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THE HILL: Clinton camp courts progressive groups

Advisers to Hillary Clinton and a co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC) are planning a meeting, according to the group, which is an enthusiastic backer of the ideas of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).

PCCC co-founder Adam Green told MSNBC, which first reported the plans for the meeting, that the group talked to Clinton’s camp and a meeting is coming “very soon.”

He did not say which advisers he is meeting with. He also encouraged other liberal groups to get involved, telling MSNBC, “Individual meetings are useful, but progressive movement-wide meetings would be really smart for her.”

The PCCC and other liberal groups could encourage Clinton to increase her populist messaging, similar to Warren.

“Hillary Clinton may be realizing that Elizabeth Warren’s economic populist positions are the path to electoral success in 2016,” PCCC’s Green said in a statement after Clinton praised Warren at an event in Boston last month. “Both in the primary and general election.”

MSNBC: Clinton camp to meet with progressive critics

Hillary’s critics on the left may finally have the opportunity they’ve been waiting for.

Adam Green, the co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, one of the groups most closely associated with the so-called “Warren wing of the Democratic Party,” said his organization reached out to Clinton’s camp before the election and that a meeting was “very soon.”

He declined to name the Clinton advisers with whom he’s been in contact, saying discussions have so far been limited to “conversations about having conversations.” “We want to keep as open a line of communication with Hillary Clinton and her team as possible,” he told msnbc.

The meeting will hopefully be a precursor to a larger summit with more progressive leaders and Clinton herself. “The more the merrier,” Green said. “Individual meetings are useful, but progressive movement-wide meetings would be really smart for her.”

Their message is that Clinton should adopt the kind of economic inequality issues championed by Warren, both for substantive and political reasons. “This is the path to victory in the primary and general election,” Green and co-founder Stephanie Taylor wrote in an op-ed in The Hill.

THE REGISTER: Obama hurls FCC under train, gutpunches ISPs in net neut battle

Obama’s statement came right in the middle of a flurry of meetings the FCC is having this week with all parties in an effort to find a solution. One of these groups, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), was behind a 120,000-person petition in support of net neutrality, and was also happy with the news: “White House support for reclassifying the Internet as a public utility is great news, and the kind of bold executive action that America needs,” it said in a statement.

Both the EFF and PCCC noted, however, that despite the strong views put forward by the President, it is the FCC that will decide. “The fight isn’t over yet,” the EFF pledged, “we still need to persuade the FCC to join him.”

USA TODAY: Q&A: Net neutrality — what is at stake?

In its January ruling, the court said the FCC can regulate Internet providers if the agency reclassifies them as “common carriers” — private companies that sell their services to all consumers without discrimination, like utilities, rather than tailoring their rates for different types of consumers.

Back in 2010, when it crafted the open Internet rules, the FCC chose not to invoke this option — calling broadband “telecommunications services” under Title II of The Telecommunications Act — because it wanted to refrain from overly regulating the Internet. Chairman Wheeler has said “I won’t hesitate to use Title II,” but says that another shot at rule-making would be faster and avoid litigation.

Some net neutrality supporters, including the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and its NoSlowLane.com campaign, have latched onto the idea of treating the net “like water.” On Wednesday, Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., joined that movement, writing to Wheeler that “this approach will allow the FCC to get the policy right and avoid the need to water down essential open Internet protections out of a concern about inadequate authority.”

BROADCASTING & CABLE: Stakeholders Weigh In on President’s Title II Stand

Reaction was swift Monday to the President’s call for reclassifying Internet Access under Title II.

CTIA – The Wireless Association called it a “gross overreaction,” Verizon called it a “gratuitous” and “radical” reversal, while Title II proponents were celebrating.

“White House support for reclassifying the Internet as a public utility is great news, and the kind of bold executive action that America needs,” said the Progressive Change Campaign. “In the wake of the 2014 elections, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee is calling for a Democratic Party of ‘big ideas,’ and this is a great example of what that means — aggressive, creative ways to level the playing field. Working people and small businesses depend on the Internet as a utility, and it’s time for the FCC and Chairman Wheeler to act.”

Progressives’ Route to Power Beyond 2014

PCCC_2014_report_image_v2Last Tuesday was not a repeat of 2012, when PCCC members helped elect 30 amazing candidates — including Elizabeth Warren. It looked more like 2010. It was tough. It was disappointing.

Candidates who ran great campaigns — and should have won — lost in the Republican wave. Bold progressives achieved some important victories Election Night, and some were too close for comfort.

But progressives need to remember that we don’t just work for one election, one candidate, or one party. The PCCC and its members work to build a movement, to build long-term progressive power.

The PCCC Post-Election Report outlines the huge investments made this election cycle that are now for the long term — in future leaders, new technology, new best practices, and more member empowerment. All in addition to congressional victories.Ai??Check it out here.

