NOTES

INTRODUCTION

  1. when he attacked immigrants as rapists and drug-carrying criminals: “Here’s Donald Trump’s Presidential Announcement Speech.” Time. June 16, 2015. https://time.com/3923128/donald-trump-announcement-speech/.
  2. Trump lackey cited America’s Japanese internment camps: Bromwich, Jonah Engel. “Trump Camp’s Talk of Registry and Japanese Internment Raises Muslims’ Fears.” New York Times. November 17, 2016, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/18/us/politics/japanese-internment-muslim-registry.html.
  3. his plan was to find common ground with Trump on infrastructure: Steinhauer, Jennifer. “Senate Democrats’ Surprising Strategy: Trying to Align with Trump.” New York Times. November 16, 2016, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/17/us/politics/democrats-house-senate.html.
  4. The Tea Party was super-racist and sometimes violent: Miller, Carlin. “Tea Party Getting Violent? 10 House Dems Report Threats, Vandalism.” CBS News. March 26, 2010. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tea-party-getting-violent-10-house-dems-report-threats-vandalism/.
  5. Robert Reich posted it to his Facebook page: Reich, Robert. “Indivisible Town Hall Tip: How to Respond to Evasive Members of Congress.” Facebook. July 3, 2017. https://www.facebook.com/RBReich/videos/1621262431219680/?__xts__[0]=68.ARDO6-Zmfz2Ak3aXUaVsTlU_byG8g2-VixDGh1En_NXyIG-mVrJeA-VUeiawbR1HcCWAbyQohBteC2SKvwhbgHKktewfKWbbhFulmAjMF3_UodgnDJBEYO_MErqXR-_mALO4H8jt5dA1UJJx6hkwn95aSIszOxFYlSNbfmuSEbyK-2PoYBkjoLos5BdHw5tLcrkikVmqU5IuF4oBSxt22wtOS9NbMvW43Dq_4YIWqEXCTrtcp7Wpbq9WNCjmxai-NL9DzKw2UR24KiGx5kLcHke0CEM6bQ3w6Y8TrUswQYpnc_pyw0xCGi9ZVzaaYDMEcz1Hg1VAeuOELmurTjR5awSHsdw_rxQlfFJnyw&__tn__=H-R.

CHAPTER 1: THE PROBLEM: A BUCKLING AND RIGGED DEMOCRACY

  1. wrote an essay called “The Perils of Presidentialism.”: Linz, Juan J. 1990. “The Perils of Presidentialism.” Journal of Democracy (Johns Hopkins University Press) 1 (1): 51–69. https://doi.org/10.1353/jod.1990.0011.
  2. “segregation is not humiliating”: Matthews, Dylan. “Woodrow Wilson Was Extremely Racist—Even by the Standards of His Time.” Vox. November 20, 2015. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/20/9766896/woodrow-wilson-racist.
  3. a concession to segregationist Southern Democrats: Kaiser, Robert G. “ ‘Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time’ by Ira Katznelson.” Washington Post. March 1, 2013, sec. Opinions. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/fear-itself-the-new-deal-and-the-origins-of-our-time-by-ira-katznelson/2013/03/01/a4030f2c-7b72-11e2-a044-676856536b40_story.html.
  4. “walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights”: Traub, James. “The Party of Hubert Humphrey.” Atlantic. April 7, 2018. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/04/did-hubert-humphrey-doom-the-democratic-party/557282/.
  5. “we just delivered the South to the Republican Party”: Oreskes, Michael. “Civil Rights Act Leaves Deep Mark on the American Political Landscape.” New York Times. July 2, 1989, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/1989/07/02/us/civil-rights-act-leaves-deep-mark-on-the-american-political-landscape.html.
  6. a backlash among white evangelicals: Balmer, Randall. “The Real Origins of the Religious Right.” Politico. May 27, 2014. https://politi.co/2Qa1pUg.
  7. liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats retired: Parker, Clifton B. “Politicians More Polarized Than Voters, Stanford Political Scientist Finds.” Stanford News. December 20, 2017. https://news.stanford.edu/2017/12/20/political-parties-polarized-voters/.
  8. Republicans have vaulted to the right: “The Polarization of the Congressional Parties.” Voteview.com. March 21, 2015. https://legacy.voteview.com/political_polarization_2014.htm.
  9. “the core of the problem lies with the Republican Party”: Mann, Thomas E., and Norman J. Ornstein. “Let’s Just Say It: The Republicans Are the Problem.” Washington Post. April 27, 2012, sec. Opinions. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/lets-just-say-it-the-republicans-are-the-problem/2012/04/27/gIQAxCVUlT_story.html.
  10. Republican Party is the “root cause”: Mann, Thomas E., and Norman J. Ornstein. “How the Republicans Broke Congress.” New York Times. December 2, 2017, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/02/opinion/sunday/republicans-broke-congress-politics.html.
  11. brothers spent years in “bare-knuckle legal brawls”: Schulman, Daniel. “The ‘Other’ Koch Brother.” Vanity Fair. May 19, 2014. https://www.vanityfair.com/style/society/2014/05/frederick-koch-brothers.
  12. reshape America in line with their radical reactionary agenda: If you want to go deeper on this, check out Jane Mayer’s New Yorker article “Covert Operations” and her book Dark Money; Nancy MacLean’s book Democracy in Chains; and Theda Skocpol and Alexander Hertel-Fernandez’s research on the Koch funding network, “The Koch Network and Republican Party Extremism.” In short, it’s scary, well-documented stuff.
  13. Stalin’s Russia and Germany during the rise of the Third Reich: Confessore, Nicholas. “Father of Koch Brothers Helped Build Nazi Oil Refinery, Book Says.” New York Times. January 11, 2016, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/12/us/politics/father-of-koch-brothers-helped-build-nazi-oil-refinery-book-says.html.
  14. platform he ran on included, among other initiatives: “Astounding: David Koch’s 1980 VP Run: Kill Medicare, Social Security, Minimum Wage, Public Schools.” Daily Kos. April 10, 2014. https://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/4/10/1291095/-Astounding-Charles-Koch-s-1980-VP-Run-Kill-Medicare-Soc-Sec-Min-Wage-Public-Ed.
  15. Biff was based on Donald Trump: Stuart, Tessa. “ ‘Back to the Future’ Writer: Biff Is Donald Trump.” Rolling Stone (blog). October 21, 2015. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/back-to-the-future-writer-biff-is-donald-trump-190408/.
  16. funded conservative academic institutions and think tanks: “Lawmaking Under the Influence of Very Special Interests.” Progress Florida, n.d. Accessed July 30, 2019. https://www.progressflorida.org/sites/all/files/thinktankreport/spn-report.pdf.
  17. A real argument made in a real book: Lott, John R., Jr. 2000. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. University of Chicago Press.
  18. Carter governed as a conservative Democrat: Khan, Jibran. “Jimmy Carter’s Conservatism That History Forgets.” National Review. May 10, 2018. https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/05/jimmy-carter-more-conservative-administration-than-history-remembers/.
  19. trumpeting fiscal conservatism and deregulation: Leonard, Andrew. “No, Jimmy Carter Did It.” Salon. June 4, 2009. https://www.salon.com/2009/06/04/jimmy_carter_did_it/.
  20. the “era of big government is over”: Mitchell, Alison. “State of the Union: The Overview; Clinton Offers Challenge to Nation, Declaring, ‘Era of Big Government Is Over.’ ” New York Times. January 24, 1996, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/24/us/state-union-overview-clinton-offers-challenge-nation-declaring-era-big.html.
  21. health care proposals of the conservative Heritage Foundation: Krugman, Paul. “Heritage on Health, 1989.” New York Times. The Conscience of a Liberal (blog). July 30, 2017. https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/07/30/heritage-on-health-1989/.
  22. Lee Atwater explained the strategy: Rosenthal, Andrew. “Lee Atwater’s ‘Southern Strategy’ Interview.” New York Times. Taking Note (blog). November 14, 2012. https://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/14/lee-atwaters-southern-strategy-interview/.
  23. Willie Horton: Withers, Rachel. “George H. W. Bush’s ‘Willie Horton’ Ad Will Always Be the Reference Point for Dog-Whistle Racism.” Vox. December 1, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/12/1/18121221/george-hw-bush-willie-horton-dog-whistle-politics.
  24. one New York Times article on Trump’s closing argument: Shear, Michael D., and Julie Hirschfeld Davis. “As Midterm Vote Nears, Trump Reprises a Favorite Message: Fear Immigrants.” New York Times. November 1, 2018, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/01/us/politics/trump-immigration.html.
  25. thirty were men, and all thirty-one were white: Segers, Grace. “Democrats Have More Diverse Slate of New House Members Than Republicans.” CBS News. November 14, 2018. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/democrats-have-a-more-diverse-slate-of-new-house-members-than-republicans/.
  26. precisely one Black Republican was elected: Will Hurd, a representative from Texas, won election in 2018. The only other Black Republican serving in Congress is South Carolina senator Tim Scott.
  27. Today, whites make up about 60 percent of the population: Poston, Dudley, and Rogelio Sáenz. “The US White Majority Will Soon Disappear Forever.” Chicago Reporter. May 16, 2019. https://www.chicagoreporter.com/the-us-white-majority-will-soon-disappear-forever/.
  28. In 1960, there were fewer than 10 million immigrants: Radford, Jynnah, and Luis Noe-Bustamante. “Immigrants in America: Trend Data and Demographics, 1960–2017 | Pew Research Center.” Pew Research Center (blog). June 3, 2019. https://www.pewhispanic.org/2019/06/03/facts-on-u-s-immigrants-trend-data/.
  29. And this proportion is growing: “The Foreign-Born Population in the United States.” 2011. Census.gov. CSPAN Presentation. https://www.census.gov/newsroom/pdf/cspan_fb_slides.pdf.
  30. America’s richest 1 percent took home about 10 percent: Stone, Chad, Danilo Trisi, Arloc Sherman, and Roderick Taylor. “A Guide to Statistics on Historical Trends in Income Inequality.” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Policy Futures. Updated December 11, 2018, 23. https://www.cbpp.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/11-28-11pov_0.pdf.
  31. Today, the top 1 percent take home more than 20 percent: “Income Inequality.” Inequality.org, n.d. Accessed July 16, 2019. https://inequality.org/facts/income-inequality/.
  32. the total number of white people: Sáenz, Rogelio, and Kenneth M. Johnson. “White Deaths Exceed Births in a Majority of U.S. States.” Applied Population Lab. June 18, 2018. https://apl.wisc.edu/data-briefs/natural-decrease-18.
  33. racial wealth gap is huge and growing: Collins, Chuck, Dedrick Asante-Muhammed, Josh Hoxie, and Sabrina Terry. “Report: Dreams Deferred.” Institute for Policy Studies. January 13, 2019. https://ips-dc.org/racial-wealth-divide-2019/.
