Call Your Senators and Tell Them To Vote NO On Mitch McConnell’s Attempt to Reduce Debate Time For District Court Nominees to Two Hours, April 3 Edition

April 3, 2019April 2, 2019 otycd

Update April 3, 2019: The vote on this is still due to happen this week. Please continue to call your Senators to oppose McConnell’s motion, and please spread the word about this bullshit move by him and urge others to call their Senators, too.

This is going to be the OTYCD task until McConnell backs down or until this is a moot point. Also please stay on calling all three of your Congressional representatives to demand the release of the Mueller Report in full, unredacted form to them, and a version with the fewest possible cuts to us.

On the off-chance you didn’t hear about it, MoveOn will be holding a second No One Is Above the Law protest if Attorney General William Barr fails to deliver the Mueller Report by Congress’s April 2 deadline.

These protests will be held Thursday, April 4, at 5 pm.

Find the protest nearest you here:

https://act.moveon.org/event/mueller-firing-rapid-response-events/search/

Important: Don’t just go back to the same place you went for the November 2018 protests that MoveOn called for when Trump fired Attorney General Jeff Sessions and installed Matt Whitaker as acting AG.

Check the link above and make sure your nearest protest is happening at the same place. Not every group that participated in the November 2018 event is able to join this one. And there might be other groups hosting events nearer to you this time around.

Original text of this post follows.

Call your Senators and tell them to vote NO on Mitch McConnell’s attempt to reduce debate time for district court nominees to two hours.

OTYCD note: Please keep calling all three of your Congressional representatives and demand the release of the full, unfiltered-by-William-Barr-or-the-White-House Mueller Report. But this flared up on March 28, 2019 and requires urgent attention.

Since Trump entered the White House, Senator Mitch McConnell has been shoving through judicial nominees with the fervor of a contestant grabbing cash in one of those booths with paper money flying around in it.

He keeps throwing aside norms and tradition to greedily serve his borked goals. Each of these terrible far-right nominees will sit on the bench for life.

It is truly absurd how many he’s managed to cram through already. Something like one in 10 serving federal judges is a Trump appointee already.

We have warned you about this problem in the past and encouraged you to call to oppose the ongoing train wreck.

We’re already in a position of having to add many more judges to rebalance the judicial branch once the Dems gain power again.

Now McConnell wants to reduce the debate time on judicial nominees from 30 hours to two.

Yeah. You read that right. And it’s just as bullshit as you think it is.

McConnell wants to hold a vote on the rules change next week.

We at OTYCD are asking you to call NOW to urge your Senators to vote NO HELL NO.

We need to scream loud and long over this, until the GOP backs down or until the point is moot.

You should call whether or not your Senators are on the Judiciary Committee, but it’s extra-important for you to step up if they are. See the list of Senate Judiciary Committee members here:

https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/about/members

Celeste Pewter, who is always on top of everything, has your script:

After you call, please show your appreciation for Celeste Pewter in some fashion.

You can follow her on Twitter: @Celeste_Pewter

You can tweet about calling your MoCs, using the #ICalledMyReps hashtag.

You can follow @ICalledMyReps on Twitter.

And you can subscribe to her peerless newsletter, It’s Time to Fight:

http://itstimetofight.weebly.com

Subscribe to One Thing You Can Do by clicking the blue button on the upper right or checking the About & Subscribe page. And tell your friends about the blog!

Action Alerts · Community Activism · Marches and Protests · Stand Up for Civilization · Stand Up for Norms · Use Your Power, Recruit Friends

Attend the No One Is Above The Law Protest Near You Thursday November 8, 5 pm Your Time

November 8, 2018November 7, 2018 otycd

Attend the No One Is Above the Law protest near you, taking place Thursday, November 8, at 5 pm your time (local time).

So, we at OTYCD wrote about the if-then protest in the past, when MoveOn.org and friends started planning it.

We also urged you to visit the site and write down the details for your local No One Is Above the Law protest site in case a triggering event sends people stampeding toward the site from all over the Internet and the web page goes down.

Welp. On Wednesday November 7, with the midterm results not even a day old (and some still trickling in), Trump compelled Attorney General Jeff Sessions to resign and installed an Acting Attorney General, Matthew Whitaker, who had been Sessions’s chief of staff.

