Moderate Democrat Congressman Brad Ashford has a $1 million cash advantage over his Republican challenger Don Bacon.  Ashford should be able to be re-elected in November thanks to Omaha shading a little blue for Presidential elections but that $1 million cash advantage would have been insane to think about two years ago.

Mike Coffman in Colorado also holds a cash advantage over his challenger.

Sheriff Paul Babeu has received Young Guns status from the National Republican Congressional Committee.  He has not received the Republican nomination for Arizona’s 1st Congressional district.  Babeu is somewhat of a loose cannon and should be somewhat helpful in helping Tom O’Halleran retain Ann Kirkpatrick’s seat in November.  Babeu is in 2nd place for fundraising in the Republican primary behind Wendy Rogers.  Babeu is leading in the polls right now.  But it should be interesting to watch on August 30.

The RNC will have freshman Senators from the Republican Party brag about getting Harry Reid fired from the Senate majority.  Reid fired a scathing review of Donald Trump’s selection of Mike Pence as his Vice President nominee:

The American people will never stand for Donald Trump’s dangerous proposals and divisive rhetoric, no matter who his running mate is. But by picking Governor Mike Pence, Trump has doubled down on the fringe policies and partisan gridlock that fueled his rise as the leader of the dysfunctional Republican Party. Trump could not have selected a more extreme partner in his campaign of hate and division.

President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have chosen sides in Florida’s Democratic Senate primary and the California Senate election.  Their choices?  Patrick Murphy and Kamala Harris.

I’ll admit that I liked this essay quite a bit.  Speaking of which, LGBT history will be taught in California schools.

After the child migrant crisis in 2014, the issue of immigrant children not having adequate lawyers became a salient issue.  One of the judges at the most recent hearing regarding this issue called on Congress or the courts to make a “Gideon decision” for these children.  Seems like a good time to mention that H.R. 4646 would help with this.  Currently has 88 co-sponsors, all Democrats.

Should veterans deported for minor offenses be able to return?  Progressive champion Rep. Raul Grijalva believes so.  He has introduced a bill to help these veterans.

Veterans often come back home and don’t receive services to help them adjust back to civilian life, Grijalva said, which can lead to destructive behavior such as driving under the influence and drug use. But while any other veteran would serve a sentence for such a crime and be released, those like Barajas are deported after they have served their time.

The ACLU of San Diego has published a report about veterans being deported after completing their service.

For some reason, I thought yesterday was Thursday when I put the links together.  That was embarrassing.

Professor Scott Lemieux finds the recent interview that Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave The New York Times is not as big of a deal as people think.  He writes, “and I do think there are some valid reasons to find Ginsburg comments inappropriate. But I also think that they need to be kept in perspective. Supreme Court justices have political views, and these views are reflected to lesser and greater degrees in politically salient cases, and these things remain true even if we have to merely infer how Supreme Court justices intend to vote.”  He continues:

Where I get off the bus, however, is with respect to the question of the magnitude of Ginsburg’s transgression. According to Drezner, Ginsburg “bears almost as much responsibility as Trump for the slow-motion crisis in American democracy.” This conclusion is overwrought. Ginsburg’s comments didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know about her or about Supreme Court justices in general, they won’t change the nature of the Supreme Court as an institution, and they won’t have a meaningful causal impact on the polarization of the Court.

Read the whole thing.

Alex Pareene writes for Gawker about the return of Evan Bayh.  Pareene notes that Bayh was part of the Repubilcan hawks who were trying to sabotage the Iran deal.

It is generally accepted that Bayh-style politics are necessary if Democrats wish to win in conservative states. (Indiana, which experimented with voting for Obama in 2008, swung decisively back to the GOP in 2012, and Trump is expected to win easily.) The weird thing has always been that the actual policiesof Bayh-style moderates aren’t really popular with anyone. There is no mass constituency for “entitlement reform” or war with Iran. Bayh-style politics work in reddish states mainly through rhetorical distancing from liberalism—not opposition to popular liberal ideas, but careful tribal signaling that you’re not one of those liberals.

