Daily Archives: May 27, 2022

With help from Ella Creamer, Rishika Dugyala and Teresa Wiltz

POLITICO Illustration/Getty Images

What up Recast family! Oklahoma approves a measure banning abortions after conception, a GOP House member acknowledges giving constituents a tour of the U.S. Capitol complex on the eve of the Jan. 6 attack and the CDC recommends boosters for children ages 5 to 11. First though, we focus on a historic primary win in the Bluegrass State.

The sting of narrowly missing out on the Senate nomination two years ago still doesnt sit well with Charles Booker.

In 2020, the former Kentucky state representative, riding on the groundswell of emotion that erupted after the killing of Breonna Taylor by Louisville police officers and the subsequent racial justice protests, came within 2.8 percentage points of securing the Democratic nomination.

Nominee Amy McGrath went on to spend some $90 million only to get trounced by the Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell.

On Tuesday, Booker (no relation to this Recast author, though we joked about being distant cousins) left no doubt about his viability this time: winning his latest primary with more than 73 percent of the vote. He is the first Black candidate ever nominated to federal statewide office in Kentuckys history.

But he faces an equally daunting challenge of toppling incumbent Republican Sen. Rand Paul, who is well-financed and is running in a year far more favorable to the GOP than last cycle.

What Booker has got going for him is energy and charisma that is infectious and a willingness to speak about his own pain. He lost a cousin to gun violence and was raised in the economically depressed West End of Louisville.

As he sees it, Kentucky is ready to embrace a liberal Black Democrat trying to build a coalition of abandoned and ignored voters from the hood to the holler those hailing from the inner city to Appalachia. Its also the name of his memoir.

But he also may have to win over his own party. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has yet to release a statement or a tweet about his historic win. We talk about that, plus why he says, it should if it wants to be on the right side of history.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

THE RECAST: Has that gravity of being one election away from becoming the first Black person from the commonwealth to be sent to Congress sunk in for you yet?

BOOKER: You know, it hasn't. It's so overwhelming.

I'm doing my best to appreciate the magnitude of this moment. I feel the humility, I feel my ancestors. I've said a lot over the years in the Legislature and beyond, that my ancestors were enslaved in Kentucky.

I've had ancestors lynched in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. And so to stand in this moment now, helping to break barriers, even in becoming the first Black person to be a major party nominee for the U.S. Senate in Kentucky, to be the top of the ticket, its a big deal and Im proud.

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THE RECAST:You secured the nomination with about 73 percent of the vote.

It comes on the same night that Cheri Beasley won her Senate primary in North Carolina. I mean, there's a long list of Black Senate candidates: Raphael Warnock and Herschel Walker are likely going to duke it out in Georgia. Mandela Barnes in Wisconsin, Val Demings in Florida.

Is there something about 2022 that is the year of the Black Senate candidate? Does this year feel different to you?

BOOKER: What feels different to me is the heightened sense of urgency.

I'm not running for office because I want a title.

I'm doing this, because I genuinely want things to change for my family, I want poverty to end. I don't want to lose another cousin or a loved one in the streets to gun violence. And I don't want anyone to have to ration their insulin, like I've had to do as a Type 1 diabetic.

Surrounded by his family, Booker speaks to a group of supporters following his victory in the Kentucky primary in Louisville, May 17. | Timothy D. Easley/AP Photo

I'm telling the story of my struggles, which I think is something that's really powerful for Black candidates. Particularly those who have lived in the struggles that have often been prescribed to Black communities, because it gives us the lens to speak about structural inequity that weighs everybody down.

And I tell this story in my book, From the Hood to the Holler, because the challenges that we are seeing in my community in the West End of Louisville, in the hood, are very similar to the challenges in Appalachia. And those common bonds are not only how we're going to win this race, but it's how we win democracy.

THE RECAST: In 2020, you ran a campaign by harnessing the energy and fervor of the social justice movement following the police killings of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd and others. You came very close winning the Democratic nomination two years ago. Can you talk a little bit about what you learned in that defeat?

BOOKER: The thing that I learned was that the people of Kentucky are ready for the change that I'm fighting for. I was just willing to step out on faith and give my family, my loved ones across Kentucky, the chance to choose.

So this time around, I'm not a surprise to anyone. We came through the front door this time. And we went from being impossible to being inevitable.