  34. broader Southern strategy shift in the 1970s: Frances Fox Piven and Richard A. Cloward provide an overview of this transition in their book Why Americans Still Don’t Vote, which focuses on the fight to expand voting rights, leading ultimately to the 1993 Motor Voter Act.
  35. the “Lenin of social conservatism”: Lapham, Lewis H. September 2004. “Tentacles of Rage: The Republican Propaganda Mill, a Brief History.” Harper’s 309 (1852): 16. https://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/gned/laphamtentacles04.pdf.
  36. lock people—especially Black and brown voters—out of the system: If you’re interested in a history of GOP attacks on voting rights in the past several decades, check out Ari Berman’s Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America. In it he tracks the GOP’s multi-decade legal assault to undermine the Voting Rights Act. A central antagonist in Berman’s history is John Roberts, a twenty-six-year-old Reagan administration staffer who helped wage a campaign inside the Justice Department to weaken the Voting Rights Act—and who would go on, as chief justice of the Supreme Court, to write the majority opinion gutting the Voting Rights Act in 2013.
  37. calling voter suppression to dampen progressive turnout “a great idea”: Brice-Saddler, Michael. “GOP Senator: It’s a ‘Great Idea’ to Make It Harder for ‘Liberal Folks’ to Vote.” Washington Post. November 16, 2018, sec. Politics. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/11/16/cindy-hyde-smith-its-great-idea-make-it-harder-liberal-folks-vote/.
  38. twenty-five states enacted reforms making it harder to vote: “New Voting Restrictions in America.” Brennan Center for Justice. Updated January 7, 2019. https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legislation/New%20Voting%20Restrictions.pdf.
  39. “worst voter suppression we’ve seen in the modern era.”: Roth, Zachary, and Wendy R. Weiser. “This Is the Worst Voter Suppression We’ve Seen in the Modern Era.” Brennan Center for Justice. November 2, 2018. https://www.brennancenter.org/blog/worst-voter-suppression-weve-seen-modern-era?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialmedia.
  40. alleged to have purged more than 340,000 voters from the rolls: Durkin, Erin. “GOP Candidate Improperly Purged 340,000 from Georgia Voter Rolls, Investigation Claims.” Guardian. October 19, 2018, sec. U.S. News. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/oct/19/georgia-governor-race-voter-suppression-brian-kemp.
  41. preemptively weakening the not-yet-inaugurated Democrat: Hersher, Rebecca. “North Carolina Governor Signs Law Limiting Power of His Successor.” NPR. December 16, 2016. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/12/16/505872501/north-carolina-governor-signs-law-limiting-power-of-his-successor.
  42. Republican Speaker of the Wisconsin State Assembly answered honestly: Beauchamp, Zack. “The Wisconsin Power Grab Is Part of a Bigger Republican Attack on Democracy.” Vox. December 6, 2018. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/12/6/18127332/wisconsin-state-republican-power-grab-democracy.
  43. prioritizing instead the interests of a plutocratic few in the donor class: This is outside the scope of what we want to cover here, but there are two excellent books on just how unrepresentative and unresponsive American government is to the public will: Democracy in America? by the political scientists Benjamin Page and Martin Gilens; and Winner-Take-All Politics by the political scientists Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson. Both books are rigorous works by well-known academics with fancy credentials, and both focus on how the political system in modern America systematically reflects the interests of elites rather than middle- or lower-class Americans. Basically, if you have a gut feeling that American democracy is rigged in favor of the rich and corporations, these books provide academic research to back up that feeling.

CHAPTER 2: THE SOLUTION: CONSTITUENT POWER

  1. with posters of the congressman with devil’s horns: King, Michael. “Health-Care Hysteria Dogs Doggett.” Austin Chronicle. August 7, 2009. https://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2009-08-07/819416/.
  2. relationship between racial animus and Tea Party affiliation: Xavier, Jonathan. “How Racial Threat Has Galvanized the Tea Party.” Stanford Graduate School of Business. July 15, 2016. https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/how-racial-threat-has-galvanized-tea-party.
  3. we had people: For a very readable blow-by-blow of the rise of grassroots energy, take a look at Ryan Grim’s book We’ve Got People.
  4. gut the Office of Congressional Ethics: Lipton, Eric. “With No Warning, House Republicans Vote to Gut Independent Ethics Office.” New York Times. January 2, 2017, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/02/us/politics/with-no-warning-house-republicans-vote-to-hobble-independent-ethics-office.html.
  5. many were voting consistently to approve Trump’s nominees: Andrews, Wilson. “How Each Senator Voted on Trump’s Cabinet and Administration Nominees.” New York Times. January 31, 2017, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/31/us/politics/trump-cabinet-confirmation-votes.html.
  6. a plan to focus on infrastructure: Short, Aaron. “Chuck Schumer Under Fire from Left-Wing Activists.” New York Post. January 28, 2017. https://nypost.com/2017/01/28/chuck-schumer-under-fire-from-left-wing-activists/.
  7. But that all changed quickly: Caldwell, Leigh Ann. “Democrats Sour on Trump Infrastructure Proposals.” NBC News. June 5, 2017. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/democrats-sour-trump-infrastructure-proposals-n768446.
  8. an Islamophobe who had been an apologist for torture: Wise, Lindsay. “New CIA Director Mike Pompeo on Torture, Muslims, Terror, Iran, NSA Spying.” McClatchy DC Bureau. November 18, 2016. https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/election/article115635853.html.
  9. he’d literally written some of the history himself: Skocpol, Theda, Marshall Ganz, and Ziad Munson. 2000. “A Nation of Organizers: The Institutional Origins of Civic Voluntarism in the United States.” American Political Science Review 94 (3): 527–46. https://doi.org/10.2307/2585829.
  10. Maybe this isn’t sexy: Robert Putnam, a political scientist at Harvard, actually did write a sexy analysis of American civic engagement: Bowling Alone. Well, “sexiness” is in the eye of the beholder, but the book was hugely popular and launched a thousand think pieces on the decline of American society. But whereas Putnam focused on the decline of basic social ties (e.g., bowling leagues), the analysis in “A Nation of Organizers” focuses on the bygone era of nationally coordinated, locally led civic associations with direct ties to democratic participation. This analysis, while far less known outside the halls of academia, is far more relevant to the current predicament facing our democracy. Don’t get us wrong: it’s all well and good to have a bowling league. But bowling leagues themselves don’t defeat fascism or concentrated corporate power.
  11. gathered together locally and often across class lines: Skocpol, Theda. 2003. Diminished Democracy: From Membership to Management in American Civic Life. SOE Curriculum Lab. University of Oklahoma Press.
  12. “much grander organized endeavors”: Ibid.
  13. some of these groups were violent, nativist, and racist.: Ibid.
  14. all-white membership policy into the 1970s: Graham, Fred P. “Fraternal Clubs That Bar Negroes Are Held Taxable.” New York Times. January 12, 1972, sec. Archives. https://www.nytimes.com/1972/01/12/archives/fraternal-clubs-that-bar-negroes-are-held-taxable-court-forbids.html.
  15. Social Security Act systematically excluded workers of color: Katznelson, Ira. 2013. Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time. First Edition. Liveright Publishing Corporation.
  16. bestowing the pen in recognition of the Eagles’: “Remarks by Hon. Jim McDermott ‘Commending the Fraternal Order of Eagles on Its 110th Anniversary.’ ” Congressional Record. September 23, 2008. https://www.congress.gov/crec/2008/09/24/modified/CREC-2008-09-24-pt1-PgE1869-4.htm.
  17. 5,600 in 1959 and more than 22,000 in 1990: Skocpol, Theda. 2003. Diminished Democracy: From Membership to Management in American Civic Life. SOE Curriculum Lab. University of Oklahoma Press.
  18. With the rise of direct mail: Karpf, David. 2012. The MoveOn Effect: The Unexpected Transformation of American Political Advocacy. Oxford Studies in Digital Politics. Oxford University Press. https://books.google.ca/books?id=xlifgdlbCIkC.
  19. building connections to membership bases of millions: The evolution of digital organizations is charted with great insight by Dave Karpf in The MoveOn Effect. Karpf describes the rise of digital organizing hubs whose work and fund-raising depend on their lists of members, millions of people connected to a central national organization through emails, cell phone numbers, and social media followers. These national organizations use their lists to mobilize their membership to make donations, sign petitions, or take other off-line action.

CHAPTER 3: HOW TO MAKE CONGRESS LISTEN

  1. Congress was less popular than toenail fungus: Jensen, Tom. “Americans Like Witches, the IRS, and Even Hemorrhoids Better than Congress.” Public Policy Polling. October 8, 2013, 42. https://www.publicpolicypolling.com/polls/americans-like-witches-the-irs-and-even-hemorrhoids-better-than-congress/.
  2. Members of Congress have reelection rates of about 90 percent: “Reelection Rates Over the Years.” OpenSecrets.org. Center for Responsive Politics. 2018. https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/reelect.php.
  3. Ryan gushed that Trump will lead a “unified Republican government”: LoBianco, Tom. “Ryan: Trump to Lead ‘Unified Republican Government.’ ” CNN. November 9, 2016. https://www.cnn.com/2016/11/09/politics/paul-ryan-says-trump-will-lead-unified-republican-government/index.html.
  4. he groused in a meeting with local conservative activists: Murphy, Tim. “The Women Are in My Grill No Matter Where I Go.” Mother Jones (blog). January 31, 2017. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/01/dave-brat-women-obamacare-town-halls/.
  5. they’d go ahead without him if he refused to show up: Remmers, Vanessa, and Patrick Wilson. “Meet the Women Who Are up in Dave Brat’s Grill.” Richmond Times-Dispatch. February 19, 2017. https://www.richmond.com/news/virginia/meet-the-women-who-are-up-in-dave-brat-s/article_c41b47cb-736a-58e4-9448-b99e8f7bac11.html.
  6. Coffman sneaked out a back door and fled the scene: Stern, Mark Joseph. “GOP Congressman, Overwhelmed by Constituents Concerned About ACA Repeal, Sneaks out of Event Early.” Slate. January 15, 2017. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/01/rep-mike-coffman-sneaks-out-of-event-early-as-constituents-ask-about-aca-repeal.html.
  7. Duncan flatly refused their request for a town hall: Dorman, Travis, and Rachel Ohm. “U.S. Rep. Duncan Rejects Town Hall Requests, Citing Extremists.” Knoxville News Sentinel. February 6, 2017. https://www.knoxnews.com/story/news/politics/2017/02/06/us-rep-jimmy-duncan-rejects-town-hall-requests-citing-extremists-kooks/97525388/.
