catz sold $250 million worth of shares in her company-- the largest executive payday this year. Product development head Thomas Kurian sold $85 million. The sales came after the company announced a $12 billion share repurchase.

Mastercard CEO Ajay Banga sold $44.4 million of stock in May, the largest single cash-out by an executive of the company in at least 10 years, months after the company announced a $4 billion buyback of its own stock.

Two days after Eastman Chemical announced it would purchase $2 billion of its own stock, CEO Mark Costa sold 55,000 shares for $5.4 million.

The SEC requires company executives to disclose share purchases or sales within two business days. Companies emphasize that their executives’ share sales are often scheduled at regular intervals well in advance. In Banga’s case, he has routinely sold shares once a year, and always in May, since 2013.

Yet the insider sales feed the narrative that corporate tax cuts enrich executives in the short term while yielding less clear long-term benefits for workers and the broader economy. Critics of insider sales argue that they diminish the value of paying C-suite employees in shares-- a practice that’s intended to give them a greater stake in the long-term health of the company-- and can even raise questions about the motivation for the buybacks themselves.

Following the tax cuts, roughly 28 percent of companies in the S&P 500 mentioned plans to return some of their tax savings to shareholders, according to Morgan Stanley. Public companies announced more than $600 billion in buybacks in the first half of this year-- already toppling the previous annual record.

Year to date, buybacks have doubled from the same period a year ago, Merrill Lynch said in a July 24 report, citing its clients’ trading activity. “Last week we noted that buyback activity [was] poised to accelerate over the next six weeks, and indeed, corporate clients’ buybacks picked up to a two-month high and the 6th-highest level in our data history,” the company said.

The correlation between corporate buybacks and insider sales is clear, according to SEC Commissioner Robert Jackson, a Democrat. He studied 385 buybacks since the beginning of 2017 and found that after half of them, at least one executive sold shares within the next month.

The link between the tax cuts and big executive payouts, fueled by buybacks, is also plain, according to one institutional research firm.

“Stock buyback announcements in the U.S. have swelled to the highest levels on record in the wake of last year’s corporate tax cut,” said TrimTabs Investment Research in a July 10 report. “Corporate America’s actions suggest that most of the benefits of the corporate tax cut will flow to investors in general and top corporate executives in particular.”

And as the Washington Post pointed out yesterday, "since Paul Ryan joined Congress in 1999, the budget will have gone from a $125 billion surplus to a $1.1 trillion deficit." But... maybe some of these rich executives getting much richer are hiring butlers or buying more private planes and yachts and a little of that money is trickling down to working folks. Maybe. But a blue collar friend of mine who just moved to L.A. can't find a job. And he's been looking really hard and is pretty much willing to do anything. Trickle down has never worked and it's not working now.

Ellen Lipton, is running for an open seat in a suburban Michigan district north of Detroit. Today she pointed out that "For decades, Republicans have been running on the same message-- that massive tax cuts to billionaires and huge corporations will spur economic growth and make everyone better off. One reason I'm running for Congress in Michigan's 9th district is because voters here know that's not true, and that we can't afford to keep giving massive tax breaks to the top 1% while working people in this country continue to suffer. If Republicans in Congress could find over a trillion dollars to give tax breaks to their rich donors, we can absolutely make universal health care a reality in this country. Americans are sick and tired of hearing that there's no money for free college, no money for infrastructure, no money for a living wage. We know trickle-down doesn't work, and that it's time to stop putting the needs of political donors ahead of everyone else."

Progressive Democrat Lisa Brown was the chancellor of Washington State University in Spokane and an economist herself. She pointed out that despite the terrible numbers, her opponent, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers "continues to deliver the DC talking points in eastern Washington to avoid talking about what’s really coming down-- which is the fallout of the ill-conceived tariffs and trade war on farms, ranches, businesses, and consumers. Tariffs are taxes. Worth repeating-- tariffs are taxes, ultimately paid in lost markets and revenue for farms and businesses  and higher prices for everyone. The administration has imposed billions of dollars of tariffs on imports and friends and foes alike are in retaliation imposing billions on U.S. exports. Republicans in the House are 'expressing disappointment' and then pivoting to their talking points while this disaster continues to unfold."

