“Wake up, America!” #BLM protests and other antiracist things to do…

Today’s Local Actions – Tues 8/11  – “This is how voting will work” Edition

VENTURA COUNTY VOTERS: Watch this well-researched video from our dedicated NON-PARTISAN League of Women Voter members, who explain how voting will work in our county for the Nov. 3rd election. Please share this with those who are anxious or suspicious of the process. (BTW – The League is an awesome group that anyone can support and/or join, even the non-women out there.) For those who prefer a written informational sheet about this year’s voting format, go here.

  • Be absolutely sure you are eligible to vote. CA election center here.
  • For the November 2020 election, due to Covid-19, ALL CALIFORNIA VOTERS will automatically receive a Vote-by-Mail ballot, whether requested or not, INSTEAD of a sample ballot and you will be able to track it!
  • Be sure you are counted. Be included on the 2020 Census online, by phone or by mail at 2020census.gov!
  • #BLM resources here.

Check out all our “Watch Party” videos here.

Events happening today! 

“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; It must be demanded by the oppressed.” ~ MLK

  • We’re putting up information on local protests and actions by others we’re finding from informal sources. These listings are not endorsements nor guarantees as to time/place/type of protest or participant safety. Events can and have already been cancelled without notice.
  • Protest safely in the time of pandemic and police overreaction: Go here for resources on camera apps, equipment, what to know if you’re stopped by police.

Tuesday – 8/11 – ONLINE – “The Inside Scoop with Salud Carbajal (5:15 pm)

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Facebook link here. You are invited to join Indivisible Santa Barbara in a virtual meeting with our Congressman Salud Carbajal on Tuesday, August 11 at 5:15pm. Mr. Carbajal will address issues such as Election Integrity and Fairness, Coronavirus in District 24, and his recent legislation to prevent the establishment of a denaturalization section within the DoJ.
You must REGISTER in advance for this event. Confirmation emails, with links and passcodes to join this virtual meeting, will be sent to approved registrants late afternoon on Monday, August 10th.

Mon 8/10: Comment to stop the administration from refusing asylum over COVID-19. Deadline tonight, 11:59pm EST.

Acting Director of the Department of Homeland Security Chad Wolf is unfolding another one of his horrid, xenophobic rules. While the world is shutting Americans out for being the most infected country in the world, this proposed rule would block asylum seekers from seeking protection in the U.S. under the pretext of the pandemic, based on reports of COVID where they came from, even if they’re uninfected, or have been living here for some time. The public health community has condemned the administrations repeated and false associations between immigrants and public health risk. Plus, Wolf’s official time expired before he signed this.

  • Comment here (Remember, it does not need to be long. But it needs to be in your own words.)
  • Read the rule here.
  • Read other comments here for inspiration only. Copied comments will be eliminated.

Information to use.

Continue reading “Mon 8/10: Comment to stop the administration from refusing asylum over COVID-19. Deadline tonight, 11:59pm EST.” →

Fri 8/7: Part 1 – The UN and Amnesty International are calling out the U.S. for violations of BLM protesters’ human rights. Call your legislators.

Action:  – Call your representatives!  “YES” on HR 7315! ” Protect our Protestors Act of 2020″

This is humiliating. Under Trump, “the shining city on the hill,” now merits 14 pages in the World Report on Human Rights Violations. (pages 602 to 616).

Amnesty International urges Congress to pass HR 7315 – the Protect our Protestors Act of 2020 and for all law enforcement agencies to revise their policies and practices for the policing of protests, and  comply with international human rights standards, including the UN Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials and the UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials, the guiding principles underpinning all operations before, during and after demonstrations. Continue reading “Fri 8/7: Part 1 – The UN and Amnesty International are calling out the U.S. for violations of BLM protesters’ human rights. Call your legislators.” →

Wed 8/5: Census: “It’s going to be impossible to complete the count in time. I’m very fearful we’re going to have a massive undercount.”

Quote from Census area manager in charge of local census offices.

Action #1: Ask your senators to extend the Census count!

The Census Bureau requested an extension of time to complete the count because of difficulties posed by the pandemic. In response, the Trump administration announced that they would prematurely end it instead, deliberately causing an undercount the population, in violation of the Constitution.

Continue reading “Wed 8/5: Census: “It’s going to be impossible to complete the count in time. I’m very fearful we’re going to have a massive undercount.”” →

Mon 8/3: COVID-19 is airborne and that changes everything! Thank your local essential workers & businesses for keeping you safe from anti-maskers.

(2) actions to help grocery employees below! 

Update:

Anti-maskers just had a workshop in Ventura County…

Despite reports that GOP voters are now paying attention to the newest COVID studies, Ventura County residents were dismayed to learn that there was a workshop this weekend at the Simi Valley “Republican Values Center” to instruct local anti-maskers on how to “firmly assert your right to enter public spaces, shop, and go about your business” and to use tools to “effectively counter opposition.” Although assuredly an improvement on the open warfare at the doors of supermarkets, these “tools” will undoubtedly spread misinformation, including outdated science, distortions of HIPAA, ADA laws, and the Constitution, entitled privilege and racism, strategies for deliberate deception and a misunderstanding of the nature of “freedom” itself. (Check out “Deeper Dive” below for discussion of anti-masker mythology.)

Why anti-maskers’ attitudes are so dangerous to those who are actually immunocompromised.

Continue reading “Mon 8/3: COVID-19 is airborne and that changes everything! Thank your local essential workers & businesses for keeping you safe from anti-maskers.” →

Wed. 7/29: The GOP wants to “strengthen” Social Security to death. “NO” to their duplicious “TRUST” Act & “YES” to the “Social Security 2100 Act.” 