  8. “Duncan calling me a kook and a radical, I was heartbroken”: Bales-Sherrod, Lesli. “ ‘Out of the Shadows’: Indivisible East Tennessee Brings Together Like-Minded Progressives.” Daily Times. February 12, 2018. https://www.thedailytimes.com/news/out-of-the-shadows-indivisible-east-tennessee-brings-together-like/article_8db64d13-f954-5751-b77e-55f35c7e96a7.html.
  9. staged a well-covered event outside his office, “Kookfest”: Ackerson, Leslie. “Duncan Protesters Collect Donation in Honor of Rep’s Brother-in-Law.” WBIR News. February 10, 2017. https://www.wbir.com/article/news/local/duncan-protesters-collect-donation-in-honor-of-reps-brother-in-law/51-406950584.
  10. Senator Gardner was trying to hide from his constituents: Bush, Stan. “Sen. Gardner Moves Office to a Federal Courthouse.” CBS Denver (blog). August 4, 2017. https://denver.cbslocal.com/2017/08/04/cory-gardner-office-federal-courthouse/.
  11. went ahead and put town halls on the books: Lowry, Rich. “Town Hall Protests—Democrats Echo 2009 Tea Party Protests.” National Review. February 14, 2017. https://www.nationalreview.com/2017/02/town-hall-protests-democrats-echo-2009-tea-party-protests/.
  12. with chants of “Do your job!”: Hanrahan, Mark. “ ‘Do Your Job!’: Oversight Chairman Faces Furious Crowd.” NBC News. February 10, 2017. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/rep-jason-chaffetz-faces-angry-town-hall-crowd-utah-n719231.
  13. “I will die. That’s not hyperbole”: Thompson, Doug. “ ‘I Will Die,’ Springdale Woman Tells Cotton.” Arkansas Online. February 23, 2017. www.arkansasonline.com/news/2017/feb/23/i-will-die-springdale-woman-tells-cotto/.
  14. “a very paid, Astroturf-type movement”: Schor, Elana, and Rachael Bade. “Inside the Protest Movement That Has Republicans Reeling.” Politico. February 10, 2017. http://politi.co/2AogOri.
  15. Brat urged the press to “Google ‘Indivisible’ ”: Riddell, Kelly. “Meet ‘Indivisible,’ the Progressive Organization Behind the Raucous GOP Town-Halls.” Washington Times. February 22, 2017. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/feb/22/meet-indivisible-progressive-organization-behind-r/.
  16. exposés “revealing” the secret playbook: Gizzi, John. “Newsmax Exposes Group Behind Chaos at GOP Town Hall Meetings.” Newsmax. February 24, 2017. https://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Town-Halls-GOP-Indivisible/2017/02/24/id/775464/.
  17. Got me!: Lucas, Fred. “ ‘Indivisible,’ with George Soros Ties, Targets Republicans.” Daily Signal. February 10, 2017. https://www.dailysignal.com/2017/02/10/indivisible-with-ties-to-george-soros-sows-division-against-trump-gop-lawmakers/.
  18. denouncing the moms as a “mob” of “unruly activists”: Kirkland, Allegra. “GOP Rep. Claims ‘Assault’ on Staffer By ‘Mob’ Staging Valentine’s Day Protest.” Talking Points Memo. February 15, 2017. https://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/dana-rohrabacher-claims-staffer-assault-protesters-valentines-day.
  19. handwritten note Frelinghuysen had sent to a board member: Solomon, Nancy. “N.J. Activist Says GOP Congressman’s Complaint Forced Her to Quit Her Job.” NPR. May 16, 2017. https://www.npr.org/2017/05/16/528570746/n-j-activist-says-congressmans-complaint-forced-her-to-resign.
  20. to represent their no-show Republican congressman: Wilson, Jennifer. “Angry Constituents Bring Chicken to Town Hall.” FOX 47: Lansing & Jackson. February 24, 2017. https://www.fox47news.com/news/angry-constituents-bring-chicken-to-town-hall.
  21. The Sarasota group kayaked out to confront him: Wise, Lindsay. “Activists Confront Republican Lawmakers Hundreds of Miles from Home.” State. May 15, 2017. https://www.thestate.com/news/politics-government/article150667762.html.
  22. “Laughter was our greatest weapon against the regime”: Popovic, Srdja, and Matthew I. Miller. 2015. Blueprint for Revolution: How to Use Rice Pudding, Lego Men, and Other Nonviolent Techniques to Galvanize Communities, Overthrow Dictators, or Simply Change the World. Spiegel & Grau.
  23. Trumpcare’s approval ratings kept falling: Pramuk, Jacob. “Rough Series of Polls Show Americans Broadly Disapprove of GOP Health-Care Plan.” CNBC. June 28, 2017. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/28/senate-gop-health-care-bill-has-dismal-approval-rating-poll.html.
  24. A frustrated Ryan gave a speech: Conway, Madeline. “Ryan: ‘Obamacare Is the Law of the Land’ for Foreseeable Future.” Politico. March 24, 2017. https://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/obamacare-repeal-failed-paul-ryan-reaction-236478.
  25. Trumpcare had a staggeringly low 31 percent approval rating: Kirzinger, Ashley, Bianca DiJulio, Liz Hamel, Elise Sugarman, and Mollyann Brodie. “Kaiser Health Tracking Poll—May 2017: The AHCA’s Proposed Changes to Health Care.” Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation (blog). May 31, 2017. https://www.kff.org/health-costs/report/kaiser-health-tracking-poll-may-2017-the-ahcas-proposed-changes-to-health-care/.
  26. without time for most of the Republican caucus to even understand: Cone, Allen. “Ryan: Claims House Rushed to Replace Obamacare a ‘Bogus Attack.’ ” UPI. May 7, 2017. https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2017/05/07/Ryan-Claims-House-rushed-to-replace-Obamacare-a-bogus-attack/8591494175953/.
  27. with just two votes to spare: “Final Vote Results for Roll Call 256.” Clerk.House.gov. May 4, 2017. http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2017/roll256.xml.
  28. “Na na na, na na na, hey hey, goodbye!”: Kaplan, Thomas, and Robert Pear. “House Passes Measure to Repeal and Replace the Affordable Care Act.” New York Times. May 4, 2017, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/04/us/politics/health-care-bill-vote.html.
  29. we launched the Payback Project: “Payback Project.” Payback Project, n.d. Accessed July 18, 2019. https://www.paybackproject.org/.
  30. danced around a faux-casket: “ ‘The Wake’: Political Theater.” Indivisible Las Cruces. May 13, 2017. https://nmdistrict2.com/new-events/2017/5/13/5rrvvhc8i3qa8lwbcilvldslqmcpup.
  31. “Democrats will start objecting”: Haberkorn, Jennifer. “Democrats to Halt Senate Business over Obamacare Repeal.” Politico. June 19, 2017. https://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/19/democrats-stop-senate-business-obamacare-239715.
  32. Disability activists stormed Republican offices: Stein, Perry. “Disability Advocates Arrested during Health Care Protest at McConnell’s Office.” Washington Post. June 22, 2017, sec. Public Safety. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/disability-advocates-arrested-during-health-care-protest-at-mcconnells-office/2017/06/22/f5dd9992-576f-11e7-ba90-f5875b7d1876_story.html.
  33. the Senate wouldn’t consider the Trumpcare bill: Armour, Stephanie, and Kristina Peterson. “Short on Backers, GOP Delays Vote on Health Bill.” Wall Street Journal. June 27, 2017, sec. Politics. https://www.wsj.com/articles/senate-health-bill-vote-delayed-until-after-congress-july-4-recess-1498586899.
  34. “residents were just surprised to see Mr. Heller there”: Robertson, Campbell, Dave Philipps, Jess Bidgood, and Emily Cochrane. “Senate Republicans Lie Low on the Fourth, or Face Single-Minded Pressure.” New York Times. July 4, 2017, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/04/us/politics/senate-republicans-lay-low-on-the-fourth-or-face-single-minded-pressure.html.
  35. people who came up were talking about health care: Schoenfeld, Ed. “Murkowski Speaks with Constituents About Health Care During Senate Recess.” Alaska Public Media (blog). July 10, 2017. https://www.alaskapublic.org/2017/07/10/murkowski-speaks-with-constituents-about-health-care-during-senate-recess/.
  36. Moran’s own family pediatrician showed up: Lerner, Kira. “Republican Senator Confronted by His Daughters’ Pediatrician over Health Care Bill.” Think Progress. July 6, 2017. https://thinkprogress.org/moran-town-hall-b2d31976774e/.
  37. Constituents flooded the venue: Lowry, Bryan. “Packed Town Hall in Palco, Kan., Urges Moran to Stand Firm Against GOP Health Bill.” Kansas City Star. July 6, 2017. https://www.kansascity.com/news/politics-government/article159927569.html.
  38. In a bizarre press conference: Pramuk, Jacob. “GOP Senators Shred ‘Skinny’ Obamacare Repeal—Then Say They’ll Support It.” CNBC. July 27, 2017. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/27/mccain-graham-johnson-lay-out-terms-for-supporting-obamacare-repeal.html.
  39. and then gave a thumbs-down: “McCain Votes Against ‘Skinny Repeal’ Health-Care Bill.” Washington Post. July 28, 2017. https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/national/mccain-votes-against-skinny-repeal-health-care-bill/2017/07/28/206422e2-7356-11e7-8c17-533c52b2f014_video.html.
  40. Democrats in the chamber audibly gasped: Stevenson, Peter W. “The Iconic Thumbs-down Vote That Summed Up John McCain’s Career.” Washington Post. August 27, 2018, sec. The Fix Analysis. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/08/27/iconic-thumbs-down-vote-that-summed-up-john-mccains-career/.
  41. robbing millions of people of their health coverage: Goldstein, Amy. “ ‘Skinny Repeal’ of Obamacare Would Leave 16 Million More People Uninsured in a Decade.” Washington Post. July 27, 2017, sec. Health & Science. https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/skinny-repeal-of-obamacare-would-leave-16-million-more-people-uninsured-in-a-decade/2017/07/27/8d0ab412-72dc-11e7-8f39-eeb7d3a2d304_story.html.
  42. outpouring of gratitude: Kelly, Devin. “After Health Care Vote, Supporters Rally in Anchorage to Thank Murkowski.” Anchorage Daily News. July 29, 2017. https://www.adn.com/slideshow/visual/photos/2017/07/29/after-healthcare-vote-alaskans-rally-around-their-senator/.
  43. spontaneous applause for Collins: Manchester, Julia. “Collins Recounts ‘Heartwarming’ Welcome in Maine After Healthcare ‘No’ Vote.” Hill. July 30, 2017. https://thehill.com/homenews/sunday-talk-shows/344527-collins-reminisces-about-heart-warming-welcome-in-maine-after.
