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tina smith
Ocasio-Cortez, Smith Push Bill to Create Social Housing Authority
"Because we believe that housing is a human right, like food or healthcare, we believe that more Americans deserve the option of social housing."
Sep 18, 2024
"It's becoming nearly impossible for working-class people to buy and keep a roof over their heads. Congress must respond with a plan that matches the scale of this crisis."
That's according to U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.), who on Wednesday introduced the Homes Act in a New York Timesopinion piece and an event with supporters of the proposal on Capitol Hill.
"Because we believe that housing is a human right, like food or healthcare, we believe that more Americans deserve the option of social housing," the pair wrote in the Times. "That's why we're introducing the Homes Act, a plan to establish a new, federally backed development authority to finance and build homes in big cities and small towns across America. These homes would be built to last by union workers and then turned over to entities that agree to manage them for permanent affordability: public and tribal housing authorities, cooperatives, tenant unions, community land trusts, nonprofits, and local governments."
"Our housing development authority wouldn't be focused on maximizing profit or returns to shareholders," the congresswomen continued. "Rent would be capped at 25% of a household's adjusted annual gross income. Homes would be set aside for lower-income families in mixed-income buildings and communities. And every home would be built to modern, efficient standards, which would cut residents' utility costs. Renters wouldn't have to worry about the prospect of a big corporation buying up the building and evicting everyone. Some could even come together to purchase their buildings outright."
In addition to establishing the new authority under the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the bill would repeal the Faircloth Amendment, which prevents the use of federal money for building new public homes. Under the new plan, construction would be funded by congressional spending and Treasury-backed loans.
"In New York, the average worker would need to clock in 104 hours a week to afford a one-bedroom apartment," Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement. "This country is staring down a full-blown housing crisis. A crisis where affordable housing is slipping out of reach."
"This bill would create more than 500,000 jobs and create 1.25 million affordable housing units," she noted, declaring that "everyone deserves a place to call home."
It's not just New York City where lower-wage people are struggling to keep a roof over their heads. Smith pointed out that "more than 90% of workers cannot afford a modest one-bedroom apartment. Americans across the country are bidding for homes against the wealthiest financial firms and they're losing."
"We have a severe housing crisis," she stressed. "The private market cannot meet this moment on its own. The Homes Act meets peoples' needs through social housing."
As Jacobin's Samuel Stein wrote Wednesday:
The housing system sketched out in the Homes Act looks nothing like what we are used to in the United States. Though we have an important social housing legacy, we have never normalized decommodification as the cornerstone of our housing system.
Introducing legislation like the Homes Act does not accomplish that goal in and of itself, but it offers us a concrete depiction of what that transition could look like. It also highlights the severe disjuncture between what our housing and urban planning system does right now—promote private profits in real estate while minimizing the public provision of housing—and what we need it to do.
The goal of legislation like this is not to pass it immediately, since no sober person would expect the current U.S. Congress to line up in support. Nor is the goal to supplant the messy work of organizing with the schematic and technical language of legislation. Instead, the point is to inspire organizing: to show that the status quo is not the only way our housing could operate, to give tenant organizations a concrete and affirmative vision to build toward, and to offer socialist candidates for office a platform to run on.
The bill to create a social housing authority—introduced less than two months out from the U.S. general election—is backed by the Center for Popular Democracy (CPD) and its affiliates from across the country.
"Working families are being forced to make sacrifices in order to pay the skyrocketing cost of keeping a roof over their heads, while corporate landlords and Wall Street executives are getting even richer," said CPD co-executive directors Analilia Mejia and DaMareo Cooper. "This legislation provides a clear alternative to for-profit housing. It creates a framework to make community-owned, permanently affordable green social housing a reality."
Advocates from both sponsors' states also spoke out in favor of the bill.
"In Greater Minnesota, counties and towns don't have staff to build affordable housing projects, financing is another huge issue. We don’t have as many philanthropic organizations or financial institutions as urban areas," explained Noah Hobbs, policy director at One Roof Community Housing in Duluth. "This bill is the first real investment we've had in years. We're incredibly proud to endorse this legislation."
Aisha Hernandez, secretary of the Coalition to Save Affordable Housing at Co-op City in the Bronx, said that "cooperative housing gave me the ability to co-own my home. A few years ago, my neighbors and I came together to ensure our housing stays affordable, that our management is working in the interest of homeowners and prevent any corporate takeover of Co-op City."
"We are co-owners, not at the whims of corporate landlords," Hernandez added. "I want my fellow Americans to have the same access to housing that co-op has afforded me. This bill has the ability to do that. So let's get it done."
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Rights Groups, Dems Don't Buy Johnson's Claim He Won't Push Federal Abortion Ban
"Mike Johnson's flip-flopping on abortion just proves our movement is winning and that Republicans know they're losing," one advocate said.
May 11, 2024
Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said that he would not attempt to ban abortion on the federal level, a claim that earned instant skepticism from reproductive rights groups.
Johnson's remarks came as part of an interview published by Politico on Friday, as Johnson responded to questions from Politico's Ryan Lizza and Rachael Bade:
Lizza: Some like lightning round questions: Do you anticipate putting forward any legislation on abortion before the election?
No.
Bade: If there is Republican control of both chambers of Congress and the White House next year, do you anticipate passing any sort of nationwide abortion ban?
No, I don't.
