EXCUSES FROM LISA MURKOWSKI

July 1, 11 AM

She posts on FB:

This was one of the hardest votes I have taken during my time in the Senate.

My goal throughout the reconciliation process has been to make a bad bill better for Alaska, and in many ways, we have done that. In addition to extending pro-growth tax cuts, a larger child tax credit, and no tax on tips or overtime, we made a historic investment and modernization of the Coast Guard; enhanced our border security and national defense; funded aviation safety, including AWOS/VWOS systems that will save lives; and provided tax-exempt status for the Community Development Quota Program to help western Alaska communities establish a sustainable economy, among other provisions.

We have advanced new opportunities for resource development in the NPR-A, the Coastal Plain, and Cook Inlet that will help us create jobs and increase the share of revenues our state receives. I also co-led the Senate effort to restore a slightly longer phase-out for wind and solar tax credits while deleting a punitive excise tax targeting them.

Those provisions will benefit our economy, but it is the people of Alaska that I worry about the most, especially when it comes to the potential loss of social safety net programs—Medicaid coverage and SNAP benefits—that our most vulnerable populations rely on.

To address the bill’s shortcomings, we have helped our communities through a $50 billion rural health fund. This will mean hundreds of millions of dollars for Alaska hospitals, community health centers, and other providers. We secured commitments from the CMS Administrator to continue to address longstanding priorities which will directly help Bartlett, Fairbanks Memorial, Central Peninsula, and other hospitals in Alaska.

In the SNAP program, we have added tribal exemptions for work requirements, delayed cost-share penalties to help Alaska get benefits to the people who need them, and included work requirement waivers that align with our Medicaid policies. We also secured commitments from the Secretary of Agriculture to provide additional flexibilities to Alaska for SNAP.

But, let’s not kid ourselves. This has been an awful process—a frantic rush to meet an artificial deadline that has tested every limit of this institution. While we have worked to improve the present bill for Alaska, it is not good enough for the rest of our nation—and we all know it.

My sincere hope is that this is not the final product. This bill needs more work across chambers and is not ready for the President’s desk. We need to work together to get this right. 

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1291561145665338&id=100044343943390&mibextid=wwXIfr&rdid=ad0hoGHTmkzVlh2I#

Parliamentarian Blocks 'Big, Ugly Bill' Public Lands Sale and Offshore Drilling Policies

 

While calling the public lands decision "an important victory," one campaigner also warned that "this threat is far from over."

Critics of Republican efforts to continue wrecking the planet celebrated some small victories after the U.S. Senate parliamentarian on Monday advised that multiple provisions cannot be passed as part of a megabill that only requires a simple majority.

Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough found that some GOP legislative proposals about offshore drilling and mandatory public land sales could not be included in the package due to the so-called Byrd Rule, which bars provisions considered "extraneous to the purpose of implementing budget resolution policies."

Specifically, MacDonough axed a provision that deems offshore oil and gas projects as automatically compliant with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), nullifying their environmental review processes. She also ruled against a proposal requiring offshore fossil fuel leases to be issued to successful bidders within 90 days after the sale, and a separate mandate for the sale of millions of acres of public land.

READ MORE:

Common Dreams

By Jessica Corbett
Jun 24, 2025

https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-public-lands 

Budget Bill gives a $7 trillion tax cut on the backs of the poor and does NOT cut deficit!

 

Write a letter to your congressman or a letter to the editor about the new budget bill!

And, as I suspected, the new budget bill slashes services to the poor while handing out a tax cut to the billionaires. The U.S. House Committee on Financial Services wrote this: "Not only will this bill hand billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg a massive $7 trillion tax cut, but it also slashes $880 billion in Medicaid and funding for food stamps. At a time when our nation is facing a worsening housing and climate crisis, this bill guts funding for affordable, climate-resilient housing."

The US House Committee also says it will "Drive U.S. Toward 2008-Style Recession"


And it says the bill will " These sweeping deregulatory measures defund the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which was created after the financial crisis of 2008 to protect working-class families from financial fraud and abuse and has saved consumers $21 billion since. It abolishes oversight bodies like the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, established to regulate auditors after two major accounting scandals and the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC), and Office of Financial Research (OFR), leaving millions of American families vulnerable to a financial crash."
https://democrats-financialservices.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=413304


Furthermore, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Government says that “The Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimated that the bill as written would increase deficits by $3.8 trillion through 2034, or 1.1 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP); if all of its expiring policies are extended permanently, we estimate it would add $5.3 trillion to deficits, or 1.5 percent of GDP.”
https://www.crfb.org/blogs/permanent-ways-means-bill-could-add-53-trillion-deficits


So, they have made very harmful cuts that will impact the poorest of Americans and asked us all to sacrifice but they are NOT reducing the deficit or the debt, but raising it, while giving tax cuts to billionaires. I feel that this is sinister, and that we should all object to this bill.