  44. signs thanking McCain along the road: Johnston, Joy. “Cindy McCain Thanks Supporters Who Left Signs Along Road.” Dayton Daily News. July 29, 2017. https://www.daytondailynews.com/news/national-govt--politics/cindy-mccain-thanks-supporters-who-left-signs-along-road/WZ4QUzff9TJeUYQMuAOr3N/.
  45. “Another Round of Anger over Health Care”: Weigel, David. “At Raucous Town Halls, Republicans Have Faced Another Round of Anger over Health Care.” Washington Post. August 11, 2017, sec. PowerPost. https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/at-raucous-town-halls-republicans-have-faced-another-round-of-anger-over-health-care/2017/08/10/9d82cbbe-7de9-11e7-83c7-5bd5460f0d7e_story.html.
  46. hundreds of attendees were angry about his vote: Staff. “Rowdy Town Hall Crowds Greet Sen. Gardner. Health Care Vote Leads Concerns.” Colorado Public Radio. August 15, 2017. https://www.cpr.org/2017/08/15/rowdy-town-hall-crowds-greet-sen-gardner-health-care-vote-leads-concerns/.
  47. an op-ed by us and our policy director, Angel: Levin, Ezra, Leah Greenberg, and Angel Padilla. “Who Saved Obamacare from the GOP? The American People.” Washington Post. July 31, 2017, sec. PostEverything Perspective. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2017/07/31/who-saved-obamacare-from-the-gop-the-american-people/.

CHAPTER 4: HOW TO BUILD POWER TOGETHER

  1. Research on new activists in the Trump era: Fisher, Dana R. 2019. American Resistance: From the Women’s March to the Blue Wave. Columbia University Press.
  2. middle- to upper-middle-class, and white: Putnam, Lara, and Theda Skocpol. “Middle America Reboots Democracy.” Democracy: A Journal of Ideas. Arguments. February 2018. http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/33816/1/Middle%20America%20Reboots%20Democracy%20_%20Democracy%20Journal.pdf.
  3. multiracial, cross-class, intersectional progressive movement: Coaston, Jane. “The Intersectionality Wars.” Vox. May 28, 2019. https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/5/20/18542843/intersectionality-conservatism-law-race-gender-discrimination.
  4. shape our experiences with systems of power and oppression: Crenshaw, Kimberle. “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics.” University of Chicago Legal Forum, 1989, issue 1, Article 8: 31. https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1052&context=uclf.
  5. tried to move compromises on immigration: Valverde, Miriam. “Did Senate Pass Immigration Bills in 2006, 2013?” Politifact. January 26, 2018. https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2018/jan/26/ronald-brownstein/did-senators-pass-immigration-reform-bills-2006-20/.
  6. by painting him as soft on immigration: Cantor had widely been seen as sympathetic to immigration reform, and, following his defeat, Politico predicted that “Cantor loss kills immigration reform.” See Kim, Seung Min. “Cantor Loss Kills Immigration Reform.” Politico. Updated June 11, 2014. https://www.politico.com/story/2014/06/2014-virginia-primary-eric-cantor-loss-immigration-reform-107697.
  7. official election autopsy report released by the Republican National Committee: Barbour, Henry, Sally Bradshaw, Ari Fleischer, Zori Fonalledas, and Glenn McCall. 2013. “Growth & Opportunity Project.” Republican National Committee. http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/623664/republican-national-committees-growth-and.pdf.
  8. it had a majority of Republican support: Easley, Jonathan. “Poll: Two-Thirds of Republicans Back Citizenship for DACA Recipients.” Hill. September 22, 2017. https://thehill.com/latino/351901-poll-two-thirds-of-republicans-back-citizenship-for-daca-recipients.
  9. Republican attorneys general threatened a lawsuit: Kopan, Tal. “States Try to Force Trump’s Hand on DACA.” CNN. July 1, 2017. https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/30/politics/trump-daca-bind/index.html.
  10. demonstrations to pressure Trump not to rescind DACA: Conley, Julia. “#DefendDACA: Nationwide Rallies Demand Protection for Young Immigrants.” Common Dreams. August 15, 2017. https://www.commondreams.org/news/2017/08/15/defenddaca-nationwide-rallies-demand-protection-young-immigrants.
  11. Marielena Hincapié slammed Trump’s move: Shear, Michael D., and Julie Hirschfeld Davis. “Trump Moves to End DACA and Calls on Congress to Act.” New York Times. September 5, 2017, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/05/us/politics/trump-daca-dreamers-immigration.html.
  12. “We will not be thrown back into the shadows”: Ellis, Ralph. “Dreamers on DACA’s End: ‘We Will Not Be Thrown Back into the Shadows.’ ” CNN Politics. September 5, 2017. https://www.cnn.com/2017/09/05/politics/daca-dreamer-reaction/index.html.
  13. hunger strikes at Obama reelection campaign offices: “DREAM Act Protesters Who Staged Sit-in at Obama’s Denver Campaign Office, Call Off Hunger Strike, Vow More Actions to Come.” HuffPost. June 13, 2012. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/dream-act-protesterswho-_n_1593739.
  14. Pelosi called the decision a “deeply shameful act”: “Pelosi Statement on DACA Termination.” Speaker Nancy Pelosi. September 5, 2017. https://www.speaker.gov/newsroom/9517/.
  15. Obama described the attack on DACA as “wrong”: Johnson, Jenna. “Obama Calls President Trump’s Decision to End DACA ‘Wrong,’ ‘Self-Defeating’ and ‘Cruel.’ ” Washington Post. September 5, 2017, sec. Politics. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/09/05/obama-calls-trumps-decision-to-end-daca-wrong-self-defeating-and-cruel/.
  16. part of the chorus of national news organizations: Gaudiano, Nicole. “Chuck Schumer Recounts the Art of Democrats’ Deal with Donald Trump.” USA Today. September 8, 2017. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/09/08/chuck-schumer-recounts-art-democrats-deal-trump/643235001/.
  17. Indivisible joined with our partners: “Immigrant Groups and Allies Call on Congressional Democrats to Force Vote on Dream Act.” United We Dream. September 7, 2017. https://unitedwedream.org/2017/09/immigrant-groups-and-allies-call-on-congressional-democrats-to-force-vote-on-dream-act/.
  18. “My brother has DACA and my parents are undocumented”: Lee, Esther Yu Hsi. “Trump’s Aides Urge Him to Keep DREAMers as He Deports Their Parents.” Think Progress. August 22, 2017. https://thinkprogress.org/trump-aides-daca-bargain-immigration-9f42f0294585/.
  19. “we should’ve frankly been more assertive”: Caygle, Heather, and Elana Schor. “Dems Back Away from Brink on Dreamers.” Politico. December 12, 2017. https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/12/democrats-dreamers-immigrants-shutdown-293750.
  20. agrees, and he tells the advocate, “Make me do it”: Coates, Ta-Nehisi. “Evolving.” Atlantic. June 24, 2011. https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/06/evolving/240972/.
  21. Trump was up on the airwaves targeting Democratic senators: Gibson, Ginger, and Doina Chiacu. “Trump Campaign Ad on Murder Raises Heat in Shutdown Fight.” Reuters. January 20, 2018. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-congress-shutdown-immigration/trump-campaign-ad-on-murder-raises-heat-in-shutdown-fight-idUSKBN1F914U.
  22. polls showed Democrats winning the messaging fight: Rakich, Nathaniel. “The Public Blamed Trump for the Shutdown—but That May Be Changing.” FiveThirtyEight. January 4, 2019. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-public-blamed-trump-for-the-shutdown-but-that-may-be-changing/.
  23. millions of people, including Indivisibles, flooded the streets: Lopez, German. “Women’s March 2018: Millions Are Still Protesting Trump.” Vox. January 23, 2018. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/1/23/16922884/womens-march-attendance.
  24. By Monday it was over: Stolberg, Sheryl Gay, and Thomas Kaplan. “Government Shutdown Ends After 3 Days of Recriminations.” New York Times. January 22, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/22/us/politics/congress-votes-to-end-government-shutdown.html.
  25. “Democrats cave on Shutdown,” tweeted President Trump: Stolberg, Sheryl Gay, and Thomas Kaplan. “Government Shutdown Ends After 3 Days of Recriminations.” New York Times. January 22, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/22/us/politics/congress-votes-to-end-government-shutdown.html.
  26. Supreme Court declined Trump’s request: Lind, Dara. “The Supreme Court May Have Just Kept DACA on Life Support for Several More Months.” Vox. February 26, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/2/26/17053202/daca-supreme-court-ruling-trump.
  27. message to communities under threat is almost always “Wait”: “Immigrant Groups and Allies Call on Congressional Democrats to Force Vote on Dream Act.” United We Dream. September 7, 2017. https://unitedwedream.org/2017/09/immigrant-groups-and-allies-call-on-congressional-democrats-to-force-vote-on-dream-act/.
  28. the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice: King, Martin Luther, Jr. “Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.].” African Studies Center, University of Pennsylvania. April 16, 1963. https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html.
  29. “Well, what the hell’s the presidency for?”: Caro, Robert A. 1982. The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson. Knopf. 428.
  30. “the power that we hold to transform our conditions”: Garza, Alicia, and Jesenia Santana. “Ally or Co-conspirator?: What It Means to Act #InSolidarity.” Move to End Violence. September 7, 2016. http://www.movetoendviolence.org/blog/ally-co-conspirator-means-act-insolidarity/.
  31. “We showed the country that it is possible”: Gomez, Alan, and Ledyard King. “House Passes Bill to Protect ‘Dreamers,’ but Faces Long Odds in Republican-Led Senate.” USA Today. June 4, 2019. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/06/04/house-passes-bill-dreamers-tps-but-senate-unlikely/1337753001/.
  32. even the Republican propaganda network Fox News refused to run it: Stelter, Brian, and Oliver Darcy. “NBC and Fox Finally Stop Running Trump’s Racist Ad After It Was Viewed by Millions.” CNN Business. November 5, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/05/media/nbc-trump-immigration-ad/index.html.
  33. Democratic leadership embraced a funding bill giving Trump billions: Davis, Julie Hirschfeld, and Emily Cochrane. “House Passes Senate Border Bill in Striking Defeat for Pelosi.” New York Times. June 27, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/27/us/politics/border-funding-immigration.html.
  34. agents to carry out sexual assault and abuse on a wide scale: “Report Reveals Widespread Sexual Assault In Immigration Detention.” HuffPost. May 7, 2017. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/report-reveals-widespread-sexual-assault-in-immigration_b_590fc4d2e4b0f71180724604.