J.D. Scholten is giving Iowa racist Steve King a real race for his money, Yesterday he told me that "Trump and Speaker Ryan said the average American worker would see an extra $4,000-9,000 a year from this bill. So far, the average American worker has seen an additional $323, according to an Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In IA-04, we haven't seen any job growth. Our district is shrinking. As much as we produce corn, hogs and wind energy, the best thing we produce is our children. This Tax Bill doesn't do a damn thing for this district long term and it doesn't help us create a modern economy that allows us to keep our high school and college graduates in our district."

Matt Haggman is running for the open Miami-Dade seat that Ileana Ros-Lehtinen is retiring from, the bluest Republican-held district in the country. Trump only took 38.9% of the vote in 2016. Matt told us that "we know America is the strongest when its middle class is in good shape and we also know that trickle-down economics only benefits the wealthiest in this country. Trickle-down economics has never worked in this country and it never will. It’s time that as a country we get smarter about changing the economic landscape and start preparing our workforce for a 21st century economy. Too many families today are working twice as hard for less and we don’t tackle this issue now it will likely get much worse soon. The GOP tax reform passed in late 2017 was not only a scam that lied and manipulated lower and middle-class Americans, but it gave the wealthiest 1% breaks that they don’t need. The tax cuts that should have been made should’ve gone towards middle class families. It should have also made sure corporations and the wealthiest 1% are paying their fair share of taxes-- which as of today is not the case. I believe that everyone who is willing to work hard and play by the rules deserves a fair shot at the American Dream. It is clear though, after their horrendous Tax plan, we see the GOPs mentality is more towards the ‘kick them while they’re down’ approach."

If You Were Running For Congress Would You Want Trump Coming To Your District To Campaign?

Bad campaign message

The albatross is on the way! Republican incumbents got some really bad news Friday evening on Hannity's show. Down deep, Trump knows he's really bad at being president. He would never admit it but he knows the 38% job approval is silly. It should be 8%, not 38%. He's terrible at his job. Everything he touches turns to shit. The only thing he's been "good" at is stirring up racist and xenophobic sentiments and dividing the country for partisan goals. And Julie Davis reported for the NY Times that he "plans to spend almost all of his time this fall campaigning for the most vulnerable Republican congressional candidates in the midterm elections, a strategy that would have him in many districts where endangered lawmakers in his own party regard him as a liability." He may be good at turning out the base in swing districts but those aren't the districts the midterms are being fought in. He's poison in districts where moderates and independents decide who wins election.

Trump told Hannity that he's "going to work very hard. I’ll go six or seven days a week when we’re 60 days out, and I will be campaigning for all of these great people that do have a difficult race, and we think we’re going to bring them over the line." Ted Lieu is the DCCC vice chair for California, Oregon, Washington, Hawaii, Alaska and Nevada. He couldn't be more enthusiastic about Trump spending time on the West Coast. "I would pay the permit fees for Donald Trump to come to California and do one of his toxic rallies," he told us yesterday. "Can't wait for him to explain how the GOP tax scam increases taxes on millions of Californians; the random Trump tariffs hurt Californian farmers: and the rollbacks to environmental laws hurt our air and water. Trump's presence in California would help all Democratic candidates."

Trump said he had instructed John F. Kelly, his chief of staff, and others on his team to compile a list of about two dozen of the most hotly contested races in the country so he could use the bully pulpit to promote the Republicans running in them.

“Give me the top 25 congresspeople that are, you know, could go either way, and I want to go out and campaign for those people,” Trump said.

But many if not most of the most competitive races are in districts where Trump is unpopular and more centrist Republican incumbents are toiling to distance themselves from him, as well as where Democrats are most motivated to turn out to vote against the president’s party.

The Midwest is a battle ground whereTrump hopes to con people. Strong Democratic candidates aren't going to lie down and roll over for him. Iowa progressive J.D. Scholten won his primary and is facing down racist and Trumpist Steve King in November. "Trump," he told us "needs to focus on regaining and finding markets for our farmers rather than campaigning. I would be shocked if he came to campaign for King because King is a coward and doesn’t have public events"

Kara Eastman also won her primary, this won in Nebraska. She told us she firmly believes that "the policies of Donald Trump and Don Bacon do not represent Nebraskans’ values. We are all aware that their tax bill is for the very wealthy and large corporations. We know that they have no plan to provide healthcare to Americans. We also know that they are beholden to interest groups like the NRA, instead of to voters who want common sense gun safety regulations to protect our children. The President’s proposed trip to Nebraska is another example of Washington trying to influence Nebraskans. It is also a campaign stop for his personal gain. We need solutions to complex problems rather than scripted and choreographed political rallies." 

