#3: We're Not Even Close to Being Done

This is the next of a new series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. Each will provide three steps we can all take to build upon our huge victories winning back the House in 2018 and the Presidency in 2020. 

We will be sharing these messages every two weeks by eblast and on blog, Our Unfinished Work. Please click here to be added to our email list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can also read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement.

A surprising thing happened in America at 7 am on Thursday, December 17. In the 20-minute CBS news summary there was not a single mention of Donald Trump. There was no tweet revisited, con expanded upon, citizen counterpunched, scientific fact dismissed, or false election claim advanced. 

For those glorious 20 minutes, America’s possibilities were in view. On television, vaccines were administered and snowstorms described. Fresh, distinguished governmental officials were appointed with the new president detailing dreams they will all seek to realize. 

It turned out this was just a fleeting moment, but nonetheless we have seen a future where we can attend to the American agenda. In the meantime, Trump is occupying his last 30 days with an extraordinary set of rants and lies. He is conspiring with people who are as dysfunctional as he is. This is a pool more and more limited as time passes. It is up to us to move the country forward, limit his screen time, and try to decrease the damage.

How do you drive away from someone when they’re desperately clinging to your rear bumper? Joe Biden and Kamala Harris know what to do in the longer-term to put this bizarre person behind us. It’s a matter of getting things done. Administer the vaccine. Escape from the pandemic. Repair the economy. Address our country’s enormous wealth disparities. Fix the tattered Affordable Care Act, and tackle climate change as if lives depend upon it. Fight for racial justice in an all-new way. 

Before those goals are sought, we must retain our focus on the damage that Donald Trump will continue to cause between now and inauguration. We are using our phenomenal organizing skill to put Georgia in play on January 5 hoping to take advantage of dissension in the Georgia Republican ranks. You don’t get 80 million votes for your candidate and then stop.

Even now that Mitch McConnell has called the election, the damage to the democracy being caused by Trump is on the shoulders of the Republican leadership in the Senate. It was they that enabled Trump to advance his lies about fraud all the way from November 3 to the electoral college vote on December 14. They believed Trump would stop once the Supreme Court refused to hear his case. Since McConnell and Cornyn and Thune know Trump this expectation does not qualify as rational. Children waiting for Santa Claus to come have a stronger basis for their belief.

Trump’s current destruction is concentrated in three areas:

First, the fraudulent claims of election rigging and the ascendancy of Sidney Powell send a signal worldwide that we are not currently a beacon for the fair and peaceful transfer of democratic power. Imagine being an American diplomat somewhere in the world trying to talk a military leader into honoring the vote of his country’s citizens. Will our country sanction him after he tells made up stories about their voting machines?

Second, Trump’s last month has seen several actions by the Department of the Interior to expedite mining claims or decrease protections of existing wilderness areas. These projects include the transfer of public lands in Arizona for a huge copper mine, a helium drilling permit in a Utah wilderness area and open pit lithium mine in Nevada. As the New York Times outlines, a number of these actions are contestable by environmental organizations but a few have been timed to make reversal less likely. 

Third, the most significant rending of the constitution will come right at the end as Donald Trump makes a further mockery of the already mockable pardon process. Even if Trump ends up pardoning himself, and the courts uphold that pardon, it would not free him from charges that can be brought under state law in New York. Any number of miscreants from his administration will receive his pardon as will various other people who have received his attention, perhaps even Joe Exotic. There will be almost nothing that anyone can do about it except express dismay and find and keep a better president.

There are 100 things that we can do to stand in the way of the megalomaniacal person. Let’s start with these three:

1) Stop Tommy Tuberville
	There’s an argument that we should want an up or down vote in Congress on January 6 on whether to overturn the results of the electoral college which selected Joe Biden for President. This will be unsuccessful and will create enmity in the Republican party for several years. That’s why Mitch McConnell doesn’t want the vote to happen and why he’s trying to achieve a unanimous Republican caucus to prevent it. To have a vote at all requires at least one senator to join a small group home of especially disgruntled Republicans members of the House. Donald Trump has found new Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville who probably knows less about the constitution than he does. Tuberville may be willing to bring this matter to a vote. He shouldn’t because it’s just one more American trip through a garbage dump. We have had enough of that.  Email Tommy Tuberville and tell him that America wants him to do the right thing. He doesn't have an office yet since he won't be a senator till January so let's reach him at contact@tommyforsenate.com.
2) Win the Mining Battles One at a Time
	For decades the Natural Resources Defense Council has been the leading litigant on federal lands management. They are on the front lines of defense in stopping Trump’s new efforts to open up mining in protected areas. Now is a good time to sign up for their information briefs and to give them whatever financial boost is possible.
3) Do the Next Best Thing to Stopping Trump's Pardons
	There is no way to rescind presidential pardon powers. However there is a way to make our new President more successful. Give Joe Biden the Senate majority by winning the two seats in Georgia. The state has been flooded with money. At this point pick a smaller organization working hard with limited resources. A great choice is Mi Familia Vota seeking to expand Latino turnout.

In less than a month Joe Biden will be president and Kamala Harris will be vice president. We all did that together and we’re not close to being done. 

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#2: Getting the Truth Down From the Scaffold

This is the next of a new series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. Each will provide three steps we can all take to build upon our huge victories winning back the House in 2018 and the Presidency in 2020. 

We will be sharing these messages every two weeks by eblast and on blog, Our Unfinished Work. Please click here to be added to our email list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can also read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement.

It is too easy to fall into jibes about banana Republicans. It is more essential to see the continued challenge to the integrity of the election process as a huge problem for America, and one that isn’t going to go away soon. It tarnishes our democracy worldwide, and diminishes the trust of the American voter.