  35. but far too little public outrage or oversight: Ali, Safia Samee. “Sexual Assaults in Immigration Detention Centers Rarely Get Investigated, Advocacy Group Charges.” NBC News. April 12, 2017. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/sexual-assaults-immigration-detention-centers-don-t-get-investigated-says-n745616.

CHAPTER 5: HOW TO MAKE WAVES

  1. where there were active Tea Party protests: Madestam, Andreas, Daniel Shoag, Stan Veuger, and David Yanagizawa-Drott. “Do Political Protests Matter? Evidence from the Tea Party Movement*.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 128, no. 4 (November 2013): 1633–85. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjt021.
  2. A study of Women’s March mobilizations: Pinckney, Jonathan. “Did the Women’s March Work? Re-Evaluating the Political Efficacy of Protest.” Submission to 2019 Mobilization Conference, n.d., 22. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/57fbfb81e3df28f99496b5a0/t/5ccf2541f9619a23bcf11999/1557079363726/Pinckney+Women%27s+March+Paper.pdf.
  3. called attention to his unwillingness to appear in public: Smith, Rich. “Where’s Congressman Dave Reichert? His Constituents Can’t Seem to Find Him.” Stranger. February 22, 2017. https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/02/22/24884014/wheres-congressman-dave-reichert-his-constituents-cant-seem-to-find-him.
  4. Jayapal joined them for an “Adopt a District” town hall: Hsieh, Steven. “Pramila Jayapal to Attend Town Hall in No-Show Dave Reichert’s District.” Stranger. July 14, 2017. https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/07/14/25289919/pramila-jayapal-is-attending-a-town-hall-in-dave-reicharts-district-where-he-has-been-a-ghost.
  5. The star of the ad? The empty chair: Smith, Rich. “Another New Challenger Enters the Race for Reichert’s District: Dr. Kim Schrier.” Stranger. August 8, 2017. https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/08/07/25333922/another-new-challenger-enters-the-race-for-reicherts-district-dr-kim-schrier.
  6. they deal with Indivisible people outside their office every week: Golshan, Tara. “The Simple Explanation for All the Republican Retirements: Congress Sucks.” Vox. February 2, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/2/2/16879086/republican-retirements-congress-explained.
  7. Costello himself announced his retirement: Golshan, Tara. “Republican Rep. Ryan Costello Isn’t Running for Reelection. That’s Big for Democrats.” Vox. March 26, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/3/26/17164586/republican-pennsylvania-ryan-costello-retire-2018.
  8. incumbents win reelection around 90 percent of the time: “Reelection Rates over the Years.” n.d. OpenSecrets.org, Center for Responsive Politics. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/reelect.php.
  9. cause that rarely stirs people’s blood: the U.S. tax code. We chatted with Katie Farnan of Indivisible Front Range Resistance fame about these events, and relied on journalist Jacob Weindling’s accounting of the event for some of the details: https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2017/11/what-i-saw-at-a-protest-against-the-republican-tax.html.
  10. benefits of the tax cut to the rich and corporations: Staff. “A Preliminary Analysis of the Unified Framework.” Tax Policy Center. September 27, 2017. https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/publications/preliminary-analysis-unified-framework.
  11. Trump and his congressional supporters downplayed that part: Long, Heather. “The Average American Family Will Get $4,000 from Tax Cuts, Trump Team Claims.” Washington Post. October 16, 2017, sec. Economic Policy. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/10/16/the-average-american-family-will-get-4000-from-tax-cuts-trump-team-claims/.
  12. Indivisible dressed up as billionaires in mock support: Lyons, Jarrett. “GOP’s Senate Tax Bill Met with Protests Across Country.” Salon. November 29, 2017. https://www.salon.com/2017/11/29/gops-senate-tax-bill-met-with-protests-across-country/.
  13. 48 percent of Americans approved of the prospective bill: Shepard, Steven. “Poll: 48 Percent Approve of Trump’s Tax Proposal.” Politico. October 4, 2017. https://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/04/trump-tax-proposal-polling-243426.
  14. its popularity was down to 26 percent: “Half The Public Say Their Taxes Will Go Up Under GOP Plan.” Monmouth University Polling Institute (blog). December 18, 2017. https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_us_121817/.
  15. Republican had pressured his mistress to have an abortion: Seyler, Matt. “Anti-Abortion Rep. Tim Murphy Resigns After Report He Asked Lover to End Pregnancy.” ABC News. October 5, 2017. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/anti-abortion-rep-tim-murphy-asked-mistress-terminate/story?id=50274843.
  16. February, 65 percent of Republican ads: Robillard, Kevin. “Republicans Abandon Tax Cut Message in Pa. Special Election.” Politico. March 13, 2018. https://www.politico.com/story/2018/03/13/pennsylvania-special-election-preview-tax-republicans-458276.
  17. “Rick Saccone fights hard for working families”: Kamisar, Ben. “New GOP Ad Attacks Dem in Pa. Special Election over Pelosi.” Hill. January 31, 2018. https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/371488-new-gop-ad-attacks-dem-in-pa-special-election-over-pelosi.
  18. voters agreed that the bill “benefited large corporations”: Kapur, Sahil, and Joshua Green. “Internal GOP Poll: ‘We’ve Lost the Messaging Battle’ on Tax Cuts.” Bloomberg. September 20, 2018. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-20/internal-gop-poll-we-ve-lost-the-messaging-battle-on-tax-cuts.
  19. support for Trump’s tax bill continuing to fall: Stewart, Emily. “The Republican Tax Law Is Becoming Less Popular, Not More.” Vox. June 22, 2018. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/6/22/17492468/republican-tax-cut-law-poll.
  20. driving down his approval ratings: Cadei, Emily. “Tied to Trump, These Two California Republican Congressmen Lag in Poll.” Sacramento Bee. February 6, 2018. https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article198560324.html.
  21. Rohrabacher was known in D.C. as: Arnsdorf, Isaac, and Benjamin Oreskes. “Putin’s Favorite Congressman.” Politico. November 23, 2016. https://politi.co/2EbppEv.
  22. “a booming bat signal to Democrats”: Krieg, Gregory. “Indivisible Backs Rohrabacher Challenger as Progressives Vie to Unseat Old Democratic Kingmakers.” CNN. May 2, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/02/politics/grassroots-groups-endorsements-democratic-primaries/index.html.
  23. Dana Rohrabacher, for instance: Sanger-Katz, Margot. “Republicans Are Suddenly Running Ads on Pre-existing Conditions. But How Accurate Are They?” New York Times. October 16, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/16/upshot/republicans-health-care-ads-midterms.html.
  24. Democrats unleashed a devastating ad: Bowman, Bridget. “New York Race Spotlights National Clash over Health Care.” Roll Call. October 3, 2018. https://www.rollcall.com/news/politics/one-house-race-spotlights-national-clash-over-health-care.
  25. ad featuring an actor dressed as Bigfoot: Kessler, Pat. “Reality Check: Phillips Ad Finds Bigfoot Looking for Rep. Paulsen.” WCCO: CBS Minnesota. September 19, 2018. https://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2018/09/19/reality-check-bigfoot-ad/.
  26. countered by running a series of wildly racist ads: Murphy, Tim. “Republicans Are Deploying Staggeringly Racist Ads in Upstate New York.” Mother Jones (blog). September 28, 2018. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/09/republicans-anthony-delgado-big-city-rapper/.

CHAPTER 6: A DAY ONE DEMOCRACY AGENDA

  1. Agnew had been forced to resign: For a gripping history of Agnew’s rise and downfall, check out Rachel Maddow’s “Bag Man” podcast.
  2. Trust in government was at an all-time low: “Public Trust in Government: 1958–2019.” Pew Research Center. U.S. Politics & Policy (blog). April 11, 2019. https://www.people-press.org/2019/04/11/public-trust-in-government-1958-2019/.
  3. Instead he looked optimistically to the future: “Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents of the United States: Jimmy Carter.” Avalon Project. Yale Law School. January 20, 1977. https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/carter.asp.
  4. “one of the broadest political reform packages ever”: Weaver, Warren, Jr. “Carter Proposes End of Electoral College in Presidential Votes.” New York Times. March 23, 1977, sec. Archives. https://www.nytimes.com/1977/03/23/archives/carter-proposes-end-of-electoral-college-in-presidential-votes.html.
  5. Heritage Foundation declared it a mistake: R., Milton. “Carter’s Election Reform Proposal.” Heritage Foundation. April 20, 1977. https://www.heritage.org/election-integrity/report/carters-election-reform-proposal.
  6. Republican National Committee denounced the package: Perlstein, Rick. “Jimmy Carter Got It Right: Race, Ronald Reagan, and How the Right Gutted His Visionary Electoral Reform.” Salon. September 5, 2015. https://www.salon.com/2015/09/05/jimmy_carter_got_it_right_race_ronald_reagan_and_how_the_right_gutted_his_visionary_electoral_reform/.
  7. The die was cast: “Public Financing, Campaign Spending Bills.” CQ Almanac Online Edition. 1978. https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal78-1237181.
  8. Democracy reform in the post-Nixon era was dead: Watergate and Nixon’s resignation did lead to a whole host of reforms, just none of the pro-democracy reforms included in Carter’s big package of proposals. Sam Berger and Alex Tausanovitch at the Center for American Progress provide a good overview of the good that did come out of this dark period: https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/democracy/reports/2018/07/30/454058/lessons-from-watergate/.
  9. “a sweeping anti-corruption proposal”: Nilsen, Ella. “House Democrats Officially Unveil Their First Bill in the Majority: A Sweeping AntiCorruption Proposal.” Vox. November 30, 2018. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/11/30/18118158/house-democrats-anti-corruption-bill-hr-1-pelosi.
  10. “a broad political overhaul”: DeBonis, Mike. “House Democrats to Unveil Political Reform Legislation as ‘H.R. 1.’ ” Washington Post. November 30, 2018, sec. PowerPost. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/11/30/house-democrats-unveil-political-reform-legislation-hr/.
  11. “Biggest Voting-Rights Bill to Appear in Congress Since the Civil Rights”: Pierce, Charles P. “This Is the Biggest Voting-Rights Bill to Appear in Congress Since the Civil Rights Movement.” Esquire. January 7, 2019. https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a25778915/democrats-anti-corruption-bill-voting-rights/.
  12. arguing that the proposed legislation was “unnecessary”: “The Facts About H.R. 1—the For the People Act of 2019.” Heritage Foundation. February 1, 2019. https://www.heritage.org/election-integrity/report/the-facts-about-hr-1-the-the-people-act-2019.
  13. wrote an op-ed picking apart the proposal: McConnell, Mitch. “Mitch McConnell: Behold the Democrat Politician Protection Act.” Washington Post. January 17, 2019, sec. Opinions. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/call-hr-1-what-it-is-the-democrat-politician-protection-act/2019/01/17/dcc957be-19cb-11e9-9ebf-c5fed1b7a081_story.html.
