Heritage says it’s running a $24 million, 2-year voter suppression plan across 8 states.
They describe a "direct nexus" between passing state voting restrictions and blocking HR1/S1.
"If we don't win this, we lose our republic. Period."
.@Heritage director Jessica Anderson lays out details of their work:
- quietly drafting and astroturfing voter suppression bills
- lobbying GOP governors to pass voting restrictions rapidly
- "literally giving marching orders" to others on the right
Another Heritage official, Hans von Spakovsky, says he has been holding private briefings with top GOP state election officials for years. More recently they’ve included governors, AGs, lawmakers.
Secrecy is critical. "No leaks."
A Heritage director admits that they wouldn't be running a voter suppression strategy if Trump had managed to win.
"If maybe two, maybe three of these 8 states went a different way in November, we would be having a different conversation here today."
They discuss passing their first voter suppression law in Iowa earlier this year.
“We did it quickly and we did it quietly... Little fanfare. Honestly, nobody even noticed. My team looked at each other and we're like, 'It can't be that easy.'"
Heritage says it also helped draft Georgia’s voter suppression bills, with an eye toward avoiding a legal challenge from @marceelias.
They say they spent $1M dollars on an ad campaign on CNBC to try to tamp down the corporate backlash against the bill.
Heritage officials say that the “most important part” of their strategy in passing voting restrictions may be to re-motivate the conspiratorial Trump base to "return to the polls in 2022."
Finally, Heritage says that blocking the #ForthePeopleAct is critical.
They warn that it "voids every voter ID law in the country" & implements same-day and automatic voter registration.
They call the voting rights bill an "ever present problem."
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In the first two weeks of the Elon Musk presidency, the world’s richest man has attacked the federal government relentlessly.
Here’s what the billionaire has done in just 14 days. Thread 🧵
Musk and his cronies have forced their way into the Treasury Department, and his young, inexperienced loyalists are attempting to get into the system that manages payments for the entire government. crisesnotes.com/elon-musk-want…
The extent of Musk’s infiltration into the Treasury is not yet clear, but that’s part of the problem. Once fairly transparent, the activity systems that ought to be apolitical are suddenly unclear thanks to the billionaire’s underhanded advances.
Unprecedented wildfires are ripping through the Los Angeles area, and the state’s wildfire fighting force often includes incarcerated workers making as little as under $6 a day.
🧵
2) California has dozens of “fire camps” throughout the state for incarcerated people to fight wildfires.
They work in “hand crews” to dig trenches, clear vegetation, and perform other “dirty work” to help make putting out fires possible. smithsonianmag.com/history/the-hi…
3) Despite the fact that these workers can make up nearly a third of the force battling the state’s wildfires, they’re paid between $5.80 and $10.24 per *day*.
The number of inmates willing to do this work has plummeted from a peak of more than 4,000 in 2005, to less than 1,800 today, even as fires have gotten deadlier. latimes.com/california/sto…
President Biden has officially blocked the sale of U.S. Steel to Japanese giant Nippon Steel for $14.9 billion.
"Without domestic steel production and domestic steel workers, our nation is less strong and less secure," Biden said.
Despite extensive lobbying by Nippon, United Steelworkers opposed the deal over concerns including that Nippon would seek to renegotiate their existing contract, which expires in September 2026, and could pursue layoffs and plant closures. washingtonpost.com/business/2024/…
Biden first announced his opposition to the deal last March. In September, his admin told Nippon in a letter that that the sale would damage American steel production and pose a national security risk. reuters.com/markets/deals/…
The FTC is suing the biggest alcohol distributor in the country, and it matters a whole lot more than you think.
It could even change the price of your groceries.
Here’s why you should know about the Robinson-Patman Act. Thread.
The Robinson-Patman Act requires suppliers to offer the same prices and terms to all buyers. Passed in 1936 to protect small businesses, the law meant that big chains and corporations couldn’t get discounts that weren’t available to mom and pop shops. ilsr.org/articles/the-c…
But in the 1980s, the FTC simply stopped enforcing it.
Since 1982, the market share of independent retailers has fallen from 53 percent to 22 percent, according to the @ilsr.
The Lambeau Field vendors who provide endless beer for Green Bay Packers fans have approved a new union contract with huge raises — doubling pay for some workers. 🧵
More than 90 drink vendors work at Lambeau Field, employed by the corporation Delaware North. They unionized last year with the independent union @MASHworkers, which also represents workers at the home arena of the Milwaukee Bucks.
The FTC has also recently reached a settlement with Invitation Homes, the biggest owner of single family homes in the U.S.
The company is returning nearly $50 million to tenants after concealing the true price of rent and skimming security deposits. /3 substack.perfectunion.us/p/this-corpora…