Trump’s reaction was foreshadowed well before the election. He said that either he would win, or that he would maintain that he was cheated out of winning. On this front, as historian Henry Adams (grandson of President John Quincey Adams) said, “I expected the worse, and it was worse than I expected.” Much more disheartening is that Republican Senators have gone AWOL. More than a month after the election, they have settled on the view that Trump has the “right” to pursue his increasingly outrageous ventures. Roger Stone is now claiming that North Korea delivered fake ballots to Maine harbors in the dead of night.

The shameful thing is that Marco Rubio and Lamar Alexander and Susan Collins and John Cornyn all know that Joe Biden is the president-elect. They know that putting Rudy Giuliani out there day after day has been a disorienting, democracy-damaging disaster, halted only by Giuliani contracting the virus. They will not honor their own oath of office for fear of retribution from Trump. Perhaps Henry Adams was foreshadowing Alexander, now nearing the end of his notable career, enabling Trump daily and gnashing his teeth at night. “It was all the worse that he was a good man and a fine character and acted conscientiously. It was always the good men that did the most harm.” Perhaps not always, but if we all know that Trump is a con man, what does that make those who will not expose the con?

In the meantime, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are putting together a very encouraging and diverse team of senior advisers and heads of Cabinet agencies. Every day brings evidence that adults are in the room. Because it has to happen, a bi-partisan stimulus package will be agreed to in the upcoming week. Tellingly, this deal was made possible by Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia.

Manchin’s corralling of five Republican Senators represents good news and bad news for the next two years, if not the next four. Whether or not Democrats take back the Senate in the Georgia runoff elections of January 5, Manchin is showing that Mitch McConnell will not have the stranglehold that he had during much of the Obama presidency. McConnell will have a difficult time getting Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney to regularly walk the plank to support the goals of a Trump dominated party. 

This bodes well for much of Biden’s aims, but not for his most ambitious goals. Because he can issue executive orders and send John Kerry around the world, Biden will be able to claim a leadership position for the United States on climate change. But, Congress will not pass anything remotely tracking the scope of the Green New Deal. Similarly, even with Bernie Sanders wanting more, the health care agenda will be fixing the tattered Affordable Care Act and expanding its coverage.

With or without Manchin’s bi-partisan efforts, it would be glorious to claim the two Georgia seats and push McConnell away from the podium. Last minute donations can go to the turnout increasing New Georgia Project, which is doorbelling. Those resisters not yet signed up to do calls, texts and postcards can find a home at Common Power. 

This focus on Georgia reminds that beyond the Biden/Harris legislative/executive agenda for the next two years will be a hyper-focused nationwide battle over election systems and rules. This will be elevated by Republican refusals to accept the election results in six states in particular and everywhere else in general. The venue for false claims about large scale fraud will shift from the courts back to state legislatures. Terrified of Trump, Republican legislators and many of the Governors will put truth on the scaffold.

To lessen the spread of the virus, this year several states made it easier to vote by mail. In every instance, Republicans will try to change the conditions under which mail in ballots can be sought. In addition they will seek to decrease early voting, reduce polling locations, and add to voter identification requirements. Who knew it was okay to have a party obsessed with suppressing voting? They are trying to lower the turnout of all people who do not look like them. We can help make certain they do not succeed by doing these three things.

1) Find a Home for Your Voting Rights Advocacy
	You can’t be an effective voting rights advocate without getting regular information about our progress and what you can do to help. Hedrick’s Smith’s Reclaim the American Dream has a resource guide to national (and some regional) organizations focused on these issues. Stacey Abrams’ Georgia-based Fair Fight is organizing volunteers in each state and would like you to sign up. In most states, Indivisible chapters are focused on these issues. The national organization Vote at Home is centered entirely on mail-in voting. Beyond all of these organizations, it’s nothing but a great idea to ask a friendly state legislator who is the most effective voting rights advocate during legislative sessions.
2) Make Charles Grassley a Project
	This country badly needs a Republican United States Senator to aggressively vouch for the integrity of voting in America. It needs to be someone who has not regularly rebelled against Trump. Charles (Chuck) Grassley disappointed all of us in not blocking the Supreme Court hearings but he is nonetheless ideal. He has had good relations with Joe Biden, with whom he served for 30 years. He is retiring in two years, so Trump can’t touch him politically, and he is sore at Trump for firing Inspectors General of several Cabinet agencies. Time to send him a note and call him and ask him to use his influence to help restore the faith of voters. Use this form for your comments and call his Des Moines office at 515-288-1145. In a polite way, let them feel the intensity of your concern.
3) Guarantee Our Nationwide Capacity to Litigate
	The last two years have seen notable victories in state and federal courts by those fighting voter suppression and supporting the efforts of states to increase mail in voting and access to the polls. No one does this work better than the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU. Even without your financial assistance, they will keep you posted on their full docket of cases. Checks from all of us will make them even stronger.

We secured 80 million votes on November 3 and we needed all of them. We worked hard for all of those votes. We will keep working that hard because that is what it has taken and will take to get Trump and Trumpism behind us.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#1 First Ways to Tackle Our Unfinished Work

This is the first of a new series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. Each will provide three steps we can all take to build upon our huge victories winning back the House in 2018 and the Presidency in 2020. 

We will be sharing these messages every two weeks by eblast and on blog, Our Unfinished Work. Please click here to be added to our email list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can also read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement.

Talking about, thinking about and celebrating the Biden-Harris victory is not even close to getting old. Joe Biden has handled the last three weeks of Trump’s slanders of America with grace. Each staff and cabinet appointment is a part of our national restoration. Each is just the first of a thousand steps Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will take. On the national security front, Joe Biden has already sent the signal that we are eager to renew global alliances. Somewhere out there Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron and Justin Trudeau are smiling.