Scott Lemieux over at Lawyers, Guns, and Money believes that Bayh running is good news.  His argument is that the Supreme Court will be of the utmost importance as it will shift the median vote of the Supreme Court to liberals.

It’s been a long time since the Vice President nominee has meant anything, a piece in Politico magazine argues.  Politico magazine is so much better than the regular Politico website.  That seems…odd.  The political science literature is a mixed bag on the impact of Vice Presidents.  They don’t usually help except maybe in small states they might provide a small bump.  Otherwise the nominee usually does more harm than good.  This is why I want Joe Biden to be Vice President for life.

Why, though, was there any choice to be made? Four years earlier, Henry Wallace had been put on the ticket at the insistence of FDR himself; indeed, Roosevelt was so adamant about running with his then-secretary of agriculture that when serious opposition arose—he was too committed to civil rights, too liberal for more conservative Democrats, too “enthusiastic” about spiritualism—the only way Roosevelt got him on the ticket was by publicly threatening that he’d otherwise decline the presidential nomination.

It’s a very interesting article to read.

Meet Senator Rand Paul.  On the one hand he can write his opinions on the opioid epidemic here where I almost agree with him.  On the other hand, he can say things like in this article where he comes off as a crank.

Governor Pat McCrory signed HB 972 into law in North Carolina.  This bill exempts dash cam and body cam videos exempt from the public record.  Not surprisingly, the ACLU of North Carolina is not happy with this development.

Ruben Kihuen is trying to win an election in Nevada against a Republican incumbent.  He posted pretty good fundraising numbers.

Progressive Zephy Teachout has raised a considerable sum of money to help her try to win a Congressional seat against her Republican opponent.

Barack Obama wrote an article for the Journal for the American Medical Association.  And consistent with the Obama of the last few years, he’s finally willing to say what’s on his mind.

“The first lesson is that any change is difficult, but it is especially difficult in the face of hyperpartisanship. Republicans reversed course and rejected their own ideas once they appeared in the text of a bill that I supported. For example, they supported a fully funded risk-corridor program and a public plan fallback in the Medicare drug benefit in 2003 but opposed them in the ACA. They supported the individual mandate in Massachusetts in 2006 but opposed it in the ACA. They supported the employer mandate in California in 2007 but opposed it in the ACA—and then opposed the administration’s decision to delay it. Moreover, through inadequate funding, opposition to routine technical corrections, excessive oversight, and relentless litigation, Republicans undermined ACA implementation efforts. We could have covered more ground more quickly with cooperation rather than obstruction. It is not obvious that this strategy has paid political dividends for Republicans, but it has clearly come at a cost for the country, most notably for the estimated 4 million Americans left uninsured because they live in GOP-led states that have yet to expand Medicaid.”

 

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California was one of the biggest advocates for reform of the Los Angeles Police Department.  Their work for body cams with LAPD officers is still very important.

Gary Johnson is the Libertarian nominee for President.  He thinks that he can get to 15% in polls to be able to make the national debate stage.  Johnson got just less than 1% of the popular vote in 2012.  A third party has received 15% of the popular votes twice in the last 100 years.  Those two times were Ross Perot in 1992 who self-funded his campaign and Robert La Follette in 1924.  Intuitively, it makes sense for Johnson to be able to pick up Republicans who refuse to vote for Trump in November, I’m not sure of how many votes that actually will be.

Representative Patrick Murphy has been endorsed by another member of Congress. This time it is Rep. Gwen Graham.  One of the weirdest things of this cycle is that Florida Democratic bench is so thin in Florida that voters have to choose between Murphy and Rep. Alan Grayson.

Former Rep. Joe Garcia is hitting Carlos Curbelo for donating money to Rep. Barbara Comstock who once questioned why we couldn’t track immigrants like Fed Ex tracks  packages.  The only problem is that Rep. Garcia once said something very similar, using American Express, instead.

