vox--2020-08-19--Reviving DACA to reforming DHS: 5 immigration issues Biden could confront as president

Vox answers your biggest questions about the 2020 presidential election , which could be one of the most consequential of our lifetimes .
If Joe Biden wins in November , advocates who have spent the last four years suing President Donald Trump over his immigration policy are ready to hold the Democratic nominee accountable for his campaign promises .
Biden is positioning himself as former President Barack Obama ’ s natural successor , including on immigration policy .
But he has sworn he won ’ t merely revert to the Obama-era status quo if elected .
“ I was very @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he acknowledges we can ’ t go back to what it was , ” the former vice president said in June , pledging to send an immigration reform bill to Congress on day one of his presidency .
“ We have to go back and build back better .
And so I have a program that is significantly different and builds upon where we left off and tries to undo the damage Trump has done.
” Immigration isn ’ t the only policy area in which Biden has made big progressive promises .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ change , presidents have broad legal authority over immigration policy — as Trump has demonstrated by singlehandedly and fundamentally reshaping the immigration system during his first term , typically through executive action .
Merely undoing these changes will be a tall order if Biden claims victory in November .
Advocates want to know how Biden plans to reign in the agencies tasked with immigration enforcement , which have become vessels of Trump ’ s nativist policies , and what he would do would respond if he faces a surge of migration at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the political calculus on immigration , which is no longer one of voters ’ top priorities .
In an era of mass unemployment , it might be difficult for Biden to advocate for policies vastly expanding immigration , as his immigration plan promises , when Americans fear they will be passed over for job opportunities , even though research shows that immigrants have essentially no effect on the unemployment rate .
But there are policy changes that Biden could undertake unilaterally and immediately upon assuming office : He could reverse some of Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the travel ban and his pandemic-related restrictions on legal immigration , and begin the immense task of reforming the immigration agencies by installing new leadership and revising their enforcement priorities .
Here are the top immigration priorities Biden would be under pressure to address during his first days in office : Trump has primarily pursued his agenda via executive fiat , meaning that Biden could easily reverse at least some policies as soon as he assumes office .
The presumptive Democratic nominee has already vowed to immediately end , among other policies , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 13 countries that his administration deems to be security threats ; his practice of separating families in immigration detention ; and restrictions on asylum including the Migrant Protection Protocols , under which Trump has sent tens of thousands of migrants back to Mexico to wait for their court hearings in the US .
Biden has also suggested that he would roll back the restrictions Trump recently imposed on foreign workers and immigrants applying for green cards .
He has not yet said whether he would rescind Trump ’ s pandemic-related policies at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ asylum seekers to Mexico , nor the president ’ s recent memorandum excluding unauthorized immigrants from 2020 census population counts that will be used to draw new congressional districts in 2021 .
( The Biden campaign didn ’ t immediately respond to a request for comment . )
Other Trump-era regulations may be more difficult to roll back .
That includes Trump ’ s so-called public charge rule , which imposes a wealth test on immigrants applying to enter the US , extend their visa , or convert their temporary immigration status into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one of Trump ’ s harshest blows to legal immigration yet and has had the effect of deterring immigrants from seeking out much-needed public services amid the pandemic .
But Biden can ’ t afford to rush through the process of repealing the complex , 217-page rule ; he will likely have to use executive action to initially limit the effect of the rule before formally repealing it or else risk losing challenges in the courts , David Bier , a policy analyst for the libertarian Cato Institute , said .
“ A @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the courts , ” he said .
“ As much as the immigrant advocacy community has used the courts to their advantage , the opposite will be the case [ under a Biden administration ] .
Especially with many Trump judges on the courts , it will be hard to find a favorable ear.
” 2 ) Reform the immigration agencies and install new leadership Unlike more progressive candidates in the primaries , Biden has said that he would reform the existing federal immigration agencies — the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Customs and Border Protection ( CBP ) , US Immigration and Customs Enforcement ( ICE ) and US Citizenship and Immigration Services ( USCIS ) — rather than defunding them or dismantling them and building something new in their place .
That will be a difficult task given just how fundamentally Trump has altered these agencies to do his bidding on immigration .
Leadership crises have plagued the DHS , which has been without a Senate-confirmed secretary since April 2019 , and a government watchdog recently finding that the appointments of two top @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the middle of a budget crisis of Trump ’ s making that could hamstring its ability to process immigration applications , has changed its mission statement to make clear that it no longer deigned to serve immigrants , but rather the American people .