We’re smiling too, since it isn’t smart to move too quickly away from this celebration. We found Biden and Harris ten million more votes than have ever been cast for a presidential candidate. We won because our efforts were monumental. We need to remember that fact because it strengthens our resolve and confidence for our incomplete work, which will require the same relentlessness we just displayed. Because of all that is at stake, we will make it a bit of an obsession.

Of course, our list starts with the January 5 runoff elections of two United States Senators in Georgia. We have a solid chance and having the Senate majority is a big prize. Before we even think of what we can do in Georgia, we need to establish some rules for ourselves. Ten Commandments have proven to be a stretch for America, so let’s start with three.

First, there is hardly any political instinct more self-defeating than our ongoing dismay that a lot of people voted for Donald Trump. From the outset, Trump was grossly unsuited for the Presidency. We saw a man who was all about himself, indifferent to the needs of the people, incurious about how government works, and insulting most everyone when the mood struck, which was pretty much always. The fact that this is obvious to us, that this was all a con, increases our consternation that there were millions who bought in to supporting him. However, we can stop generalizing right now about who these voters are collectively (QAnon! Evangelicals!) because they aren’t a single thing collectively. We know we can win without them because we just did. But, if we don’t want Trumpism to be a danger in the future, and we do want narrower divides among Americans, we can do a more serious job of sorting out who’s not with us.

Second, we won’t win two and four years from now unless we maintain our big tent. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris understand that depending upon the issue, it is difficult to distinguish between progressives and liberals. Neither word involves the awarding of shiny badges for exceptional advocacy. Disagreeing passionately over the most desirable course of action should be seen as a central part of who we are. Let’s bring it on, and let’s stop worrying quite as much about incorrectly being called socialists. The people who call us names to seek political advantage are not fact checking every day. Let’s worry more about fixing the economy, stopping the virus, tackling climate change and expanding health care. If we do a good job of all these things, the labels will take care of themselves.

Third, let’s focus on our demographic destiny. Non-white voters will continue to increase as a percentage of all voters. All of the attention to the Cuban-American vote in Florida has masked the fact that over 2/3 of all Latino voters nationally supported Biden-Harris. Latino voters were instrumental in the victories In Arizona and Nevada, and the increase in voting by African-Americans more than explains our margins of victory in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

All three are pillars upon which we can build. We have resolved to get to work right away. Georgia is there as a prize, if we can go get it.

On the hard to get Georgia side, Democrats in Georgia have had a difficult time generating voter turnout in runoff elections. Of course, that was before Stacey Abrams made it her own personal job. Obviously there are a lot of people working by her side, but if you want a fair fight, there isn’t anything like her organization Fair Fight. 

Further, Republican Candidates Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue are trying to make the race about resisting the socialistic impulses of Joe Biden. The problem there is that it is hard for voters to see that he has any. Further, Loeffler and her primary opponent Doug Collins tacked even further to the right as November neared, emphasizing who would have the blindest loyalty to a re-elected Donald Trump. That left Loeffler and Purdue a little more vulnerable with centrist voters.

The biggest problem for the Republican ticket is the internecine war within the Georgia Republican party over the ethical election management behavior of their Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Loeffler and Perdue, undoubtedly drawing upon their deep moral reservoirs, have called for Raffensperger to resign, for his error in not finding a way for Trump to win the hand recount. Some Trumpists have called for their loyalists to sit out the election because Loeffler and Perdue have been insufficiently rabid about throwing out Raffensberger. In addition, Trump so far has shown little interest in the race. If he does get more involved, it will be all about him, which is not such a good thing for Loeffler and Perdue.

So, we have a solid chance here. We should do these three things forthwith:

1) Recognize a Profile in Courage
	The Republican Secretary of State just did something that is awesomely difficult today. Not only did he stand up for the integrity of the Georgia election he called out the unethical behavior of Senator Lindsay Graham when Graham phoned to intervene. Email your personal thank you to soscontact@sos.ga.gov.
2) Disburse Piggy Bank Balance
	Money is pouring into Georgia. It’s all about finding a good place to send the last of your 2020 campaign dollars. One important option is sending to Fair Fight, where Stacey Abrams will take 1/3 for her organizing efforts, and send 1/3 each to Democratic candidates Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff. There are other good options. The New Georgia Project is focused on younger voters. The activists at Mi Familia Vota who were so indispensable in Nevada and Arizona are all in on the effort to boost the Latino vote in Georgia, especially in the Atlanta area. Here's the link to the special fund to boost their Georgia mobilization.
3) Use Our Core Tools
	Many resistors have settled into regular involvement with organizations that do phone banking, send personalized postcards, and text targeted voters. For those unaffiliated volunteers who have time and a hankering to unseat Mitch McConnell as majority leader, Vote Forward comes highly recommended. They are all set to help you send handwritten letters to selected Georgians.

So there it is. If you think this is difficult, just think how hard it would be if we had lost on November 3. We can keep on doing this, and our world will be the better for it.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#104: Trump Won’t Be Living in Our House Anymore

The movement of which we are all a part will restore a wounded America's promise. Because our agenda has not been completely fulfilled, we will be continuing this blog under the rubric of “Our Unfinished Work". This new approach will be shorter and will deal every two weeks with a single issue or challenge. Each time it will include specific action steps we can carry out. Please stay with me as we protect and take advantage of our gains and build toward the fall of 2022. If you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages.

You can read analyses of when and how Donald Trump will ultimately acknowledge the impending presidency of Joe Biden. You can review Senate scenarios. You can check in on arguments between Democrats, thankfully focused for the most part on future public policies. Or, you could do the right thing, set all those things aside for a minute, and then let your heart nearly burst with gladness and relief. Let your wounded soul heal a bit. Celebrate. Do not permit yourself to move away from this moment of victory too quickly.

