BREAKING CAMPAIGN UPDATE: The 127K petitions sit untouched, Mayor Gimenez refuses to act, and the campaign coalitions have begun holding direction actions and have filed a lawsuit in attempts to get the county to do their job and count the petitions.
Every day, many U.S. families must make the impossible choice of falling into debt to pay for critical medical care or foregoing necessary treatment. In 2014, 64 million people were struggling with medical debt and it is the leading cause of bankruptcy in the United States.
I have just finished reading—re-reading, actually—A Vision for Black Lives, the national policy platform released recently by the Movement for Black Lives, the Black Lives Matter Network, BYP100 and over 50 other grassroots organizations. This document is a must-read for anyone who considers themselves a public servant, policy maker, civic or community leader. It’s hot off the press, and it is an extraordinary gift.
When the Labor Department ruled last week that 674 workers in the cafeteria of the United States Senate had been denied their full pay in recent years, the contractor that runs the cafeteria said it was an accident. The workers said it was deliberate.
The editorial makes the case that we have more of a nuisance than a crisis on our hands. It misunderstands the entire point behind the push for debt-free public college.
Latino/as’ changing economic fortunes in the wake of the Great Recession and the racist undertones of anti-immigrant rhetoric are major sources of their disillusionment with the Republican Party. While Latino/as have more positive attitudes toward the Democratic Party, their feelings are lukewarm.
CINCINNATI (CN) — The state of Ohio, a key battleground state in this year's presidential election, told a Sixth Circuit panel on Wednesday that it believes it has the right to purge from voter registration rolls anyone who hasn't voted in consecutive federal elections and did not respond to inquiries about a change in their address, regardless of the reason.[...]
Latino/as distrust of the Republican Party was high even before explicitly racist language became mainstream again this year. Much of this distrust is rooted in the GOP’s discourse on immigrants and immigration, but immigration is not the only policy area in which Latinos and Republicans diverge in opinion.
Confidence in American political institutions is at one of its lowest points in recorded history. About one out of every ten Americans expresses confidence in Congress and roughly one-third have confidence in the presidency or the Supreme Court, according to a Gallup poll from June. By contrast, nearly three-quarters of Americans have confidence in the military; a small majority trust the police.
Yesterday, Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) and Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) introduced The Degrees Not Debt Act. This legislation would create a state-federal partnership program with the Department of Education, states, and public colleges or universities in order to ensure college affordability becomes a reality for all Americans.
Settlement Ensures Low-Income New Jerseyans Will Be Offered the Chance to Register to Vote
TRENTON, NEW JERSEY and WASHINGTON, D.C, July 14, 2016 — Voting rights advocates and New Jersey officials announced today that they have reached a settlement to ensure low-income citizens are provided voter registration services through public assistance agencies, as required by the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA). New Jerseyans will be able to access these registration options in advance of the 2016 presidential elections.
Today, Congressman Robert Brady, the ranking member of the Committee on House Administration, introduced the “Automatic Voter Registration Act of 2016.” A companion bill has also been introduced in the Senate. In response, Brenda Wright, Demos’ Vice President of Policy and Legal Strategies, offered the following statement of support:
Despite lore from parents and grandparents about the caddying jobs or serving gigs they used to pay for school, today’s young adults know the idea of working your way through college is about as antiquated as milk delivered daily in glass bottles or Mad Men-era martini lunches.
More bosses are weighing the credit worthiness of job candidates before making a hire — a practice that some lawmakers say unfairly keeps people with bad credit from landing a job.
On Thursday, the Senate takes up a proposal to restrict employers in most cases from using financial information such as credit scores to decide whom to hire, promote or fire. [...]
Miami-Dade County in Florida has had its fair share of high-profile voter suppression issues. Whether it be long lines, canceling of Souls to the Polls Sundays, or voter registration restrictions, many of the issues have directly impacted the black community. However, there is a significant and structural impediment to black political participation that is rarely examined. Political donations have a large amount of influence over the political process, and the county’s vibrant diversity isn’t represented in the county’s donor class.
If nearly 70 percent of graduates are borrowing, 30 percent (including 35 percent of public college graduates) are not. Who are these students? What type of family or financial resources do they have at their disposal? What are their work habits? In short, what does it take to graduate debt-free these days? This brief answers these questions.