Since Trump took office , there have been growing reports of abuses in ICE detention , including sexual assault , inadequate medical care , and retaliatory use of solitary confinement .
CBP officers in military-style gear have been used to quash protests in Portland and to aid ICE @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sanctuary cities .
There have also been shifts at other agencies that preside over immigration issues : Trump ’ s US Attorneys General have increasingly sought to politicize immigration court proceedings .
And there has been a mass exodus of career officials at agencies including the State Department , which oversees consulates that process visas worldwide and refugee resettlement .
Reversing these trends in the executive branch will not happen overnight .
But it needs to be a priority , Rep. Joaquin Castro , the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus ( CHC @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the number one thing that he ’ s got to do right away is to appoint a cabinet secretary at DHS , the head of the Border Patrol , the head of USCIS and the head of ICE , ” he said .
“ He ’ s got to appoint true reformers who are willing to clean house.
” But on top of that , Carlos Guevara , associate director for immigration initiatives at the advocacy group UnidosUS , said that Biden also needs to review the next layer of political appointees , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ policy shop or the general counsel ’ s office .
“ Those decisions will make a big difference , ” he said .
Biden has proposed some ways that he would try to change the culture at the immigration agencies .
He would focus on deporting only immigrants who pose a threat to national security and public safety — a designation that relies largely on the discretion of individual immigration officers .
He would also improve accountability for immigration agencies like CBP and ICE .
( His plan isn ’ t specific about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) He calls for ending for-profit detention centers , which have been sites of some of the most egregious abuses of immigrants in recent years .
And he would work towards making the immigration courts more independent from the DOJ .
The United States ’ refugee program once was considered by some as a global model of how a powerful country should support the world ’ s most vulnerable people .
But under Trump , America is now accepting fewer refugees than ever : 18,000 this year , the fewest in history and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he took office .
The refugee program has historically flourished under Republican presidents .
Even in previous Republican administrations seeking to curtail immigration , no one has ever set the cap on refugee admissions as low as Trump has .
Former President George W. Bush briefly cut the number of refugees admitted after the 9/11 attacks , but even then , the limit was set at 70,000 .
But Trump ’ s message has been clear : The US is no longer the same safe haven it once was .
Biden will attempt @ @ @ @ @ @ @ take in up to 125,000 refugees in the year after he takes office and increase admissions “ commensurate with our responsibility , our values and the unprecedented global need.
” But it will also take time to build up the institutions that have served refugee populations once again .
The Trump administration restricted organizations that resettle under 100 refugees annually from obtaining federal funding .
And according to a June 2019 report by Refugee Council USA , refugee resettlement agencies have had to suspend 51 programs in 41 offices across 23 states because @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
4 ) Offer protection to DREAMers and other immigrants with temporary legal status Almost 644,000 young immigrants who came to the US without authorization have been in limbo since Trump first tried to rescind the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals ( DACA ) program in 2017 , not knowing whether they will imminently lose their legal status and be able to continue living and working in the US free from fear of deportation .
Even a recent Supreme Court ruling only gave them temporary reprieve as Trump proceeds forward with his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ refuse new applications for the program , despite the fact that another 1.3 million immigrants are eligible .
Biden has vowed to invoke his executive authority to fully restore the program , which is overwhelmingly popular among both Republicans and Democrats , as well as send a bill to Congress that would codify permanent protections for DACA beneficiaries known as “ DREAMers ” on day one of his presidency .
There is one such Democrat-led bill that the House already passed last June : the “ Dream and Promise Act , ” which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2.5 million DREAMers and other immigrants with temporary legal status ( the original DREAM Act was narrower , covering about 1.5 million people ) .
The bill hasn ’ t gotten any traction in the current Republican-led Senate , which failed to reach a compromise on DACA legislation during open debate last year , but that could change if Biden is elected and if Democrats seize control of the chamber .
That bill also would extend protections to beneficiaries of Temporary Protected Status ( TPS ) , which is typically offered to citizens @ @ @ @ @ @ @ armed conflict , and Deferred Enforced Departure ( DED ) , another form of deportation relief that primarily covers Liberians .
About 400,000 citizens of El Salvador , Honduras , and Haiti have been able to live and work in the US with TPS , but Trump tried to terminate their status , among nationals of other countries , starting in November 2017 against the advice of senior State Department officials .
He argued that conditions in those countries have improved enough that their citizens can now safely return .
