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For Immediate Release
February, 28 2018, 11:00pm EDT
Contact:
Yasmina Dardari, yasmina@unbendablemedia.com, (407) 922-8149
Women's Group Demands Mitch McConnell Change Senate Rules to Allow New Mother Senators to Do Their Job
UltraViolet Says Voters Elected Duckworth, McConnell Should Not Prevent Her from Doing Her Job Because of Outdated Rules
WASHINGTON
UltraViolet, a leading national women's group, today launched a campaign demanding that Mitch McConnell and Republicans modernize its rules in the US Senate to allow new mothers to vote while caring for their children. The new campaign comes after expectant mother Senator Tammy Duckworth ((D-IL)--who will be the first U.S. Senator in history to give birth while in office--said in an interview with Politico that she cannot technically take maternity leave, citing Senate rules that bar children from the floor and require Senators to be physically present to cast a vote. More than 35,000 people have signed UltraViolet's petition.
VIEW THE PETITION HERE: https://act.weareultraviolet.org/sign/duckworth_maternity/
UltraViolet argues that outdated Senate rules will prevent new mother Senator Tammy Duckworth from doing the job that voters in Illinois sent her to Washington to do. The group notes that Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans could change the rules today and bring the Senate into this century if they wanted to, but they so far have declined to do so.
"Like too many working women in America, Senator Tammy Duckworth is being punished for giving birth," explained Nita Chaudhary, Co-Founder of UltraViolet." Because of the Senate's sexist and backward rules, Senator Duckworth will be unable to do her critically important job and care for her newborn at the same time. Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans, who control the Senate, could change the rules today. But so far they have refused to act. The current rules send a clear message that new moms are not welcome in the Senate. This type of discrimination ought to be unacceptable anywhere in society and particularly in the US Senate."
UltraViolet is a powerful and rapidly growing community of people mobilized to fight sexism and create a more inclusive world that accurately represents all women, from politics and government to media and pop culture.
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Hundreds of Thousands Rally Against Poland's Authoritarian Right-Wing Government
"We are now at a crossroads between being an authoritarian and a democratic country," said one activist.
Jun 05, 2023
An estimated 500,000 people took to the streets of the capital Warsaw and other Polish cities on Sunday to protest the nation's far-right government, which has assailed reproductive freedoms, attacked the rights of LGBTQ+ people, and cracked down on critical civil society groups and media outlets.
Sunday's march against the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party—which has held power since 2015—was called by former Polish prime minister Donald Tusk, who is leading the Civic Platform opposition party into an expected October general election.
"Here's my pledge to you today: We are going to win this election and hold PiS accountable," Tusk told a crowd gathered in Warsaw.
The Associated Pressreported that "the passage of a contentious law last month seems to have mobilized greater support for Tusk."
The law, signed by right-wing President Andrzej Duda, "allows for the creation of a commission to investigate Russian influence in Poland," AP noted. "Critics argue that it would have unconstitutional powers, including the capacity to exclude officials from public life for a decade. They fear it will be used by the ruling party to remove Tusk and other opponents from public life."
Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram, a lawyer and rights activist, toldThe Guardian ahead of Sunday's protests that the new measure "is against Tusk but we can all be targeted by this law, because they will not hesitate to use it against anyone."
"It is the culmination of the authoritarian system developed in Poland over the past eight years. We are now at a crossroads between being an authoritarian and a democratic country.”
\u201cPierwszym krokiem do zrzucenia niewoli jest by\u0107 odwa\u017cnym, aby by\u0107 wolnym. Pierwszym krokiem do zwyci\u0119stwa jest pozna\u0107 si\u0119 na w\u0142asnej sile.\n\nJeste\u015bmy tutaj dzisiaj, \u017ceby ca\u0142a Polska, ca\u0142a Europa, ca\u0142y \u015bwiat, \u017ceby wszyscy zobaczyli, jak jeste\u015bmy silni!\u201d— Donald Tusk (@Donald Tusk) 1685878134
Described as among the largest political demonstrations in Poland in decades, Sunday's march came amid growing alarm over the Polish government's ongoing assault on basic rights.
As Amnesty Internationalsummarized in its 2022 report on the country: "Access to abortion was further limited. Criminal charges were used to curtail freedom of expression. The authorities continued to erode the independence of the judiciary. Freedom of peaceful assembly was restricted. Violations of LGBTI rights persisted. Positive moves were made to accommodate between 1 and 2 million refugees from Ukraine, although official hostility continued towards refugees and migrants who arrived since 2021 via Belarus."