Crushing dissent. A quote from the ACLU (May 13th) regarding the new budget bill:

“In an apparent effort to aid President Trump’s discriminatory clamp down on free speech, Republicans on the House Ways & Means Committee have snuck a dangerous anti-dissent bill into their massive, new tax package.

“This provision, formerly known as H.R. 9495, would grant the executive branch the power to effectively shut down any non-profit organization — including news outlets, universities, and civil liberties groups — by accusing them of “supporting terrorism” and using that accusation to suspend their tax-exempt status without any real due process. It was defeated last year, yet extreme politicians are now trying to resurrect it once again.”

https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-urges-house-committee-to-remove-dangerous-anti-dissent-provision-from-tax-bill


Allowing the government to curb our free speech in this manner is a dangerous road to go down, and smacks of totalitarianism.

The No Rogue Rulings Act (H.R. 1526)

 

Letter from the NEA

VOTE NO on bill

to constrain courts

The No Rogue Rulings Act (H.R. 1526) would sharply limit the ability of federal district courts to impose nationwide injunctions.

Submitted on: April 1, 2025

• 
  
• 
  

U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Representative:

On behalf of our 3 million members and the 50 million students they serve, we urge you to VOTE NO on H.R. 1526, the No Rogue Rulings Act (NORRA). Votes on this issue may be included in NEA’s report card for the 119th Congress.

NORRA would sharply limit the ability of federal district courts to issue nationwide injunctions that halt, at least temporarily, unlawful and unconstitutional actions taken by the federal government while allowing litigation to proceed. When those actions could hurt people nationwide, courts must issue timely rulings to protect people nationwide. That is their job.

By its nature, NORRA threatens the checks and balances that are the cornerstone of our constitutional system. Limiting the ability of federal courts to identify and pause unconstitutional and unlawful actions with nationwide ramifications threatens our democracy and the rule of law itself.

The larger context in which NORRA is being introduced must be considered as well. In response to decisions with which they disagree, officials at the highest level of the Trump administration have attacked federal judges, railed against their authority, threatened impeachment, and openly defied court orders.

For all these reasons, we urge you to oppose NORRA.

Sincerely,

Marc Egan
Director of Government Relations
National Education Association

https://www.nea.org/advocating-for-change/action-center/letters-testimony/vote-no-bill-constrain-courts 

Bernie Sanders: Why Democrats Must Vote NO on the CR - URGENT

You need to email or call your senators!

The CR: What does it do? 

(From a speech given by Senator Bernie Sanders posted 3-13-25)

The CR (as it stands on 3-13-25) is making a lot of cuts to our services and laying the groundwork for a massive tax break to billionaires. It lowers the taxes of the richest 1% by over 1 Trillion dollars over the next decades. Richest 5% will see their taxes go down, but taxes will go up for the lowest 95% of Americans. Bernie Sanders says that the congress should vote "No" on the CR (continuing resolution that keeps the country going). He said that it gives a "green light" to all these cuts. The senate will probably vote on this on 3-14-25.

Senior Citizens/Social Security. They have fired thousands of workers at the Social Security Administration with plans to cut that staff in half. This Department is already understaffed. If they cut the staff in half then it may be a death sentence for thousands of seniors who need their benefits. Musk called Social Security a ponzi scheme. 

VA. Understaffed. They had 36,000 unfilled positions this year. They are short 2400 doctors, 6300 registered nurses, 1800 social workers, Trump and Musk are threatening to dismantle the VA by firing 83,000 employees. The CR cuts $20 billion in needed funding. 

Department of Education. They have fired half the staff of the Dept of Education and they will have a hard time administering the Title 1 program, and harder to administer the IDEA and to pay for the 180,000 teachers that they fund money for. The PELL grant application page has already crashed and is not working. 

Healthcare. 85 million Americans are uninsured, underinsured. Over 500,000 of our people go bankrupt paying medical bills.  60,000 people die in American each year because they can’t go to a doctor. And our life expectancy is 7 years shorter for low income people compared to wealthy Americans.  The CR cuts community health center funding by 3.2%, cuts national health service corp by over 5%,  cuts funds for teaching health centers by 13%. 

Housing Crisis. Over 20 million Americans spent more than 50% of their limited income on housing. The CR cuts rental assistance by $700,000,000, which could lead to more than 32,000 families being evicted from their homes. 

