Hillary Clinton's Labor Day Tweetstorm on Kavanaugh

Hillary Clinton has always stood up for labor. On this holiday, she tweeted energetically to clarify how damaging a Kavanaugh appointment would be to workers.

Happy Labor Day. There's no better time to talk about why workers’ rights would suffer if Brett Kavanaugh, whose hearings for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court start tomorrow, is confirmed.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

The Roberts Court has dealt some big blows to workers and unions in the last few years. With Kavanaugh on the Court, a 5-4 hard-right majority would be even more aggressive in siding with corporations over people.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

The Court's ruling in Janus v. AFSCME earlier this summer overturned a 40-year-old precedent to hold that public-sector workers with union contracts don't have to pay fees for collective bargaining expenses if they're not members.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

That ruling won't just hurt seven million public-sector union workers with contracts. It'll hurt all workers, because union deals on wages and working conditions affect what businesses without unions do, too.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

The Court has also recently granted corporations the right to deny workers reproductive health care and made it harder for workers to sue businesses by allowing companies to force employees to sign mandatory arbitration clauses with their contracts.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

In other words, the Court has already been widening the disparity in power between corporations and workers. Kavanaugh's record from his time as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia shows he'd help further that trend for a generation.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

In 2007, Kavanaugh wrote an opinion that severely limited union rights and allowed major damage to federal workers' ability to bargain collectively.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

In 2007, Kavanaugh wrote an opinion that severely limited union rights and allowed major damage to federal workers' ability to bargain collectively.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

In 2014, he dissented in a case where the Occupational Safety and Health Administration held SeaWorld accountable for the death of a trainer.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

In 2016, Kavanaugh held that corporations have the right to punish workers for displaying pro-union signs in their cars.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

Unions and labor movements are why we have workplace safety precautions, collective bargaining, weekends, minimum wages, and, yes, Labor Day.

We can't afford more damage to workers' rights. Make sure your senators hear from you: Let's #StopKavanaugh.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) September 3, 2018

Hillary Clinton's Op-Ed on Supreme Court Appointments

A make-or-break moment for Supreme Court appointments

By Hillary Clinton   January 08, 2016

There’s a lot at stake in this election. Nowhere is this clearer than in the US Supreme Court.

The court’s decisions have a profound impact on American families. In the past two decades alone, it effectively declared George W. Bush president, significantly weakened the Voting Rights Act, and opened the door to a flood of unaccountable money in our politics. It also made same-sex marriage legal nationwide, preserved the Affordable Care Act not once but twice, and ensured equal access to education for women.

Agree or disagree with them — and most of us have done both over the years — there’s no question that who sits on the court matters a great deal.

On Election Day, three of the current justices will be over 80 years old, which is past the court’s average retirement age. The next president could easily appoint more than one justice. That makes this a make-or-break moment — for the court and our country.

Read more >>>>

A nod here to George Lakoff, the czar of framing. When Republican say they want to "Take America back," they mean back in time.

Ready for Hillary: Petition Congress on Voting Rights

On the heels of Hillary Clinton's first domestic policy speech since leaving the Senate,  Ready for Hillary, the high-profile SuperPAC campaigning for her to run for president in 2016,  is circulating a petition demanding that Congress address recent changes to the Voting Rights Act by the Supreme Court.  Speaking to the American Bar Association yesterday having been awarded the prestigious ABA Medal,  the front-runner who has not said she is running exhorted that gathering to work at the local level to demand that Congress pass legislation to restore components of the act that SCOTUS struck down.   Ready for Hillary, in support of Hillary's first foray back into policy issues, sent the petition out in an email today.

Dear Still,

The Supreme Court recently struck down crucial provisions of the Voting Rights Act – opening the door to widespread voter disenfranchisement – and yesterday Hillary Clinton called for quick action to guarantee the right to vote for every citizen in this country.

Speaking before the American Bar Association, Hillary declared, “Anyone who says that racial discrimination is no longer a problem in American elections must not be paying attention.”