Refugees, we are saying goodbye to Stephen Miller, whose idea was to exact maximum pain upon you. Students, Betsy Devos is exiting, after not supporting public education in any way. Americans who don’t think the Justice Department should be a presidential law firm, say so long to Bill Barr. Jared Kushner, we are thrilled you are leaving but we will hear more about how you unsuccessfully deployed your college friends as the front line in the virus battle. Mike Pompeo, soon Trudeau, Merkel and Macron will not be obliged to return your calls. EPA administrator Andrew Wheeler, all of those executive orders you enforced will become unenforceable.

Most of all, Donald Trump, we have no illusions that your legendary mean-spiritedness will cease, or that you will develop new allegiance to the truth. You will continue your sullying and bullying. We know you will have to be watched, and opposed, and fact-checked, and we are definitely up to that task. We are your worst nightmare. We are not going to go away. We are happy that you aren’t going to be living in our House any more.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris emphasize that possibility is the word that guides us going forward. Week by week, we will need the same relentlessness that made us successful on November 3. And, to follow their leadership, we must fully understand what we won and what we must still secure.

What we have already won is huge. Soon after his inauguration, Joe Biden will reconnect to NATO, recommit to the Paris Accords, rejoin the World Health Organization and rescind current travel bans placed on Muslim countries. From that point on, he will be our leader in ending the virus and its grip on America, and the resultant rebuilding of the economy. He will be the appointer of judges, and the creator and sustainer of global alliances. He will be the manager of thousands of talented people who will return federal agencies to their mandates. Notably, he will take over the executive powers and fashion the executive orders which have been the province of Trump. On that front, in a few months he will undo virtually all that Trump has done.

With regard to the anticipated behavior of the Senate, it is way too early for pundits to grant Mitch McConnell superpowers. Regardless of who wins the two runoff races in Georgia, McConnell’s role in 2015 is an imperfect analogy to what will emerge in 2021. Biden will get tax policy leverage because current individual rates expire in 2025. The House speaker is Democrat Nancy Pelosi, not Republican Paul Ryan. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney are in a different position relative to their party. 

However, regardless of the Georgia results, the Senate makeup will make it impossible for Joe Biden to get anywhere near everything he wants from Congress. In these two years, he will be able to expand the Affordable Care Act and (with the help of executive orders), significantly address climate change. Neither of these two efforts will be as expansive as Biden had hoped. 

These battles will put immense pressure on the 2022 elections, where there will be 34 Senate races, including 22 Republican seats. Republicans Charles Grassley of Iowa and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania have already announced their retirement, and Republicans will also have to defend their seats in North Carolina (Richard Burr) and Wisconsin (Ron Johnson.) The map advantages the Democrats, though off year elections usually favor the party that doesn’t hold the presidency.

Buoyed by defeating Trump, and by the many things Biden and Harris can do whether or not Congress has an expansive agenda, resistors are ready to continue the fight. We can start by addressing our own understandable angst over how anyone (let alone 70 million people) could buy into Donald Trump’s con.

The problem with “This makes me feel awful about America” is that it doesn’t lead to any productive path. Trump has had his own personal television channel in a nation glued to screens. He surfaced racism, homophobia, misogyny and countless conspiracy theories to attract a scary amount of voters. Trump has also accessed voter fears in these four areas which are worth recognizing, however painfully. We are better off remembering these currents than ignoring them. We will win and hold the Senate sooner, and occupy the Presidency longer. 

• As pro-choicers we don’t have anything to do about it, but Trump had a number of voters whose support depends entirely upon the candidate being against the protections provided by Roe v. Wade. These voters are willing to ignore all other candidate characteristics, as they just proved.

• We want to dismiss the “socialism!” claims out of hand, especially in their bizarre application to Joe Biden. Liberals and progressive take to social media and mock the claims, wondering whether Republicans remember they embrace “socialist” programs like Medicare. This exchange is not going away, but we can improve our communication on the obvious and meaningful differences between American progressive social policy and taxation policy and the practices of Northern European countries. Many Democrats love Bernie and the party very much needs the progressive wing, but the fact that he has proclaimed himself a “democratic socialist”, is bound to make these discussions more complex.

• Trump has tapped into the decline in trust in government that has been an issue since Ronald Reagan ran against the government in his own presidential re-election campaign. Trump could not have been a worse manager of government. His mismanagement of the virus took him down, but it is still good to remember that Democrats rarely seize on stories of how they have made individual governmental programs more effective.

• Most subject to change than the three above issues is that many voters in industrial states are mourning the decline in family wage jobs for high school graduates. These jobs are sorely missed in many a community. Joe Biden is seen as responding to this problem, but other Democrats are not, which helps create an avenue for Trump’s fake populism. Even though Trump fleeced the same people in his tax “reform” this is still ground that must be taken.

As we navigate all of these matters, there is nothing sweeter than getting more votes than the other side, whatever the margin. That is what we can do on January 5 in Georgia. The two Republican candidates are spending their time attacking the election management of the Republican Secretary of State, who is being defended by the Republican attorney general. Meanwhile, their campaign themes up until now, have been working hard for President Trump. Such themes from the past will require revision. Besides, why would anyone want to bet against Stacey Abrams? Let’s stand with her by doing these three things:

