On Sunday, the liberal advocacy group the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which was a major supporter of Warren’s Senate campaign, launched an online petition urging the SEC to try banks.
“Taking Wall Street banks to trial is necessary for real accountability,” the group wrote. “As Elizabeth Warren says, trials allow the public to learn the truth and allow regulators to better do their job of protecting the public. We call on you to end your practice of ‘too big for trial.’”
Yesterday, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) took part in a Senate Banking Committee hearing titled “Wall Street Reform: Oversight of Financial Stability and Consumer and Investor Protections.”
Warren asked the committee — consisting of bank regulators from the federal government — about the “last time you took a Wall Street bank to trial.” Not a single witness was able to bring up anAi??occurrenceAi??of the government actually taking a big bank to trial in recent times. This is how Warren followed up on that shocking response from federal regulators:
WARREN:Anyone else want to tell me about the last time you took a Wall Street bank to trial? [silence] I just want to note on this, there are district attorneys and U.S. Attorneys who are out there every day squeezing ordinary citizens on sometimes very thin grounds and taking them to trial in order to make an example as they put it. I’m really concerned that too big too fail has become too big to jail. That just seems wrong to me. [applause from audience]
Watch it (relevant section at 03:26):
Last week, the SenateAi??Health Education, Labor, and Pensions committee held a hearing on the state of mental health care in America, an important topic in light of the recent spate of mass shootings.
During the hearing, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) asked Dr. Thomas Insel, who heads the National Institute of Mental Health, about how funding constraints are harming our battle against mental illness. Insel explained how the lack of funding harms research:
INSEL: It’s always frustrating because there’s, of course, never enough funding to support all of the best ideas that come in. We try to support about 20 percent of them. So about 1 in 5 grants gets funded. I hope I’m smartAi??enoughAi??to pick the best 20 percent. I’m afraid I’m not. And if I could do 30 percent I’d have a probably much better hit rate. It’s just hard to know often. That’s always the challenge. You never have the funding you have to do all of the science, some of which is spectacular, just sitting there in front of you.
Watch it (relevant section around 3:22):
The “National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors (NASMHPD) estimates states cut at least $4.35 billion in funding for mental health agencies from fiscal year 2009 through 2012”
New York City Council candidate Yetta Kurland, who is running for the seat of mayoral contender and Council Speaker Christine Quinn, was endorsed by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, a national organization that fights for progressive issues and candidates around the country.
Elizabeth Warren called out AIG, and it backed down.
Earlier this week, it was reported that Ai??AIG would reward taxpayers for their $182 billion bailoutAi??by suing the government over the terms of the rescue.
Bold progressive Elizabeth Warren immediately called out AIG and condemned its behavior:
Beginning in 2008, the federal government poured billions of dollars into AIG to save it from bankruptcy. AIG’s reckless bets nearly crashed our entire economy. Taxpayers across this country saved AIG from ruin, and it would be outrageous for this company to turn around and sue the federal government because they think the deal wasn’t generous enough,” said Warren in a statement. “Even today, the government provides an ongoing, stealth bailout, propping up AIG with special tax breaks — tax breaks that Congress should stop. AIG should thank American taxpayers for their help, not bite the hand that fed them for helping them out in a crisis.
Politico reports this afternoon that AIG’s board met and decided not to join the lawsuit being considered, representing an early victory for Warren and, by extension, American taxpayers.
“It’s just like someone maybe who is drowning in the water and who is saved by some hero and then says, ‘Hey, while you were saving me, you choked me a little bit. So I’m going to sue you.’ That’s simply what AIG is doing. Yesterday, Elizabeth Warren came out very publicly,” explainedAi??Progressive Change Campaign Committee co-founder Adam Green on C-SPAN this morning.Ai??”She’s not just keeping her head down, she’s keeping it straight, front and center and said, ‘This is absolutely wrong, this isAi??unconscionable.’ And I think it’s a real breath of fresh air, that someone didn’t use weasly words and beat around the bush but to say bad corporate …
The liberal advocacy group that helped draft Elizabeth Warren into the US Senate campaign in 2011 is now trying to make Barney Frank her junior senator. The Progressive Change Campaign Committee sent an email to 25,000 Massachusetts members Wednesday afternoon asking them to sign an online petition urging Governor Deval Patrick to appoint Frank as the state’s interim senator. The group also launched a website, AppointBarneyFrank.com.
Adam Green talked about the work of his Progressive Change Campaign Committee, and the organization’s agenda for the 113th Congress.*He also outlined what progressives would like to see from President Obama in his second term.