Read articles on the slo-mo modern spin on the Saturday Night Massacre here (and click these words if you need a refresher on the original Saturday Night Massacre):

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/attorney-general-jeff-sessions-resigns-at-trumps-request/2018/11/07/d1b7a214-e144-11e8-ab2c-b31dcd53ca6b_story.html?utm_term=.89b91e4aee90

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/with-the-midterms-over-mueller-faces-key-decisions-in-russia-investigation/2018/11/07/7ef2765a-e151-11e8-ab2c-b31dcd53ca6b_story.html?utm_term=.6490220bf6eb

You can question whether any of this is legal. You can question whether Trump can put Whitaker, who is not Senate-confirmed, into the Acting AG role. You can question whether Whitaker has to recuse himself, given that he is on record as opposing the Mueller investigation, and has made comments about muffling it by starving it of funds.

Rampant attack on our democracy? Yep. All that nonsensical fuckery was more than enough for the team behind the No One Is Above the Law if-then protest to pull the trigger on the event.

If you haven’t checked out the web page, please do so now, and find out where your nearest protest site is. Note the address down on paper. Google it and plot how you can get there and where you can park. As of November 7, 2018, the page reflected more than 900 events scheduled:

https://act.moveon.org/event/mueller-firing-rapid-response-events/search/

You’ll also notice that the organizers didn’t quite follow the standing plan. They chose to set it for 5 pm local time to give folks more time to prepare.

We’re now going to reproduce the bit from the page that appears after the logistics:

THEN WHAT?

Good question!

These events are only the first step. Our goal with these actions is to create an opportunity for anyone outraged by Trump’s abuse of power to engage immediately in voicing their concern. Together, we will communicate unmistakably that this is not okay and that this act to undermine democracy is not going to be allowed to become a new normal.

But that’s only the first step, and it’s far from the last one.

Congress is the only body with the constitutional power and responsibility to hold a president politically accountable for major violations of the public trust like this. And “we, the people” are their backstop and source of legitimate power.

And what people do next to force Congress to act is up to them!

Certainly, everyone at an event should also call their member of Congress to demand action. And everyone is encouraged to communicate that demand directly at congressional offices.

Beyond that, it’s up to you! It’s a good idea to discuss possible scenarios in advance with the hosts of your event or with your friends to develop other nonviolent ways you would like to compel actions from Congress.

Here’s what groups will be asking Congress to do:

CONGRESSIONAL ASKS

Demand members of Congress protect the special counsel’s office, including preserving its files and staff and ensuring it receives the full cooperation of all federal government law enforcement assets.
Demand the creation of a modern-day version of the Senate Select Watergate Committee to investigate all matters involved in the Russia scandals and Trump’s abuse of power and obstruction of justice.
Demand bipartisan hearings in the House Judiciary Committee on obstruction of justice and abuse of power.
- Some groups will call these the first steps to impeachment hearings; others will not.
- Impeaching Donald Trump is not a demand shared by all partner organizations. Nor is supporting impeachment a prerequisite to attend these events. But it is a view welcome at events, and you can definitely bring a poster calling for it if that’s your view. We can all be for the three things above if some of us are also for additional things, such as impeachment.

…So this might be a one-off, and it might not be.

Another suggestion from us at OTYCD: After you look up and note your own protest

location, look it up for friends and family who might approach you for help, or those

who you want to approach, in the spirit of making it as easy as possible for them to join.

You might want to go as far as giving them easy-to-follow driving directions and parking

tips.

If you can, offer a car-pool ride to other interested protesters. If you cannot or do not

want to go, but can offer child-care services, that definitely helps, too.

If you can’t go and can’t help others go, follow and boost these hashtags:

#NoOneIsAboveTheLaw

#TrumpIsNotAboveTheLaw

#whitakermustrecuse

It’s best not to go alone; the bigger these protests are, the better.

As you prepare for the protest, think about how you can honor those who want to be

there, but can’t.

During the course of the day, watch the Twitter feed of Celeste Pewter (@Celeste_Pewter).

She is prepping call scripts as we draft this blog post, and she’ll be on top of relevant

breaking news.

Also watch the feeds of Ben Wikler (@BenWikler) and Anna Galland (@annagalland),

both of MoveOn. They will have news about the nationwide protests and other things

you’ll want to know.