Booker speaks to protesters gathering before a march to the Breonna Taylor memorial at Jefferson Square Park on Oct. 10, 2020 in Louisville, Kentucky. | Jon Cherry/Getty Images

THE RECAST: Do you feel it's difficult to turn activism into electability? I'm looking across the political landscape, like a former colleague of yours, state Rep. Attica Scott lost in her bid to become the nominee for Kentucky's 3rd District. I'm looking at Nina Turner earlier this month, a Bernie Sanders supporter, but also seen as an activist, came up short to help in her primary bid in Ohio.

BOOKER: It is hard to be in a position where you're marginalized and your voice has been taken away or been ignored, to be able to translate and transfer the pain and the frustration into political leadership.

Poverty is a policy choice. It isn't a product of laziness, or moral deficiency.

We are up against a system that isn't limited by party, that is really perpetuating a lot of the inequities that we're facing at the expense of corporate greed and political power for people so it's difficult to get into these spaces.

So what we're doing in this [Senate] race, my prayer is that it would be a template for more regular folks to know that not only does your voice matter, but you can lead for real change and you can win while doing it.

THE RECAST: To win, youve obviously got to drive up the margins in Louisville and Lexington. But where else can you turn the tide in this race come November?

BOOKER: Well, the power of this rallying cry from the hood to the holler is really that we're telling the story of how you bring communities, coalitions, together that really haven't even been considered as possible.

We know we have much more in common than we do otherwise. And so our path to victory is, as you mentioned, we have to turn out folks that we know are already prepared to vote for my policies and for my candidacy, which is a lot of Kentuckians.

But we also have to go to those communities, like in Appalachia. There are a lot of progressives a lot of people that want true progress. Medicare for All is really popular in a lot of communities across eastern Kentucky, mainly because a lot of folks can't afford health care. And they've seen these big fossil fuel corporations, coal companies making incredible profits and screwing them on the back end.

We're building this from the ground up. This is not with a lot of the party support that a lot of folks would have expected. That should change because my call is for the Democratic Party to be on the right side of history.

This is how Georgia won.

We are proving that you can win in places like Kentucky and if you do it in places like Kentucky, we can win everywhere.

Booker at a book signing event for his memoir in Louisville, Ky. on Apr. 27. | Piper Hudspeth Blackburn/AP Photo

THE RECAST: It's already thought to be a tough year for Democrats. Are you concerned at all that the partys headwinds the current occupant of the White House is facing will impact your race?

BOOKER: Well, it certainly is a factor.

It hasn't shaped how we've moved in this campaign, because this campaign was always bigger than all that.

At the end of the day, our pursuit of democracy is not about any particular party. It's about humanity. And it's not tied down to how successful any president is.

Now, of course, those narratives can make it harder or easier at times.

I'm a Black man running in Kentucky. There's not a whole lot that anyone can say that I havent already heard. We already know its uphill because of the cynicism. So the type of campaign we're building is already made to confront and disarm that.

THE RECAST: Youre running in a state that hasnt elected a Democrat to the Senate since 1992. How do you go about convincing folks that havent voted for a Democrat in a long time, perhaps havent voted for a Black candidate to support your candidacy over someone who's got broad name recognition like Sen. Rand Paul?

BOOKER: A lot of the work that I'm doing is going to counties in areas that Democrats don't go. And that includes the hood where Im from.

Now we vote, overwhelmingly Democrat when we vote in my community. But most politicians don't come until it's time to vote. And so the organizing that we've been doing through this campaign and into the summer is really about meeting people where they are, and not talking about things from a national narrative but pulling out the common bonds, and doing storytelling.

I come from the hood. I come from the struggle. I know what it's like to be ignored.

A lot of the people that voted for Donald Trump in Kentucky also voted for Bernie Sanders. Then we have a governor who has been polled as the most popular [Democratic] governor in the country.

So the issues we're dealing with aren't actually partisan.

Whether your week inched along or zoomed by quickly, were bringing you some quick pop news items and fun features to end it on a high note.

We mentioned Cheri Beasley won her primary in North Carolina. POLITICOs Burgess Everett is reporting Democrats are unsure whether they want to go all-in for her Senate run. Find out why.

Beasley speaks at an election night event hosted by the North Carolina Democratic Party after winning her primary race in Raleigh, N.C., May 17. | Ben McKeown/AP Photo

WATCH: Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby on Operation Fly Formula the Biden administrations response to the baby formula shortage.

The Jan. 6 select committee is requesting an interview with Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.), who previously didnt disclose bringing a constituent family into the U.S. Capitol the day before it was attacked. He reversed course Thursday, POLITICOs Nicholas Wu and Kyle Cheney report.

For the birds: Christian Cooper, the Black man who got the cops called on him by a white woman while he was bird watching in Central Park in 2020, gets his own TV show on National Geographic, Extraordinary Birder.

