Dear friends,
I hate the feeling of helplessness, so we’re going to begin today with some action against Vladimir Putin.
Right-wing media outlets have been repeating Putin’s war propaganda. Bret Schafer, leader of the Alliance for Securing Democracy’s information manipulation team, has pointed out that it is difficult to assess the effect of folks like Tucker Carlson and Trump cronies Madison Cawthorn and Marjorie Taylor Greene, who promote the Kremlin’s lies.
Schafer notes, however, that
if the same narratives are being repeated by influential political figures and pundits on the most-watched news networks in Russia and the United States, those narratives are reaching a significant audience.
Given that many within those audiences have been primed to dismiss and distrust the ‘mainstream’ media and expertise writ large, there’s no amount of factchecking and objective reporting that is likely to change attitudes once certain falsehoods become adopted as facts.
There’s still time to change the false narrative. Razom for Ukraine has created a ready-made action to call on Fox News to remove Tucker Carlson from the airwaves. It takes less than a minute.
Contact Fox News to let them know that Tucker Carlson is a threat to national security.
The budget includes a $3 increase to the minimum wage for home care workers, rather than the 50% raise proposed in the Fair Pay for Home Care Act, which gained support from the majority of lawmakers in both houses. That would have brought the minimum wage for home care workers in New York City up to $22.50 per hour. Instead, the new measure brings it up to $18 per hour. The increase will cost $7.4 billion over four years.
But this smaller increase could force some home health aides to reduce their hours to remain on public benefits such as Medicaid, rather than increasing wages enough for people to get off of public benefits entirely, argued Ilana Berger, executive director of Hand In Hand: The Domestic Employers Network, one of the organizations that pushed for the Fair Pay for Home Care Act.
Let the governor know that we still need effective action on home care. This ready-made action will take 30 seconds.
I invite you to join Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ). When I was recruited to this organization last year, it was impressed upon me that FREJ is the main idea. In my work with JFREJ, it has seemed entirely true that the stuff I don’t believe in doesn’t matter as much as the stuff I do believe in.
I got involved because JFREJ organizers are integral to NY Caring Majority and they are the best organizers I’ve worked with. I believe that we will win Fair Pay for Home Care.
JFREJ isn’t just the largest grassroots Jewish organization in New York; [it’s] one of the most effective grassroots organizations in New York, period. [It is] a place to fight alongside a loving, passionate, multiracial and multigenerational community for a world that values care, not cops.
JFREJ is not just for New Yorkers, either. About one-quarter of its members live outside of NYS. Members in the JFREJ diaspora can have a say in shaping the organization’s transformative agenda.
Join JFREJ during the spring membership drive.
Mayor Adams marked his 100th day in office with a lot of grim news. Not only has the mayor who promised improved public safety contracted COVID, but shooting deaths and traffic fatalities in New York City have both surged in the months since he took office.
On Thursday, after those numbers were posted, a police van ran a red light and struck a man standing at the median near the intersection of Eastern Parkway and Schenectady Avenue in Brooklyn.
Cops said the investigation is ongoing, but declined to answer questions on the crash on Friday. Photos from the crash scene show a significant dent in the front of the van, a suggestion that it was traveling at high speed. A witness told the Daily News that the van ran a red light.
The man was killed by those who are meant to serve and protect. It’s clear that traffic enforcement is in the wrong hands and that investments in street infrastructure to safeguard cyclists and pedestrians are overdue.
Contact the mayor and the council’s Public Safety Committee head to demand police accountability, effective traffic enforcement, and investments in street infrastructure. These actions are ready-made and will take only a minute.
When I am feeling down, as I have been these last few days, I try to remember that taking action works, even if it doesn’t work as fast as I’d like.
The president has extended the pause on student loan payments, and that happened because people demanded it. Biden would prefer to sign legislation canceling student debt, rather than to take executive action, but the fact that the pause now ends before the midterm elections suggests that we have an opportunity to push the president on this issue.
Sign this new petition to demand student debt cancellation! This 15-second action is co-sponsored by a wide range of organizations.
When I need immediate results and want to feel better about the world, I buy up some medical debt and know that someone will get the joy of unexpected relief from the burden of crushing debt.
Buy some medical debt from RIP Medical Debt, make someone’s day, and feel better immediately!
with love,
L