Thread by @SunriseMvmtLA

THREAD: So...Newsom appointed @AlexPadilla4CA to be our next Senator.

We were part of a campaign pushing for a progressive appointment. Part of that campaign was sending prospective candidates questionnaires, and Padilla (well, a surrogate), filled his out

Here's what we got:

Padilla claims to support decisive climate policy such as #GND2030, banning fracking, ending development of the fossil fuel infrastructure, and direct emission regulation. Padilla views climate change as ‘an existential crisis’.

What did @AlexPadilla4CA say on voting rights? Priorities include: a constitutional amendment to overturn #CitizensUnited, reinstating the #VRA, banning photo ID laws as well as dramatically expanding early/vote by mail options.

This is where it starts to get less fun. Our new Senator claims to believe housing is a human right, but he didn’t explicitly sign on to the Homes Guarantee and doesn’t support mass rent cancellation. 🙃🙃

That being said, he does support a national moratorium on evictions during COVID-19 (bare minimum but sure) #CancelRent

@AlexPadilla4CA is not super far off most Congressional Dems on immigration issues. He wants to create a path to citizenship and a less militarized border, however doesn’t believe in Abolishing ICE or dismantling our carceral immigration system. #abolishICE

Same vibe on criminal justice issues. We’re getting a lot of talk around ending mass incarceration and large scale police demilitarization. While encouraging, it's just not anywhere close to enough.

@AlexPadilla4CA does not support abolition or even #DefundThePolice . You can’t reform a system that is working exactly as it's meant to. We need to dramatically reimagine public safety and community wellbeing. 🔥🔥🔥

Well here is a surprise. Sen. Padilla supports Medicare for All, universal childcare/pre-K and taking on Big Pharma. In the CA State Senate, Padilla killed #M4All so we are keeping a close eye on him here. 👀

sfgate.com/politics/artic…

He also wants to eliminate all student loan debt and supports tuition free college except for more affluent students (so close, @AlexPadilla4CA . You are almost there)

If education is a human right, then it has to be free of charge to every single person. #CancelStudentLoans

We hope that @AlexPadilla4CA follows through on his promises to support a $15 minimum wage, stronger labor organizing protections and (of course) taxing the rich 💵💵💵

This is a great article by @GrimKim on some strong steps Washington can take: teenvogue.com/story/unions-j…

Last but not least, foreign policy: tbh his answer seem like the nice language we’ve heard before from our leaders right before they keep terrorizing the world. So, we’re not holding our breaths BUT he does seem to want to move away from forever wars and an end to the #AUMF.

We don’t know how he hopes to accomplish this while supporting drone strikes, and opposing divesting from the military. But again, we’ll see. 👀👀

In conclusion, Padilla was not the most qualified, the most progressive, or the most centrist of the considerations. He was the closest to Gov. Newsom, and maybe that’s really what it came down to.

We’re skeptical, but we’re not hopeless. @AlexPadilla4CA , you have two years to prove that you’re the progressive champion we didn’t know you could be.
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In the meantime...we’ll hold ‘Khanna 2022’ in our back pockets.