Prepare yourself for a devastating look at Covids impact with The New York Times, on the heels of America reaching 1 million deaths. Readers shared deeply moving and intimate final text messages with their loved ones, often sent from hospital beds.

Last week, a team of climbers made history as the first all-Black group to summit Mount Everest. They tell the Today Show they want to inspire a future generation of outdoor enthusiasts.

Rhiannon Giddens has a new opera, Omar, telling the story of Omar ibn Said, an educated Senegalese man who was captured from his homeland and enslaved in South Carolina and went on to author several works in Arabic, including this autobiographical essay.

Listen to Jamil Jan Kochai reading his story, Occupational Hazards. The writer, who was born in an Afghan refugee camp in Pakistan, has a story collection coming out in July.

Kendrick Lamars back at it again, with another video from his new album, N 95:

Camila Cabello and Maria Becerra team up for their bouncy new song, Hasta Los Dientes."

TikToks of the day: Too much energy

Splitting the bill be like

Excerpt from:

The Black Democrat taking on Rand Paul - POLITICO

Long-time Democratic Secretary of State Doug La Follette tells Isthmus its 50-50 he will be able to collect the 2,000 signatures needed to make it on the ballot this year.

Ill be real honest, its going to be close this year. I might not make it, says La Follette. COVID infections are still high, including in Dane County. I want to be safe, I want others to be safe. I cant help but feel a little betrayed that the Democratic Party [of Wisconsin] wont help me get on the ballot.

La Follette, who is 81, says he nearly retired this year. But he decided to run for re-election after the Democratic Party of Wisconsin pressured him to do so, telling La Follette he was the best candidate to win in November.

Because I was encouraged to run by the party, I decided to hold off on retiring, says La Follette, who announced he was running for re-election on March 17.Democratic Party of Wisconsin spokesperson Iris Riis initially did not respond to Isthmus when asked if the party had asked La Follette to run.But after this article was published Riis emailed that the party neither "encouraged nor discouraged" La Follette to runfor re-election.

In his last election, La Follette collected 1,500 signatures himself and volunteers collected the rest. Concerned about the pandemic, he didnt think it was realistic to do that again this year. But he had an idea on how to collect nomination signatures safely this election cycle.

I didn't want to risk my health or the health of others. So I came up with a plan. There are 72 counties in Wisconsin, each with its own [Democratic] county party. I asked [the state party] could each of those county parties collect just 30 signatures for me? That way, no one would have to go to events or farmers markets to collect signatures and we could all stay safe, says La Follette. But just as the campaign period was starting, another candidate decided to run. So I was told the Democratic Party of Wisconsin has a bylaw that when theres more than two candidates, they couldnt get involved.

A week after candidates could start collecting nomination signatures, AlexiaSabor, chair of the Democratic Party of Dane County, declared she was challenging La Follette in the Aug. 9 primary.

I have had many primary opponents and I dont mind. [Sabor] has every right to run. Thats why I asked the state party to help both of us collect nomination signatures, says La Follette. My plan still could have worked. But I was basically told they wouldnt help me contact the county parties or get involved.

La Follette says the state party stopped talking to him after that.

Shortly after this article was posted, Sachin Chheda a senior advisor for Sabor provided a comment via Twitter.

Doug La Follette has spent 44 years earning bipartisan agreement that he should have essentially no responsibilities. Its way past time for a change," tweeted Chheda. "Alexia Saboris the candidate who will champion democracy, ensure our public dollars are spent wisely, and fight to keep Wisconsins election machinery safe, secure, and nonpartisan. Also, she will be on the ballot.

Riis says that "barring extraordinary circumstances, DPW is neutral in primaries, and there is another Democratic candidate for Secretary of State.

That's not true of all races with incumbents. The Democratic Party of Wisconsin is helping Gov. Tony Evers collect nomination signatures. But according to the Wisconsin Campaign Finance Information System website, there are three candidates registered as Democrats running for governor and Evers might face some token opposition in the August primary.It makes sense the state party is backing its one-term incumbent at the top of the ticket. So why not La Follette?

"DPW has endorsed Evers, which is why we are helping collect nomination signatures. His endorsement fell under the extraordinary circumstances I mentioned earlier. Evers does not have any serious primary challengers," explains Riis. "The process for endorsement is a party subunit must recommend the endorsement to the administrative committee, which then votes whether or not to endorse a candidate. No subunit recommended La Follette for endorsement, so the administrative committee never voted whether or not to endorse him."

