Furtive Facts For Friday April 6th

YOU HAVE THREE MORE DAYS TO REGISTER TO VOTE IN THE INDIANA PRIMARY

And you can do it by text:  ‘For the first time, Indiana residents can kick off the registration process with a text message. Hoosiers can text “Indiana” to 2VOTE (28683) to get a link to the indianavoters.com website to register to vote.’

https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2018/04/02/hoosiers-can-register-vote-text-sort-but-do-soon-if-you-want-vote-may-8-primary/458729002/

Showing up matters.  ‘A new Post-Kaiser survey finds that 20% of adults have attended a political protest, rally or speech in the last two years.’:

The poll offers a rare snapshot of how public activism has changed in the 50 years since large street protests and rallies last dominated the political landscape.

“This confirms there is a resistance and that a lot of people want to be associated with it,” said Michael Kazin, a history professor at Georgetown University and editor of Dissent magazine. He said many Americans intensely oppose what Trump is doing, just as many did in the second half of Lyndon Johnson’s term in the late 1960s….

Nearly 4 in 10 said they plan to become more involved in political causes in 2018. Among the one-third who planned to work or volunteer for congressional races, 64 percent say they will do so for Democrats, and 26 percent plan to work for Republicans.’

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/national/wp/2018/04/06/feature/in-reaction-to-trump-millions-of-americans-are-joining-protests-and-getting-political/?utm_term=.86703d9c7ea2

 

More women are running for office than ever before: 

‘In Indiana, for example, women are running in each of the state’s nine congressional districts — only two of which are currently represented by Democrats.’

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/politics/Women-Elections-US-House-Seats-Record-478900043.html

According to Time Magazine ‘Even with the record numbers, women are still outnumbered by male candidates. But experts say the sheer number of women running combined with so many House seats open due to retirements or resignations provides one of the best opportunities for women to make real gains in terms of representation and a change in priorities.’

Now that Rex Tillerson is gone some of his “run it like a business cost-cutting” is being questioned:

‘Congressional officials, some of whom had unsuccessfully tried for months to learn details of the redesign, expressed surprise when POLITICO disclosed the dollar figures to them and said the issue could be the subject of upcoming hearings.

“I believe we must look into how taxpayer money was spent on this botched project and will continue to call for the committee to examine these issues in open hearings in the near future,” [New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez]  Millions have been spent on private consultants (mostly from Deloitte).

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/05/tillerson-state-department-consultants-503557

 

President Trump’s relief that Robert Mueller’s investigation has told him is not a “target” of the investigation may be premature:

The Washington Post reported that ‘Prosecutors view someone as a subject when that person has engaged in conduct that is under investigation but there is not sufficient evidence to bring charges.’  However, according to University of Missouri School of Law professor Frank Bowman, that is an incomplete reading of DOJ guidelines.  ‘The full DOJ definition also offers that a target is someone “who, in the judgment of the prosecutor, is a putative defendant.” This is relevant, because current Department of Justice guidelines say that a sitting president cannot be indicted, which means that according to these guidelines he cannot technically be a putative defendant—at least not while in office.

“The ‘not a target’ designation doesn’t convey much of real substance concerning Mueller’s assessment of the current evidence against Trump,” Bowman told me over email. “If Mueller really said Trump is not a ‘target,’ all he may be saying is that, while there is substantial evidence linking him to a crime, DOJ policy precludes making him an actual indicted ‘defendant.’”

Until he is no longer President…

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/04/the-report-that-trump-is-not-a-target-of-the-mueller-probe-is-actually-terrible-news-for-him.html

Furtive Facts For Friday March 30th

More evidence that getting out the vote – registering voters and getting them to the polls – makes a huge difference:

‘In Illinois’ 6th Congressional District, 62,990 people voted Democratic last week for seven candidates, up from just 8,615 in the 2014 primary.’  That is a 631%% increase over four years ago!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/suburban-voters-angry-with-trump-threaten-gop-grip-on-house/2018/03/26/e7c81026-2de3-11e8-8688-e053ba58f1e4_story.html?utm_term=.39b0551a559e

 

The Indiana General Assembly will most likely be called for a special session in May, costing taxpayers as much as $30,000 per day:

There are quite a few questions being raised about this such as:

Is this really a special session for special interests?  Last minute addenda to three different tax bills – hundreds of pages of proposed statutes – that benefit powerful corporate interests are part of why some legislators want to come back and pass those bills.  Democrats are wondering why a GOP supermajority couldn’t get bills, some of which had bi-partisan support, passed during the regular session.  How will the fact of knowing they have lost their re-nomination bid affect the decision making of lawmakers so affected?

https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2018/03/25/special-session-special-interests/447208002/

and

http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/gov-holcomb-will-call-special-session-of-indiana-general-assembly/article_401011d7-9e68-5db2-a39b-c23a1d54e573.html

 

“[This] White House has assembled the most preponderantly male team since the Reagan administration:

This gender skew shows up at all levels of the government, which means not only are women underrepresented in senior ranks, but the appointees and aides at lower levels are also overwhelmingly male – and those are the people gaining experience that will make the attractive to the next Republican administration in power.  This, obviously, perpetuates the lack of women with input and making policy.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/the-very-male-trump-administration/556568/

 

This effect may, however, be dampened by the surge of women getting involved as candidates at the state and local levels:

In Indiana there are 75 women running for a seat in the General Assembly on May 8th, which is twice as many as ran four years ago!

https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2018/03/29/more-women-fighting-seat-table-indiana-general-assembly-primaries/389864002/

 

If you missed the debate among GOP candidates for Todd Rokita’s soon-to-be-vacated seat, you can catch up with it here:

https://www.purdueexponent.org/city_state/article_3c0026d8-f3d1-507d-8c01-9fe74dce69f3.html

This is our chance!

Let’s face it: Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan aren’t going to hold Donald Trump accountable. Todd Rokita isn’t suddenly going to grow a spine.

So we need to hold them accountable this November up and down the ballot.

We need to canvas neighborhoods. Get out the vote. Arrange transportation to take voters to the polls. Continue hosting events like the Resistance Fair.

To do so, we are asking for your support. Local Indivisible chapters like ours do not receive funding from the national group, and we don’t have deep-pocketed donors like the Kochs. We rely on donations from people in our community that, like us, simply will not abide four years of Donald Trump with a rubber-stamp Congress.

We are trying to raise $3,000 before the May 8th primary.

Can we count on your support?

https://www.lafayetteindivisible.com/donate

This is our chance. Our opportunity to shock the system with voter turnout levels this area has never seen. Let’s make this a November to remember.

Yours in resistance,

Greater Lafayette Indivisible