When Massachusetts Democrat Elizabeth Warren and the rest of the 2013 class of liberal senators start work this month, they’ll have to do more than figure out the byzantine ways of getting things done in Washington. They’ll also have to decide how seriously to engage a progressive movement that sees their assent a historic opportunity to shift the Democratic Party to the left.
“The cavalry is arriving,” said Adam Green, cofounder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “A lot of news coverage after the election focused on Democrats winning two seats, but the big story for us is the composition of the Democratic caucus has moved in a massively progressive direction.”
When Warren laid out the approach in a debate with departing Sen. Scott Brown during the campaign, it instantly entered the progressive canon… And the plan has widespread support beyond just liberals, progressives argue. Case in point, the PCCC polled voters in two swing states (Virginia and New Hampshire), and in Obama’s home state of Illinois, about Warren’s plan. The poll, conducted by PPP and shared with Salon before its release, didn’t mention Warren’s name, but asked about individual components. All had broad support.
Elizabeth Warren wants to reform the filibuster.
Bold progressive Elizabeth Warren has announced that one of her first priorities as a new senator will be to reform the filibuster — which essentially forces lawmakers to use two-thirds of the vote to pass anything to overcome it — in the Senate.
Why do we need reform? Here’s a graph from the nonpartisan Century Foundation that shows the number of cloture votes — the votes invoked to overcome a filibuster — over the past fifty years. As you can see, the filibuster is being used at a rate dozens of times higher than it was during the middle of the twentieth century:
Keep in mind that these filibusters do not involve the Mr. Smith Goes To Washington long speeches or drawn out stands on the Senate floor. Now, senators simply announce their intent to instruct and then waltz off to fundraisers and galas.
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) explained this during his appearance on Up With Chris Hayes this weekend:
MERKLEY: We’re trying to make the filibuster actually work the way it was intended. That is that folks have to make their case known before their colleagues, before their American colleagues. That they can’t simply use the silent filibuster we have now to kill things in the dead of the night. […] The talking filibuster says that if you’re going to obstruct or say there is to be more debate the public has to weigh in and say if you’re a hero or a bum.
Watch it:
The filibuster has become such a powerful tool of obstruction that lobbyists in Washington now specialize in manufacturing tactics to hold up legislation. We need to reform the filibuster so that a recalcitrant minority …
November 6 was “probably one of the best election nights progressives will ever have,” says Adam Green, cofounder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “Underlying the fact that Democrats picked up a few seats is that the progressive ranks are growing while the Blue Dogs are dwindling.” Progressive advocates believe these new faces will lead to more favorable policies out of Congress… But the progressives also make a political argument. For years, they’ve claimed that Democrats need to be more progressive, not less, if they want to win elections. The idea that tacking to the middle and embracing center-right positions is what wins, they say, is a canard. Now, they point to the 2012 results as proof.
Thanks to our efforts, Elizabeth Warren and 31 other state and federal candidates were elected last week.
As Congress moves to enter discussions over the debt and deficit during the lame duck session, many on the right — and their corporate allies — are calling for cuts to Social Security and Medicare benefits while further cutting corporate taxes.
This is not a balanced approach to the issue. Our immediate deficit is caused primarily by the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, two wars, and Wall Street’s economic meltdown — not American seniors and other middle class Americans who rely on these social insurance programs.
Senator-elect Elizabeth Warren explained what a real balanced approach to the deficit would be during a debate with Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) last month:
WARREN: I believe we need to make cuts, we need to make cuts to agriculture subsidies. We need to make cuts in our defense budget, targeted cuts. We need to end the war in Afghanistan, that’s $2 billion a week. We need to cut fraud and abuse out of the system. But we also need to ask others to pay their fair share. I believe that billionaires should pay taxes at least at the same rate that their secretaries do.
Watch it:
Thanks to our efforts, Elizabeth Warren and 31 other state and federal candidates were elected on Tuesday.
The Progressive Change Campaign Committee made a major impact in the 2012 elections. Below is a list of over 30 candidates for state and federal office who won thanks to the efforts of our 950,000 members:
Federal
Elizabeth Warren (MA-SEN) — Dem pickup!Ai??54% to 46%. PCCC members made 574,570 calls. $1,159,410 raised directly for Warren through 69,598 donations. And over a year of grassroots Warren organizing.
Sherrod Brown (OH-SEN):Ai??50% to 45%. PCCC members made 79,265 calls. $36,086 raised from 3,686 donations.