If theres one thing La Follette has proven time and time again, its that he can win even in years when Republicans are successful in elections up and down the ballot. Since 1974, Wisconsin voters have elected the Democrat to serve as secretary of state 11 times. He won on the same ballot as Republican Gov. Tommy Thompson four times, including when Thompson won in a landslide in 1994. La Follette was the only Democrat to win statewide office during the Republican wave when Gov. Scott Walker was elected in 2010; and La Follette won again in 2014.

Jay Schroeder, one of the Republicans running for secretary of state this year, has lost two elections to La Follette. Even Schroeder thinks La Follette is getting burned by his party.

I think Doug has been successful because of name recognition. But what does it say about him that his own party isnt helping him out? asks Schroeder. To me it says this is the year a Republican wins the office.

The stakes for Democrats losing the secretary of state race have never been higher. Legislative Republicans and all four top GOP candidates for governor want to abolish the Wisconsin Elections Commission, which is overseen by a board of both Democrats and Republicans. The GOP candidates for secretary of state are proposing that the office assume control of administering elections that was once the case in Wisconsin and many states still operate that way.

When Wisconsin was founded in 1848, the secretary of state was second only to the governor in terms of power. The secretary once served as the state auditor, acted as the state comptroller, and regulated state businesses. But over 170 years, the office has lost nearly all of its duties. When La Follette was first elected in 1974, he says he managed 49 employees. Now its one and the offices main duties include recording the official acts of the Legislature and governor and authenticating them with the states Great Seal, as well serving on the Board of Commissioners of Public Lands.

La Follette says he understands why the Wisconsin secretary of state race isnt a big priority for state Dems most years. And he admits his races are usually a bit sleepy.

But this year is different. The state party said they need to keep a Democrat in the office to protect them from voter finagling, says La Follette. I agree, thats why I agreed to run when I was very seriously considering retirement.

Why does La Follette think hes been so successful at the ballot box over four decades in Wisconsin politics?

Part of it is my reputation for being an independent-minded Democrat. Voters like that and thats how I have won support from independents and some Republicans. Part of it is back 40 years ago, I went around the state and shook as many hands as I could, campaigning like Bill Proxmire used to, says La Follette. Some of my success has also been because Republicans havent tried very hard to beat me. But I think that might change this year and I need all the help I can get.

Without the Democratic Party of Wisconsins help, La Follette is seeing some success urging people to collect signatures via Facebook. With just days to go before the June 1 deadline, he has about 500 more to collect and would like a healthy buffer to ensure he has a minimum of 2,000.

Like I said, its going to be close, says La Follette.

Editor's note: This article was updated to include additional comments from the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and Sachin Chheda, a senior advisor for Secretary of State candidate Alexia Sabor.

Read more:

Wisconsin's Democratic secretary of state might not make it on the ballot - Isthmus

This year has brought the final breaking point for me with Republicans, not that I voted for many of them before now.

But, really, anyone who still puts an R after their name, affiliated with the party that is about to succeed in turning back the clock on abortion rights, while putting at serious risk a whole range of other freedoms many Americans have come to take for granted as settled law mixed race marriage, gay marriage, contraception has no chance of getting my vote.

The Republican-created Supreme Court of religious zealots alsois pushing all these important matters down to the level of state legislatures and governors, making local races more important than ever before.

Republicans have created the party of voter suppression, the party of lies about voter fraud, the party that shields insurrectionists, the party that harbors white supremacists and the party that won't stand up to the gun lobby, talking about "hardening" our schools rather than stopping the madness of a shoot-em-up gun culture like none other in the world.

The problem, especially in Connecticut, is that leaves you with a motley crew of Democrats, who have long dominated the government and come to do whatever they please, granting all kinds of lucrative goodies, jobs, lavish contracts, even bloated lifetime pensions, to cronies.

I have been impressed in the past more by Connecticut's Democrats in Washington, as if they've risen to the challenge.

But then Connecticut's Washington delegation turned up in New London last week to paint lipstick on Gov. Ned Lamont's big fat $255 million pig, the remake of State Pier a subsidy to rich utilities, one foreign, who don't need it and would have done what they are doing to create profitable offshore wind farms without it.

In the long history of corporate subsidies by governments, Lamont's gift to the utilities must be close to a record breaker in terms of how few jobs it will create. Best estimates indicate the quarter of a billion dollar remake of State Pier will generate fewer wind assembly jobs than a small Walmart. The annual anticipated rent of about $2 million is, well, laughable, given the cost.