Biden has said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with TPS and DED status to be returned to countries where they are unsafe and that those who have lived in the US for a long time and laid roots will be offered a path to citizenship through legislative reform .
Developing a path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants is a priority for the Democratic Party as a whole .
But it would likely have to be part of a broader immigration reform bill , which could prove difficult to pass , if history is any indication .
And any immigration-related legislation will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a Biden administration ’ s other priorities , including responding to the pandemic .
5 ) Push for legislation offering a path to citizenship to unauthorized immigrants Immigration has been the subject of partisan gridlock in Congress for decades .
The last time legislators passed a major immigration reform bill was in 1986 , and their most recent attempt to pass a bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform package in 2013 failed in the then-Republican-led House , despite passing in the Senate .
But widespread opposition to the punitive policies that have defined Trump ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ families at the border and his attempts to end DACA — may create a window for long-sought reform under a Biden administration .
Biden says he would work with Congress on a more comprehensive bill that would , among other provisions , create a path to citizenship for the roughly 10.5 million unauthorized immigrants currently living in the US .
Guevara said that , for now , his organization is focused on making sure that Biden follows through on that promise early on in his tenure — especially now that that immigration has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , not least of all the US ’ s response to the pandemic .
“ We can debate the policy nuances , but we have to have the political will conversation first , ” Guevara said .
It ’ s possible that the pandemic might make Biden more risk-averse about prioritizing immigration amid the pandemic .
But Guevara said that there are elements of immigration reform that very clearly tie into Biden ’ s pandemic response , including the fact that many unauthorized immigrants are essential workers who have been largely overlooked by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and have limited access to health care .
Castro said he hopes that a would-be Biden administration would pass such a bill within the first six months of his administration .
But in the meantime , the CHC is separately working on their own reform proposal — the centerpiece of which is similarly a path to citizenship — that they plan to deliver to Biden and discuss if he takes office .
Biden has also proposed provisions that would ensure fair wages for temporary workers and give them and their employers more flexibility @ @ @ @ @ @ @ workers over qualified US applicants ; support family-based immigration ; preserve a visa lottery program for citizens of countries with low levels of immigration ; increase the number of employment-based visas ; create a new visa program that would allow cities to petition for more immigrants ; increase the number of visas for domestic violence victims ; and better protect unauthorized immigrants who report labor violations .
But some lawmakers , including Sen. Marco Rubio ( R-FL ) , have argued that a piecemeal approach to reform is more likely to be successful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ somewhat under Trump , passing bills reforming visas for agricultural workers and the current system by which green cards are allocated .
But both of those proposals have failed to gain traction in the current Republican-led Senate .
Will you become our 20,000th supporter ?
When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions , we weren ’ t sure how it would go .
Today , we ’ re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in .
The reason is both @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it , too .
We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy .
That ’ s never been more important than today , during a public health crisis , racial justice protests , a recession , and a presidential election .
But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive , and advertising alone won ’ t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires .
Your financial @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but it will help keep Vox free for all .
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If Joe Biden wins in November, advocates who have spent the last four years suing President Donald Trump over his immigration policy are ready to hold the Democratic nominee accountable for his campaign promises.
Biden is positioning himself as former President Barack Obama’s natural successor, including on immigration policy. But he has sworn he won’t merely revert to the Obama-era status quo if elected.
“I was very proud to serve Barack, but even he acknowledges we can’t go back to what it was,” the former vice president said in June, pledging to send an immigration reform bill to Congress on day one of his presidency. “We have to go back and build back better. And so I have a program that is significantly different and builds upon where we left off and tries to undo the damage Trump has done.”
Immigration isn’t the only policy area in which Biden has made big progressive promises. But compared to health care or climate change, presidents have broad legal authority over immigration policy — as Trump has demonstrated by singlehandedly and fundamentally reshaping the immigration system during his first term, typically through executive action.
Merely undoing these changes will be a tall order if Biden claims victory in November. Advocates want to know how Biden plans to reign in the agencies tasked with immigration enforcement, which have become vessels of Trump’s nativist policies, and what he would do would respond if he faces a surge of migration at the southern border.
The pandemic could change the political calculus on immigration, which is no longer one of voters’ top priorities. In an era of mass unemployment, it might be difficult for Biden to advocate for policies vastly expanding immigration, as his immigration plan promises, when Americans fear they will be passed over for job opportunities, even though research shows that immigrants have essentially no effect on the unemployment rate.
