Welcome to The Gov Hub Newsletter by Girl and the Gov®. This weekly pop of politics is designed to share action items, resources, and quick links to civic engagement tools and topics to inboxes far and wide. Typos included free of charge. PS this edition is a long one. Make sure to hit see all at the bottom of the email to get all the deats.

Was this email forwarded to you? Subscribe here.

THE ACTION ITEMS

Jump right in

ACTION 1:

The Ask: Tell the Texas House of Reps to Impeach Governor Abbott.

The Action: Sign this petition from United We Dream Action Fund.

The Background: In his nine years as Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott has continuously failed communities by putting his political stunts and thirst for power above the well-being of people. And Just this month, horrific details were revealed about the inhumane treatment of migrants at the border in Texas. Floating blades have been placed in the Rio Grande River that will seriously hurt migrants, and it’s been confirmed that at least 26 families have been separated since July 10th while attempting to seek asylum. This should not be happening, and it is entirely unacceptable. Human beings should be treated with dignity and respect, but as long as Greg Abbott continues to be in power, his complete disregard for human rights will continue. The man has got to goooo. Leave all of the impeachin’ to Trump? We think not.

ACTION 2:

The Ask: Show your support and tell your [federal] reps to pass the FABRIC Act to create fair wage protections for garment workers in the US and develop accountability, transparency, and growth across the US garment manufacturing sector.

The Action: Sign this petition and then call your [federal] reps to tell them to pass the FABRIC Act.

The Background: According to our friends at Remake, garment workers experience the second-highest rates of wage theft of any group of workers, with some earning as little as $2.68 an hour. How with a federal minimum wage is that possible? Good ol’ loopholes and worker exploitation, with factories able to use the piece rate system. The system of pay doesn’t pay by the hour but instead per garment sewn. The soon to be reintroduced FABRIC Act [ETA: September] would nix this loophole, creating an hourly wage requirement for garment workers, as well as a nationwide industry registry designed to keep bad actors in the space accountable. The act also looks to grow the industry in the US by:

• Enforcing minimum wage standards and eliminating wage theft in US garment factories.

• Creating a $40 million domestic garment manufacturing grant program aimed at revitalizing the industry.

• Increasing accountability on brands and retailers to combat workplace violations.

• Increasing transparency with a federal garment factory registry.

• Incentivizing reshoring with tax credits.

ACTION 3:

The Ask: Tell Congress to pass the DISCLOSE Act and the Honest Ads Act to create transparency in political advertising.

The Action: Send your [federal rep] this pre-written digital note.

The Background: Who’s your sugar daddy mega donor? That’s the question we have for so many politicians and organizations. But we’re left in the dark – shoutout Citizens United and some seriously suss billionaires and millionaires. However just because one door closes, doesn’t mean another one doesn’t open, like the door to passing legislation that would create more transparency in political campaign funding. Cue, the DISCLOSE Act and the Honest Ads Act, two such possible pieces of legislation that could make a big dif if passed.

ACTION 4: Brought to you by the Senate Majority PAC

The Ask: Show support for Democratic Senate Candidates that will fight for climate-forward policy like the Inflation Reduction Act.

The Action: Sign this petition via the Senate Majority PAC.

The Background: House Republicans passed H.R. 2811, a proposal slashing clean energy incentives while expediting oil and gas projects. The bill is unlikely to pass the Senate – because Democrats control it. But it serves as a reminder of what Republicans will do if they retake the Senate next year. Please take 15 seconds to add your name to a petition supporting Democratic senators and Senate candidates who are focused on making climate resiliency a policy priority!

Looking for more action items? Check our library of past Gov Hub’s.

FULL SEND…TO A FRIEND

Just about guaranteed to make it to the group chat

• A college sophomore is rightfully trolling the shit out of a DC councilman who sent him a DM threatening to ‘smack the shit out of him.’ The convo is going a lil’ like this – funny with a side of vote this man out.

• This Senator lost a bet with his kid and went full ultimate dad mode with this selfie as a result.

• In more selfie-related news, these Hill interns took selfies with all 100 senators, and it’s genuinely the most wholesome bipartisan thing that we’ve seen in an eternity.

• Averie Bishop put a spotlight on a few campaign jump scares. And we put a spotlight on a sleuth of campaign text jump scares. Safe to say politics still needs a rebrand, which you can make happen with this tool.

• The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act is the coolest, most popular new kid in town, and it provides workplace protections to pregnant employees such as these.

• Google has created a scam sandwich and is profiting from deceptive, suss-af, crisis pregnancy centers.

• The viral ‘tan mom’ and reality show star, Patricia Krencil has filed paperwork to run for one of Florida’s Senate seats as a Republican. Full tea here.