1) Support Stacey Abrams’ Fair Fight
	Ever since voter suppression cost her the Georgia governorship in 2018, Stacey Abrams has been delivering. There are countless other heroes that helped Joe Biden and Kamala Harris take Georgia, but none as indispensable as she was. She said we could do it when we hardly thought it possible. The Georgia Senatorial runoff elections are on January 5. Rev. Raphael Warnock can beat appointed incumbent Kelly Loeffler, who just survived a bitter primary. Jon Ossoff barely trailed incumbent David Perdue on November 3. Why not start this effort out right? Especially since the Georgia voter registration deadline is December 7, and especially if there is still money left in your donation jar, send a big socially distanced hug to Stacey Abrams by donating today.
2) Put Yourself on Raphael Warnock’s List
	Jon Ossoff has done a good job of getting the attention of supporters from around the country. We need to get strong support for Rev. Raphael Warnock, the senior minister at Martin Luther King’s church, Ebenezer Baptist in Atlanta. Rev. Warnock led the campaign for Georgia to participate in Medicaid expansion, thus delivering health care to several hundred thousand more Georgians. Unbelievably, one of the reasons why Republican Senators have not congratulated their old colleague Joe Biden is that they are afraid that it would cause Trump to be less enthusiastic in campaigning for their Georgia candidates. They think they might lose these two seats! One more reason to sign up to help Rev. Warnock today. Note his “Emergency Runoff Fund”.
3) Send a Signal to GSA Administrator Evelyn Murphy
	This is a big moment in the career of General Services Administration director Evelyn Murphy, who so far has been unwilling to sign the paperwork so the transition process can continue. She has a statutory duty to proceed but so far is unwilling to face the wrath of Donald Trump. Join Move On in petitioning her to do the right thing. And, email their media office at press@gsa.gov and ask when their agency is going to put their ethical requirements as public servants ahead of politics.

For four years we worked so hard to get Donald Trump out of our nation’s House. True to prediction, “The harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph.” If we put our shoulder back to the wheel right away, there will be more to come.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#103: The Harder the Conflict the More Glorious the Triumph

Thank you for continuing to share these messages with your friends. If you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, leading up to the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

This is the next to last of a series of 104 missives, filed every two weeks since the calamitous election of November 2016. In this house, we listened to classical music for a week after that election before we could bear to turn on the morning news. Then we decided that writing about the path forward and providing specific action steps every two weeks would help us play our own role in the resistance.

Word of mouth has given this blog nearly 2000 followers! We are a small part of the countless activist efforts around the country, mushrooming from the initial efforts of organizations like Indivisible, Swing Left, and Move On. We are all acquitting ourselves. Early on, many of us turned from despair and each became a part of a gigantic effort to have November 3, 2020 bring a fresh outcome and reclaim the idea of America. We are proud of our relentlessness during what has turned out to be an awful time. 

We are not going to be distracted by predicting an outcome. We feel good about our prospects and are eager to roll up our sleeves to repair this country, which was in need of serious work even before the Trump debacle began.

It is still about keeping our equilibrium. Without getting ahead of ourselves, we can be pleased at the levels of early voting in swing states. High turnout works to our advantage, so it is fair to be happy that Donald Trump, through his voter suppression efforts, has become the inadvertent chair of our Get out the Vote campaign. Given his past lack of verisimilitude, voters aren’t buying any of Trump’s attacks on Joe Biden, and they know we haven’t turned the corner in battling the virus. Thanks to a demonstration of integrity by the Wall Street Journal (who considered and rejected the story) they aren’t buying Trump’s false claim that Joe Biden benefited financially from Hunter Biden’s international contracts. Trump had been counting upon that as an October surprise. 

There are multiple paths for Biden and Harris to get to 270 electoral votes. It’s thought by many that we won’t know the outcome on election night, but that is no certainty. Yes, our key states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania will have been delayed in the certification and counting of mail in ballots by their state laws. However, Florida, Arizona and North Carolina all certify their mail in ballots as they arrive, guaranteeing that their election night totals will be meaningful. The Biden/Harris ticket showing well in one or more of those states would be terrific election evening news. And of course we will be keeping an eye on Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, and Texas as well.

Of course, getting the Senate majority is fundamental too, all the more so because of Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation to the Supreme Court (which hopefully will cost Lindsay Graham his Senate seat). Here the important thing to remember is that there will not be 50 Democratic votes in the Senate to expand the size of the Supreme Court, regardless of Biden’s support or opposition.

Where court expansion comes into the picture is in tandem with another Democratic tool. If we gain the majority, Majority Leader Charles Schumer will increase the likelihood that Democrats will select the “nuclear option” which would change the rules to eliminate the 60-vote requirement to close debate. (This requirement was already eliminated by Harry Reid for federal judicial appointments and by Mitch McConnell for Supreme Court). The Democratic majority would start by using both court expansion and the nuclear option as a threat. They are hoping their prospective use of the nuclear option will generate lower resistance by Republican Senators to major legislation on health care and climate change.

On many legal fronts, control by Democrats of the Presidency, the House and the Senate will also enable them to fix any court-identified “defects” in the Affordable Care Act or other laws targeted by the increasingly conservative Supreme Court. Unfortunately, this repair option will be more difficult and complex in response to the Court’s interpretation of equal protection under the law, guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. Protection of the LGBQT community is threatened by the narrow interpretations of “originalist” judges. Whatever unfavorable rulings that emerge may be difficult for Congress to respond to through statutory changes. Eventually, we could end up requiring a stronger (but very difficult to achieve) constitutional amendment to protect previous legal gains. Moreover, as much as Republican Senator Susan Collins stresses otherwise, these justices do not see Roe v Wade as “settled law”.