Iowa’s 1st Congressional District has been changed from tossup to leans Democratic thanks to a strong fundraising performance from Democratic candidate Monica Vernon.

Former Senator and Governor Evan Bayh has decided to run for Senate in Indiana.  Indiana voted for a moderate Democrat in 2012 for Senate.  Bayh is a little to the right of a moderate Democrat but definitely increases the chances of Democrats taking back the Senate in November.

 

I’m going to try to change up what I’m posting a little bit more this week.  I’m hoping that it continues.  I’ll still work on getting longer pieces posted, as well as more mini-profiles on as many candidates out there running for office in November.  But I wanted to give a few links out there to read.  I’m hoping I’m giving you some new things to read in the meantime.

A few weeks ago, two members of Congress helped to introduce a bill that would change the Fair Labor Standards Act to keep minor league baseball players not treated as typical hourly wage employees.  Due to outrage from baseball fans, I’m pretty sure, Representative Cheri Bustos withdrew her support for the bill.  It’s important to note: “Minor leaguers are paid in season only. Any offseason training is on them. They are not paid (except expenses) during the Arizona Fall League. They are not paid during spring training except for the meals not provided by the team…More perspective: Major league teams spend anywhere from $10 million to $30 million on their entire farm system per year. Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Zack Greinke is making $34,416,667 in 2016.”  Baseball is an $8 billion industry.  Pay the players who work hard to make it to Major League Baseball.

The Baton Rouge Police Department had a history of racial violence prior to the killing of Alton Sterling.  From the article, “Many law enforcement officials came to Louisiana immediately after Hurricane Katrina to provide reinforcements, and one state trooper from Michigan said Baton Rouge police attempted to thank him for his help by letting him “beat down” a prisoner. A trooper from New Mexico wrote a letter to the Baton Rouge police expressing the concerns of seven New Mexico troopers and five Michigan troopers that Baton Rouge police were engaging in racially motivated enforcement, that they were physically abusing prisoners and the public and that they were stopping, questioning and searching people without any legal justification…But the bad reports aren’t confined to the time around Hurricane Katrina. In 2014, a 15-year-veteran of the force resigned after a series of racist text messages were attributed to him. Michael Elsbury, who routinely patrolled an area around Southern University, resigned as the department was looking into text messages that called black people monkeys (and worse) and expressed pleasure ‘in arresting those thugs with their saggy pants.'”

There will be a discussion on Tuesday, July 12 about what is going to happen next in California for battling income inequality.  As California goes, so does the nation, they say.

Speaking of which, there was a defeat of a bill that would have included greater transparency in body cams for police officers in California.

My old county, Orange County, is under fire for some more issues involving jailhouse informants.    “The OCDA’s office has been under fire for almost three years for its involvement in mishandling evidence produced from a secret jailhouse informant program that has allegedly violated the rights of countless defendants. Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders, who first unearthed the informant network, has been arguing since 2013 that a tainted snitch network in county jails has existed in secret for decades. Sanders argues that county prosecutors and police have violated multiple defendants’ rights by illegally obtaining, and sometimes withholding, evidence gleaned from jail informants.”

The heir apparent to Sheriff Lee Baca’s job as sheriff of Los Angeles County has been sentenced to federal prison for five years.  More information about his role in hiding an FBI informant can be found here.

 

 

Gilbert Ayala

Future position: Candidate running for State Senator for Legislative District 5 in Nebraska

Key issues/positions:

Opposes the Employment Nondiscrimination Act

Opposes expansion of Medicaid in Nebraska

Supports school vouchers to increase “school choice.”

Opposes horse racing in Nebraska

Opposes physician-assisted suicide

Opposes the legalization of recreational marijuana

Opposes abortion in all cases – “There is no case of a child being aborted to save the mother. When a doctor is dealing with a pregnant woman he has two patients not one patient.”

