,
11 tweets,
3 min read
Read on Twitter
1/ Moments ago at the CA Democratic Party state convention, I announced that I will not run for President of the United States in 2020. I gave the question a lot of consideration because I believe our next President must make Ending Poverty the governing agenda of our nation. 
2/ As I’ve traveled our country, I’ve been moved by the number of Americans — and single moms — who are hurting just like my mom hurt when she was raising me by herself and when, even though she worked as hard as a mom could work, we lost our home to foreclosure.
3/ Somewhere along the way, we gave up the question of poverty to the statisticians and their arbitrary poverty line. But when nearly 8 out of 10 Americans live paycheck to paycheck, the middle class is dead. We have a Poverty Crisis. Yet how rarely do you hear the word Poverty?
4/ Our politics and culture have come to obsess over who is running for which office. When campaigns are now constant backgrounds, when do we do the work of helping people in trouble and in need? Our fellow Americans are hurting, struggling, hungry and scared of the future.
5/ When I launched @CalEITC4Me in 2015, I said I wouldn’t be satisfied with anything less than #EndPoverty. While we haven’t yet reached that goal, we’ve made progress:
2 million working Californians are getting thousands of $ of cash back in #EITC they didn’t get 4 years ago.
2 million working Californians are getting thousands of $ of cash back in #EITC they didn’t get 4 years ago.
6/ I first became passionate about public service in 1992 when I studied a passage from Deuteronomy for my Bar Mitzvah. In this passage called Shoftim, we are called as follows:
“Justice, justice shall you pursue!”
Note that our call is to the PURSUIT. We must TRY.
“Justice, justice shall you pursue!”
Note that our call is to the PURSUIT. We must TRY.
7/ As an adult, I pray often on Dr. King’s “Unfulfilled Dreams” speech when he said:
“One of the great agonies of life is that we are constantly trying to finish that which is unfinishable. We are commanded to do that.”
From Deuteronomy to Dr. King, the message is: We Must Try!
“One of the great agonies of life is that we are constantly trying to finish that which is unfinishable. We are commanded to do that.”
From Deuteronomy to Dr. King, the message is: We Must Try!
8/ Dr. Seuss reminds us that “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.”
From Deuteronomy to Dr. King to Dr. Seuss, the message through the ages is that we must care with all our hearts to do everything we can to reach justice.
From Deuteronomy to Dr. King to Dr. Seuss, the message through the ages is that we must care with all our hearts to do everything we can to reach justice.
9/ For the 8 out of 10 Americans living paycheck to paycheck, please care a whole awful lot. For women and people of color who are hurt by structural prejudice, please care a whole awful lot. For Jews and Muslims who pray amidst a cloud of terror, please care a whole awful lot.
10/ For LGBTQIA Americans who aren’t allowed to live and love true to who they are, please care a whole awful lot. For a generation of Americans who are being crushed by $1 trillion of student debt, please care a whole awful lot.
11/ Thank you to everyone who cares a whole awful lot, who urged and encouraged me to run for President in 2020. Our work together has just begun. I will not settle for anything less than Ending Poverty.
Now, please join our community organizing at workingheroaction.org!
Now, please join our community organizing at workingheroaction.org!