So, the battles of the future will be intense. The first step is to win back the Presidency and the Senate by doing these three things:

1) Make a Nostalgia Filled Contribution to Theresa Greenfield
	Remember back to the days we you were sending more money than you planned to political candidates? With your help, Act Blue handled $1.5 billion in Democratic donations in the third quarter. If you are interested in revisiting old times with one more click, choose Theresa Greenfield, battling in Iowa against incumbent Joni Ernst. One of our Senatorial candidates is going to win or lose by a few thousand votes, and it would be a horrible thing to have happen to Theresa.
2) Don’t Miss Out on the Last Week’s Campaigning
	There is still campaign work being done around the country, including the all-important “curing” of ballots, which is helping voters correct the errors on their rejected ballots. Here is a full list of things you can be doing from the star activist Bill McClain: Ballot curing is an opportunity to make a difference in close, swing state elections. Click here to volunteer with Swing Left. Faithful America is running a series of textbanking events: join anytime between 2 - 5:30 p.m. Pacific Time on Wednesday (Oct 28) this week. They will likely announce additional shifts later in the week, too. Text young voters with NextGen Share the Vote.org link on social media and with friends in swing states. It makes it easy to find voting info, polling locations, etc. in every state.
3) Take Care of Yourself
	Go for a socially distanced walk. Take stock of your mental health. Lean on friends.

Thomas Paine reminds that “the harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph.” After this is over, if it is over, we can all think about what we have learned and what we can do next for our country. 

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#102: Make the Best Use of These Three Weeks

Thank you for continuing to share these messages with your friends. If you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, which means there will be a total of 103 missives before the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

We are as one in our refusal to prematurely count upon relief for our wounded souls on November 3. We have worked extremely hard to secure that result. Daily, we consume some positive reports on our progress, but we know this is no time for any airborne heel clicking. We can wait three weeks longer.

There are some voters who still believe that Trump cares about the average Joanne or Jose. The rest of us have watched the situation escalate from the unacceptable to the unimaginable to the surreal. The virus is not the only malady where Donald Trump has been the super spreader.

There are at least major differences between our circumstances today and where we stood in mid-October in 2016:

• We demonstrated our aptitude in generating higher voter turnout levels when we flipped 40 House seats in 2018. That same acumen is paying off in 2020, with enormous increases in requests for mail in ballots and very promising levels of early voting.
• Virtually all polls reveal that there are many fewer undecided voters than there were in 2016. Dislodging voters who are already committed is the goal of Trump's dishonest and virulent attacks on Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. It is unpoetic justice that it is those same attacks that are driving independent voters away from Trump.
• Joe Biden is polling ten points ahead among older Americans, who make up a quarter of the electorate. These Americans know that Trump misrepresenting, mismanaging, contracting and transmitting the virus threatens their lives. Those of us who are most susceptible to the virus are unhappy about that.

With all these forces in play that are enhancing our election chances, we are still not beyond teeth gnashing and pillowcase chewing. We will spend these last three weeks campaigning for candidates, supporting them financially, and increasing voter turnout.

From veteran activist Bill McClain we get a summary of how each of us can contribute to this three week push:

• Write
• It’s not too late to reach voters with postcards. PostcardsToVoters.org is focusing on the Ohio Supreme Court right now.
• https://votefwd.org makes it easy to send letters to voters. Saturday the 17th is the target mail date.
• Call
• FlipTheWest.com offers phone banking and training to get out the vote in key senate states
• SwingLeft offers it too.
• Text
• Texting works especially well with younger voters, and “Zoomers” (18-24) are the ones who lean farthest Left, yet turn out at the lowest rate — in part because of confusion about the voting process. So texting a note of encouragement along with a “how-to” link can be very worthwhile.
• NextGen has a menu of text banking events on their site.
• Email
• The VoteWithMe.us app will sync your phone’s address book with the public voter database to find people you know who may need a nudge. Then you can email, call or text them.
• Post
• Reinforce social norms by posting your own voter activity on social media. (I reviewed my voter guide; I filled out my ballot; I mailed my ballot… or, I put my ballot in the drop box)

And, that's just the start. We can do these three additional consequential things:

1) Be a Part of the Supreme Court Strategy
	Someone talked to Senate Democrats in advance and got them to decide on a well-conceived communication strategy to resist Amy Coney Barrett's Supreme Court nomination. It is perfect that the court is scheduled to hear oral arguments on the Affordable Care Act in November and extraordinary that Barrett is already on record opposing John Roberts' past protection of the ACA. Either the Democratic approach is a way to stop the nomination (much less likely) or a way to exact maximum protection for the ACA or the broader healthcare aspirations of Democrats. Senators Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Mitt Romney of Utah have both seen themselves as capable of principled independent thought in the face of Donald Trump. Write them both to tell them that voting for Supreme Court nominee in the week before the election is contrary to their 2016 promises and will overshadow their other actions during the remainder of their careers.
2) Develop a Method to Stand Up for Science
	You know it is a momentous time when Scientific American endorses a presidential candidate (in this case Joe Biden) for the first time in their 175-year history. This is an underscoring of the danger of the continued Republican attacks on scientific processes and evidence which if unabated will greatly diminish public policy making. This is also the subject of a recent special report and recommendations from thismissive. Please write Laura Helmuth editor of Scientific American to thank her and her staff for displaying their principles.
3) Make a Last Round of Donations
	Joe Biden has a cash advantage on Donald Trump during the last three weeks of the campaign. Virtually all of our targeted Senate candidates they have outraised their opponents. These things have happened because resisters of varied financial means have reached back to provide the financial support our candidates require. We have given early and we had given often. Now there's one last chance to boost our candidates before the final votes are cast. We could give $750 in honor of Trump's tax malfeasance or $75 or $7.50. Whatever the level, we are called to provide one more dollop of candidate support. In the Senate we should add at least a couple more races beyond those that have received the most attention. Two of the best ideas for a last minute boost are: Barbara Bollier of Kansas who has come from a distance and is polling even with her opponent in an open seat and Governor Steve Bullock of Montana who is running even with the incumbent. We should also look in our own regions for hard battling House candidates who are ready to go over the top. In the Northwest those very promising candidates include Alyse Galvin of Alaska and Carolyn Long of Washington both of whom just narrowly missed victory in 2018 and can build upon those past efforts.