In the days ahead, there will be a national conversation about the future direction of the Democratic Party — and the progressive movement.

Frankly, Democrats did not have a united economic agenda in this election. There was a lack of big ideas. Some Democrats tried to sound like Republicans, and they lost.

Elizabeth Warren was the most popular Democrat on the campaign trail for a reason: Her message of taking on Wall Street, reducing student debt, and expanding Social Security benefits is popular everywhere — red, purple, and blue states.

Moving forward, something needs to change. America needs a bigger politics.

Progressives won’t win their own tidal wave elections unless they can build a movement around big ideas — free college, full employment, Medicare for All, more Social Security — and the candidates who campaign on those ideas. Elizabeth Warren is the best example. But there are thousands of others out there who believe in a more expansive vision of political …

Route to power for Democrats: Big ideas

Democrats lost on Tuesday, as widely predicted. But for months, pundits got wrong what Democrats would need to win.

There was rumor that youth turnout, Latino turnout, and cutting-edge Get Out The Vote practices would tip the balance in close races. But when “close” elections are decided by 7 to 12 points, something much bigger is happening.

Pundits say President Obama was unpopular. Score one for the pundits. But the critical question is: Why was the president so unpopular?

Did voters not show up because of Syria, Obamacare, or Ebola? No.

Was President Obama proposing some big liberal idea, sparking backlash? No. It’s hard to remember the last time the President offered a big idea.

Jobs and economic security are consistently the top issues voters say they care about in red, purple, and blue states. But Democrats did not have a united economic agenda in this election.

Voters did not wake up on Election Day thinking that their ability to have a job, have affordable college education, or to retire with security was at stake. It was a Seinfeld-ian election about nothing. And nothing does not inspire potential voters to vote. In the absence of big ideas, Democrats lost.

SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS: Ro Khanna concedes hours after Mike Honda declares victory

Rep. Mike Honda declared victory Friday morning over challenger Ro Khanna, who conceded the nationally watched, Democrat-on-Democrat race about eight hours later.

Unofficial returns updated late Friday showed that Khanna, a former Obama administration official who lives in Fremont, closed his gap with Honda to 3,658 votes, or about 3.66 percentage points. It was the slimmest margin since results started coming in Tuesday night, but still too high a hurdle.

“This win belongs to you,” Honda told a throng of cheering, chanting supporters who gathered at his campaign office Friday morning near Newark’s New Park Mall. “We looked at the numbers and said that with the remaining votes for this congressional district, no matter which way it falls, we will still prevail.”

THE HUFFINGTON POST: Mayday PAC Lost Nearly All Its Races This Year, But Refuses To Concede Defeat

The majority of the candidates Mayday backed were Democrats, and 2014 was rather unkind to their party. Senate Democrats lost seven seats, with another two still hanging in the balance, while House Democrats lost between 14 and 18 seats depending on votes not yet counted.

“It was a bad year for Democratic candidates,” said Adam Green, executive director of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which managed the majority of Mayday’s political efforts.

He pointed to the Michigan House race between Upton, chairman of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee, and challenger Clements. Upton had been headed toward what looked like an easy victory, just as in all his previous elections, until Mayday spent more than $2 million against him. Upton ultimately won re-election, but he did so with his lowest margin of victory ever while emptying his campaign war chest.

“The fact that Fred Upton was forced to scramble for his political life — that was the goal, to change the political culture,” Green said.

PORTLAND TRIBUNE: Merkley wins re-election

Democrat Jeff Merkley was handily winning a second U.S. Senate term Tuesday over Republican Monica Wehby, a political newcomer who was hindered by accusations of past stalking and campaign plagiarism.

With about 66 percent of the expected votes compiled unofficially by the Oregon secretary of state, Merkley was leading Wehby, 55 percent to 38 percent. Three minor-party candidates split the rest.

Merkley drew a visit by Vice President Joe Biden, and two visits from Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

“After a successful first term, we expect Jeff Merkley to play an even more active national progressive leadership role — fighting alongside Elizabeth Warren for big ideas like holding Wall Street accountable, reducing student debt, and expanding Social Security benefits,” says Laura Friedenbach, who spoke for the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which raised $93,000 in small donations and made 97,000 telephone calls for Merkley.

SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS: Mike Honda’s lead over Ro Khanna widens slightly

Rep. Mike Honda held a substantial but narrowing lead over Democratic challenger Ro Khanna on Wednesday, with both campaigns sounding defiant as tens of thousands of vote-by-mail ballots remained uncounted.

Unofficial returns in the nationally watched race showed Honda led Khanna by 4.46 percentage points — a significantly slimmer margin than the 7-point lead Honda held in the earliest returns.