  14. “vociferous in their condemnation”: Cochrane, Emily. “Judiciary Hearing on Democrats’ Election Bill Turns into Partisan Brawl.” New York Times. January 29, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/29/us/politics/house-democrats-election-ethics-bill.html.
  15. block the bill from even getting a vote: Nilsen, Ella. “Senate Democrats Unveiled an Anti-Corruption Companion Bill. Mitch McConnell Is Already Blocking It.” Vox. March 27, 2019. https://www.vox.com/2019/3/27/18284171/senate-democrats-anti-corruption-hr1-schumer-mcconnell.
  16. historical, international lesson on how democracies, well, die: Levitsky, Steven, and Daniel Ziblatt. 2018. How Democracies Die. Broadway Books.
  17. thirty years after the filibuster first came into existence: Binder, Sarah A. “The History of the Filibuster.” Brookings (blog). April 22, 2010. https://www.brookings.edu/testimonies/the-history-of-the-filibuster/.
  18. Lodge proposed a bill to establish federal oversight: Waldman, Michael. 2016. The Fight to Vote. Simon & Schuster, 83.
  19. there were seven motions to end a filibuster: “U.S. Senate: Cloture Motions.” United States Senate, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.senate.gov/legislative/cloture/clotureCounts.htm.
  20. McConnell amended it to give Trump two new justices: Davis, Susan. “Senate Pulls ‘Nuclear’ Trigger to Ease Gorsuch Confirmation.” NPR. April 6, 2017. https://www.npr.org/2017/04/06/522847700/senate-pulls-nuclear-trigger-to-ease-gorsuch-confirmation.
  21. conservative states, can prevent a vote from ever taking place: Seitz-Wald, Alex. “5 Reasons to Kill the Filibuster.” Salon. November 28, 2012. https://www.salon.com/2012/11/28/five_reasons_to_kill_the_filibuster/.
  22. take it from Barack Obama: Axelrod, Tal. “Obama: Filibuster Makes It ‘Almost Impossible’ to Govern.” Hill. November 20, 2018. https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/417736-obama-filibuster-makes-it-almost-impossible-to-govern-abolish-it.
  23. Alexander Hamilton wrote grumpily: Hamilton, Alexander. “The Federalist Papers.” Congress.gov. December 14, 1787. https://www.congress.gov/resources/display/content/The+Federalist+Papers#TheFederalistPapers-22.
  24. “corrupt and immoral price in order to get a barely acceptable deal”: Hertzberg, Hendrik. “Alexander Hamilton Speaks Out (III): Two Senators per State, Regardless of Population?” New Yorker. January 8, 2011. https://www.newyorker.com/news/hendrik-hertzberg/alexander-hamilton-speaks-out-iii-two-senators-per-state-regardless-of-population.
  25. residents of those other states get forty-two senators: Faris, David. “A Ferocious Plan for Democrats to Reconquer America.” Week. January 5, 2017. https://theweek.com/articles/670638/ferocious-plan-democrats-reconquer-america.
  26. there are more Republican-leaning states: “2020 Electoral College Rating.” Cook Political Report. January 9, 2019. https://www.cookpolitical.com/sites/default/files/2019-01/EC.pdf.
  27. In 2040, half the population will live in just eight states: “National Population Projections.” Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://demographics.coopercenter.org/national-population-projections.
  28. “Republicans are on the verge of a durable structural advantage”: Bouie, Jamelle. “The Senate Is as Much of a Problem as Trump.” New York Times. May 10, 2019, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/10/opinion/sunday/senate-democrats-trump.html.
  29. pay more in federal taxes than residents in twenty-two other states: “SOI Tax Stats Gross Collections by Type of Tax and State IRS Data Book Table 5.” IRS, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.irs.gov/statistics/soi-tax-stats-gross-collections-by-type-of-tax-and-state-irs-data-book-table-5.
  30. The history of Washington, D.C., is instructive: For a great political history of D.C., check out Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington D.C. by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood (20th edition, 2014).
  31. federal government revoked the city’s ability to govern itself: Masur, Kate. “Capital Injustice: Why the District of Columbia Still Lacks Voting Rights.” New York Times. March 28, 2011, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/29/opinion/29masur.html.
  32. John Dingell, the longest-serving member of Congress: Matthews, Dylan. “John Dingell: To Fix Congress, Abolish the Senate.” Vox. December 4, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/12/4/18125539/john-dingell-abolish-senate.
  33. One option for admitting new states is to split up existing states: Egelko, Bob. “Splitting up California: State Supreme Court Takes Initiative off Ballot.” San Francisco Chronicle. July 18, 2018. https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Splitting-up-Calif-State-Supreme-Court-takes-13085880.php.
  34. heavily tied up with the fight over maintaining segregationist power: Stebenne, David. “The Political Dealmaking That Finally Brought Hawaii Statehood.” Smithsonian. June 15, 2017. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-puerto-rico-learn-hawaii-180963690/.
  35. passed with an overwhelming 79 percent support: Hersher, Rebecca. “D.C. Votes Overwhelmingly to Become 51st State.” NPR. November 9, 2016. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/11/09/501412360/d-c-votes-overwhelmingly-to-become-51st-state.
  36. Yes, snowplows: McCartney, Robert. “Why Can’t D.C. Become a State? Opponents Cite Grave Snowplow Threat as One of Several Specious Objections.” Washington Post. September 14, 2014, sec. Local. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/critics-of-dc-statehood-cite-specious-objections-such-as-grave-snowplow-threat/2014/09/17/c258ff62-3e9a-11e4-b0ea-8141703bbf6f_story.html.
  37. gave the game away when he explained why he opposes D.C. statehood: Stein, Perry. “Kasich on D.C. Voting Rights: ‘That’s Just More Votes in the Democratic Party.’ ” Washington Post. April 21, 2016, sec. Local. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2016/04/21/kasich-on-d-c-voting-rights-thats-just-more-votes-in-the-democratic-party/.
  38. given its status as the country’s capital: R., Hewitt. 1993. “D.C. Statehood: Not Without a Constitutional Amendment.” Heritage Foundation. August 27, 1993. https://www.heritage.org/political-process/report/dc-statehood-not-without-constitutional-amendment.
  39. openly describing the idea of D.C. and Puerto Rican statehood: Nichols, John. “Mitch McConnell Calls Puerto Rican Statehood ‘Full-Bore Socialism.’ ” Nation. June 18, 2019. https://www.thenation.com/article/mitch-mcconnell-puerto-rico-full-bore-socialism/.
  40. The story of Nevada statehood is fascinating: “Nevada Statehood.” n.d. Online Nevada Encyclopedia. Nevada Humanities. Accessed July 25, 2019. http://www.onlinenevada.org/articles/nevada-statehood.
  41. Take the Pennsylvania House elections of 1794: “U.S. Congressional Election 14 October 1794.” Wilkes.edu, n.d. Accessed August 4, 2019. http://staffweb.wilkes.edu/harold.cox/rep/Congress%201794.pdf.
  42. academic research finds that it matters: Drutman, Lee. “To Fix Congress, Make It Bigger. Much Bigger.” Washington Monthly. December 2018. https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/november-december-2018/to-fix-congress-make-it-bigger-much-bigger/.
  43. most people don’t feel represented by either party: Drutman, Lee, William A. Galston, and Tod Lindberg. “Spoiler Alert: Why Americans’ Desires for a Third Party Are Unlikely to Come True.” Democracy Fund Voter Study Group. September 2018. https://www.voterstudygroup.org/publication/spoiler-alert.
  44. vast majority of Americans live in “safe” House districts: Fraga, Bernard L., and Eitan D. Hersh. “Are Americans Stuck in Uncompetitive Enclaves? An Appraisal of U.S. Electoral Competition.” Quarterly Journal of Political Science 13, no. 3 (August 2018): 291–311. https://doi.org/10.1561/100.00017161.
  45. the number of competitive House districts had declined: Wasserman, David, and Ally Flinn. “Introducing the 2017 Cook Political Report Partisan Voter Index.” Cook Political Report. April 7, 2017. https://cookpolitical.com/introducing-2017-cook-political-report-partisan-voter-index.
  46. fewer ten years ago than there were fifty years ago: Ferejohn, John A. “On the Decline of Competition in Congressional Elections*.” American Political Science Review 71, no. 1 (March 1977): 166–76. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055400259364.
  47. “more and more areas come, in essence, pre-gerrymandered”: Enten, Harry. “Ending Gerrymandering Won’t Fix What Ails America.” FiveThirtyEight (blog). January 26, 2018. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/ending-gerrymandering-wont-fix-what-ails-america/.
  48. One political scientist sums it up: Masket, Seth. “The Convenient Scapegoat of Gerrymandering.” Vox. March 29, 2017. https://www.vox.com/mischiefs-of-faction/2017/3/29/15109082/gerrymandering-convenient-scapegoat.
  49. Gerrymandering of state legislature districts: Willis, Jay. “Republican Gerrymandering Has Basically Destroyed Representative Democracy in Wisconsin.” GQ. December 5, 2018. https://www.gq.com/story/republican-gerrymandering-wisconsin.
  50. “There are dictators who win by less”: Enten, Harry. “Ending Gerrymandering Won’t Fix What Ails America.” FiveThirtyEight (blog). January 26, 2018. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/ending-gerrymandering-wont-fix-what-ails-america/.
  51. worried about the increase of “foreigners”: Conley, Dalton, and Jacqueline Stevens. “Build a Bigger House.” New York Times. January 23, 2011. https://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/24/opinion/24conley.html.
  52. “There is absolutely no reason, philosophy, or common sense”: Drutman, Lee. “To Fix Congress, Make It Bigger. Much Bigger.” Washington Monthly. December 2018. https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/november-december-2018/to-fix-congress-make-it-bigger-much-bigger/.
  53. If we were to expand the House: Editorial Board. “America Needs a Bigger House.” New York Times. November 9, 2018, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/09/opinion/expanded-house-representatives-size.html.
  54. Congressional Apportionment Amendment: Drutman, Lee. “To Fix Congress, Make It Bigger. Much Bigger.” Washington Monthly. December 2018. https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/november-december-2018/to-fix-congress-make-it-bigger-much-bigger/.
  55. As recently as the mid-twentieth century: Schaller, Thomas F. “Multi-Member Districts: Just a Thing of the Past?” Larry J. Sabato’s Crystal Ball. March 21, 2013. http://www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/multi-member-legislative-districts-just-a-thing-of-the-past/.
  56. Multimember districts are still used at the state level: “State Legislative Chambers That Use Multi-Member Districts.” Ballotpedia: The Encyclopedia of American Politics, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_chambers_that_use_multi-member_districts.