Hannity seemed to allude to the phenomenon in a question, in which he asked what the president would say to motivate supporters of his “who may not like their RINO congressman,” using the derisive shorthand that conservatives use for “Republican in name only.”

Trump has confined his campaigning in recent months almost entirely to red states he won handily in 2016 that have competitive Senate races, including Tennessee, Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana.

His strategy, according to advisers, has been to capitalize on his outsize popularity among core Republican supporters to try to motivate them to turn out to help oust or defeat vulnerable Democrats. He has mostly steered clear of competitive races where he is a polarizing presence and could turn out Democrats, independents and moderate Republicans who consider him toxic.

Next week, though, the president will hold rallies in Florida and Pennsylvania, a sign he is beginning to aim for battleground states.

"It’s our responsibility to continue highlighting Trump’s disastrous policies and remind constituents if a candidate running for office accepts his support and endorsement, you’re supporting his racist, xenophobic, anti-American agenda," said Matt Haggman, congressional candidate for Florida's 27th district, a district with a Republican congresswoman but that rejected Trump 58.5% to 38.9%.

"Trump created a national crisis by first allowing border enforcement agents to rip children from the arms of their parents and separate them, He continued. "Now, his administration cannot answer questions regarding reunifying these families and what the plan is now that the  deadline has passed. If you’re a congressional candidate who is okay with keeping families apart and can live with knowing that these children may never see their parents again, then receiving support from Trump clearly aligns with your agenda, as well. The upcoming midterm elections is the first opportunity for Americans across the country to loudly renounce what Trump has stood for these past two years and to begin bringing communities together so that everyone, regardless of immigration status, social class or race, can prosper in America." 

Trump said he was undaunted by the decades of history that has shown that a president’s party typically loses seats in midterm congressional elections. He insisted he would buck the trend.

“The economy may be the strongest it’s ever been in the history of our country,” Trump said, harking back to a phrase Bill Clinton’s aides used to capture a pivotal issue of his campaign: “It’s the economy, stupid.”

“If it’s the economy, then we should do very well,” he said in the Hannity interview, which was broadcast hours after Trump made a hastily arranged appearance on the South Lawn of the White House to claim credit for newly released data showing a 4.1 per cent growth rate in the last quarter, the strongest since 2014. “I just don’t know any reason why we shouldn’t do well.”

But he also previewed a negative message against Democrats, asserting to Hannity that they “want to raise people’s taxes, they want to open up borders, they want to get rid of ICE-- I mean, the things they’re doing are so destructive, we won’t have a country.” Trump was referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has become a symbol of efforts to round up unauthorized workers and migrant family separations at the border with Mexico. Some Democratic candidates say it should be abolished.

And taking a cue from Hannity, who said Democrats would shut down investigations into “deep corruption” if they took power on Capitol Hill, Trump-- facing new questions about whether his campaign colluded with Russia in the 2016 race-- declared that his political rivals were guilty of doing just that.

“If you talk about collusion, the collusion is there-- there’s no question about it, but it’s with the Democrats and Russia,” Trump said, offering no evidence. “All you have to do is look at what they did and how they participated with Russia. It’s a disgraceful situation.”

One Democratic incumbent told me the only thing she would like better than Trump showing up in her district to campaign would be Trump showing up in her district with McConnell and Ryan to campaign. "This administration and their congressional allies has failed the American people. Voters in my district know it... Trump out on the stump will just fire up the Democratic base and persuade independent voters and moderate Republicans how important it is to put a check on his excesses... Most of my colleagues are saying 'bring it on!' He's toxic."

Blue America Endorses An Inspiring New Candidate-- Meet Matt Haggman (FL-27)

I want to introduce Blue America's newest endorsed candidate, Matt Haggman in Miami-Dade, the 27th district, from which Ileana Ros-Lehtinen is retiring. The only reason this very blue seat has remained in Republican hands for so long is because Debbie Wasserman Schultz has done everything in her once- considerable power to undermine and sabotage any Democrat who has gone up against Ros-Lehtinen, an old crony of hers from when they both served in the Florida state legislature and worked together to gerrymander the state in a way that helped the GOP and, of course, Wasserman Schultz. She's now a largely reviled and powerless character and Ros-Lehtinen realized without Debbie working for her behind the scenes-- Debbie's no longer even allowed behind the scenes-- she'd better retire with grace. The district has a PVI of R+5 and Hillary beat Trump there 58.5% to 38.9%, the biggest, bluest margin in any Republican-held district in the entire country.

