September, 01 2020, 12:00am EDT
"Protect the Results" Expands To 80 Groups As Coalition Prepares To Mobilize Should Trump Contest Election
New National Partners Include Center for Popular Democracy, Color of Change PAC, Common Cause, Demos Action, PFAW, SEIU, and Working Families Party
WASHINGTON
Today, Indivisible and Stand Up America are announcing that more than 80 advocacy groups and grassroots organizations have joined Protect the Results, a coalition building a system to mobilize millions of Americans should Donald Trump contest the election results, refuse to concede after losing, or claim victory before all the votes are counted.
The new partners join Indivisible and Stand Up America in educating the public about the threat Trump poses to the peaceful transition of power and preparing to mobilize millions of their members to take action. The new partners (denoted by *) join a broad coalition of the largest grassroots networks in the country, progressive and conservative advocacy organizations, good government groups, and labor unions that includes:
- 350 Action*
- Advance Native Political Leadership Action Fund*
- Center for Popular Democracy Action*
- Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW)
- Color Of Change PAC*
- Common Cause*
- Communications Workers of America
- Community Change Action
- Demand Justice
- Demos Action*
- End Citizens United Action Fund / Let America Vote
- Friends of the Earth Action*
- Guns Down America*
- March for Truth
- Momentum*
- Mormon Women for Ethical Government*
- MoveOn
- NextGen America
- People For the American Way*
- People's Action*
- Poder Latinx*
- Progressive Change Campaign Committee*
- Protect Our Election*
- Public Citizen
- Pulso*
- Republicans for the Rule of Law
- Seed the Vote*
- SEIU*
- Showing Up for Racial Justice Action*
- Sierra Club*
- Southern Coalition for Social Justice*
- Stand Up Republic
- Sunrise Movement*
- Supermajority
- United We Dream Action
- UltraViolet Action*
- Win Black / Pa'lante*
- Women's March
- Women for American Values and Ethics (WAVE)*
- Workers Defense Action Fund*
- Working Families Party*
"Black communities are all too familiar with Trump's abuses of power, which have included various voter suppression and intimidation tactics over the years. However, a decision to not accept the results of this election would be dire, further devastating our communities, extending the tenure of the most destructive administration in modern history and completely dismembering what remains of our democracy," said Arisha Michelle Hatch, Executive Director of Color Of Change PAC."Our resistance is key in protecting the outcome of this election. That is why Color Of Change PAC is proud to join forces with Protect the Results, to defend the future of this nation. We will mobilize to safeguard Black people from the chaos and pain that will inevitably ensue should Trump choose to disregard reality in November."
"Working people's voice is their power, and making sure their votes are counted and respected is core to our democracy," said SEIU International President Mary Kay Henry. "When Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are elected it will be because people looked at the last four years of divisiveness, including unconscionable attempts to divide us based on race, and soundly rejected that rhetoric. Their message must be respected."
"With tens of millions of Americans casting their ballot by mail this year, it will take time to ensure that every vote in every state is counted. But, instead of pledging to protect the sanctity of our electoral process in the midst of a pandemic, President Trump is ratcheting up signals that he may not willingly cede power and is increasingly threatening to suppress and intimidate voters, especially in Black and Brown communities. This can't go unchecked," said K. Sabeel Rahman, President of Demos Action. "If Trump continues to apply tactics aimed at intimidating voters and disrupting our election, we will need massive grassroots resistance to protect our democracy. In the face of a consequential and crucial general election it will take all of us to ensure that our democracy isn't hijacked."
"If there's one thing the Republican convention taught us, it's that Donald Trump is prepared to do and say anything if he thinks it will prevent him from losing the election," said Ben Jealous, President of People For the American Way. "We know that voter suppression and disinformation campaigns are already under way and that Black communities are among their top targets. So we are going to fight to protect the integrity of this election and we'll keep on fighting until every vote is counted, even if it means we don't have a clear winner on November 3. We will not let Donald Trump subvert the will of the American people this fall."
