Until voters and elected leaders in Baltimore, Maryland took action to bring small donor public financing to their elections, big money in politics was a growing problem in the city.
"Although credit scores never formally take race into account, they draw on data about personal borrowing and payment history that is shaped by generations of discriminatory public policies and corporate practices that limit access to wealth for Black and Latinx families."
“These are folks who are serving [and] preparing food for all of the rest of us. It's a recipe for contagion when...the people preparing your food cannot afford to stay home when they have a contagious disease.”
In 2016, a report from the progressive think tank Demosfound that most campaign dollars in local elections were coming from contributors who are white, male and high-income.
Supporting Seattle's voter-approved Democracy Voucher Program — a system designed to empower small donors and the candidates they support in city elections.
Women of color are generally underrepresented as campaign donors even though they vote at high rates, according to research by progressive think tank Demos.
The marquee bill, which features improvements to voting, campaign finance, and ethics laws, addresses the deep political, racial, and economic inequalities that plague our democracy.
A system of Fair Elections for New York State will not only allow for candidates from diverse communities to compete, but it will help build lasting political power for communities of color.
New York City’s system has enabled candidates ― especially those from less affluent neighborhoods ― to more consistently rely on small donors in their districts.
Public-sector jobs in Massachusetts are more likely than private-sector jobs to be good jobs that provide a family-supporting income and wealth-building benefits. They need to be preserved.