• It’s almost like Christmas in July with this call for volunteers to the White House live and taking applications ahead of a September 7, 2023 deadline. The White House is looking to continue its tradition of bringing in volunteer holiday decorators, open house volunteers, and performers to create holiday cheer and you can apply. If you’re 18+, grab your best Santa suit and check out the app deats here.

BOOKMARK IT

Don’t lose the link you love; bookmark it

ADA.GOV: Where do you report violations of the ADA? And where do you do it? Ada.gov is the answer to question one and the answer to question two is the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division. If you believe that you or someone else was discriminated against based on a disability, ada.gov’s File a Complaint tab is the home base for how to file a complaint and where to do it, with three available options – online, traditional mail, or fax. The website is also home to resources and details on ADA laws and regulations. Bookmark it.

TREE FOLIO NYC: Upper East Siders – all New Yorkers, do you know how much shade trees on your block provide? Tree Folio NYC will tell you. The resource is a result of a study conducted by Cornell and was made using info from the tree census. Yes, a tree census is a real thing. The interactive tree map shows how much shade is thrown off by various trees, as well as what the tree canopy looks like across areas. Bookmark it.

GET IN, WE’RE GOING SHOPPING

Add-to-cart must-haves for you and the whole crew

• This curated closet of working in politics OOTD options, as well as all the necessary accessories was hand-picked by the GATG gals and will have new shoppable options added each week.

• For our fellow ‘love amazing food but aren’t into cooking’ friends or just those that want to save time, THISTLE has got you covered with plant-forward meals and juices delivered to your door. Try it out and save $100 off your first four weeks.

• Adding a little fun and flair to the walls of your office is made all the more possible with these prints from Ash + Chess.

WAIT, WAIT UPDATE ME

ICYMI, droppin deats, ‘dates, and stories you might’ve missed

RIKERS X FEDERAL RECEIVERSHIP: Moves and motions are being made by Federal Judge Laura Taylor Swain to get the ball rolling and the stage set for a federal receivership for Rikers. After damning reports revealing more deaths tied to the facility, a continuous onslaught of horror stories and mismanagement by this man, DOC Commissioner Louis Molina, Judge Swain began to hear arguments for and against a federal takeover of the city’s jail system in crisis. The legal process or more formally, the schedule of legal briefs will continue over the course of the next few months and according to reporting from Spectrum NY will look like this: “All sides will continue to confer and submit a joint statement by Sept. 11; if they’ve reached no resolution, the judge will allow a motion for contempt and application for receivership by Nov. 17. The city will then file its opposition by Jan. 16, and plaintiffs will reply by Feb. 15, meaning a final decision on receivership would come no sooner than six months from now.”

TRUMP’S GEORGIA INDICTMENTS: This man is collecting indictments like early Millennials in the late 90’s collected beanie babies – by the bucket full. Early last week that man of ______ [fill in the blank with your fave adj], was hit with his fourth indictment that included not just him but 18+ of his closest cronies and crew, such as former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and flat broke Rudy Giuliani. Specifically, they were indicted in Georgia over their unified efforts to overturn Trump’s 2020 election L in the peach state. The prosecutors are using the infamous RICO law, which stands for ‘Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations’ and has been used to go after mobsters/mafiosa/organized crime groups since the ‘70s. In this particular case, the prosecutors are arguing that this crew was a part of a ‘criminal enterprise’ aimed at keeping Trump in the Oval Office. For Trump himself, he’s looking at least 13 charges against him that target his many schemes, including an effort to create fake Electoral College documents, corruptly solicit senior Justice Department officials, making false statements to state leg’s, and more. The golden goose of it all, is if the Georgia charges land, because of Georgia state law, even if Trump is re-elected president, he cannot pardon himself. While we wait for the trials [literally] and tribulations to play out, an investigation is underway for the online threats toward the grands jurors in the case whose addresses were leaked online, as well as the harassment toward Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis [who is prosecuting Trump]. All eyes will be on August 25, the date aka deadline that the defendants have until to voluntarily surrender.

BIDEN X MAUI UPDATES: The Biden’s will be in Maui today [the 21st] to talk with survivors of the deadly fires that have devastated the island. While there, the two will also tour the damage and meet with a combo of local and state officials, and first responders. A part of the day’s agenda is the official announcement of Bob Fenton being tapped as the regional leader at FEMA to be the chief federal response coordinator for the Maui fires, which is a role responsible for long-term recovery efforts in Lahaina and the island. As of the time of this writing, the fires are 85% controlled and survivors are being encouraged to register for assistance via the DOD and FEMA → access to registration can be made here.