"The only guardrail keeping Trump from driving our democracy over the cliff into an ocean of fascism is we the people on Election Day," said Nelini Stamp, Director of Strategy and Partnerships at the Working Families Party. "The Working Families Party is proud to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with allies to protect our right to vote. If Trump wants to ignore the will of the people and fight over election results, it's a fight he'll get."
Last month, Trump refused to say whether he would accept the results of the 2020 election during an interview on FOX News. Just last week, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany doubled down, saying that "the president has always said he'll see what happens and make a determination in the aftermath." These comments follow a deeply troubling pattern of Trump undermining the election, from making false claims that mail-in voting leads to rampant voter fraud to disturbing comments about staying in office past 2024.
Stand Up America is a progressive advocacy organization with over two million community members across the country. Focused on grassroots advocacy to strengthen our democracy and oppose Trump's corrupt agenda, Stand Up America has driven over 600,000 phone calls to Congress and mobilized tens of thousands of protestors across the country.
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'An Affront to the World': Shell Posts Billions in Profits as Planet Burns
"The grotesque wealth that this Earth-wrecking company continues to accumulate is something we cannot allow ourselves to accept as normal," one campaigner said.
May 02, 2024
Oil major Shell announced $7.7 billion in profits during the first quarter of 2024 on Thursday, as well as a $3.5 billion share buyback program.
The news comes as every month covered by the period was the hottest of its kind on record. The three-month period also saw the second-largest wildfire in Texas history, extreme heat in West Africa and the Sahel, and the beginning of the Great Barrier Reef's fifth mass bleaching event in eight years. Scientists have clearly linked global heating, and the weather disasters it exacerbates, to the climate crisis driven primarily by the burning of fossil fuels.
"As extreme weather accelerates and the cost-of-living crisis rumbles on, Shell's latest billion-pound profits are an affront to the world," Izzie McIntosh, climate campaign manager at Global Justice Now, said in a statement. "The grotesque wealth that this Earth-wrecking company continues to accumulate is something we cannot allow ourselves to accept as normal."
"This is the sad irony of the global energy system in which those causing chaos are the ones getting rich."
Shell's profits for the first three months of 2024 were around 20% lower than for the same time in 2023, CNBC reported. However, the company brought in $1.2 billion more than analysts had predicted. The world's largest oil firms, including Shell, saw record profits in 2022 following Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the energy crisis that followed.
"Shell has beaten expectations by a reasonable margin, despite the impact of lower gas prices during the first quarter," Stuart Lamont, an investment manager at RBC Brewin Dolphin, said in a statement shared by CNBC.
Global Witness pointed out that Shell's earnings to date amounted to over $58,000 a minute, more than the average U.K. nurse makes in a year.
"Shell continuing to rake in huge sums of money shows us that huge polluter profits were not a one-off but are the twisted reality of an energy system that benefits climate-wrecking companies to the cost of everyone else," Global Witness fossil fuel campaigner Alexander Kirk said in a statement.
Shell announced its profits one day after the U.S. Senate held a hearing on how large oil and gas companies, including Shell, have continued to deceive the public about the dangers of their products, moving from outright climate denial into making commitments they don't intend to keep or touting false solutions like carbon capture and storage that they then fail to develop. Shell, according to the testimony of Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), spent only 11% of its capital on low-carbon technologies between 2009 and 2023.
The hearing sparked calls for accountability from the fossil fuel industry—such as mechanisms to make climate polluters pay for the transition to renewable energy—and the news of Shell's profits generated more.
In the U.K., Labor Shadow Energy and Climate Minister Ed Miliband proposed increasing the tax on energy company profits. Shell paid the U.K. government around $1.4 billion in taxes in 2023, of which around $300 million went to the Energy Profits Levy, according toThe Guardian. Also last year, it paid its shareholders $23 billion, nine times more than it invested in its "Renewables and Energy Solutions" program.