This cycle, predictably, a boatload of Democrats jumped into the race. Since then many of them dropped out, leaving it a contest basically between progressive Matt Haggman and two garden variety Democrats, Clinton-era throwback Donna Shalala and moderate state legislator David Richardson. All have raised approximately the same out of money. Shalala and Richardson, though, are both self-funders who each dropped over half a million dollars of their own money into their campaigns. Yep... seat buyers. Clearly the best of the three candidates, I asked Matt to introduce himself to DWT readers with a guest post. If you like what he has to say, please consider contributing to his campaign-- by clicking on the Blue America 2018 congressional thermometer on the right.



Why We Must Change In Big Ways, Not Small
by Matt Haggman

I’ve never run for elected office before. But last year I decided to quit my job and run for Congress.

Before the last presidential election I believed America would never elect a person who said and did the things that Donald Trump said and did. I believed America today would never elect a bully, a liar, someone who preyed upon our worst fears and sought to divide us to win. We might come close to electing such a demagogue as president, but at this stage in our country’s history we would never actually do it. We had come too far to take such a clear and destructive step backward. America today was, I thought, different. I was obviously wrong.

Eight years after the most hopeful moment in our politics in my lifetime, we now were at the very bleakest moment. The better angels of our nature had given way to the most base sensibilities. A presidency built on hope had been followed by one built on our worst fears.

How we respond is, of course, critical. Years from now we will each be asked, what did you do when a president was elected who declared the press the enemy of the state, instituted a Muslim ban, ripped immigrant children away from their parents? Each of us is answering that question in our own way. For me, I’m answering by running.

But I would argue even more is at stake than standing up against a rogue and duplicitous president.

To me, what is required in Congress today is dramatic overhaul. Not incremental tweaks but deep and widespread change. This needs to be more than simply retaking the House but a moment of renewal in our politics in which we chart an entirely new path, and practice our politics in entirely new ways.

Even as Donald Trump’s election was a call to action and even as we must ensure that Trump’s America doesn’t become the new normal, Trump’s election revealed something else. Namely, it revealed that our political system is badly broken.

For years our politics have been stuck. Friends intent on driving social change have long given up on politics as the place to do it. They’ve focused their efforts in community activism, entrepreneurship, arts, education (my brother has worked as an 8th grade public school teacher the past decade), rather than try to make a dent in the messy and ineffective world of politics. Trump’s election served notice that the rupture is complete. Something is deeply wrong with our entire political system. Indeed, the sad truth is that while Trump is a cause of our political dysfunction, he is also a symptom of it.

At the time of Trump’s election I was Miami Program Director at the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Before that I was a journalist for almost a decade, most of that time at the Miami Herald.

During my nearly six years at Knight Foundation I launched an effort focused on propelling Miami’s entrepreneurs and civic innovators as a way to expand opportunity and drive community engagement. The effort resulted in thousands of jobs, spawned myriad new leaders and, most important to me, created a new sense of possibility in Miami.

We aimed to lift up the entire community, supporting the launch of dozens of programs ranging from The Idea Center at Miami Dade College, supporting student entrepreneurs at the largest and most diverse college in the U.S., to the creation of the Black Tech Week and Women Innovating Now LAB Miami, supporting black and women founders.

I loved the work, and it’s hardly finished in Miami. But, for me, the presidential election interrupted all of that. Instead, I submitted my resignation, packed up my office at Knight Foundation, and drove home. There, sitting on my couch in my living room, I started calling friends. “I have a crazy idea,” I told them, “I’m running for Congress.”

As I’ve set out on my first campaign-- building a plane while flying it, I’ve often described it-- much has shaped my thinking. From growing up in Cambridge, Mass. in Speaker Tip O’Neill’s district, being a product of public schools, attending college in New Orleans at Tulane University, working as a journalist at the Miami Herald. But what I want to focus on here is the work at Knight Foundation helping propel entrepreneurs, small business owners and community leaders in neighborhoods across Miami.

At its core, that work focused on investing in and empowering people, helping entrepreneurs honestly assess challenges and think in new ways to solve them, while building trust and establishing core values across the community. And, most of all, the work thrived on an ethos of helping people disrupt-- in big, transformative ways-- the normal way of doing things.