Supports providing religious liberty protections for faith-based organizations

Opposes government funding for abortion and planned parenthood

Opposes raising the minimum wage in Nebraska

Opposes comprehensive sex education in all Nebraska schools

Opposes allowing students and children to use bathrooms that are consistent with their biological gender

Carol Blood

Current position: Consultant

Future position: Running for state senator of Nebraska, legislative district 3.

Key positions/issues:

Believes voting is a fundamental right.  She does not believe that voter fraud is a problem in Nebraska so we do not need voter id laws.

Supports Medicaid expansion in Nebraska

Believes that we should  review mandatory minimum sentences and expanding prison alternatives.

 

Tommy Garrett

Current position: State Senator, Legislative District 3

Future position: Running for re-election for Legislative District 3 in November

Political party: Republican

Key issues/votes:

Garrett was a sponsor of LB 643 which would allow medical marijuana for Nebraska.  This bill would allow medical marijuana for those who suffer from cancer, AIDS, glaucoma, Crohn’s disease, chronic pain, nausea, or seizures.  He voted in favor of this bill.

LB 268: This bill would repeal the death penalty in Nebraska.  Garrett voted in favor of this bill.

LB 10: This bill would have changed the electoral votes in Nebraska by eliminating the electoral votes by Congressional district.  The bill would move Nebraska back to a winner take all state.  Garrett voted against this bill.

LB 947: This bill would allow immigrants protected by President Barack Obama’s DACA executive actions to receive professional licenses.

LB 586: This bill was to establish an employment non-discrimination act for the state of Nebraska.  The bill would prohibit employment discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.  The vote was to table the bill.  A vote in favor of tabling the bill is, in effect, a vote against the bill.  Garrett voted in favor of tabling the bill.

LB 1032: This bill would expand Medicaid in Nebraska.  The medicaid expansion includes plans for people to buy private health insurance plans.  The vote was to table the bill.  A vote to table the bill is, in effect, a vote against the bill.  Garrett voted in favor of tabling the bill.

LB 485 (previous session): This bill would establish an employment non-discrimination act for the state of Nebraska.  Garrett voted against the bill.

LB 943 (previous session): This bill would have increased the minimum wage to $7.65 in January 2015, $8.35 in January 2016, and $9.00 in January 2017.  Garrett voted against this bill.

 

 

 

 

Dan Watermeier

Current position: State senator, Legislative District 1, Nebraska

Future position: Running for re-election for legislative district 1 in 2016.  He is running unopposed in the general election.

Key issues/votes:

LB 268: This bill would repeal the death penalty in Nebraska.  Watermeier voted against this bill.

LB 10: This bill would change Nebraska from splitting their electoral votes by congressional district and move the state to a winner-take-all program.  Watermeier voted against this bill.

LB 947: This bill would allow professional licenses to immigrants who were protected by President Barack Obama’s DACA executive order.  Watermeier did not vote on this bill.

LB 586: The bill would create a Employment Nondiscrimination Act for the state of Nebraska.  The vote was to table the bill.  A vote to table the bill is, in effect, a vote to reject the bill.  Watermeier voted to table the bill.

LB 1032: This bill would expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act.  The bill would give funds to people eligible for expanded Medicaid to purchase private health insurance.  The vote was to table the bill.  A vote to table the bill is, in effect, a vote to reject the bill.  Watermeier voted to table the bill.

LB 83: This bill would prohibit wage discrimination based on gender for employers with 2-15 employees.  Watermeier did not vote on this bill.

LB 943 (previous session): This bill would increase the minimum wage from $7.25 to $7.65 in January 2015, $8.35 in January 2016, and $9.00 in January 2017.  Watermeier did not vote on this bill.

LB 599: This bill would establish a minimum wage for young student workers to $8/hour or 85% of the federal minimum wage whichever is higher.  Watermeier was a co-sponsor of the bill.  He voted for the bill.

LB 643: This bill would authorize medical marijuana for those who have cancer, glaucoma, Croh’s disease, AIDS, chronic pain, nausea, or seizures.  Watermeier voted against the bill.

Watermeier does not support a pay increase for state senators or repealing the term limits for state senators.