"These results show yet again why it is so damning [that Prime Minister] Rishi Sunak refuses to bring in a proper windfall tax on the oil and gas giants," Miliband said. "These are companies that have made record profits at the expense of working people. Labor says tax these companies fairly so we can invest in clean homegrown energy that will end the cost of living crisis and make Britain energy independent."
Greenpeace U.K. called Shell's latest profits "shameless."
"Their reckless hunt for profits needs to end," the environmental advocacy group wrote on social media. "When will world leaders find their backbone and make polluters pay?"
When one commenter suggested governments held back out of desire to keep collecting Big Oil's taxes, Greenpeace fired back, "What taxes?" and noted that Shell avoided paying U.K. taxes for years.
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Global Witness and Global Justice Now also took the opportunity to call for an energy transition.
"This is the sad irony of the global energy system in which those causing chaos are the ones getting rich," Kirk said. "This spiral won't stop until we make the urgent switch to a fairer renewable energy system that puts both people and planet first."
McIntosh concluded: "We urgently need to bring a fair and organised end to the fossil fuel era, and that means companies like Shell must stop trying to extract new oil and gas, and start paying what they owe for the loss and damage they've caused. Profit announcements like this for a corporate dinosaur like Shell need to become a thing of the past."
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Protest events including rallies, "die-ins," and the projection of messages and images on government buildings were organized in countries including the United States—the top supplier of arms to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF)—Canada, Germany, Australia, South Korea, and Slovakia.
"The Global Day of Action must serve as a wake-up call to states that continue to supply arms to all parties to the conflict in Gaza that they are at risk of being complicit in war crimes and other violations of international law," said Erika Guevara Rosas, senior director for research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns at Amnesty International.
The groups and their supporters amplified the global campaign on social media using the hashtags #StopSendingArms and #CeasefireNOW.
The day of action comes a day after dozens of universities in the United Kingdom were warned by a legal group that they could be criminally liable for investing in weapons manufacturers that provide arms to Israel, and days after Amnesty International filed a report with the U.S. government detailing specific attacks on Palestinian civilians by the IDF in which Israel used weapons provided by the United States.
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The Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) in the U.S. noted that calls for divestment from Israel have spread across U.S. college campuses in recent weeks, despite violent crackdowns by police forces.
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Organizers in Australia displayed signs reading, "Every F-35 [fighter jet] contains some Australian parts and components."
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Los Angeles police wearing riot gear launched a violent attack on a pro-Palestinian encampment at UCLA early Thursday, using flash bangs and firing impact munitions at students demanding an end to their university's complicity in Israel's war on Gaza.
Video footage posted to social media by reporters present at the scene shows officers firing multiple "less lethal" munitions and sound-concussive devices at student demonstrators as they closed in on the encampment, which UCLA's leadership has declared unlawful.
Police reportedly arrested dozens of students as they advanced on the encampment.
"They'd rather shoot kids than stop this genocide," said one observer.
Police fire multiple impact munitions at protestors. 4:38am pic.twitter.com/960I4iVMtt
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) May 2, 2024
Graeme Blair, an associate professor of political science and member of Faculty for Justice in Palestine at UCLA, told the university's student newspaper early Thursday that police officers "violently dragged" students from the Gaza solidarity encampment and that some demonstrators were "visibly injured."
"Their blood is on Gene Block and the UC administration's hands for a series of catastrophic decisions over the last two days," said Blair, referring to UCLA's chancellor. "It did not need to be this way."
Blair said UCLA professors inside the encampment "plan to be arrested alongside students who have done nothing but talk about a genocide taking place in Palestine."
Matt Barreto, a professor of Chicano studies and political science, told the Los Angeles Times that "our job is to stand up for their First Amendment rights, their rights on their own campus."
Police arrest protestor 4:55am pic.twitter.com/udgS0Terc9
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) May 2, 2024
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The Daily Bruin, whose student journalists were on the scene, reported Thursday that police "continued to detain protesters in the encampment as the clock struck 4:00 am, marking one week since the initial erection of the solidarity encampment by the UC Divest Coalition and Students for Justice in Palestine at UCLA."
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