Axioms in GOP politics:

  • If Trump accuses someone of something distasteful, it’s because he’s done it himself.
  • If the GOP creates a catchy acronym for a bill, it does the exact opposite.
  • Never let a national emergency go to waste. 

Vote “NO” on the “TRUST Act” and “Yes” on H.R.860/S.269 – “Social Security 2100 Act.” 

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell confirmed Thursday that he is using the pandemic as cover to shove Mitt Romney’s stale and duplicious TRUST Act into the proposed Republican coronavirus relief package. Continue reading “Wed. 7/29: The GOP wants to “strengthen” Social Security to death. “NO” to their duplicious “TRUST” Act & “YES” to the “Social Security 2100 Act.” “ →

Wed. 7/22: “Then they came for the Democrats.” 7 actions to fight back.

Paraphrase of Martin Niemöller

Who is keeping us “safe” from Trump?

Our president’s retweet of this now-deleted post – “Democrats are the true enemy of America,” was not a error of judgement, tweeting too quickly at 3:00 in the morning. It a statement of intent. He’s now openly targeting Democrat-led cities with federal law enforcement troops, including ones with no protest events. This is a constitutional crisis, being tested out as a re-election campaign.

The deployment of radicalized, abusive and untrained paramilitary forces against American protesters is just the beginning of Trump’s nationalistic free-for-all. The administration has been consulting with John Yoo, the former government lawyer who wrote the legal justification for waterboarding, on how the president could rule our country by decree, completely skipping over Congress and those pesky checks-and-balances. In a Fox News Sunday interview, Trump declared that the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on immigration allows him to issue decrees on healthcare, immigration and “various other plans” over the coming month. Yesterday morning, he issued a directive instructing the U.S. Census Bureau to not count undocumented immigrants for purposes of apportioning seats in the House of Representatives, targeting states like California, Texas and New York with large communities of residents who lack a legal immigration status. His earlier efforts to add a citizenship question to the census was thrown out of court.

The warning signs of the breakdown of our democracy are accelerating. Yale professor Jason Stanley, whose new book is titled “How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them.” states, “Are there fascist forces in America today that are ascendant and threatening our status as a democracy? Is Trumpism a fascist, social, and political movement? I think it is.”

Time to get to work.

Our democracy, and those persons who Trump considers to be his enemies, are now in serious trouble. 

What can we do now?

Continue reading “Wed. 7/22: “Then they came for the Democrats.” 7 actions to fight back.” →

Mon. 7/20: In honor of John Lewis. “Wake up, America, wake up! For we cannot stop, and we will not be patient.”

“We are one people; we are only family. And when we finally accept these truths, then we will be able to fulfill Dr. King’s dream to build a beloved community, a nation, and a world at peace with itself.” – John Lewis. Great photo essay her)

Action #1: Rename the Edmund Pettus Bridge after Rep. John Lewis.

Sign this petition to Governor Kay Ivey. Almost half a million have signed on by this morning.

“It’s far past time to rename the Edmund Pettus Bridge after Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights icon that nearly gave his life on that bridge,” said Michael Starr Hopkins. “Edmund Pettus was a bitter racist, (Confederate general and leader in the Alabama Ku Klux Klan), undeserving of the honor bestowed upon him. As we wipe away this country’s long stain of bigotry, we must also wipe away the names of men like Edmund Pettus.”

The Edmund Pettus Bridge, now a National Historic Landmark, was the site of the brutal Bloody Sunday beatings of civil rights marchers during the first march for voting rights. The televised attacks were seen all over the nation, prompting public support for the civil rights activists in Selma and for the voting rights campaign. After Bloody Sunday, protestors were granted the right to continue marching, and two more marches for voting rights followed.”

Action #2: Senate – Pass  H.R.4 – Voting Rights Advancement Act and rename it as the John Lewis Voting Rights Act!

Continue reading “Mon. 7/20: In honor of John Lewis. “Wake up, America, wake up! For we cannot stop, and we will not be patient.”” →

Tues. 7/14: Speak out against the Trump administration’s deadly new asylum proposal – deadline Wednesday – 7/15

Article regarding Salvadoran deaths here.

Write a comment against Trump’s proposed human rights violating asylum changes. Deadline 7/15 (Wednesday) 11:59 pm EST.

Over the last three years, the Trump administration has drastically altered the U.S. asylum system. From attempts to ban asylum seekers who entered the United States between Ports of Entry, to forcing more than 60,000 to wait in squalor in Mexico while their cases wind their way through backlogged immigration courts, gaining access to the U.S. asylum system has become fraught with challenges. Continue reading “Tues. 7/14: Speak out against the Trump administration’s deadly new asylum proposal – deadline Wednesday – 7/15” →

Mon – 6/22: “A justice system which tolerates injustice is doomed to collapse.” Get your friends and family to call their GOP senators to stop Cory Wilson!

Quote by Leonard Noisette, quoted in Reducing Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System (2000)

Action: Tell your senators that voting for Federalist Society judicial nominees is a racist action and to vote “NO” on Cory Wilson.

  • Q: Who is the other racist judge you’re referring to?
  • A: Justin Walker. He was just  confirmed last Thursday to the the second most powerful court in the country.

Continue reading “Mon – 6/22: “A justice system which tolerates injustice is doomed to collapse.” Get your friends and family to call their GOP senators to stop Cory Wilson!” →