To me, all of this is required in our politics today. We need wrenching, system-wide change. And we, as candidates, can’t just aspire to it, but have the courage to live it.

Change must really mean change

It’s for that reason that my campaign is refusing to accept any donations from political action committees, federal lobbyists or special interests that often play an outsized role in Florida politics like the sugar and energy industry. Instead, our mantra is people, not PACs.

My belief is that if we can get people elected who are funded purely by individuals, then it’s one step closer to getting a Congress that is working in the public interest rather than the corporate or special interest.

Consider that polls show that more than 80 percent of Americans-- more than 8 in 10-- want universal background checks for gun sales. Yet, there is zero movement on legislation in Congress to establish universal background checks. To me, there is one explanation: how congressional campaigns are funded.

Once in Congress, I would support legislation banning contributions from PACs and lobbyists. Furthermore, support legislation that increases transparency on political contributions of all kinds and begin the process of passing a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United.

But, to me, the key is not to wait. For too long we have seen well-meaning candidates who say we must have campaign finance reform but become beholden to the very system they pledge to change.

Meanwhile, this needs to be a moment when we not only change the way we fund elections, but have the courage to let new leaders emerge from the bottom ranks of Congress to the very top. Now, more than ever, we need new leaders and fresh voices. But solely electing a host of fresh-faced members to Congress this Fall is not nearly enough.

That’s why when I was asked in May by a Miami Herald reporter, if elected to Congress, would I support House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi to continue leading the party, I responded, “No, it’s time for a new day.”

My response was not meant to detract from the years of great service Leader Pelosi has given to the party. She is a trailblazer who is responsible for some of the biggest successes of the Democratic Party in the past fifteen years.

Experience and institutional knowledge are, of course, important. But if the Democratic party doesn’t see voters’ frustration with both its current leadership and our politics today, we will have missed an historic opportunity to chart a new path at a pivotal moment.

If elected, I would also push for reforms that allow members of Congress to move up the ranks quicker. For instance, establish term limits for committee leadership posts. With this change, members will be able to move into leadership roles faster and groom future speakers.

In sum, the “Blue Wave” must not only result in a Democratic majority in Congress, but new leaders at all levels too. If it doesn’t, my hunch is that this surge could ultimately resemble the last Democratic wave in Congress, which was short-lived and unsustainable.

Throwing out the playbook

Yet, this is just the start of the broad change that is needed. We need to move away from the campaign formula that candidates are told to follow. Namely, focusing on a specific set of Democratic voters, sticking to selected Democratic poll-tested issues, and then spending most of our waking hours raising money.

Back in 2012, when my Knight Foundation colleague Ben Wirz and I first sketched out our plan to help build Miami’s startup and entrepreneurial community, we established principles to guide us.

• Build networks from the bottom up
• Diversity as a core strength
• Entrepreneurs over institutions
• Fund experiments first, then scale
• Don’t reinvent if we can import
• Learn as we go

This was built on a model of constant community engagement. Every other week we held a coffee open to the entire community. Anyone could come (we didn’t extend invitations or decide who could attend) and conversations were purposefully open-ended with nothing off limits for discussion. The result was a regular platform for people to share ideas, aspirations, complaints, fears-- whatever.

Our thinking was that we didn’t have the best ideas, the community did. Furthermore, the best solutions are reached when you listen and have the courage to embrace good ideas no matter where they arise. And that the greatest impact is achieved when the most diverse range of people are included-- after all, innovation is built on a diverse range of people and ideas connecting and colliding.

Thinking back on it now, I see how different it is from how we are told to run for political office. Rather than opening ourselves up to as many people possible, we choose to connect with a select few who regularly vote. Rather than being open to myriad ideas and solutions, we read from poll-tested position papers. Rather than seeing diversity and inclusion as a critical value, it’s viewed as a nice thing.

For our campaign, our approach is to start with the voter and work backwards. We’ve built a campaign fellows program powered by more than 60 people who, along with me, are visiting voters in all 245 precincts across Florida’s District 27. Currently, we have hit 220. We’ve hosted meetups and coffees open to all. We also have tried an online site called UpVote where we ask people to identify what solutions they prefer. This is only a start.