  57. “voters and candidates say they’re happier with it”: Editorial Board. “Vote for Me! For Second Place, at Least?” New York Times. June 9, 2018, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/09/opinion/ranked-choice-voting-maine-san-francisco.html.
  58. growing number of major American cities: “Ranked Choice Voting/Instant Runoff.” FairVote, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.fairvote.org/rcv#where_is_ranked_choice_voting_used.
  59. Manhattan has four overwhelmingly Democratic districts: This example comes from political scientist Lee Drutman, source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/19/opinion/gerrymandering-districts-multimember.html.
  60. he ended up winning the seat with second-choice votes: “November 2018 Elections.” FairVote, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.fairvote.org/november_2018_maine_elections.
  61. “no other reforms are likely to be effective without it”: Page, Benjamin I., and Martin Gilens. 2017. Democracy in America?: What Has Gone Wrong and What We Can Do About It. University of Chicago Press, 226.
  62. Opinion polls back up this knee-jerk reaction: “5. The Electoral College, Congress and Representation.” Pew Research Center. U.S. Politics & Policy (blog). April 26, 2018. https://www.people-press.org/2018/04/26/5-the-electoral-college-congress-and-representation/.
  63. “Whatever idealized deliberation and bonhomie”: Drutman, Lee. “To Fix Congress, Make It Bigger. Much Bigger.” Washington Monthly. December 2018. https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/november-december-2018/to-fix-congress-make-it-bigger-much-bigger/.
  64. more districts would mean more opportunity for gerrymandering: Thanks to Ian Milhiser at ThinkProgress for raising this point with us in conversation.
  65. groups behind improving the fairness of our political institutions: “The Fair Representation Act: Racial Minority Voting Rights FAQ.” FairVote, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://fairvote.app.box.com/s/6d11xwnf9ykavj8ib5201p9ne0kl4q0t.
  66. significantly lower proportion of representatives of color: Richie, Robert, and Steven Hill. “The Case for Proportional Representation.” Boston Review. March 1998. http://bostonreview.net/archives/BR23.1/richie.html.
  67. the most common voting system was proportional representation: “Electoral Systems Around the World.” FairVote, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.fairvote.org/research_electoralsystems_world.
  68. Supporters of these reforms include: “The Fair Representation Act.” FairVote, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.fairvote.org/fair_rep_in_congress.
  69. “one reform to save America”: Brooks, David. “ One Reform to Save America.” New York Times. May 31, 2018, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/31/opinion/voting-reform-partisanship-congress.html.
  70. “the only way a democracy can survive”: Editorial Board. “ A Congress for Every American.” New York Times. November 10, 2018, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/10/opinion/house-representatives-size-multi-member.html.
  71. so far as to label them a “quixotic fantasy”: Levitz, Eric. “America’s Political System Is Rigged Against the Left (and Always Has Been).” New York Magazine. Intelligencer. July 10, 2019. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/07/aoc-pelosi-feud-gerrymandering-why-cities-lose.html.
  72. Cruz dismissed the idea that the Court needed nine justices: Totenberg, Nina. “If Clinton Wins, Republicans Suggest Shrinking Size of Supreme Court.” NPR. November 3, 2016. https://www.npr.org/2016/11/03/500560120/senate-republicans-could-block-potential-clinton-supreme-court-nominees.
  73. In his first two years as president: Gramlich, John. “With Another Supreme Court Pick, Trump Is Leaving His Mark on Higher Federal Courts.” Pew Research Center (blog). July 16, 2018. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/07/16/with-another-supreme-court-pick-trump-is-leaving-his-mark-on-higher-federal-courts/.
  74. “Obama judges” and “Trump judges”: Durkin, Erin, and Ben Jacobs. “Trump Hits Back at John Roberts: ‘You Do Indeed Have Obama Judges’—as It Happened.” Guardian. November 21, 2018, sec. U.S. News. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2018/nov/21/us-politics-donald-trump-nancy-pelosi-democrats-republicans.
  75. “carry out elections, but the results will be preordained”: Millhiser, Ian. “Let’s Think About Court-Packing.” Democracy Journal. Winter 2019. https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/51/lets-think-about-court-packing-2/.
  76. commit to automatic expansions of the Court going forward: Tucker, Todd. “Off-Balance: Five Strategies for a Judiciary That Supports Democracy.” Roosevelt Institute (blog). November 13, 2018. https://rooseveltinstitute.org/off-balance-five-strategies-judiciary-supports-democracy/.
  77. Congress could also impose term limits for Supreme Court justices: This idea came to us from Brian Fallon, head of the national progressive court reform nonprofit Demand Justice, and Tyler Cooper, with another national nonprofit, Fix the Court. https://news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/insight-fixed-terms-for-supreme-court-justices-checks-constitutionality-boxes.
  78. senior status excluded Supreme Court justices: Stras, David R., and Ryan W. Scott. “Are Senior Judges Unconstitutional?” Cornell Law Review 92, no. 453 (2007): 70. http://cornelllawreview.org/files/2013/02/Stras_Scott_92-3.pdf.
  79. taken senior status and continue to issue opinions: Barnes, Robert. “Retired Supreme Court Justices Still Judge—and Get Judged.” Washington Post. March 10, 2013, sec. Politics. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/retired-supreme-court-justices-still-judge-and-get-judged/2013/03/10/1b22943c-897f-11e2-8d72-dc76641cb8d4_story.html.
  80. battle over the judiciary could become “a full-out war”: Millhiser, Ian. “Let’s Think About Court-Packing.” Democracy Journal. Winter 2019. https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/51/lets-think-about-court-packing-2/.
  81. 9 million of these people are lawful permanent residents: “Population Estimates: Lawful Permanent Resident Population in the United States: January 2015.” Homeland Security: Office of Immigration Statistics. May 2019, 6. https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/lpr_population_estimates_january_2015.pdf.
  82. majority of the roughly 11 million undocumented Americans: “Profile of the Unauthorized Population—US.” Migrationpolicy.org, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.migrationpolicy.org/data/unauthorized-immigrant-population/state/US.
  83. he wanted fewer immigrants from “shithole countries”: Kirby, Jen. “Trump Wants Fewer Immigrants from ‘Shithole Countries’ and More from Places like Norway.” Vox. January 11, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/1/11/16880750/trump-immigrants-shithole-countries-norway.
  84. Scotland and Austria have extended voting to sixteen-year-olds.: Dahlgaard, Jens Olav. “The Surprising Consequence of Lowering the Voting Age.” Washington Post. March 1, 2018, sec. Monkey Cage (Analysis). https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/02/28/the-surprising-consequence-of-lowering-the-voting-age/.
  85. 6 million American citizens are deprived of the right to vote: Uggen, Christopher, Ryan Larson, and Sarah Shannon. “6 Million Lost Voters: State-Level Estimates of Felony Disenfranchisement, 2016.” Sentencing Project. October 6, 2016. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/6-million-lost-voters-state-level-estimates-felony-disenfranchisement-2016/.
  86. In many other democracies: Lemon, Jason. “Can Prisoners Vote In Other Countries? Bernie Sanders Wants Felons to Cast Ballots While Incarcerated.” Newsweek. April 24, 2019. https://www.newsweek.com/which-countries-felons-vote-1405142.
  87. vary widely among the states: Chung, Jean. “Felony Disenfranchisement: A Primer.” Sentencing Project. June 27, 2019. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/felony-disenfranchisement-a-primer/.
  88. a legacy that stretches back to the era of slavery: For a powerful overview of the links between the nineteenth century slave state and today’s state of mass incarceration, check out Ava DuVernay’s 2016 documentary 13th.
  89. 20 percent of all potential Black voters in the country are disenfranchised: Chung, Jean. “Felony Disenfranchisement: A Primer.” Sentencing Project. June 27, 2019. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/felony-disenfranchisement-a-primer/.
  90. If this feels uncannily like the Three-Fifths Compromise: Rivers, Christina R. “ ‘Felon Power’: Prison Gerrymanders, the ⅗ Clause, and the Incarceration of Democracy.” SSRN Scholarly Paper ID 2675381. Rochester, NY: Social Science Research Network. https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=2675381.
  91. Reagan signed the single largest immigration reform law: Staff. “A Reagan Legacy: Amnesty for Illegal Immigrants.” NPR. July 4, 2010. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128303672.
  92. This could also have a “trickle-up” effect: Dahlgaard, Jens Olav. “Trickle-up Political Socialization: The Causal Effect on Turnout of Parenting a Newly Enfranchised Voter.” American Political Science Review 112, no. 3 (August 2018): 698–705. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055418000059.
  93. publicly embraced lowering the voting age: Kay, Jazmin. “Nancy Pelosi Proposes Lowering the Voting Age to 16 or 17.” Generation Progress (blog). August 6, 2015. https://genprogress.org/nancy-pelosi-proposes-lowering-the-voting-age-to-16-or-17/.
  94. Pelosi reiterated her support for the idea: Bowden, John. “Pelosi Says She Backs Lowering Voting Age to 16.” Hill. March 14, 2019. https://thehill.com/homenews/house/434115-pelosi-says-she-backs-lowering-voting-age-to-16.
  95. “skills necessary to make informed decisions are firmly in place”: Steinberg, Laurence. “Why We Should Lower the Voting Age to 16.” New York Times. March 2, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/02/opinion/sunday/voting-age-school-shootings.html.
  96. according to some studies, more knowledgeable: Hart, Daniel, and Robert Atkins. “American Sixteen- and Seventeen-Year-Olds Are Ready to Vote.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 633, no. 1 (2011): 201–22.
  97. their voting rates are far higher: Douglas, Joshua. 2017. “The Right to Vote Under Local Law.” SSRN Scholarly Paper ID 2816972. Rochester, NY: Social Science Research Network. https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=2816972.
  98. “I don’t think felons oughta be allowed to vote”: Perry, Mitch. “Tampa Attorney Argues Against Proposed Voter Restoration Amendment.” Florida Politics (blog). November 3, 2017. https://floridapolitics.com/archives/248704-tampa-attorney-argues-proposed-voter-restoration-amendment.
  99. legislature and governor gutted the initiative: Rozsa, Lori. “Florida Governor Signs Bill Making It Harder for Felons to Regain Voting Rights.” Washington Post. June 28, 2019, sec. Politics. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/florida-governor-signs-bill-making-it-harder-for-felons-to-regain-voting-rights/2019/06/28/5e446828-9a0b-11e9-916d-9c61607d8190_story.html.
  100. “could leave a dramatically diminished version of democracy in its wake”: Nichols, John, and Robert W. McChesney. “The Death and Life of Great American Newspapers.” Nation. March 18, 2009. https://www.thenation.com/article/death-and-life-great-american-newspapers/.
