Get Money OUT of OUR Elections!

Potential initial actions:

  • Support Pennsylvania’s joining the National Popular Vote Compact, designed to do an end-run around the Electoral College.

  • Support Pennsylvania’s version of the Montana Plan, to prohibit corporations from spending money on politics in our state. March On Harrisburg is already working towards this goal.

  • Support legislation and/or lawsuits allowing open primaries in PA.

  • Support and promote public financing of political campaigns.

  • Support Mark Pinsley’s campaign. Mark stated he supports open primaries for PA.

  • Reach out to DSA for common projects.

  • Oust Steve Santarserio as BCDC chair?

  • No donations. Not ever. Not even from the candidates themselves. What do we do instead?

    1. Create a website governed by the FEC where all US Citizens can have a secure, verifiable account.

    2. Those who wish to run file the proper FEC forms and are given access to a Candidate’s Account, where they can upload photos, videos, state their positions, fill out an issues survey and interact with potential supporters via private message or public comment.

    3. A year before the election, the candidate’s pages are made available to the public, who are invited to compare the candidates and choose those they believe are worthy of a government funded grant. Supporters must live in the district to choose a House of Representatives candidate, in the state for a Senate candidate, and be a US citizen to choose a Presidential candidate.

    4. After a limited time period - perhaps a month - qualifying candidates would each receive the same amount, ensuring all candidates are on equal financial footing.

    5. There are NO private donations. These funds must last through primaries (which should be eliminated) on to election day. If a candidate runs out of money before the election, too bad. Learn to stay within budget BEFORE you get to Congress.

    6. All awarded grants would be subject to the same strict scrutiny by which campaign funds are currently regulated. If money is misspent, all federal laws apply. Unused funds go back to the FEC or Treasury Department.

    Under this grant system, candidates will have to run on the strength of their ideas and the quality of their character, not the size of their campaign’s bank account. Elected candidates will be directly accountable to the taxpayer BOTH financially and at the ballot box.

    We get this done, see how fast we get affordable healthcare, low-cost prescription meds, green energy initiatives, affordable child care, sensible gun laws and fair treatment for working class men and women and their families.

  • Billionaires and corporations should not be able to hide massive donations to organizations that seek to control our elections. Money does NOT equal free speech. If it did, then Elon Musk has A LOT more free speech than you. And corporations are NOT citizens. We allow them to exist to make our lives better. We don’t exist to increase their profit margins.

  • Severely limit donations to PACs that directly support or oppose candidates for office. They are free to talk about issues and advocate for causes and raise funds to do so. But if they endorse or denigrate candidates by name or image, then they are limited to no more than $100/year in donations from any individual or source.

  • We all saw Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and other incredibly rich donors to the $245 million inaugural fund, standing front and center at the event. Unlike campaigns, inaugurals are not subject to contribution limits. So for a relatively meager $1-2 million, individuals and corporations can buy favor with an incoming administration, and you know they expect a return on that investment.

    So no private donations to inaugural committees. If there are to be inaugural events, let it be paid for with taxpayers funds. That said, I would much rather skip the pomp and circumstance, have a small swearing in ceremony at the White House, and the President can deliver a brief speech or address the nation from the Oval Office, then get to work. Mark and Jeff and Sundar can watch on TV with the rest of us.

Election Reform: Fair Policies that Encourage Voting

Partisan gerrymandering dilutes the votes of citizens and helps extremists gain elected office. “It's a great idea to allow political parties or elected officials to draw congressional districts!” said no one ever. We need independent districting commissions in every state to counter partisan gerrymandering.

And it's time to end the electoral college. In presidential elections, the votes cast in our least populated states have up to 3.5 times the weight of votes cast in our most populous states. This is simply unfair and undemocratic. The original reasons for an electoral college, which include giving more electoral power to slave states, are no longer relevant. In 2000 and in 2016, the candidate who got the most votes did not win the election.

  • Politicians should NEVER be allowed to draw election maps. Federally-mandated independent commissions in each state should be tasked with creating fair and balanced districts. The goal should be reasonably balanced congressional districts, not maps designed to give advantage to one party over another.

  • The Electoral College disenfranchises millions of American voters. For example, Pennsylvania is a “winner take all” electoral state. So votes for the losing candidate are essentially wiped out in the final national electoral college tally.

    Plus, voters in so-called “safe” red or blue states are more likely to find excuse to stay home, figuring their one vote won’t make a difference in the final outcome. With a national popular vote, their votes would now always be meaningful.

    A national popular vote would also eliminate so-called battleground states (and thus maybe fewer political ads in Pennsylvania!). It would encourage candidates to visit states and areas they might have ignored in the past. It would also encourage focus on national issues such as healthcare, debt reduction and tax fairness instead of local issues in battleground states. Additionally, it would increase chances for third-party candidates who can focus on grass-roots campaigns across the country instead of spending money trying to win key battlegrounds.

