May 12, 2025 - Reconciliation Markups This Week on the Reverse Robin Hood Budget
Plus: Newark's mayor arrested, protecting basic rights, Trump takes a $400 million bribe, and more
🚨 Today providers and parents will mark A Day Without Child Care to fight for a better economy economy for all. Let’s find an event near us, join tonight’s virtual rally and sign the solidarity pledge. 🚨
❤️🩹 GOP PROPOSALS ON MEDICAID, SNAP CUTS SHOULD BE OUT TODAY ❤️🩹
We are set for a big week in the GOP’s efforts to push through their reverse Robin Hood reconciliation bill. Committee markups on the sections that will cut Medicaid, SNAP and taxes for billionaires are all set to begin Tuesday, and we should see the GOP proposals in full today. We received a partial look at the tax plan over the weekend, and which will cost us nearly $5 trillion while making huge giveaways to billionaires and big corporations permanent. The Wall Street Journal is also reporting the Medicaid section will include work requirements, which are cuts, and cracking down on the Medicaid provider tax loophole, which will be cuts. (Check out more details in this thread from the Center for American Progress’ Bobby Kogan, but the Congressional Budget Office’s preliminary suggests it will cost 13.7 million people their health care.)
This is a moment to make sure we are getting loud as possible – and that everyone around us is, too. Here’s what we can do:
Contact our own reps to oppose the GOP plan. We can use scripts and emails from Indivisible here or push them to take concrete action by signing a discharge petition here.
Share our own stories of how Medicaid has impacted our lives with our reps and with People’s Action Institute here. We can also reach out to our local media outlets with these experiences – many of them will be looking for a local angle!
Reach out to folks in our lives and urge them to speak up, too. Matthew Cortland has written a call to action on this here.
Phonebank to folks in key districts and get them to contact their reps:
TODAY 2:00PM-4:00PM ET with Working Families Power, sign up here
TOMORROW 10:00AM-12:00PM ET with Alliance for Retired Americans, sign up here
TUESDAYS AND SATURDAYS from 2:00-4:00PM and 1:00AM-1:00PM ET with Bluevote.org, sign up here
WEDNESDAYS 7:00PM-9:00PM ET with Indivisible Chicago, sign up here
THURSDAY 11:00AM-1:00PM Eastern with Indivisible, sign up here
THURSDAYS from 6:00-9:00PM ET with People’s Action focused on deep canvassing, sign up here
THURSDAYS 7:00-11:15PM ET with Grassroots Democrats HQ and , sign up here
FRIDAYS 1:00PM-2:00 PM ET with Citizen Action Illinois, sign up here
SATURDAY 11:00AM-1:00PM ET with Fighting Oligarchy, sign up here
We can find guides to writing letters to the editor, social content, and district-by-district details on how Medicaid and SNAP cuts will hurt us here.
🚨 NEWARK MAYOR ARRESTED, REPS MENACED BY ICE 🚨
On Friday, three Democratic members of Congress and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka attempted to conduct an oversight visit to the recently reopened and very controversial Delaney Hall federal immigration detention center. ICE officials created a confrontation, denied Mayor Baraka entry and then arrested him for trespassing as he left – videos by bystanders show that he was taken into custody in a public area outside the gates of the facility. Now, Homeland Security is threatening to arrest Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman, Rob Menendez and LaMonica McIver as well.
Once again, this is the Trump Administration using state power to attempt to silence and possibly imprison those who dare speak up against them, and in this case for simply attempting to do their jobs. (Under the law, members of Congress are permitted to enter any Homeland Security facility used to detain immigrants and are not required to provide prior notice before an inspection.) It’s also once again demonstrative an out-of-control deportation force that would rather manhandle an 80-year-old grandmother then let anyone look too closely at how they’re treating immigrants. Let’s take action by:
Sending messages of solidarity and support to Mayor Baraka (contact info) and Reps. Watson Coleman (contact), Menendez (contact) and McIver (contact). We can also make an emergency donation to Mayor Baraka’s gubernatorial campaign here.
Join Mayor Baraka and Reps. Watson Coleman, Menendez and McIver for a mass call TONIGHT at 5PM here on how we can push back against Trump’s authoritarian power grab and show solidarity with immigrants.