HURRICANE + EARTHQUAKE HIT SOCAL: For the first time in 84 years, a tropical cyclone aka a hurricane, hit SoCal, bringing flash floods and loads of rain. What hit the region varied, with some experiencing this and others more something along these lines. In the midst, an earthquake in the 5.1 magnitude range decided it was having FOMO and jumped into action with an earth shakedown. The storm continues to make moves, with some school districts canceling classes today, as well as others declaring local emergencies or state of emergencies. And since this tropical cyclone was Hilary with one L, cue the Duff.

MORE KEY STORIES TO HAVE ON YOUR RADAR THIS WK & BEYOND:

• The Hill: US military at pivotal moment for biodefense, review warns

• Politico: New district lines will scramble key New York House races

• Roll Call: Judge to hear arguments over Texas buoy barriers on Rio Grande

• Texas Tribune: Ken Paxton’s team said there was no evidence to support impeachment. The House published nearly 4,000 pages.

2024 → BALLOT MEASURE BONANZA

Get these bbs on the ballot

NEBRASKA X ABORTION: Goods new bears with this one – a coalition of pro-abortion rights orgs in Nebraska have come together to create a political campaign committee dubbed ‘Protect Our Rights.” The goal is to put abortion on the ballot in 2024, although what the exact parameters will be is still up for debate. Will it be written to protect the right to abortion as-large or will it be a more narrow approach geared toward reinstating the prior 20-week ban in the state? That’s totally TBD. What’s more set in stone is the process for getting whatever the resulting lang is on the ballot in NE. First and once petition lang is submitted to the Nebraska Secretary of State’s office, it has to be approved. If it’s given the go-ahead, then signatures must be collected – specifically that of 10% of the state’s registered voters [approx 123K rn]. AND to make us non-math people’s heads spin, the signatures have to be collected from 5% of registered voters across 38 of the state’s 93 counties. So, there’s a lot to be done and a lot to be seen.

OHIO X FAIR MAPS: For how much maps come up in the world of politics, you’d think we’d all have degrees in cartography, but we digress to a possible ballot measure taking shape in Ohio over congressional and state legislative maps. In the state that just hell no to an edit on ballot measures, pro-democracy groups have begun collecting signatures for a state constitutional amendment. The amendment would change the way that the maps are drawn, allowing a bipartisan and citizen-led redistricting commission to draw the lines of the congressional and state leg maps. The magical ‘why’ behind the BM is that the current redistricting commission in charge of producing the maps has made a habit of passing maps gerrymandered to the high heavens. And this shouldn’t be much of a surprise because the current commission’s members are either electeds like the literal governor or people that have been appointed by electeds. Republicans also outnumber Dems on the commission, so unfortunately, need we say more? On the positive end of this, is that should the amendment make it to the ballot, and then voted into effect, the commission created would be made up of 15 non-elected humans with an even split amongst Dems, Republicans, and Independents.

BACK ON OUR BILLSH*T

New bill, new BILLsh*t

FEDERAL: Backlog begone is what this bipartisan bill has in mind for its legacy. The Visa Processing Improvement Act intro’d by Senator Klobuchar [MN-D] and Senator Moran [KS-R] is designed to reduce ongoing delays that have created visa interview timelines in the 2+ year zone. The delays can be attributed to an array of factors, but the result is negative for businesses, universities, and so on. The bill’s solution is to require the State Department to set goals for interview wait times, and to allocate resources to embassies and consulates that aren’t meeting these goals. The legislation would also allow the State Department to waive IRL interviews and go the Zoom route for pre-vetted and “low risk” applications, as explained here.

…and for a bill that made it across the finish line:

ILLINOIS: This bill may ~influence~ other states to take a similar action, which is to create compensation guidelines and requirements for parent influencers who include their children under the age of 18 in their content. The newly minted state law amends Illinois’s Child Labor Law to do a few things. First and according to CNN, it allows children over the age of 18 to “take legal action against their parents if they were feat. in monetized social media videos and not properly compensated.” In addition, parents in Illinois will be required to put aside 50% of earnings per content piece into a blocked trust fund for the child. That will be based on the amount of time the child was featured in the video - was it the whole thing? 10 seconds out of 60? The fine print of that is that this concept only applies when the child has appeared in 30% of the so-called vlogs made and posted by the parent across a 12-month period. The law takes inspo from a California state law on child actors called Jackie Coogan’s Law. The convo on privacy, monetizing one’s kids, social media content that lives on forever, momagers, and more continues with this bill in hand.

CANDIDATE WATCH ‘24

The following have said put me in coach for….

• NEW JERSEY: Former State Department official Jason Blazakis has put his hat in the ring for a seat in Congress – specifically the NJ seat currently held by the GOP’s Rep. Tom Kean Jr. Learn more about his campaign here.