You can see this is a governor who inherited the fortune that is financing a second gubernatorial campaign. He didn't make it himself.

Lamont, who presided over a Bond Commission meeting Thursday in which funding to cover another $20 million cost overrun was approvedfor a project that started at $93 million, commented that he knows his way around a change order. Yes, and he pays it with the taxpayers' credit card.

This is the same governor who in 2020 said he was willing to accept all of the cost overruns for the then $157-million project signing a deal in which the utilities were responsible for no price increases because he had confidence in his deputy budget chief, Konstantinos Diamantis, who was overseeing the massive construction project.

Then Diamantis, the subject of a federal grand jury probe into spending at State Pier and Connecticut schools, resigned in disgrace. Oops. That sure was a lot of misplaced confidence by the governor.

What was so distressing about the pig painting last week by Connecticut's Washington politicians was the way they so blithely exaggerated and misled.

Really, how often do you see such a large gaggle of politicians gather around and enthusiastically talk about a project that is literally, as you read this, under investigation by the FBI, a new layer of criminal scrutiny that has followed countless scandals associated with the project.

The Washington Democrats dragged with them, because they could, the U.S. energy secretary, who helped them gush, saying President Joe Biden is personally watching and impressed with what's happening in New London.

Boy, do they think we are gullible.

"Come to State Pier ... this is the future of energy in America," Sen. Richard Blumenthal swooned.

Rep. Joe Courtney called the project he was looking at "eye-watering." Yikes. Get a grip.

You would almost think these folks, so anxious to put lipstick on Lamont's pig, don't know that offshore wind staging facilities are being built all up and down the East Coast, that maybe they've been fooled too. But no.

They are trying to fool us.

And it's likely that the wind staging facilities being built in other states, without the corruption or the same kind of cost-spiraling, massive public subsidies, have not put a union of longshoremen out of work or diverted traditional shipping to competing ports, some out of state.

New London Mayor Michael Passero, a Democrat, turned up predictably for the lipstick event. Passero sold his credibility about State Pier a long time ago, when he actually signed a deal with the rich utilities promising to always sing the praises of the pier project whenever asked.

What excuse do the others have?

Republicans on the Bond Commission asked some hard questions about the pier and the spiraling costs of Lamont's folly at Thursday's meeting.

Alas, I appreciate that.

But I couldn't pull a lever after their names if they appeared on a ballot in my voting booth, as long as there are still Rs after them.

There is too much else at stake for this country, which urgently needs to fend off a pressing Republican offensive against our freedoms and our democracy.

This is the opinion of David Collins.

d.collins@theday.com

See the rest here:

I have to vote for Democrats, but I don't have to like them - theday.com

Austin, TX, May 25, 2022 For the second time this month, Democrat Jolanda Jones bested Danielle Keys Bess in a contest to replace retiring Rep. Garnet Coleman (D-Houston) for Texas House District (HD) 147.

After winning a May 7 special election over Bess by 202 votes, Jones was sworn in to assume interim duties as the representative for HD 147 under the districts previous geographic boundaries.

With slightly shifted boundaries under redistricting, Jones took first in the March primary election with 41 percent in a seven-way primary but came away with a 493-vote margin of victory in Tuesdays runoff against Bess.

A former Houston ISD trustee, Jones touted endorsements from Rep. Al Green (D-TX-09), Coleman, and state Sen. Boris Miles (D-Houston), but Bess held competing endorsements from her former employer Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX-18), state Rep. Harold Dutton (D-Houston), and Houston ISD trustee Elizabeth Santos.

Jones outraised and outspent Bess, and enjoys the support of the LGBTQ Victory Fund and Planned Parenthood Texas Votes political action committees along with numerous labor and teacher union groups.

With a rating of D-79% from The Texans Texas Partisan Index, as the Democratic Party nominee Jones is heavily favored to win, although controversial figure Damien Thaddeus Jones will appear on the ballot as the Republican nominee.

Damien Jones, who previously worked for both then-state Sen. Rodney Ellis (D-Houston) and Beto ORourkes 2018 Senate campaign, defeated Rashard Baylor in the Republican Primary but has ceased to campaign for the HD 147 seat.

Tied to the investigations and indictments of conservative activist Steven Hotze and former Houston police captain Mark Aguirre, Damien Jones is himself under indictment on misdemeanor charges after he allegedly threatened to expose then-state Rep. Gina Calanni (D-Katy) accusing her of personal matters if she did not resign from her seat in December 2019.

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Jolanda Jones Wins Again in Bid to Replace Retiring Houston Democrat Garnet Coleman - The Texan