I know that listening, or even changing one’s mind after hearing a better idea, rather than presenting one’s self as having bold ideas and clear convictions isn’t typically rewarded in today’s politics. But we should start to try. Change occurs from the bottom up. Washington has not been able to find the solutions to our most pressing problems, listening more closely and more widely across our neighborhoods may prove better.

Investing in people and thinking different

My approach at Knight in supporting entrepreneurs wasn’t to make direct investment in businesses. Instead, it was to create an ecosystem of resources across the community that people could choose from to better build the ideas and solve the problem most important to them. This included programs that provided mentorship, connection, learning, access to funding, and fostered a greater sense of community.

Examples include Endeavor, a non-profit which provides mentorship and support to help entrepreneurs scale ventures. eMerge Americas, an annual conference in Miami uniting entrepreneurs across the Americas. LaunchCode and Girls Who Code, each making learning to code more accessible and, in the case of Girls Who Code, taking aim at the yawning gender gap in technology. Social Entrepreneurship Bootcamp and programs, which I mentioned earlier, like The Idea Center at Miami Dade College, Black Tech Week, Women Innovating Now LAB, with a particular focus on black, Hispanic and women entrepreneurs.

Our mantra was that talent is everywhere, but opportunity is not-- and that must be changed. Creating a network of resources that invest in people across the community from the bottom up was our way to try.

It’s time our politics took the same approach. And, while at it, it’s time to start matching the scale of the challenges we face with the size of the solutions. For too long, we’ve operated under the assumption there are things we cannot do. That needs to end.

Matt and his wife at the Women's March-- the day he decided to run for Congress

I mentioned earlier that years from now we will each be asked what we did in response to a destructive and irresponsible Trump presidency. But an equally important question is, what did you at a time when the opportunity and income gap is wider than it’s been since the great depression; when getting an education resulted in so many going deeply into crippling debt; when we seemed helpless to confront gun violence; when quality, affordable healthcare remains a challenge for way too many families and prescription drugs remain artificially and cruelly high; when the planet continues to warm and sea levels rise; when entrepreneurship and business creation remain at decade lows; when the era of mass incarceration continues unabated; when public transportation remains abysmal for too many here in South Florida who lose hours each day commuting to work or school; and when there is such deep-seated mistrust in our politics.

It's a long list. But that’s why we need a new approach which is both honest about what is required and unafraid to embrace solutions that actually have a shot at solving the problem.

That’s why I am for Medicare for All, importation of prescription drugs and allowing Medicare to negotiate reasonable drug prices, universal pre-K, refocusing on improving public education, free tuition in community colleges and public universities, high-speed internet into every home, revamping our criminal justice system, raising the minimum wage to $15, increasing federal funding for public transportation, piloting a federal jobs guarantee. Taken together, this would begin to address the searing the opportunity gap in our country, while expanding opportunity and stirring job creation.

Not only that, hastening the transition to an economy powered renewable energy. Indeed, my moonshot goal is for South Florida-- a region threatened by sea level rise-- is to be the first metropolitan area to do it. We are a long, long way from there today. But if we can muster the resolve, this is a change that will not only safeguard the environment and make us more resilient, but increase jobs and drive our economy.

Meanwhile, we must get back to celebrating that we are-- and always will be-- a nation of immigrants. My wife’s family came to this country in 1966 from Cuba. They found a country that welcomed them with open arms and gave them a shot. We need to get back to being that America. Comprehensive immigration reform includes a pathway citizenship for the undocumented, fighting for Dreamers and those with Temporary Protect Status, cleaning up a cumbersome visa process, and abolishing ICE.

Lastly, no one will believe Congress is really serious about change until we pass gun safety reform. This includes universal background checks, an assault weapons ban and a ban on high capacity magazines, among other changes.

This is a tall order. But the truth is that we are at a crossroads. We need a new direction in our politics focused on solving problems with an open mind that is grounded in common sense, champions our diversity and engages the entire community. The response must allow for experimentation and cannot be top down. But it also can’t be incremental. To do it, in my view, we will need many new leaders in our politics.

We can’t expect the same approach and the same people to deliver a different result.

In President Obama’s farewell address he warned that we can’t take democracy for granted. It “falls on each of us to be anxious, jealous guardians of our democracy,” he said. What the speech said to me is that, yes, America is a special place-- but it is special because generation after generation have continually stepped up and engaged in making it so even as there are setbacks, sometimes dramatic setbacks, along the way.

Now is that time for us.