But there are policy changes that Biden could undertake unilaterally and immediately upon assuming office: He could reverse some of Trump’s signature immigration policies, including the travel ban and his pandemic-related restrictions on legal immigration, and begin the immense task of reforming the immigration agencies by installing new leadership and revising their enforcement priorities.
Here are the top immigration priorities Biden would be under pressure to address during his first days in office:
1) Undo some of Trump’s biggest immigration policies
Trump has primarily pursued his agenda via executive fiat, meaning that Biden could easily reverse at least some policies as soon as he assumes office.
The presumptive Democratic nominee has already vowed to immediately end, among other policies, Trump’s travel ban citizens of 13 countries that his administration deems to be security threats; his practice of separating families in immigration detention; his recent memorandum excluding unauthorized immigrants from 2020 census population counts that will be used to draw new congressional districts in 2021; and restrictions on asylum including the Migrant Protection Protocols, under which Trump has sent tens of thousands of migrants back to Mexico to wait for their court hearings in the US.
Biden has also suggested that he would roll back the restrictions Trump recently imposed on foreign workers and immigrants applying for green cards. He has not yet said whether he would rescind Trump’s pandemic-related policies at the border that allow him to rapidly return asylum seekers to Mexico. (The Biden campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.)
Other Trump-era regulations may be more difficult to roll back. That includes Trump’s so-called public charge rule, which imposes a wealth test on immigrants applying to enter the US, extend their visa, or convert their temporary immigration status into a green card.
The rule represents one of Trump’s harshest blows to legal immigration yet and has had the effect of deterring immigrants from seeking out much-needed public services amid the pandemic. But Biden can’t afford to rush through the process of repealing the complex, 217-page rule; he will likely have to use executive action to initially limit the effect of the rule before formally repealing it or else risk losing challenges in the courts, David Bier, a policy analyst for the libertarian Cato Institute, said.
“A hasty repeal could get hung up in the courts,” he said. “As much as the immigrant advocacy community has used the courts to their advantage, the opposite will be the case [under a Biden administration]. Especially with many Trump judges on the courts, it will be hard to find a favorable ear.”
2) Reform the immigration agencies and install new leadership
Unlike more progressive candidates in the primaries, Biden has said that he would reform the existing federal immigration agencies — the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its component agencies, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) — rather than defunding them or dismantling them and building something new in their place. That will be a difficult task given just how fundamentally Trump has altered these agencies to do his bidding on immigration.
Leadership crises have plagued the DHS, which has been without a Senate-confirmed secretary since April 2019, and a government watchdog recently finding that the appointments of two top officials were invalid. USCIS, which is in the middle of a budget crisis of Trump’s making that could hamstring its ability to process immigration applications, has changed its mission statement to make clear that it no longer deigned to serve immigrants, but rather the American people.
Since Trump took office, there have been growing reports of abuses in ICE detention, including sexual assault, inadequate medical care, and retaliatory use of solitary confinement. CBP officers in military-style gear have been used to quash protests in Portland and to aid ICE in conducting routine immigration arrests in other sanctuary cities.
There have also been shifts at other agencies that preside over immigration issues: Trump’s US Attorneys General have increasingly sought to politicize immigration court proceedings. And there has been a mass exodus of career officials at agencies including the State Department, which oversees consulates that process visas worldwide and refugee resettlement.
Reversing these trends in the executive branch will not happen overnight. But it needs to be a priority, Rep. Joaquin Castro, the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC), said.
“I think the number one thing that he’s got to do right away is to appoint a cabinet secretary at DHS, the head of the Border Patrol, the head of USCIS and the head of ICE,” he said. “He’s got to appoint true reformers who are willing to clean house.”
But on top of that, Carlos Guevara, associate director for immigration initiatives at the advocacy group UnidosUS, said that Biden also needs to review the next layer of political appointees, such as the officials running the DHS policy shop or the general counsel’s office.
“Those decisions will make a big difference,” he said.
Biden has proposed some ways that he would try to change the culture at the immigration agencies. He would focus on deporting only immigrants who pose a threat to national security and public safety — a designation that relies largely on the discretion of individual immigration officers. He would also improve accountability for immigration agencies like CBP and ICE. (His plan isn’t specific about what this accountability would look like.) He calls for ending for-profit detention centers, which have been sites of some of the most egregious abuses of immigrants in recent years. And he would work towards making the immigration courts more independent from the DOJ.