Tammy Baldwin (WI-SEN):Ai??51% to 46%. PCCC members made 92,030 calls. $55,200 raised from 4,585 donations.Chris Murphy (CT-SEN):Ai??55% to 43%. PCCC members made 41,466 calls. 451 donations.
Mazie Hirono (HI-SEN):Ai??63% to 37%. PCCC members made 41,604 calls. 1,129 donations.
Sheldon Whitehouse (RI-SEN):Ai??65% to 35%. PCCC members made 10,764 calls. $10,113 raised from 1,102 donations.
Bernie Sanders (VT-SEN):Ai??71% to 25%. $53,056.61 raised from 4,199 donations.
Alan Grayson (FL-09) — Dem pickup!Ai??62% to 38%. PCCC members made 216,577 calls. $56,684 raised from 5,429 donations.
Annie Kuster (NH-02) — Dem pickup!Ai??50% to 45%. PCCC members made 119,095 calls. $88,456 raised through 10,726 donations.
Carol Shea-Porter (NH-01) — Dem pickup!Ai??50% to 46%. PCCC members made 133,355 calls. $15,721 raised from 2,302 donations.
Rick Nolan (MN-08) — Dem pickup!Ai??54% to 46%. PCCC members made 66,907 calls. $13,912 raised from 1,974 donations.
Mark Takano (CA-41) — Dem pickup!Ai??56% to 44%. PCCC members made 54,632 calls. $11,528 raised from 1,793 donations.
Lois Frankel (FL-22) — Dem pickup!Ai??55% to 45%. PCCC members made 230,522 calls. $13,217 raised from 2,987 donations.
Raul Ruiz (CA-36) — Dem pickup!Ai??51% to 49%. PCCC members made 5,626 calls.
Alan Lowenthal (CA-47) — Dem pickup!Ai??55% to 45%. PCCC members made 15,271 calls.
Mark Pocan (WI-02):Ai??68% to 32%. PCCC members made 34,090 calls. …
Warren, a Harvard University law professor, has become a liberal darling in her first race for elected office. She helped President Obama create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and won a featured speaking slot at the Democratic convention in Charlotte. “Progressives just won our marquee race of 2012 and elected a leader who will shake up the corridors of power from Washington to Wall Street,” said Stephanie Taylor, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, one of Warren’s earliest supporters. The group raised more than $1 million for Warren.
The national news media has just called the Massachusetts Senate race for Elizabeth Warren.
Progressive Change Campaign Committee Ai??(PCCC) members made over 570,000 calls for Warren and raised over $1.1 million for her campaign.
PCCC co-founder Stephanie Taylor has the following statement on Warren’s election:
“Progressives just won our marquee race of 2012 and elected a leader who will shake up the corridors of power from Washington to Wall Street.Ai??We are proud to have made nearly 600,000 calls and raised well over $1,000,000 in small-dollar donations for Warren’s campaign.Ai??The election of Elizabeth Warren is a historic moment and an investment in a progressive future whereAi??working families have a fighting chance.”
LIVE RESULTS UPDATE: SIXTEEN PCCC CANDIDATES WINNING AND COUNTINGai??i??
Peter Shumlin (VT-GOV) re-elected. (26,000 PCCC calls)
Chris Murphy (CT-SEN) elected. (41,000 PCCC calls)
Bernie Sanders (VT-SEN) re-elected. ($53,000 raised)
Sheldon Whitehouse (RI-SEN) re-elected. (10,000 PCCC calls, over 1,000 grassroots donations)
Alan Grayson (FL-HOUSE) elected. (216,577 PCCC calls,Ai??$56,684 raised)
Lois Frankel (FL-HOUSE) elected. (230,522 PCCC calls, nearly 3,000 contributions)
Elizabeth Warren (MA-SEN) elected. (570,000 PCCC calls, $1.1 million raised)
Tammy Baldwin (WI-SEN) elected. (92,000 PCCC calls, $55,000 raised)
Sherrod Brown (OH-SEN) elected. (79,000 PCCC calls, $36,000 raised)
Mark Pocan (WI-HOUSE) elected. (34,090 PCCC calls)
Keith Ellison (MN-HOUSE) elected. (17,504 PCCC calls)
David Cicilline (RI-HOUSE) elected. (10,764 PCCC calls)
Beth Pearce (VT-TREASURER) elected. (26,000 PCCC calls)
Annie Kuster (NH-HOUSE) elected. (119,095 PCCC calls)
Raul Ruiz (CA-HOUSE) elected. (5,626 PCCC calls)
Carol Shea-Porter (NH-HOUSE) elected. (133,355 PCCC calls)
The Massachusetts Democratic Party is reporting on the latest dirty trick:
If you witness any election irregularities or voter suppression, send us a tip about it at tips@boldprogressives.org. Or tweet it at us @boldprogressive.
