David Sirota is editor-at-large at Jacobin. He edits the Lever and previously served as a senior adviser and speechwriter on Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign.
Republican Senators Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue could actually force a Senate vote on $2,000 checks for almost two thirds of Georgia households. After all, their state is in the middle of a calamity. Instead, they are issuing belated, meek platitudes.
Bernie Sanders is prepared to fight to win $2,000 survival checks for all. While Senate Democrats were prepared to do nothing to challenge Mitch McConnell, Sanders is pledging to filibuster a Pentagon veto override to provide real help for millions of Americans struggling to survive.
House Republicans and Senate Leader Mitch McConnell represent voters who are disproportionately struggling — yet they’re blocking $2,000 survival checks. It’s American politics in a nutshell.
Vice president–elect Kamala Harris made headlines earlier this year pushing $2,000 checks for all American. But suddenly, despite being desperately needed right now, she’s nowhere to be found on the issue.
Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and Joe Biden need to do everything in their power to call Donald Trump’s bluff and force a vote to increase the proposed $600 relief checks to $2,000. The fact that they don’t seem to be says a lot about what’s wrong with the Democratic Party.
We’re in the middle of a brutal pandemic during which millions are suffering. Yet according to the New York Times, Joe Biden actually moved to undercut progressives demanding greater economic aid in the stimulus negotiations, giving “Democrats confidence to pull back on their demands” — and surrender to Mitch McConnell.
The Federal Reserve could provide low-interest loans to small businesses and governments struggling under the pandemic as part of the stimulus. But the Fed providing those loans would mean Wall Street wouldn’t get that business, at much higher rates — something Republican Pennsylvania senator Pat Toomey decided on Thursday could not happen.
Democrats refused to seize a rare opportunity to outmaneuver Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell. They settled for a COVID relief bill that skimps on benefits, provides tax breaks to the rich, and pulls us toward austerity extremism.
Republican Sen. Ron Johnson led the fight to give himself a tax cut of up to $205,000. Now he is citing budget concerns to block emergency $1,200 checks as America faces mass starvation.
Democrats have bought the right-wing lie that they must zealously guard against deficits by reining in public spending. The result: mass economic pain and poor performance at the polls. It’s time for Democrats to finally reject austerity.
In a major sop to business interests, a Senate proposal would allow corporations to avoid COVID-related lawsuits from workers and patients. Corporate immunity is the last thing we need.
The stimulus bill currently under consideration in Congress does not include direct payments to the millions of workers struggling to survive. That’s an outrage — and, as a further slap in the face, the legislation subsidizes defense contractors.
Forcing a House floor vote on Medicare for All isn’t a bad idea. But we should prioritize wielding power over engaging in spectacles — and there are several steps progressive lawmakers like AOC can take to substantively shift power toward Medicare for All’s supporters.
Billionaire Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman bragged that his firm “was a huge winner coming out of the global financial crisis” in 2008. Today, he’s boasting about his firm’s big earnings off high rents, even as millions of tenants face eviction.
Tax records we’ve reviewed show a health care industry front group run by a former Hillary Clinton aide has already amassed millions to block a public health insurance option. Even small reform isn’t possible without confronting powerful interests.
Xavier Becerra advocated Medicare for All and tough action against Big Pharma. Too bad the incoming Biden administration he’s set to be a part of as Health and Human Services head has refused to take on the health insurance industry.
In praising the pro-corporate Washington hacks Joe Biden has chosen to staff his administration, liberal groups are betraying their missions in order to try to gain influence — despite that appeasement strategy rarely working in American history.
A group of Democratic and Republican lawmakers just joined together to shield their corporate donors from lawsuits when they kill more workers. If this legislation passes, corporations won’t be held to account for their criminal actions during coronavirus.
Former government officials Tony Blinken, Michele Flournoy, and Lloyd Austin may run Biden’s national security agencies — their firm is telling investors it expects to profit off ties to those officials.
Comcast received $1 billion in government subsidies. But it’s still imposing new data fees on customers reliant on the internet due to COVID. Thanks to a massive lobbying effort and ties to Joe Biden, the telecom giant might very well get away with it.