Some of Honda’s liberal allies are trying to make his re-election sound like a done deal already. The Progressive Change Campaign Committee called it “a victory to the Elizabeth Warren wing against the corporate wing” of the Democratic Party.

“Ro Khanna is a corporate conservative who ran as a Democrat in name only, who called Mike Honda ‘too liberal’ in smear attacks,” the committee said in a statement. “His Big Money donors should demand a refund.”

MINNEAPOLIS STAR TRIBUNE: Franken cruises to easy re-election

Minnesota U.S. Sen. Al Franken won a resounding re-election victory Tuesday, defeating Republican challenger Mike McFadden, a businessman making his first run at political office.

“I am so honored and so humbled and so grateful to the people of Minnesota,” Franken told a chanting, cheering crowd at a downtown Minneapolis election party. “Thank you for taking a chance on me six years ago. And thank you for giving me the chance to keep working for you in Washington.”

Franken’s easy victory was a stunning contrast to his 2008 razor-thin win against former GOP Sen. Norm Coleman. That came only after an excruciating eight-month recount and a margin of just 312 votes.

While bands played and drinks were poured at DFL Party election headquarters at the Minneapolis Hilton, party Chairman Ken Martin called Franken’s win “a really sweet victory, to be able to go to bed tonight and not have to wake up to a recount, knowing that he’s going to be a U.S. senator again.”

THE HUFFINGTON POST: Democrats Had Winning Issues, Just Not Winning Candidates

If American voters want to see the minimum wage raised, they sure have a funny way of showing it.

Binding ballot initiatives that would raise the minimum wage passed by wide margins in four red states on Tuesday night. And yet the Democratic candidates who’ve been championing a minimum wage hike all year long got trounced in elections from coast to coast. The Republican Party, which has steadfastly opposed raising the federal minimum wage, took control of the Senate and picked up even more seats in the House.

And while Republicans are saying that their victories mean voters want Obama to work with the GOP-controlled Congress, progressives urged him to avoid moderating his administration’s economic priorities.

“The brand of the Democratic Party needs to be as clear and strong as the brand of minimum wage and other progressive priorities that voters overwhelmingly supported yesterday,” Progressive Change Campaign Committee co-founder Stephanie Taylor said in a statement to HuffPost. “It’s their only route back to power. That’s why we’re calling for President Obama to make Elizabeth Warren’s agenda the center of his 2015 agenda, so that Democrats can rebuild a brand about economic issues again.”

NEW YORK MAGAZINE: The Midterm Elections Gave Republicans a Lot to Celebrate, But No Mandate

The election’s over, and now it’s official: The Democrats got crushed. For the first time since the Party won the House and Senate in 2006, Congress is back in Republican hands. As of midnight, the GOP had a 52-seat majority. We won’t know the exact number until Louisiana holds a runoff race in December, and in Alaska, the race was too close to call, but it looks like the GOP will win those races, too. Republicans also destroyed Democrats in governor’s races: Rick Scott in Florida, Scott Walker in Wisconsin, and Rick Snyder in Michigan all won reelection, and Republicans even picked up liberal states like Maryland, Massachusetts, and Illinois.

Already the finger-pointing over why the president didn’t play a larger role in the midterms has begun. The president had almost no presence on the campaign trail this year, in large part because Democrats didn’t want him there. “The White House failed to define any agenda for voters in 2014,” Stephanie Taylor and Adam Green, the co-founders of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, said. “Elizabeth Warren was the most popular campaigner in 2014 for a reason: Her clear economic-populist message of reforming Wall Street, reducing student debt, and expanding Social Security benefits is popular everywhere. Red, purple, and blue states.”

USA TODAY: Analysis: Shaking things up … and making them worse?

Dissatisfied with President Obama’s leadership and dismayed by the failure of both parties to work together on big problems, Americans voted Tuesday to shake things up.

The result: They just may have made those things worse.

Among some Democrats, too, the lessons of Tuesday’s elections are not to compromise but to confront.

“There are three basic directions that things could go,” says Adam Green of the liberal Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “One is really big bad ideas, like lowering corporate taxes. Two is lowest-common-denominator, small-bore ideas that paper over differences and don’t make anybody happy. And the third is a debate about big, bold, economic-populist, Elizabeth Warren ideas,” he says of the outspoken Massachusetts senator. “That’s the debate that Americans deserve.”

WASHINGTON POST: Democrats, Republicans scramble to round up last-minute votes

With less than 24 hours left until polls open, Democrats and Republicans scrambled Monday to turn out every possible vote for their candidates. Party strategists in key states scrutinized early vote statistics and weather reports ahead of what both sides expect to be a number of nail-bitingly close contests.