President Trump said this is in the states' purview now. After the Dobbs decision, I think that's where it is. Look, I am a lifelong pro-lifer. I’m a product of a teen pregnancy. And so I believe in the sanctity of human life. It's also an important article of faith for me. But I have 434 colleagues here. All of us have our own, philosophical principles that we live by, but you have to have a political consensus.
In response to Johnson's answer, Reproductive Freedom for All President and CEO Mini Timmaraju said it reflected a growing awareness among Republicans that restricting abortion is not politically popular. Since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, every electoral attempt to protect abortion rights on the state level has succeeded.
"Mike Johnson's flip-flopping on abortion just proves our movement is winning and that Republicans know they're losing," Timmaraju said.
However, she pointed out that "'leaving abortion to the states' is not a moderate position, as 21 states are already enforcing horrifying bans with devastating consequences."
"Don't be conned. They can't be trusted with our rights."
Further, she warned against taking Johnson at his word.
"Voters have made it clear to the GOP that we will not tolerate abortion bans," she continued. "Mike Johnson and congressional Republicans have shown time and time again they are willing to do anything in their power to restrict our reproductive freedom, and we can't trust them."
Other abortion rights and pro-democracy campaigners issued similar warnings.
"The technical political science term for this is 'lying,'" Indivisible co-founder Ezra Levin wrote on social media in response to the interview.
Activist Olivia Julianna pointed out that Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh had calledRoe v. Wade "settled precedent" before helping to overturn it in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization.
Elected Democrats also expressed suspicion.
Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.) pointed out that Johnosn was one of 127 Republicans who had co-sponsored a bill to ban abortion at the federal level.
"If he really isn't for a national abortion ban, he should withdrawal his co-sponsorship first thing when we are back next week," Frost wrote on social media.
Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) wrote that "these people have been working to ban abortion and deny women the freedom to control our own bodies their entire careers."
"Don't be conned. They can't be trusted with our rights," she said.
In a second post, she asked incredulously, "I'm really supposed to believe Mike Johnson, the lifelong anti-abortion zealot, is suddenly just going to leave it alone?"
Even if the Republicans did steer clear of a federal ban, it would not be enough to ensure abortion rights in the U.S.
"We demand a federal response to the abortion crisis and call on the press to ask the speaker if he will support federal protections," Timmaraju said. "We demand nothing less from our federal government than locking in the federal right to abortion and expanding access."
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Senators Sound Alarm on Push to 'Undermine the Goals of Dodd-Frank'
"We urge the commission to continue to focus on its vital work preserving market integrity and protecting the public, uphold the letter and spirit of the Dodd-Frank Act, and withdraw the proposed rule."
Nov 27, 2023
A trio of Democratic U.S. senators on Monday wrote to Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chair Rostin Behnam expressing their "serious reservations" with the agency's proposed rule on seeded funds and money market funds, a policy the lawmakers warned would "undermine the goals of Dodd-Frank" by rolling back the already weakened financial oversight law.
Passed in the wake of the 2008 global financial meltdown, the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act—which was partially rolled back during the Trump administration—overhauled federal financial regulation. In a letter to Behnam, Sens. John Fetterman (Pa.), Sherrod Brown (Ohio), and Tina Smith (Minn.) assert that the CFTC's proposed rule is a "step in the wrong direction" that would increase market instability by decreasing collateral requirements for certain transactions.
The Global Markets Advisory Committee, largely made up of finance industry insiders, recommended the proposed rule in 2020 during the Trump administration.
As the letter explains:
The proposed rule would reduce or eliminate initial margin requirements for up to three years for a subset of swap market participants. "Initial margin" is the collateral that participants must set aside when entering swap agreements. Initial margin requirements, along with "variation margin" and other capital requirements, protect counterparties to a swap in the event of a default. Dodd-Frank set up comprehensive rules for swap agreements after they significantly contributed to the 2008 financial crisis and the federal government was forced to bail out Wall Street.
"The 2008 financial crisis showed the dangers that swaps can pose to economic stability, and Dodd-Frank directed regulators, including the CFTC, to require initial margin for uncleared swaps specifically to reduce those risks," the senators wrote. "It is vital for the CFTC to continue upholding its Dodd-Frank mandate and to maintain high standards and safeguards for this important market."
"We urge the commission to continue to focus on its vital work preserving market integrity and protecting the public, uphold the letter and spirit of the Dodd-Frank Act, and withdraw the proposed rule," the lawmakers added.
The collapse earlier this year of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank—both of which benefited from regulatory relief thanks to the 2018 rollback—brought renewed scrutiny on Dodd-Frank's Republican-engineered shortcomings. Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), who wrote the 2018 banking deregulation law, insisted in March that "there is no need for regulatory reform" in the wake of the banks' failures.
Robert Weissman, president of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, responded to Crapo's assertion by writing that "you have to be hard-core committed to mindless free-market fundamentalism—or truly in thrall to your donors—to insist there's no need for new regulations after Silicon Valley Bank."
Last month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) also wrote a letter to Behman sharing her concerns about the proposed rule. Noting the policy's 2020 introduction, Warren said in her October 10 letter that "it is unclear why the commission is choosing to propose these rules now, three years later, without conducting its own additional analyses of whether the changes are necessary or will strengthen the stability of the domestic financial system."
"I strongly urge the commission not to loosen the existing rules and not to roll back important Dodd-Frank Act reforms," Warren added.
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