Sorry it’s come to this, folks. Sorry it comes so soon after the conclusion of the multi-

month saga that was the lead-up to the 2018 midterms, which took so much out of so

many of us.

We thought we could rest. Hell, most of us planned on taking at least one goddamn

day off. Wednesday. Joke’s on us. (Fuck that guy. Seriously, fuck that guy.)

But we gotta muster. We gotta. We gotta show up in big honking numbers, just like

we did on Tuesday.

Democracy needs us again. It’s just that kind of week. (If you’re not already keeping a

journal, now’s the time to start. Your kids, grandkids, nieblings, and grandnieblings will

want to know what this time was like, and they will want to know what you did to push

back.)

Subscribe to One Thing You Can Do by clicking the button on the upper right of the

page. And tell your friends about the blog!

Marches and Protests · Uncategorized

Note Where the Nearest Nobody Is Above the Law Rally Takes Place, NOW, Just In Case. If Trump Does Fire Mueller or Rosenstein, Etc., the Server Might Crash

October 21, 2018September 1, 2018 otycd

ThisOTYCD post originally appeared in May 2018. In the lead-up to the midterms, we’re re-running important posts. Please click on the announcement from Sarah Jane to learn why you’re not seeing timely daily posts.

Take a moment and note down the actual address and directions to the site where the Nobody Is Above the Law rally is happening closest to you. Just in case.

We hope it won’t be necessary to rally. But if Trump actually fires Special Counsel Robert Mueller, or Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, or does some other ridiculous thing to undermine the Trump-Russia investigation and thus cause a constitutional crisis, you’ll need to be ready to go to your nearest protest site.

As of late April 2018, more than 350,000 people have RSVPed. That’s good! But if Trump does the deed, there’ll be a lot more people than that who’ll be interested in going out to one of the 900-plus protests.

Think about it. That 350,000 number represents those who intend to protest and who are comfortable filling out a form and giving their info to MoveOn.org.

For every person who’s willing to do that, there are a bunch more who are only willing to do the first of those things.

And for every person who intends to protest but who doesn’t want to fill out a form or give their info to MoveOn.org, there’s a bunch more people who will realize they want to protest once the batsignal is hanging in the sky over their heads. (Metaphorically.)

If you’re a regular reader of OTYCD, you’ve probably become The One In Your Circle Who Knows About Politics. Your friends and family will expect you to know where the Mueller Firing Rapid Response protest is, and how to get there, and where they can park.

Do you?

At the very least you need to go to the Mueller Firing Rapid Response page, find your protest site, and write down the name of the spot and its street address.

Put it on paper. Put it in your phone. Email it to yourself. Heck, do all three.

Even better, take some time and teach yourself how to give good, precise directions to the site, and learn what the parking options are.

We’re saying this because if Trump does the deed–and remember, we know he’s threatened to do it at least twice and hasn’t carried through–it’s possible that the MoveOn.org site, which is hosting the Mueller Firing Rapid Response page, will be super-slammed in seconds, and it might go down due to the spike in traffic.

Be prepared. Plan ahead. Take down the protest site info and put it where you can get it easily.

Find your Mueller Firing Rapid Response protest site here:

https://act.moveon.org/event/mueller-firing-rapid-response-events/search/

While you’re at it, review The Plan–what would trigger the protests, and why:

https://act.moveon.org/survey/mueller-firing-rapid-response-plan/?

And you may as well review the FAQ page, too, and take notes:

https://act.moveon.org/survey/mueller-firing-rapid-response-faq/?

Subscribe to One Thing You Can Do by clicking the button on the upper right of the page. And tell your friends about the blog!

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How you can push back against Trump and Trumpism, day by day.

Tag: No One Is Above The Law

Call Your Senators and Tell Them To Vote NO On Mitch McConnell’s Attempt to Reduce Debate Time For District Court Nominees to Two Hours, April 3 Edition

Attend the No One Is Above The Law Protest Near You Thursday November 8, 5 pm Your Time

Note Where the Nearest Nobody Is Above the Law Rally Takes Place, NOW, Just In Case. If Trump Does Fire Mueller or Rosenstein, Etc., the Server Might Crash