  101. got it from the three big networks: ABC, CBS, and NBC: Hindman, Douglas Blanks, and Kenneth Wiegand. 2008. “The Big Three’s Prime-Time Decline: A Technological and Social Context.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 52, no. 1 (2008): 119–35. https://doi.org/10.1080/08838150701820924.
  102. well-known and well-liked by broad swaths of Americans: Bowman, Karlyn. “The Decline of the Major Networks.” Forbes. July 27, 2009. https://www.forbes.com/2009/07/25/media-network-news-audience-opinions-columnists-walter-cronkite.html#af5c17147a5f.
  103. Newspaper circulation has declined literally every year: “Town by Town, Local Journalism Is Dying in Plain Sight.” CNBC. March 10, 2019. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/10/town-by-town-local-journalism-is-dying-in-plain-sight.html.
  104. nearly 47 percent of newspaper jobs disappeared: Grieco, Elizabeth. “U.S. Newsroom Employment Has Dropped a Quarter since 2008, with Greatest Decline at Newspapers.” Pew Research Center (blog). July 9, 2019. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/09/u-s-newsroom-employment-has-dropped-by-a-quarter-since-2008/.
  105. The economic model for local news has collapsed: Madrigal, Alexis C. “Local News Is Dying, and Americans Have No Idea.” Atlantic. March 26, 2019. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/03/local-news-is-dying-and-americans-have-no-idea/585772/.
  106. “local news deserts” across the country: “The Expanding News Desert: The Loss of Local News.” University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, School of Media and Journalism, Center for Innovation and Sustainability in Local Media. Expanding News Desert (blog), n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.usnewsdeserts.com/reports/expanding-news-desert/.
  107. nearly 80 percent of Democrats trust the media: “For Americans, Trusting the Media Has Become a Partisan Issue—Daily Chart.” 2019. Economist. April 3, 2019. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/04/03/for-americans-trusting-the-media-has-become-a-partisan-issue.
  108. a full-fledged propaganda operation: Mayer, Jane. “The Making of the Fox News White House.” New Yorker. March 4, 2019. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/03/11/the-making-of-the-fox-news-white-house?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&mbid=social_twitter&utm_brand=tny&utm_social-type=owned.
  109. drive the entire American electorate to the right: Arceneaux, Kevin, Martin Johnson, Rene Lindstadt, and Ryan Vander Wielen. “Fox News Pushes Democrats and Republicans to Be More Conservative, Especially around Election Time.” London School of Economics US Centre. United States Politics and Policy (blog). April 2, 2015. https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2015/04/02/fox-news-pushes-democrats-and-republicans-to-be-more-conservative-especially-around-election-time/.
  110. Fox News is responsible for a significant vote swing: Martin, Gregory J., and Ali Yurukoglu. “Bias in Cable News: Persuasion and Polarization.” American Economic Review 107, no. 9 (2017): 2565–99. https://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdf/10.1257/aer.20160812.
  111. non–news watchers were more informed than Fox News watchers: Rayfield, Jillian. “Study: Watching Fox News Actually Makes You Stupid.” Rolling Stone. May 24, 2012. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/study-watching-fox-news-actually-makes-you-stupid-235770/.
  112. reach about 40 percent of U.S. households: Chang, Alvin. “Sinclair’s Takeover of Local News, in One Striking Map.” Vox. April 6, 2018. https://www.vox.com/2018/4/6/17202824/sinclair-tribune-map.
  113. as much of a conservative bullhorn as Fox News.: For a good overview of Sinclair Broadcast Group’s reach and conservatism, take a look at the New Yorker long-form piece by Sheelah Kolhatkar, “The Growth of Sinclair’s Conservative Media Empire” (October 15, 2018): https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/10/22/the-growth-of-sinclairs-conservative-media-empire. Wil S. Hylton, though, identified the growing behemoth more than a decade ago in a long-form piece for GQ, “Not Necessarily the News” (December 2005): http://reprints.longform.org/not-necessarily-the-news-hylton.
  114. believes that “99.9 percent of the media is left of center”: Wofford, Ben. “Sinclair Broadcast Group Hostile Takeover.” Rolling Stone. April 24, 2018. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/sinclair-broadcastings-hostile-takeover-629299/.
  115. required to read the exact same script: Kolhatkar, Sheelah. “The Growth of Sinclair’s Conservative Media Empire.” New Yorker. October 15, 2018. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/10/22/the-growth-of-sinclairs-conservative-media-empire.
  116. Trump campaign struck a deal with the media giant: Dawsey, Josh, and Hadas Gold. “Kushner: We Struck Deal with Sinclair for Straighter Coverage.” Politico. December 16, 2016. https://politi.co/2IodmRi.
  117. “unfair that the FCC wouldn’t approve the Sinclair Broadcast merger”: Gold, Hadas. “Trump Slams His Own Administration’s Actions on Sinclair-Tribune Deal.” CNN Business. July 25, 2018. https://money.cnn.com/2018/07/25/media/trump-tweet-sinclair-tribune-fcc/index.html.
  118. “Net Neutrality is the First Amendment of the Internet”: Cyril, Malkia. “FCC’s Plan to Repeal Net Neutrality Will Silence Black Voices.” Root. November 22, 2017. https://www.theroot.com/fcc-s-plan-to-repeal-net-neutrality-will-silence-black-1820676304.
  119. driven dramatic surges—or collapses—in entire sectors of the media: Hazard Owen, Laura. “One Year in, Facebook’s Big Algorithm Change Has Spurred an Angry, Fox News-Dominated—and Very Engaged!—News Feed.” Nieman Lab (blog). March 15, 2019. https://www.niemanlab.org/2019/03/one-year-in-facebooks-big-algorithm-change-has-spurred-an-angry-fox-news-dominated-and-very-engaged-news-feed/.
  120. Facebook has instead divided us into warring camps: Karr, Timothy, and Craig Aaron. “Beyond Fixing Facebook: How the Multibillion-Dollar Business Behind Online Advertising Could Reinvent Public Media, Revitalize Journalism and Strengthen Democracy.” Free Press. February 2019. https://www.freepress.net/sites/default/files/2019-02/Beyond-Fixing-Facebook-Final_0.pdf.
  121. Facebook accepted ads from Putin-linked sources: Shane, Scott. “These Are the Ads Russia Bought on Facebook in 2016.” New York Times. November 1, 2017, sec. U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/01/us/politics/russia-2016-election-facebook.html.
  122. 70 percent of all web traffic on the Internet flows through: Cuthbertson, Anthony. “Who Controls the Internet? Facebook and Google Dominance Could Cause the ‘Death of the Web.’ ” Newsweek. November 2, 2017. https://www.newsweek.com/facebook-google-internet-traffic-net-neutrality-monopoly-699286.
  123. Facebook had just shy of $56 billion in revenue in 2018: “FB—Facebook Inc Financial Results.” CNN Business, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://money.cnn.com/quote/financials/financials.html?symb=FB.
  124. Google had about $137 billion: “Alphabet Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2018 Results.” Alphabet, Inc. February 4, 2019. https://abc.xyz/investor/static/pdf/2018Q4_alphabet_earnings_release.pdf.
  125. just behind California in terms of revenue: “2017 State Tax Revenue.” Federation of Tax Administrators, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.taxadmin.org/2017-state-tax-revenue.
  126. it has plans to expand even further: Fischer, Sara. “Sinclair Plots National Expansion.” Axios. April 23, 2019. https://www.axios.com/sinclair-plots-national-broadcasting-expansion-sports-news-514cdaa0-87a7-4ed0-9061-294d0f8b4b43.html.
  127. an early Facebook investor and mentor to founder: McNamee, Roger. “I Mentored Mark Zuckerberg. But I Can’t Stay Silent About What’s Happening.” Time. January 17, 2019. https://time.com/5505441/mark-zuckerberg-mentor-facebook-downfall/.
  128. “Mark’s power is unprecedented and un-American”: Hughes, Chris. “It’s Time to Break Up Facebook.” New York Times. May 14, 2019, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/09/opinion/sunday/chris-hughes-facebook-zuckerberg.html.
  129. the United States drastically underinvests in media: Coren, Michael J. “Americans Could Barely Buy a Coffee with What They Spend per Year on Public Media.” Quartz. September 9, 2018. https://qz.com/1383503/americans-could-barely-buy-a-coffee-with-what-they-spend-per-year-on-public-media/.
  130. proposes a big new “Public Interest Media Endowment”: Karr, Timothy, and Craig Aaron. “Beyond Fixing Facebook: How the Multibillion-Dollar Business Behind Online Advertising Could Reinvent Public Media, Revitalize Journalism and Strengthen Democracy.” Free Press. February 2019. https://www.freepress.net/sites/default/files/2019-02/Beyond-Fixing-Facebook-Final_0.pdf.
  131. which cost about $230 billion per year: Rogers, David. “Politico Analysis: At $2.3 Trillion Cost, Trump Tax Cuts Leave Big Gap.” Politico. February 28, 2018. https://www.politico.com/story/2018/02/28/tax-cuts-trump-gop-analysis-430781.
  132. Free Press recommends adding a small tax: Karr, Timothy, and Craig Aaron. “Beyond Fixing Facebook: How the Multibillion-Dollar Business Behind Online Advertising Could Reinvent Public Media, Revitalize Journalism and Strengthen Democracy.” Free Press. February 2019. https://www.freepress.net/sites/default/files/2019-02/Beyond-Fixing-Facebook-Final_0.pdf.
  133. to fund public media “sinful and tyrannical”: Gonzalez, Mike. “ ‘Is There Any Justification for Continuing to Ask Taxpayers to Fund NPR and PBS?’ ” Knight Foundation, n.d. Accessed July 25, 2019. https://www.knightfoundation.org/public-media-white-paper-2017-gonzalez.
  134. carefully guarded from government or from party control: Califano, Joseph, Jr. “How President Johnson Set the Stage for Passage of the Public Broadcasting Act.” Current. May 5, 2017. https://current.org/2017/05/how-president-johnson-set-the-stage-for-passage-of-the-public-broadcasting-act/.
  135. Americans trusted PBS and NPR news more than any other: “Perceived Accuracy and Bias in the News Media.” Gallup, Inc. & Knight Foundation. 2018. https://kf-site-production.s3.amazonaws.com/publications/pdfs/000/000/255/original/KnightFoundation_AccuracyandBias_Report_FINAL.pdf.
  136. Even GOP voters oppose cutting funding: “New National Survey Shows 73 Percent of Voters—Including Most Republicans—Oppose Eliminating Federal Funding for Public Television.” PBS. February 16, 2017. http://www.pbs.org/about/blogs/news/survey-shows-voters-oppose-eliminating-federal-funding.