THE CANDIDATES on the ISSUES on the BALLOT January 2020
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Policy Pack III.I THE CANDIDATES ON THE ISSUES ON THE BALLOT January 2020 PLATFORMWOMEN.ORG @PLATFORMWOMEN YEAR IN REVIEW Table of Contents Note from the Team 1 Meet The Candidates 2 Reparations 3 College Access 7 Healthcare 13 Disability 18 Indigenous Rights 24 Sexual Violence Prevention 31 Gun Violence Prevention 36 LGBTQ+ Equity 45 Reproductive Rights 52 Environmental Racism 57 Justice Reform 63 Workplace and Economic Opportunity 70 D.C. Statehood 77 THE CANDIDATES Note from the Team There have been remarkable leaps and bounds of young people reclaiming our government. We are voting in higher numbers and regularly taking to the streets to strike and to protest. Yet still far too many of us believe our votes do not matter. And we get it. We know that this belief is not rooted in apathy but rather from a very deep reality that inside city halls, state capitals, and the chambers of Congress, elected officials make decisions about our bodies, lives, and futures without listening to our voices. It is rooted in the reality that on the campaign trail, we are promised change that counts everybody in, but in session, we are dealt legislation that negotiates people out. We can change this. We have to change this. We do that through voting AND through the actions we take every day before, on, and after election day. It is the work we do before election day that ensures campaign promises reflect us and the future we are determined to create. It is the voting we do on election day that ensures we fill the seats of power with partners in progress. It is the lobbying, the protests and strikes, the die-ins and call outs we do every day after election day that turn campaign promises into legislation into the realities we live. Election day is not the end of the road, but the beginning of a new fight. A fight that becomes easier when elected officials share in our vision and use their position to amplify our voices in the movement for change. And we have the power to determine who holds those positions. A candidate’s victory hinges upon our decisions to show up and be heard. They don’t have a job without us and they cannot keep their job without leading for us. Your vote, or your ability to organize and mobilize voters, is therefore inherently powerful. With that, we present this Policy Pack. In the pages that follow you will see highlights of the candidates’ stances and plans regarding many of the policy issues critical to our community and captured in our Platform Pledge. We did our best not to editorialize and worked primarily to break down candidates’ official agenda items, as released by their teams. However, in some cases, we included external information when their website could not provide a clear answer (or any answer) or when we believed background information was essential in painting a deeper picture of their perspective. What we share is not the entirety of their platforms, and the amount of space allocated to each person roughly translates to the comprehensiveness of their plan, though not the full plan. Finally, where content is not cited it was taken directly from their campaign website in December of 2019. Primary election and caucus days are approaching. It’s almost time to decide who will not only fight back against the injustices of the current administration, but also chart a new path forward that counts us all in. Let’s build power together, The Platform Team 1 THE CANDIDATES MEET THE CANDIDATES Michael Bennet Current U.S. Senator for Colorado Joe Biden Former Vice President Michael Bloomberg Former NYC Mayor, Founder of Everytown Pete Buttigieg Former Mayor of South Bend, Indiana John Delaney Former U.S. Representative for MD-6 Tulsi Gabbard Current U.S. Representative for HI-2 Amy Klobuchar Current U.S. Senator for Minnesota Deval Patrick Former Governor of Massachusetts Bernie Sanders Current U.S. Senator for Vermont Tom Steyer Founder of NextGen America Elizabeth Warren Current U.S. Senator for Massachusetts Andrew Yang Founder of Venture for America 2 THE CANDIDATES REPARATIONS Reparations: “The making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged.” 1 H.R. 40/S.1083, H.R.40 Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African-Americans Act: On the first day of the 116th Congress, Representative Sheila Jackson Lee introduced this bill into the House. Senator Booker introduced its companion in the Senate in April of 2019. The bill was introduced to: “address the fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality, and inhumanity of slavery in the United States and the 13 American colonies between 1619 and 1865 and to establish a commission to study and consider a national apology and proposal for reparations for the institution of slavery, its subsequent de jure and de facto racial and economic discrimination against African-Americans, and the impact of these forces on living African-Americans, to make recommendations to the Congress on appropriate remedies, and for other purposes.” This legislation has become a benchmark of candidates’ commitment to addressing the legacy of slavery and present systems of inequality and oppression. 3 THE CANDIDATES REPARATIONS Cosponsors H.R. 40’s Senate Companion During an appearance on ABC’s The View, the Senator responded to a question about reparations by stating: “I've supported the bill to study reparations in the House, because I think there are distinct issues relating particularly to African American people in this country. There's a straight line that you can draw from slavery, through Jim Crow through the red lining and the banking and housing to mass incarceration today. And I think it's important as somebody who's been a school superintendent, it's important that we face those facts." Bennet 2 During the third Democratic Presidential Debate, the former Vice President was directly asked about the responsibility to repair the damage of slavery. His response: “We have — make sure that every single child does, in fact, have 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds go to school. School. Not daycare. School. We bring social workers in to homes and parents to help them deal with how to raise their children. It's not want they don't want to help. They don't—they don't know quite what to do. Play the radio, make sure the television—excuse me, make sure you have the record player on at night, the — make sure that kids hear words. A kid coming from a very poor school— a very poor background will hear 4 million words fewer spoken by the time they get there.” Previously, a campaign spokesperson said that the former Vice President "believes that we should gather the data necessary to have an informed conversation Biden about reparations, but he has not endorsed a specific bill." 3 As of January 1, 2020, Bloomberg had not yet released an official policy plan or statement regarding reparations. Bloomberg Stated Support of H.R. 40 During the sixth debate, the Mayor stated: “I support H.R. 40, which is the bill that has been proposed in Congress to establish a commission to look at reparations. But we shouldn't wait for that commission to do its work to do things that are reparative. Remember, we're not talking about a gift to anybody. We're talking about mending what was broken. We're talking about the generational theft of the wealth of generations of African-Americans. And just crossing out a racist policy and replacing it with a neutral one is not enough to deliver equality. Harms compound, just like a 1 dollar saved in its value compounds over time. So does the value of a dollars stolen. And that is why the United States must act immediately with investments in minority- owned businesses, with investments in health equity, with investments in HBCUs, and Buttigieg on the longer term look at reparations so that we can mend what has been broken.” 4 4 THE CANDIDATES REPARATIONS (cont'd) Stated Support of H.R. 40 In April, the former Representative attended Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network Convention where he said he would sign H.R. 40 if elected. Delaney 5 Cosponsors H.R. 40 Gabbard Cosponsors H.R. 40’s Senate Companion During an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press, the Senator responded to a question about reparations stating she supports investing in “those communities that have been so hurt by racism… it doesn’t have to be a direct pay for each person. "But what we can do is invest in those communities. Acknowledge what’s happened. ... Making sure we have that shared dream of opportunity for all Americans." Klobuchar 6 In November, the former Governor said that while he thinks reparations are “right” he does not think he supports H.R. 40. He later expanded: “Yes we need to deal with the chronic poverty and marginalization that has been true of an overwhelming number of our people that has its roots in slavery. But once the check is written, unless we have reconciliation, unless we have some truth telling about what actually happened, I’m just not sure we’re going to feel satisfied.” 7 Patrick Cosponsors H.R. 40’s Senate Companion When asked about his support of reparations in the form of cash payments during the Second Democratic Debate, he responded: “I am supportive of Jim Clyburn’s legislation, which is called 10-20-30. And what that understands is that, as a result of slavery and segregation and the institutional racism we see now in healthcare, in education, in financial services, we are going to have to focus big time on rebuilding distressed communities in America, including African-American communities.