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A dozen states have released early data on the number of people removed from Medicaid as they restart eligibility checks, a cumbersome process that many people ultimately fail to navigate.
So far, the statistics are alarming: More than 600,000 people across the U.S. have been stripped of Medicaid coverage since April, according to a KFF Health Newsanalysis of the available data, and "the vast majority were removed from state rolls for not completing paperwork" rather than confirmed ineligibility.
Nearly 250,000 people who have been booted from Medicaid live in Florida, whose governor is a longtime opponent of public healthcare programs. As HuffPost's Jonathan Cohn wrote Sunday, DeSantis "has refused to support the ACA's Medicaid expansion for the state, which is the biggest reason that more than 12% of Floridians don't have health insurance."
"That's the fourth-highest rate in the country," Cohn noted.
But DeSantis, who has said he wants to "make America Florida," appears unmoved by the staggering number of people losing Medicaid in his state as he hits the campaign trail. The governor relied heavily on large contributors to bring in more than $8 million during the first 24 hours of his presidential bid.
Prior to formally launching his 2024 campaign, DeSantis traveled the country in private jets on the dime of rich and sometimes secret donors, and he is currently facing a Federal Election Commission complaint for unlawfully transferring more than $80 million from a state committee to a super PAC supporting his White House bid.
"Families with children have been erroneously terminated, and parents are having trouble reaching the DCF call center for help with this process."
Late last month, DeSantis' administration insisted it "has a robust outreach campaign" aimed at ensuring people are aware of the hoops they have to jump through to keep their Medicaid coverage, such as income verification.
In Florida, a four-person household must make less than $39,900 in annual income to qualify for Medicaid.
The state's early data indicates that 44% of those who have lost coverage in weeks were removed for procedural reasons like failing to return paperwork on time.
The figures have drawn outrage from local advocates, who urged DeSantis late last month to pause the Medicaid redetermination process after hearing reports of people losing coverage without receiving any notice from Florida's chronically understaffed Department of Children and Families (DCF).
"One of these individuals is a seven-year-old boy in remission from Leukemia who is now unable to access follow-up—and potentially lifesaving—treatments," a coalition of groups including the Florida Policy Institute and the Florida Health Justice Project wrote to DeSantis. "Families with children have been erroneously terminated, and parents are having trouble reaching the DCF call center for help with this process. Additionally, unclear notices and lack of information on how to appeal contribute to more confusion."
Citing Miriam Harmatz, advocacy director and founder of the Florida Health Justice Project, KFF Health Newsreported last week that "some cancellation notices in Florida are vague and could violate due process rules."
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The Congressional Budget Office recently estimated that, nationwide, around 15.5 million people are likely to lose Medicaid coverage over the next year and a half—including 5 million children—as states resume eligibility checks made necessary by a system that doesn't guarantee healthcare to all as a right.
"Many people don't realize that they've been disenrolled from Medicaid until they show up at the pharmacy to get their prescription refilled or they have a doctor's appointment scheduled," Jennifer Tolbert, director of state health reform at the Kaiser Family Foundation, toldThe Washington Post last week.
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Will the Democrat from West Virginia go to bat for the billionaire-backed No Labels?
Jun 04, 2023
Sen. Joe Manchin—the West Virginia lawmaker reviled by progressives for his climate-killing policies and many Democrats over his repeated sabotage of his own party's agenda—said Sunday he has still not decided about whether he might make a third-party run for president in 2024.
Asked by "Fox News Sunday" host Shannon Bream if he's decided on a possible run with the billionaire-backed "No Labels" or otherwise, Manchin applauded the group "pushing very hard to the centrist middle" and "making commonsense decisions," but dodged a direct answer to the question.
"If Plan A shows that we're going to the far reaches of both sides, the far left and the far right, and the people don't want to go to the far left and the far right, they want to be governed from the middle," Manchin said. "I think there is… you better have that Plan B available and ready to go."
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\u201cSen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) hits extremism on the left and right but does not give a straight answer to Fox's Shannon Bream when she asks whether he'll run as a third-party candidate on a No Labels ticket.\u201d— The Recount (@The Recount) 1685886740
Last month, as Common Dreamsreported, journalists with More Perfect Union dove into the secretive funding of No Labels—which offers itself as a harmless, more middle-of-the-road option to the two major political parties in the U.S.—and found that much of the money behind the group comes from "a whole lot of billionaires with a history of opposing democracy."
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In a 2018 column, financial industry watchdogs Porter McConnell and Rion Dennis identified No Labels as part of a cabal of so-called "centrists" who are really just "wolves of Wall Street in sheep's clothing," hiding behind their harmless-sounding name to mask very insidious intent.
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