Climate Change. Trump thinks it is a hoax, but scientists say it is an existential threat. It doesn’t even specify funding levels for Climate Change and Environmental Justice. And JD Vance has said that if the Trump’s administration doesn't like anything in the CR, they’ll ignore it.

This CR is laying the ground work to give a big tax cut to billionaires, paid for by massive cuts to Medicaid, nutrition assistance, housing and education. 

https://www.youtube.com/live/Qb0Fh7o1Y6s?si=HQm_huAyojaYcxIx

_______________________________________________________________________

SAMPLE LETTER TO YOUR SENATOR:

[Your Name]
[Your Address]
[City, State, ZIP Code]
[Your Email]
[Your Phone Number]
[Date]

The Honorable [Senator’s Name]
[Senator’s Office Address]
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510

Subject: Urgent Request to Vote NO on the Continuing Resolution (CR) on 3/14/25

Dear Senator [Last Name],

I am writing to urge you to vote NO on the Continuing Resolution (CR) currently before the Senate, as it stands on March 13, 2025. This budget proposal is unacceptable in its current form because it prioritizes massive tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans while slashing vital services that millions of working- and middle-class citizens depend on.

The CR lays the foundation for over $1 trillion in tax cuts to the richest 1% over the next decade while simultaneously raising taxes on 95% of Americans. This is an outrageous redistribution of wealth that benefits billionaires at the expense of hardworking citizens. Even Senator Bernie Sanders has called this bill a “green light” for devastating budget cuts, and I strongly agree.

If passed, this resolution will result in significant cuts to:

• Senior Citizens & Social Security – Reduced cost-of-living adjustments and eligibility restrictions will hurt retirees who rely on these benefits. The Trump administration wants to cut the staff in half this year.

• Veterans Affairs (VA) – A proposed budget reduction will limit healthcare, mental health services, and housing assistance for veterans who have served our country. Trump and Musk are threatening to dismantle the VA by firing 83,000 employees. The CR cuts $20 billion in needed funding. 
  
  

• Department of Education – Deep cuts will force schools to operate with fewer resources, worsening teacher shortages and reducing access to quality education, especially in low-income communities. They have fired half the staff of the Dept of Education.

• Healthcare – Medicaid and Medicare will see drastic funding reductions, increasing costs for the elderly and low-income families while further limiting access to life-saving treatments. 85 million Americans are uninsured, underinsured. Over 500,000 of our people go bankrupt paying medical bills.  60,000 people die in American each year because they can’t go to a doctor.

• Housing Assistance – Affordable housing programs will face funding cuts, exacerbating the housing crisis and leaving thousands more Americans at risk of homelessness. Over 20 million Americans spent more than 50% of their limited income on housing. The CR cuts rental assistance by $700,000,000, which could lead to more than 32,000 families being evicted from their homes. 
  
  

• Climate Change Initiatives – Critical environmental protections and clean energy programs will be stripped, further endangering our planet’s future. Trump thinks it is a hoax, but scientists say it is an existential threat. The CR doesn’t even specify funding levels for Climate Change and Environmental Justice.

This budget is a direct attack on the majority of Americans while serving only the interests of the ultra-wealthy. I urge you to stand with the people who elected you and vote NO on the CR. Instead of passing a resolution that enriches billionaires while gutting social programs, Congress should be focusing on fair taxation, strengthening essential services, and protecting the most vulnerable in our society.

I appreciate your time and consideration and hope to see you take a stand against this disastrous proposal. Please do the right thing and vote NO on March 14th.

Sincerely,
[Your Name]
[Your Address]
[City, State, ZIP Code]

Congressional Recess, March 15-23. Musk or Us!

 

We are calling on every member of Congress to hold a town hall and we want you to show up.

Saying they don't like to be pushed and don't want to talk to constituents is not legitimate. 

--Check with your representatives and see if they are holding a town hall

--If they don't have a town hall yet, call their office and ask. 

--If they do have a town hall, go and take friends with you. Ask questions. Share highlights on social media.

--If you need to, hold an empty town hall by yourself. We call it "Missing Member Town Halls". Pass out fliers, invite the media, invite that member of congress. See if they show up.

This is tactical escalation.

Musk or Us Recess Explainer

From Indivisible

Ezra talks about everything you need to know for the upcoming congressional recess and how you can take action: https://indivisi.org/muskorus

Congress and senate will be on recess from March 15-23. Many have been told not to hold town halls (because so many voters showed up angry to the last recess.

https://youtu.be/vkkFY74BY2o?si=JSOieujy61sMrUKg