  • Rather than allowing political parties to be gatekeepers that use endorsements and primaries to prevent outsider candidates from advancing to the general election while also shutting out Independents from being involved in the primary process, why not eliminate primaries altogether? And to ensure that so-called fringe candidates won’t act as spoilers who split the vote, allow voters to rank candidates in order of preference. The candidate who gets the highest combined ranking wins.

  • Mail-in ballots are great, but many people prefer voting in person. Rather than cramming all in-person voting into one day, forcing people to stand in line for hours, allow voters to participate according to their schedule, over a week.

Protect Our Democracy. Defend our Constitution.

People disappeared off our streets by masked thugs in tactical gear. Families torn apart. Journalists and public figures intimidated, sued or prosecuted simply for investigating or criticizing Donald Trump. Barriers to legal voting raised higher and higher. Public servants fired or removed for simply reporting factual data that conflicts with Donald Trump’s falsehoods. Federal troops sent to American cities for no reason other than to intimidate the local population.

Our country is becoming a repressive autocracy, well on its way to a police state where anyone can be locked up with no due process. A partisan Supreme Court and sycophantic Republican Congress is actively enabling this. And our own Congressman, Brian Fitzpatrick, is too fearful of Trump to honor his oath of office to defend our Constitution.

Fitz won’t fight for our American democracy. I will. We must restore and strengthen the guard rails of our democracy and republic.

  • As in done in 43 states, including Pennsylvania, the Attorney General of the United States should be an independent elected office which operates as part of the Judicial Branch of the Federal Government. It’s vital that this position is not under the control of the Presidency or Congress, subject to political influence or pressure. This is the people’s national attorney, not the President’s, and should be accountable only to to us.

  • Donald Trump must be impeached. Not just to protect our Constitution and democracy right now and because he’s committed many offenses which include:

    • Inciting the J6 Riot

    • Pardoning those same rioters

    • Sending federal troops into American cities under false pretense

    • Undermining due process

    • Undermining our election process

    He must be impeached to make clear to our citizens and the entire world that we do not tolerate such actions. Every time a President commits an act for which he should be impeached, then we MUST impeach. If we don’t, we set a precedent for future Presidents to do the same or worse.

    As a country and a people, we are better than Donald Trump. We need to set the bar much higher for our Presidents by holding him and others in his administration accountable for their actions.

Government Reform

  • The attack on our capital on January 6, 2021 was a dagger strike at our democracy. A sitting United States President actively undermined our Constitution and elections by lying about fraud and election rigging for nearly a year. After losing the election, he schemed to corrupt the process himself in order to stay in power.

    But Donald Trump was not impeached because he had enough Republican sycophants and party hacks in Congress to protect him. The best chance to impeach AND convict him was a week after J6. Even then, Brian Fitzpatrick would NOT vote for impeachment, in spite of calling J6 “Nothing short of a coup attempt” that the President actively incited.

    Then 43 Republicans in the Senate chose party over country and voted him not guilty during the trial, blocking the required ⅔ majority to convict. Every time we fail to impeach a President when justifiably charged, we set a precedent for future presidents to do similar or worse.

    So I propose the following:

    Impeachment trials should not be held in the Senate. After the House approves articles of impeachment, the Senate vote whether to advance it with a 60 vote majority (or perhaps a simple majority), not the current 67 vote super majority. 

    If advanced, the governors of the fifty states convenes to decide whether to convict, with the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court presiding. A simple majority vote would be required. That way the final decision would be from fellow chief executives, and allow all levels of our federal system to be heard from.

  • Personally, if elected I plan to serve no more than three terms. I’ve no ambition for a career in Congress.

    But there are those who serve decades. There is wisdom to be gained from new perspectives and voices who are actually living and working in the community rather than career politicians who become too accustomed to the trappings of office.

    So I propose a limit of five terms for members of the House (ten years total) and two terms for the Senate (twelve years). This will help ensure a “citizen’s mindset” in our Congress rather than a politician’s outlook.

Ensure Fair and Independent Reporting and Social Media.

Independent, objective news media is vital to any democracy. Allowing corporate control of news organizations and social media (where many get their news) ensures a biased flow of reporting and information. Government can control corporate-owned media by threatening corporate mergers and deals. Billionaire owners can bias the media they control to ensure election outcomes they prefer. There needs to be a government-funded not-for-profit news media agency and social media outlet(s) that are free from corporate ownership, government influence and bias-inducing algorithms.

  • Privately owned media can no longer be trusted. Corporations that control major networks are all too willing to influence the reporting and content to gain favor with government agencies that could influence their bottom line. Additionally, the pursuit of high ratings among network and cable news ensures sensationalized reporting to increase advertising and profits.

    PBS, NPR and other media, independent of private or government influence, should be expanded to compete with biased news sources.