Democrats were once certain that in Iowa, Rep. Bruce Braley (D) would beat state Sen. Joni Ernst (R) by a wide margin. In a conference call with members of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee on Saturday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid — whose job is on the line Tuesday — said losing Iowa would mean losing the Senate.

“What Joni Ernst would mean, coming to the United States Senate, is that Mitch McConnell would be the leader of the Senate, someone who agrees with her on virtually everything,” Reid said on the call. “If we win Iowa, we’re going to do just fine.”

REUTERS: Courting liberals, Clinton takes tougher line on big business

In Minnesota, Clinton expanded on her economic priorities, saying that before the financial crisis “a lot of us were calling for regulating derivatives and other complex financial products, closing the carried-interest loophole, getting control of skyrocketing CEO pay.”

It was a line that raised eyebrows given the deregulatory policies of Bill Clinton’s administration. But progressive activists, who have criticized Hillary Clinton’s practice of giving highly-paid speeches to groups including financial firms, welcome such statements.

“It’s baby steps in the right direction after $200,000 speeches at Goldman Sachs,” said Adam Green of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.

CBS: Harry Reid: Senate control hangs on one key race

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, said Saturday that a Republican takeover of the Senate will likely depend on the outcome of the Iowa Senate race.

“What Joni Ernst would mean, coming to the United States Senate, is that Mitch McConnell would be the leader of the Senate, someone who agrees with her on virtually everything. Think what that would mean to our country,” Reid said Saturday, according to Roll Call.

Republican Joni Ernst is neck and neck with Rep. Bruce Braley, the Democratic candidate. Reid was participating in a conference call organized by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which was phone banking for Braley.

THE HUFFINGTON POST: Harry Reid: Joni Ernst May Be Too Extreme Even For GOP

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) warned Democrats on Saturday that they couldn’t afford a loss in Iowa’s “critical” U.S. Senate race, because it would hand Republicans control of the chamber.

Speaking of Republican candidate state Sen. Joni Ernst on a conference call hosted by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Reid said, “She’s so far to the right that maybe even a part of the right wouldn’t like what she’s talking about.”

Reid urged progressive activists to make phone calls to Iowa voters on behalf of Rep. Bruce Braley (D-Iowa), whom he described as “a fine man” with “a good record of public service.”

“She’s so out of line with mainstream Iowans, mainstream Americans, that she refuses to appear before editorial boards,” Reid said. “She has spent the entire campaign talking about what she did as a young girl, castrating animals. That is not the issue.”

THE HILL: Reid: Ernst too far right for conservatives

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Saturday urged progressive activists to get out the vote for Bruce Braley, calling Iowa crucial to Democratic hopes to keep the Senate.

“If we win Iowa, we’re going to do just fine,” Reid said on a call organized by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “Iowa is a key for what we do.”

During the call, Reid said Joni Ernst, the GOP Senate nominee in Iowa, would be a disaster for issues key to progressives, like protecting Social Security and raising the minimum wage.

WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Harry Reid: Iowa is ‘critical’ for Democrats

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Saturday that the nail-biter Iowa Senate race will be “critical” to Democrats.

“If we win Iowa we’re going to do just fine,” Reid said on a call hosted by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Talking Points Memo reported. “Iowa is critical. There’s no other way to say it.”

The race between Republican Joni Ernst and Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley is one of the closest in the country, with Ernst maintaining only the narrowest lead over Braley in public polling.

Now, each party is directing last-minute firepower to the Hawkeye State, with appearances by party surrogates and heavy spending on television and radio advertising. Recently, Hillary Clinton traveled to the state on multiple occasions to boost Braley. Sens. Marco Rubio and John McCain have appeared with Ernst on the campaign trail in recent days.

LOS ANGELES TIMES: Harry Reid, Elizabeth Warren push in Iowa to save Senate for Democrats

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said keeping a U.S. Senate seat in Iowa was key to Democratic control of the upper chamber as he and Sen. Elizabeth Warren rallied voters Saturday in a final push before election day.

“If we win Iowa, we’re going to be just fine,” Reid told activists on a morning conference call organized by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “Iowa is critical.”

What was supposed to be an easy lift for Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley in the race for the seat opened by longtime Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin in Iowa is now among the most competitive contests of the midterm elections.

POLITICO: Reid: Senate hinges on Iowa

If Joni Ernst beats Rep. Bruce Braley in Iowa on Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he expects to kiss the Democratic majority goodbye.

The Nevada Democrat said if Braley wins in Iowa, Democrats will do “just fine.” And if they lose? Say hello to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Reid said in a conference call Saturday with the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.

“Joni Ernst would mean — coming to the United States Senate — that Mitch McConnell would be leader of the United States Senate, who agrees with her on everything. Think of what would mean for our country,” Reid said of Ernst, repeatedly attacking her positions against raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.

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