We are campaigning, we're donating, and we are dreaming of the possible outcome of this four-year struggle.

David Harrison

Bainbridge Island, Washington

#101: Let’s Keep Our Bearings in Tumultuous Times

At this point, we do know the extent the virus will put the President in danger. For this reason, we are not sending the Path Forward blog that would have gone out today, Friday, October 2. As has been this blog’s practice, it would have included a detailed analysis of our present political situation, and steps to be taken between now and November 3. Instead, we are providing this shorter note. Our next issue of the blog will be on Wednesday, October 14.  If you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, which means there will be a total of 103 missives before the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

Donald Trump has contracted the virus that has overwhelmed our nation. This is one more disorienting event in a year that has threatened to unravel us. It is a huge and unfortunate threat to him personally, a national security concern for our nation, and a complication in the election process.

Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and other Democratic leaders know how to focus upon Donald Trump’s wellbeing while still attending to the last month of the campaign. It falls to all of us as resistors to keep our own bearings. We want health and safety for the President and for all Americans, and we look for a time in which the virus is under control. We still have so much to learn about how to fight against this pandemic, and we can’t wait to learn it until many more have died.

As of mid-week, we were in a strong campaign position, not only with Biden/Harris polling leads, but in numerous swing district races. The disclosures of Donald Trump’s tax returns was itself of major political significance. There is still no new stimulus deal. Democrats have been warning the Supreme Court appointment is a plan to reverse the Affordable Care Act and remove protection of Americans with pre-existing conditions.

Before the new news, it had also become clear that Donald Trump and other Republicans were carrying out a strategy to discredit the election as a way to suppress the vote. This included Trump saying “the results of the election may never be known”, which was disputed by Marco Rubio and six other Republicans from the Senate Intelligence Committee. Joe Biden has reassured the country that there will be a peaceful transition of power, and the House of Representatives passed a nearly unanimous resolution reaffirming that commitment. Trump’s refusal to pledge a peaceful transition is seen by many as an additional effort to discourage voting and thus depress Biden’s turnout.

There’s just over a month left. The thing to do is just what we have been doing all along. Make certain our candidates are well supported. Do as much door to door campaigning as the virus allows, and use calls, texts, and postcards to establish our one on one connections. We will remember that it will take more than a President to move us all forward after November 3. Let’s make certain that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have the Senators on their side that they need to do the work of a nation.

We are feeling very good about the chances for Democratic candidates John Hickenlooper in Colorado, Mark Kelly in Arizona, Sara Gideon in Maine and Cal Cunningham in North Carolina. There is one thing to do--- go out and get at least another four.

Here are the other races being talked about. In each case, we will either win by a small margin or lose by a small margin. Money matters. Let’s continue to make certain that these candidates have the help they need.

1. In Iowa, Theresa Greenfield has come from behind and is polling ahead of Joni Ernst. 
2. In South Carolina, in every Democrat’s dream, Jaime Harrison is running even with Lindsay Graham. 
3. In Georgia, Jon Ossoff is even or barely trailing David Perdue. 
4. In Montana, we could be doing everything possible for Steve Bullock. 

And, there are other races for which there is a case to be made. 

1. Barbara Bollier has some promising recent polls in Kansas. 
2. Al Gross has been closing in on Dan Sullivan all summer in Alaska. 
3. The second Georgia seat will involve a runoff, which will hopefully feature Democratic candidate Raphael Warnock. 

In the month ahead, we will hope for the recovery and health of Donald Trump and every other world citizen beset by the virus. We plan to win on November 3, and expect to put our shoulder behind the wheel for a new American age.

David Harrison

Bainbridge Island, Washington

#100: Bonus Special Report: Protecting Science in the Trump Era and Beyond

This special report on science and public policy in the age of Donald Trump has been prepared for The Path Forward blog by Benjamin K. Harrison, Phd., a CalTech-trained environmental microbiologist. Harrison is co-founder of the Data Engagement and Access Project, an environmental organization dedicated to expanding citizen use of environmental data at the local level.

Donald Trump’s wrongs against science range from the criminal (pushing hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19 for the sake of political advantage) to the trivial (modifying a weather map with a sharpie). He has famously denied the science behind climate change (“a Chinese hoax”; “it’ll start getting cooler… you just watch”) and misrepresented other important areas of research (forest management, meteorology) in order to downplay it. He has fought against ethical, effective response to COVID-19 since before it existed, removing or ignoring government infrastructure designed to protect against pandemics. 

He downplayed the COVID threat, mistimed or misdirected every effort to slow the spread at the borders, pushed treatments that were either unverified (at first) or demonstrably ineffective, and actively fought against life-saving public health efforts (masks, social distancing). Trump’s desperate promotion of an early vaccine has ruined any confidence the public could muster, even should the considerable research power of the nation and world achieve an accelerated timeline. He pulled the nation out of the World Health Organization in the midst of a global pandemic over political pique.

No Republican voice in Congress has adequately worked against Trump’s intent to place his political fortune before American lives and livelihoods. They all deserve to be voted from office over matters of science.

Scientists and allies often make the mistake of treating any individual attack on science in isolation. Certainly, each separate issue needs to be diligently communicated to the public, and each deserves a good faith discussion pairing advocacy and skepticism. Unfortunately, this can be insufficient, because Republican opposition to science and damage to scientific institutions is not targeted at any particular topic. The arguments against COVID recycle the ammunition of the fights against climate science, against evolution, and against tobacco regulation. Each has these characteristics:

• Amplifying the voices of token, select “experts” against scientific consensus (sometimes even using the same contrarian voices, regardless of subject).
• Using the innate uncertainty of science to demand perpetual, excessive skepticism and inaction.
• Attacking the character and ethics of scientists to separate them from the lay public.
• Exploiting the media’s propensity to voice “all sides” without revealing their proportional representation.