We don’t yet know who is behind this dirty trick, but we know how to fight back.
We’ve just released a new video featuring a group of celebrities and political icons who want you to vote for Elizabeth Warren.
“I believe she’ll stand up for the working person, the everyday person, the people who have been taken advantage of by the system,” says Ben Affleck in the video. “I love Elizabeth Warren…She cares about people. Not corporations ‘people.’ People people,” says comedian Sarah Silverman.
“I support Elizabeth warren because she works tirelessly for the people,” says Daily Show co-creator Lizz Winstead. “She understands that economic issues and women’s issues are one in the same.”
Former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis has this to say about if her opponent Sen. Scott Brown (R) wins: “Karl Rove will be running the Senate of the United States. That’s the last thing in the world we need.”
“I know that she’ll work so hard, day in and day out in the Senate, on behalf of working families,” says Progressive Change Campaign Committee co-founder Stephanie Taylor.
Watch it yourself:
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Can’t make calls? Chip in $3 to help elect Warren to the Senate.
The president’s former advisor and the conceptual founder of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Elizabeth Warren is now the Democrats’ candidate for senate in Massachusetts. Her campaign has become a second rallying point for politically-concerned celebrities — and in a new spot from the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Massachusetts native Ben Affleck sings the Harvard professor’s praises.
Help defend Warren against this dirty trick. Sign up to make calls for her.
It appears that somebody in Massachusetts is trying to use dirty tricks to prevent Elizabeth Warren from being elected.
Patch.com’s Susan Manning reports that at least one voter got a robo-call telling them to vote for President Obama and Warren on Wednesday — the day after the election. The calls apparently are claiming the election date has been changed due to Hurricane Sandy:
The call said “Hi, I’m one of your neighbors in Holliston and … I want to urge you to vote for Elizabeth Warren and Barack Obama on Wednesday, November 7.” The date, said the call, had been changed because of Hurricane Sandy.
Manning was unable to ascertain the origin of these calls, the caller ID listed it simply as Massachusetts 000-0000.
We don’t know who’s behind this dirty trick, but we do know how to respond. We’re making calls to Massachussetts voters over the next few days asking them to vote for Warren on Tuesday. Click here to join our Call Out The Vote effort.
A month ago, we reported that Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown has held over thirty Washington, D.C. fundraisers with lobbyists and other elite donors but hasn’t held a single open town hall for all of his constituents to come to.
Since then, Brown has yet to hold any town hall events, even as he’s campaigning against bold progressive Elizabeth Warren, who has steadily overtaken him in the polls. That means Brown has been in office a whopping 1,000 days and he hasn’t held any open town hall events for his constituents.
In his last campaign for office, Brown said that he was running for “the people’s seat.” But he consistently refuses to meet with the people.
Take action. Sign up to make calls for his bold progressive opponent Elizabeth Warren.
On the eve of today’s 10th anniversary of the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.), family, friends, former Congressional colleagues and average Americans who were touched by Wellstone’s work gathered on a conference call to share their memories of one of the icons of the progressive movement, vowing to continue to champion the causes he fought so hard for… This is a person who understood his moral compass,” Progressive Change Campaign Committee Co-Founder Adam Green said on the call. “And even when he was an isolated voice in an out of touch Senate, he voted his conscience and was very much the tip of a spear of an entire movement across this country.”
(Photo credit: Flickr user Brian Harrington Spier)
Last week, we told you how the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — perhaps the most powerful corporate lobbying group in all of Washington — is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to launch mailers in Massachusetts attacking Elizabeth Warren.
It’s important to remember that even though the Chamber has “U.S.” in front of it’s name, it has been caught in the past taking funding from foreign entities like the state-owned Bahrain Petroleum Company.
Because it refuses to disclose its donors, we don’t know who all of the group’s corporate sponsors are. But an alarming bit of news from the Wall Street Journal suggests that they may be even more corrupt than we imagine. The paper reports that the Chamber is suing to stop regulations that require companies to disclose whether they use blood diamonds:
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers filed a challenge late Friday toAi??rules requiring U.S.-listed companies to disclose whether their products contain minerals blamed for fueling violence in central Africa.
The Chamber works on behalf of its donors, and this bit of news suggests that companies involved in the blood diamond trade in Africa are likely Chamber donors.