When it was first implemented, the Voting Rights Act was used to put a stop to poll taxes, literacy tests, grandfather clauses, and additional tactics that disenfranchised countless minority voters. Hillary noted, “The Department of Justice has used the law to block nearly 90 discriminatory changes to state and local election rules,” but “in the weeks since the ruling, we’ve seen an unseemly rush by previously covered jurisdictions to enact or enforce laws that will make it harder for millions of our fellow Americans to vote.”

We cannot allow this blatant voter suppression to continue. As Hillary said, “Congress should move quickly to pass legislation to replace those portions of the act that the court struck down.”

Join Hillary in demanding that Congress take action to protect the right to vote.

Yesterday, Hillary called for grassroots mobilization on this critical issue. She said, “Enforcing the Voting Rights Act has always depended on activists and advocates working at the grassroots level.”

This isn’t a Democratic or a Republican issue. Presidents of both parties have supported the Voting Rights Act. We need to ensure its protections live on.

Will you stand with Hillary and demand that Congress act to stop voter suppression?

Thanks,

Craig Smith
Senior Advisor

A Special Relationship

With Hillary on a brief vacation beginning last Wednesday in Bermuda, there has not been much to post here. These dry news times routinely generate memory photo albums on Hillary blogs, so here are a few cute ones. Here's Hillary with her good friend British Foreign Minister David Miliband back in March at the NATO conference.





With HBO famously making a movie called "A Special Relationship" about the bilateral friendship between President Bill Clinton and then British PM, Tony Blair, the relationship between Hillary and Miliband appeared from the outset to reaffirm the special alliance between the U.S. and the U.K. despite a rather bumpy start when the Obama team decided to redecorate the White House by returning a bust of Winston Churchill to the Brits. Things got bumpier still when current PM, Gordon Brown, et famille visited the new First Family. But Hillary came through to save the day forming a firm and, by all indications cordial friendship with Miliband...cordial, that is until this happened:

David Miliband calls Hillary Clinton to voice anger over Guantánamo inmates' transfer to Bermuda By Toby Harnden in Washington Published: 6:34PM BST 12 Jun 2009.

Ooohhhh, noes! Hillary! How could you! Actually, Hillary and David have met since then, and we have not seen frost on the friendship. We have to remember that this was not a decision made within the State Department and although Hillary was certainly consulted, the decision was not hers to make.

Now the choice of Bermuda as a vacation spot is interesting! The Clintons only had a few days there making a quick getaway in advance of Hurricane Bill (I know! You can't make this stuff up!) closing the airport (and we haven't heard a whisper since of where they might be). But Bill did play some golf on the course where the Uighurs are groundskeepers, and Hillary has a penchant for making statements just by her presence. Maybe they DIDN'T go there to celebrate the 30th anniversary of ...um... the beginning of Chelsea (or maybe they DID!), but if there was a second good reason for Bermuda, I can see a reflection of Hillary's decision to stay at the Taj Mahal in Mumbai in this choice. "It's fine! You can still vacation here. See?" She probably promised David she would gladly make this gesture despite:

Release of Abdel Basset Mohamed al-Megrahi, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, Washington, DC, August 20, 2009

When that statement was released, she was already in Bermuda.

Over the weekend, and in total Hillary-blackout, the rage over Al-Megrahi grew legs:

FBI boss Robert Mueller rips Scots who released Lockerbie bomber: "Comfort to terrorists" by Christina Boyle, DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER, Sunday, August 23rd 2009, 2:18 AM

So what is the take-away from all this? I think it's like when Scott Beckett hits Derek Jeter so next inning Andy Pettitte hits Big Papi - no harm meant just a little payback...and a compulsory warning.

One thing, though: You appoint and confirm Secretaries of State and Foreign Ministers to maintain diplomatic relations. Before any further moves of this kind are considered, the administrations would do well to consult and heed the advice of their top diplomats who seem to have a special enough relationship to get us past this bumpy patch.

Meanwhile, Quadaffi, the guy who gave Al-Megrahi the hero's welcome in Libya, is planning to pitch a tent here in New Jersey - not far from me! I told you, you can't make this stuff up! Stay tuned.