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19 May, 14 tweets, 5 min read
Ok I know I tweet so much that, like monkeys w/typewriters, I'm bound to be prescient occasionally but: I will say this thread holds up pretty well 3 ys later
👇👇
[two years after that, & one year ago: another thread👇]
Meanwhile in Washington county, which has been shifting rapidly R, the anti-Wolf "Yes" vote on ballot Qs 1&2 is running about a point behind Trump's 2020 result. So far I'm not seeing a rural/rust anti-Dem backlash getting *worse* from the highs (lows?) it already hit in Nov 2020
👇More fodder for tea-leaf reading re PA's blue collar/pink collar "Middle Suburbs" here. This is not a Dems-went-back-to-brunch & the GOP-discovered-a-whole-new-Tea-Party-and-turned-it-up-to-11 result
People, weird things are happening in PA's small cities tonight. Not like, super radical left things. Just, incumbent/establishment Dem men being held accountable by getting voted out of office things 🧐
👆Harrisburg; Allentown 👇
👇Erie
👇👇👇👇👇 Beaver Falls, PA 👀
Likely you are saying to yourself, if only I had an backgrounder on the trajectory of local organizing in Beaver Falls PA (pop 9,000) to read. Friends: I got you. Starting here w/the state house campaign of Darcelle Sloppy in 2018, one of those downballot races that "lays tracks"
democracyjournal.org/magazine/57/ru…
Yesterday's municipal primary results suggest that the socio-organizational shifts I described last yr as remaking+rebuilding Democratic politics in rural+rust belt PA are going strong: even as the trends pushing these regions toward the GOP haven't waned democracyjournal.org/magazine/57/ru…
Woah: Adding to the new-accountability-for Dem-insiders thread: in hard-hit McKeesRocks, a 40 yr political career dogged by rumors of corruption has been disrupted by the election of a progressive community activist (who also beat out an anti-Wolf Republican seeking the Dem nod)
Another south Pgh incumbent defeated👀 Progressive schoolteacher JoAnna Taylor will be the new mayor of Mt Oliver, community hit hard by the opioid epidemic. Conflicts over Trump support among some Dem insiders in the area made headlines last yr @RyanDeto pghcitypaper.com/pittsburgh/doe…

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More from @lara_putnam

Lara Putnam Profile picture
19 May
The underlying piece here imho is a shift of political weight away from the unions that represent people who build hospitals, towards the unions that (seek to) represent people who labor in them
Health/service sector unions, w/their diverse member base & breadth of priorities that follow, are far better positioned to lead & benefit from coalitions w/the range of groups & actors newly mobilizing around racial disparities, police accountability, & more.
Also: this👇 Image
The developers-trades-professional/managerial class alliance that's been the modal version of Democratc urban power sharing for ~30 ys had few incentives to support political *or* workplace organizing that would empower low-wage workers. That's been costly
Read 4 tweets
Lara Putnam Profile picture
18 May
Local democracy alive and kicking in Pittsburgh this morning 🇺🇸❤️
Local press also alive and kicking in Pittsburgh! @CPotterPgh & co on the case
I appreciated this voter’s true deep cut in campaign swag
Read 4 tweets
Lara Putnam Profile picture
11 May
I haven't seen this previously: Greene County GOP is urging No vote on PA Ballot Question 3, claiming (inaccurately) that it seeks to give new rights to "illegal aliens". Is this framing being heard elsewhere in the state? facebook.com/GreeneCoGOP/
For more info on this ballot question see 👇 from @SpotlightPA . @sarahanne_news you wrote that you could not identify any opponents to adding anti-discrimination protections to the PA constitution... I think we just found some opponents for you?
👇 interesting...
Read 4 tweets
Lara Putnam Profile picture
10 May
Re-posting bc I just read yet another piece in whch a green-circle insider assures green-circle readers that the reason former Dems in purple circle don't vote for green-circle leaders is those pesky kids in the pink going on about trans rights & truly my head is going to explode
Like the twin decline of the Dem Party+labor movmnt as organizational presences in rural+rustbelt America; the Dem-side failure to compete as RW model honed in talk radio moved into natl then local news: these happened on someone's watch right? & those someones are older than 25?
The lack of meaningful bridges between green & purple—channels that would cultivate & amplify voices of party members from beyond cosmopolitan metros, & give Dems trusted interlocutors to do last-mile comms into a wider breadth of communities—is real & damaging.
Own that.
Read 9 tweets
Lara Putnam Profile picture
2 May
The Big Lie is still in place because the trusted communication infrastructure that supported & cemented the Big Lie is still in place. If your plans/advice to Dems re future elections aren't grappling w/this ongoing reality, *you're* the one living in a fantasy version of the US
Like this👇 should not be an evergreen tweet. yet here we are
As a Cardcarrying Historian™ I've been thinking a lot about what sources future historians will have to work with in reconstructing this moment: & am struck by how radically different your understanding of just what happened in 2020—& what people thought about—will be, depending
Read 15 tweets
Lara Putnam Profile picture
30 Apr
Today I learned that a new anti-racist civic group in an upscale suburb near me, that grew out of a local #BlackLivesMatter protest on June 11, 2020, at the height of George Floyd vigils & solidarity protests nationwide... Image
... & then carried energy into a campaign to change a derogatory park name over the summer... triblive.com/local/valley-n…
... not only continues to exist but is now hosted events like zoom forums, for community to meet & question local candidates in the upcoming primary. Huh!

I don't think anyone has a clear sense of how widespread this kind of civic consequence of the last spring's protest wave is Image
Read 5 tweets

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