Members of Congress work on behalf of their donors, too. The Chamber opposes the Affordable Care Act and equal pay for women. So does Warren’s opponent, Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA).
If Brown is re-elected with the Chamber’s dollars, we may see him, too, fighting regulations requiring the disclosure of blood diamonds.
We don’t have to let that happen. Click here to sign up make calls to voters for Warren.
Tommy Thompson
Wisconsin Republican Senate Tommy Thompson has been caught on tape saying he wants to “do away with Medicare and Medicaid.” To accomplish this assault on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security — which he supported privatizing in 2004 — he has to try to convince the public that they are going broke.
So maybe that explains this bizarre statement by Thompson. At a recent Republican Party event in Wisconsin, Tommy Thompson ludicrously claimed that China is paying for a portion of every Social Security and Medicare check mailed to seniors:
THOMPSON: I look at the fact that 40 cents out of every dollar, ladies and gentleman, is borrowed mainly from the Chinese. Every Social Security check, every Medicare check 40 cents is borrowed from the Chinese. Does that make you comfortable?
Watch it:
Thompson is trying to claim that 40 cents out of every dollar in our Social Security and Medicare checks comes from the Chinese. The truth is actually the opposite. Social Security is fully financed through payroll contributions, taxes on higher income beneficiaries, and the interest on its own surplus. In fact, it is actually one of the largest holders of U.S. debt — meaning that not only do we not borrow from the Chinese to finance it, but it actually keeps us from borrowing more from the Chinese and other foreign debt holders.
With respect to Medicare, it is also largely funded by its own dedicated revenue stream of payroll taxes, although half of Medicare Part A is funded by general revenue.
And by the way, China only owns 10 percent of U.S. treasuries.
This leaves one of two possibilities. Either Thompson is too ignorant to realize that American taxpayers, not Chinese debt holders, pay for …
Last June, Senate Republicans filibusteredAi??and killed the Paycheck Fairness Act, which was designed to make sure women can get equal pay for equal work at their jobs.
One of the Senators who joined this filibuster effort was Scott Brown (MA). Brown — who, remember, is running misleading commercials claiming he is a friend to women voters — told the mediaAi??the bill would’ve placed “job-killing burdens on small businesses.”
But what the media didn’t report was that many of the same Big Business front groups and lobbyists that battled the bill behind the scenes have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to re-elect Brown since he helped kill fair pay for women.
In the days leading up to the Senate vote for the bill, corporate lobbyists from groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) lined up to oppose it. One group, theAi??Society for Human Resource Management, mobilized human resources officers at corporate firms to lobby senators to kill the bill.
The resulting filibuster ended up killing the bill, in a blow to women everywhere who are discriminated against in the workplace. But as is often the case in Washington, the vote was just the beginning. The payoff was what senators like Brown were waiting for.
Before the vote, Brown received $238,028 from interests opposed to the bill. But in his campaign against bold progressive Elizabeth Warren, the real payday arrived. Two weeks ago, Norquist’s ATR dropped $162,000 on mailers attacking Warren on behalf of Brown.
Last week, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — which has in the past been caught taking funding from overseas corporations like the state-owned Bahrain Petroleum Company — spent $300,000 to hire Meridian Strategies, …
New York City’s billionaire mayor Michael Bloomberg last year shocked the world when he ignored a court order and moved to crush the nascent Occupy Wall Street movement. He famously deployed the New York Police Department to jettison protesters from Zuccotti Park, whose owners paid his girlfriend $109,954 in 2009.
Bloomberg is apparently not done with attacking the 99 percent. He has launched a new Super PAC to boost candidates who share his plutocratic vision for America. In an interview with the New York Times, Bloomberg threw his support to embattled incumbent Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) while absurdly invoking the Soviet Union to blast his bold progressive challenger Elizabeth Warren:
In the Senate, Scott Brown, who single-handedly stopped the right-to-carry bill. You can question whether heai??i??s too conservative. You can question, in my mind, whether sheai??i??s Godai??i??s gift to regulation, close the banks and get rid of corporate profits, and weai??i??d all bring socialism back, or the U.S.S.R.
It’s unlikely that Bloomberg is truly fearful that Warren will unleash Communism on America. Rather, Bloomberg has been one of Wall Street’s biggest defenders. In 2011, he famously claimed that it wasn’t “the banks that created the mortgage crisis.” The banks, of course, are all against Warren, and half of Brown’s top twenty donors come from the financial industry.
It’s sad that, torn between his desire to defend Wall Street and to desperately seek attention in light of his own failed national aspirations, Bloomberg would engage in such extreme rhetoric to smear Warren.