Contacting our own members of Congress and telling them it’s completely unacceptable for ICE to attempt to bully and intimidate them out of performing oversight, and we want them to speak out in support of their colleagues.
Connecting with the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice to stay engaged in fighting for those detained at Delaney Hall here.
☎️ MILLER THREATENS TO SUSPEND HABEAS CORPUS ☎️
Habeas corpus (Latin for “you should have the body”) is called the “Great Writ of Liberty” for a reason. It is the right of those held by the state to appear in a court of law to challenge their imprisonment, a cornerstone of freedom that predates the Magna Carta and about as basic a protection against tyranny as there is. It is explicitly guaranteed in Article 1, Section 9 of the Constitution, the courts have held it applies to non-citizens, and the historical and near-universal consensus is it requires express authorization from Congress to suspend.
Top Trump adviser Stephen Miller told reporters Friday the administration is “actively looking at” ways to ignore habeas corpus to speed up mass deportation. This is a trial balloon, and an incredibly dangerous one. It is crucial we shoot it full of holes.
We need to demand our elected officials at all levels of government firmly and publicly reject any threats to suspend habeas corpus and pledge to resist them – right now. In particular, we should reach out to our members of Congress and insist they issue a statement definitively and in plain language committing to oppose such a move. We can find talking points and language to use here.
💰 BRIBE IN PLANE SIGHT: TRUMP GETS $400 MILLION LUXURY JET FROM QATAR 💰
ABC News is reporting that Donald Trump is preparing to accept a super luxury jumbo jet as a “present” from the royal family of Qatar. While ostensibly the most valuable gift ever to the United States from a foreign government, we are barely involved. Trump would be able to use this “flying palace” as the new Air Force One until near the end of his term and it would then be transferred to the Trump presidential library foundation.
This plane is estimated to be worth $400 million, and it is for all intents and purposes being handed over directly to the President of the United States for his personal use. This is about as open as corruption gets – it’s even been given the legal go-ahead by an attorney general who once worked for the government of Qatar. It can’t be allowed to go on. And we need to know what Trump has agreed to do with our government on Qatar’s behalf to make such a bribe worth their while.
Let’s contact our reps to demand they block Trump from taking this luxury jet and launch congressional hearings and a special counsel investigation into the President accepting “gifts” from foreign rulers. We must determine if there is a quid pro quo between Trump and the Qatari royal family. They should also examine whether or not this arrangement violates the law and the Constitution’s prohibition against emoluments, and demand the release of the legal analysis the White House Counsel and the Department of Justice prepared on this issue. We can find scripts and language here, and send this Resistbot message directly to our electeds by texting SIGN PIQXHS to 50409.
💻 PUBLIC COMMENTS AGAINST THE POLITICIZATION OF PUBLIC SERVICES 💻
Trump is attempting to go even further to unravel public services we count on and purge federal workers. He has proposed a rule to reinstate Schedule F, which would turn 50,000 or more career civil servants into political appointees – requiring them to be loyal to him and bolstering personalist authoritarianism. (We can read more about this plan and its extensive consequences from
here and follow to stay updated on this push.)The Office of Personnel Management is accepting public comments on this proposed rule from now until May 23rd. The Federal Unionists Network has put out a toolkit on how to submit one here (h/t
). Let’s check out the toolkit and make our voices heard here.💲 #TESLATAKEDOWN REACHES TESLA WORKERS 💲
Apparently the protests organized by volunteers with #TeslaTakedown have been so successful that Elon Musk's employees have felt the need to speak out. Tesla Employees Against Elon are trying to force him out as CEO: "We are now at a crossroads: continue with Elon as CEO and face further decline as customers abandon the brand, or move forward without him and allow our products and mission to succeed or fail on their own. We vote for the latter." We can read their open letter here and spread the word about it - let’s keep up the pressure on Elon as the CEO of Tesla and maybe make his employees' wish come true.
Let’s also keep showing up to our local #TeslaTakedown protests and consider joining the divestment campaign - which last week earned its first major victory as Lehigh County, Pennsylvania’s pension fund pulled the plug on Tesla!