The significant damage the conservative movement has done to science predates Trump, including the undermining of the public’s necessarily active role in the scientific process, attacks on science as a profession, and pervasive misinformation concerning the scientific process. It is a rejection of that essential good-faith participation in scientific critique. The GOP must be defeated electorally, but the case for taking action to correct the damage it has done invites further explanation.

Some things we learned about science in school are inaccurate.

Not “wrong” or “false” – the truth of any scientific matter is always the goal, but rarely the conclusion. Consider an example from K-12 biology: life may be classified into 4+ distinct kingdoms. Most of us first learned from such a system in grade school, but we know now that it has some shortcomings (e.g., poor representation of evolutionary descent). Based on evidence gathered from widespread genetic sequencing, Carl Woese and colleagues published a seminal article in 1990, dividing all life into 3 “Domains” – Archaea, Bacteria, Eucarya – in which the common descent of all life on Earth is more clearly depicted. Woese’s model, too, has some weaknesses – it’s hard to imagine any classification scheme could avoid that caveat… or ultimately resist improvement. Moreover, any rigorous descriptive system (including the kingdom classification) may be useful in specific circumstances and weak in others. 

The empirical foundation of science we learned in grade school is still intact – it is iterative and infinite, as each observation generates a hypothesis and each hypothesis is tested by observation. To be “wrong” is often a necessary step in becoming more knowledgeable. This process is inherently communal – there is no rational problem that cannot be more readily solved by more observers (including laypeople) acting in good faith. Where science becomes entangled with politics or other public pressure, the most common error is to short-circuit the process – to seek or promote only such evidence as fits a preconceived notion. 

One early scandal within the broad COVID-19 crisis illustrates both the failings and resiliencies of public science. In May, respected medical journals The Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine published COVID articles that relied on data ostensibly collected by a small, private data science company, Surgisphere. In June, both articles were retracted, after careful observers pointed out implausible characteristics of the data (e.g., a count of Australian deaths that exceeded government records) and the company refused a full independent audit. The overwhelming demand to publish often, to disseminate research in key journals, or to discover breakthroughs that generate private investment each conflict with professional ethics at the best of times. The justifiable need to treat or cure COVID-19 only increases the pressure, and we should anticipate that some researchers will fail that ethical test, consciously or unconsciously.

We should expect the scientific community and the public at large to correct mismanaged research. Rigorous analysis is needed to detect errors that eluded the first pass of peer review in academic journals and to demonstrate error through further investigation. In the COVID case, this is poor consolation when a policy impact of bad research outpaces correction. Time, evidence, and good science eventually leave us better informed and better able to use that knowledge in public policy on any given topic, even if not so quickly as we would prefer. 

Public support for that good science is somewhat sheltered from Trump misadministration by balkanized government oversight – the Departments of Defense, Energy, Interior (US Geological Survey), Commerce (NOAA), and HHS (NIH) all have roles in science funding. EPA and NASA are independent agencies. At least four Senate committees and six House committees exercise meaningful authority over science issues. The professional ranks of government agencies are still filled with earnest, qualified practitioners. If we elect representatives who practice sensible support of science and choose qualified political appointees, the science infrastructure of government will recover from these past four years. 

The same cannot so easily be said for institutional damage to the scientific process. Like democracy, science benefits from earnest participation. As with democracy, Republicans have done lasting damage to science by discouraging engagement and spreading misinformation on the process. 

Beyond defeating the GOP in November, there are 3 targeted ways to help:

1) Join in Citizen Science and Community Science
	Republican mythology on the “ivory tower” implies science is done by “other” people, academics unconcerned with the livelihood of the public and disconnected from their reality. Everyone can do science, and scientists are real people living in our communities. The greatest limitation on who conducts the research that informs policy is the choice to participate. Local school districts, universities, city, county and state-level agencies need volunteers and often offer training. For example, the University of Washington is affiliated with projects helping volunteers monitor beach waste and seabird mortality. Zooniverse facilitates numerous research projects which volunteers can assist from their own computers. There is nothing anyone can teach community members about the scientific method that surpasses the learning experience of participation. One of the best things we can do for science education, as well, is to discover such experiential learning opportunities for our children.
2) Support Science Policy Organizations
	There are many worthy scientific organizations for membership, volunteering, and contributions, covering a variety of missions from advocacy (Union of Concerned Scientists) to education (National Association of Geoscience Teachers; National Science Teachers Association, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science). 314 Action works to directly elect scientists to public office, including providing training in conducting political races. In the 2018 cycle the group helped support eight successful candidates for the House of Representatives, one Senator, and boosted many state-level legislative races.
3) Contribute to Targeted Races
	In April, Dr. Rick Bright was removed from his position as director of the US government’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, seemingly over his concerns with the government’s focus on hydroxychloroquine, and after he filed a whistleblower complaint. He testified in May before the House Energy and Commerce committee. One of the Republicans who attacked Bright (and boosted hydroxychloroquine) was Richard Hudson (NC-08). He alleged “this hearing is not about a whistleblower complaint… it's about undermining the administration during a national and global crisis.” Hudson is in a competitive race (PVI R+8, leans Republican by Cook Political Report) against Patricia Timmons-Goodson. Also, In the Senate, Cory Gardner has embraced Trump and attacked public health experts for “politicizing” the pandemic.5 In November, we have the opportunity to replace Gardner with former professional geologist John Hickenlooper.

COVID in America is clear evidence of the consequences of anti-science demagoguery Republicans have promoted for decades. Conservatives have not managed to fully silence voices in national and state government promoting responsible public health. They have not managed to silence our collective knowledge of responsible conduct. With effort, we can take that lesson and meet future crises in health and environmental change.

Benjamin K. Harrison