CANDIDATE WATCH ‘23

Yes, there are elections in 2023 and they are v important

• CONNECTICUT: Sarah Hague has announced that she’s running for Canton Board of Selectmen. Learn more about her campaign here.

• SOUTHOLD, LONG ISLAND: This nook in the North Fork has ‘23 local elections with an array of candidates and positions on the ballot. Check ‘em out the roster here.

Subscribe while you scroll, sign up for The Gov Hub Newsletter here if you’re not already on the list.

THE ICK LIST

The rotten eggs of politics [& sometimes culture]

FIFA PRESIDENT, GIANNI INFANTINO: We didn’t know auditions for leading misogynist were still open, but FIFA President, Gianni Infantino made his audition tape public AF. In a presser this week, Infantino said “women should pick the right battles to convince us men what we have to do on equal pay.” Last time we checked, women’s sports are breaking viewership records from soccer [ya know that sport that involves FIFA] to basketball and beyond. Oh, and the economic horizon for women’s sports? Yea, it’s raining men – dollar dollar bills y’all – something you can stay on top of via The GIST Sports Biz, a progressive newsletter focused on the business of women’s sports.

SAMUEL MIELE: We would’ve loved to see Kevin McCarthy’s face when he found out that George Santos’ campaign aide was impersonating one of his [McCarthy’s] aides to raise funds. The shock and awe must’ve worn off however because we Kev hasn’t exiled Santos, but alas we still would’ve loved to have seen it go down. Moving to the rn of the sitch, Sam Miele, the Santos aide that impersonated a MCarthy aide has been indicted for wire fraud and identity theft. Despite pleading not guilty, in an email, Miele openly admitted to Santos that he was faking his identity for campaign cash – guess that guy’s never watched a true crime doc?

MICHAEL FLYNN: The man with a 22 day tenure in Trump’s White House, Christian Nationalist, and anti-semite retired Lt. General Michael Flynn gave a speech claiming the Jews were responsible for their own deportations via the Nazi’s. He made claims that weren’t guards and that Jews could’ve simply said “no.” This is not the first time he’s made anti-semitic or Holocaust comparison and/or denial commentary, but this time it reached a Twitter audience of over 8 million people. Great.

SENATOR TUBERVILLE [AGAIN]: What’s he done now? Well it’s more about what he hasn’t been doing, which is living in the state he is supposed to represent – Alabama. Rumors turned paper trail that the Senator is actually a Florida resident have been swirling and have since caught the investigative eyes at the Washington Post. And all arrows point to the guy pulling a Dr. Oz with this run-through.

NEW ON THE POD

New week, new guest

What is disability justice and how is it achieved? And, what’s the difference between disability justice and disability rights? Wait – and another Q, what about the ADA? What does that do? And what policies and legislation do we need to build upon the ADA legacy? These questions are just a few of the many asked and answered by our guest Mia Ives-Rublee who serves as the Director of the Disability Justice Initiative at Center for American Progress. In this episode, Mia, who is also the founder of the Women’s March Disability Caucus walks us through the groundwork of this issue area, setting up the infrastructure needed for further deep dives on disability justice and the work that needs to be done. And to that point, we get into what’s on the horizon currently and how people can get involved, which you can learn more about by tuning in via Apple Podcasts, Spotify Podcasts, and YouTube:

Listens for the commute, the HGW, the wknd roadtrip, the workday, and everything else in between → a playlist of pods to download and tune into.

ALL THINGS GIRL AND THE GOV®

THE GOV CLUB: Focused on political networking and community amongst civically engaged besties, The Gov Club provides members access to free virtual networking events, 1v1s, and connections with one another. The Gov Club has also made moves from its old Slack channel home to the Geneva platform to make connecting with one another easy as pie. Sign up for the Gov Club, here.

#VIRAL, THE NEWSLETTER: Skip the meeting, make it an email – subscribe to Girl and the Gov®’s paid newsletter, #VIRAL, dedicated to providing the 411 on the social media trends, tricks and tips, and how-to’s for politicos is hitting inboxes with a splash, weekly. A sample of the newsletter, which we dub ‘social media consulting to your inbox,’ can be viewed here, and interested humans can subscribe here.

PODCAST AUDITS: Girl and the Gov®’s Podcast Audit service provides a comprehensive review of the client’s existing show with the goal of identifying areas of improvement. This is for clients with existing podcasts at any stage that wants to bring their show to the next level. Start the process with a Discovery Call.

SOCIAL MEDIA AUDITS: Think it’s time for a social media audit? Girl and the Gov® can help with that. Get up to speed on what needs to stay, and what needs to go on your social media accounts for it to go from zero to hero. Book a Discovery Call to learn more about what an audit can do for your accounts.

Other *things* of note on the comms front:

For pitches, PR, partnerships, collaborations, and more, send all details to [email protected].