3) Raise the refugee admissions cap
The United States’ refugee program once was considered by some as a global model of how a powerful country should support the world’s most vulnerable people. But under Trump, America is now accepting fewer refugees than ever: 18,000 this year, the fewest in history and down from a cap of 110,000 when he took office.
The refugee program has historically flourished under Republican presidents. Even in previous Republican administrations seeking to curtail immigration, no one has ever set the cap on refugee admissions as low as Trump has. Former President George W. Bush briefly cut the number of refugees admitted after the 9/11 attacks, but even then, the limit was set at 70,000.
But Trump’s message has been clear: The US is no longer the same safe haven it once was.
Biden will attempt to reverse that stance, promising to take in up to 125,000 refugees in the year after he takes office and increase admissions “commensurate with our responsibility, our values and the unprecedented global need.”
But it will also take time to build up the institutions that have served refugee populations once again. The Trump administration restricted organizations that resettle under 100 refugees annually from obtaining federal funding. And according to a June 2019 report by Refugee Council USA, refugee resettlement agencies have had to suspend 51 programs in 41 offices across 23 states because the US is accepting so few refugees.
4) Offer protection to DREAMers and other immigrants with temporary legal status
Almost 644,000 young immigrants who came to the US without authorization have been in limbo since Trump first tried to rescind the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in 2017, not knowing whether they will imminently lose their legal status and be able to continue living and working in the US free from fear of deportation. Even a recent Supreme Court ruling only gave them temporary reprieve as Trump proceeds forward with his plan to end DACA and continues to refuse new applications for the program, despite the fact that another 1.3 million immigrants are eligible.
Biden has vowed to invoke his executive authority to fully restore the program, which is overwhelmingly popular among both Republicans and Democrats, as well as send a bill to Congress that would codify permanent protections for DACA beneficiaries known as “DREAMers” on day one of his presidency.
There is one such Democrat-led bill that the House already passed last June: the “Dream and Promise Act,” which offers a pathway to citizenship for about 2.5 million DREAMers and other immigrants with temporary legal status (the original DREAM Act was narrower, covering about 1.5 million people). The bill hasn’t gotten any traction in the current Republican-led Senate, which failed to reach a compromise on DACA legislation during open debate last year, but that could change if Biden is elected and if Democrats seize control of the chamber.
That bill also would extend protections to beneficiaries of Temporary Protected Status (TPS), which is typically offered to citizens of countries suffering from natural disasters or armed conflict, and Deferred Enforced Departure (DED), another form of deportation relief that primarily covers Liberians. About 400,000 citizens of El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti have been able to live and work in the US with TPS, but Trump tried to terminate their status, among nationals of other countries, starting in November 2017 against the advice of senior State Department officials. He argued that conditions in those countries have improved enough that their citizens can now safely return.
Biden has said that he won’t allow immigrants with TPS and DED status to be returned to countries where they are unsafe and that those who have lived in the US for a long time and laid roots will be offered a path to citizenship through legislative reform. Developing a path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants is a priority for the Democratic Party as a whole. But it would likely have to be part of a broader immigration reform bill, which could prove difficult to pass, if history is any indication. And any immigration-related legislation will likely have to compete for attention among a Biden administration’s other priorities, including responding to the pandemic.
5) Push for legislation offering a path to citizenship to unauthorized immigrants
Immigration has been the subject of partisan gridlock in Congress for decades. The last time legislators passed a major immigration reform bill was in 1986, and their most recent attempt to pass a bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform package in 2013 failed in the then-Republican-led House, despite passing in the Senate.
But widespread opposition to the punitive policies that have defined Trump’s tenure — including separations of migrant families at the border and his attempts to end DACA — may create a window for long-sought reform under a Biden administration.
Biden says he would work with Congress on a more comprehensive bill that would, among other provisions, create a path to citizenship for the roughly 10.5 million unauthorized immigrants currently living in the US. Guevara said that, for now, his organization is focused on making sure that Biden follows through on that promise early on in his tenure — especially now that that immigration has been eclipsed by voters’ other priorities, not least of all the US’s response to the pandemic.
“We can debate the policy nuances, but we have to have the political will conversation first,” Guevara said.
It’s possible that the pandemic might make Biden more risk-averse about prioritizing immigration amid the pandemic. But Guevara said that there are elements of immigration reform that very clearly tie into Biden’s pandemic response, including the fact that many unauthorized immigrants are essential workers who have been largely overlooked by the Covid-19 relief bills passed in Congress and have limited access to health care.
Castro said he hopes that a would-be Biden administration would pass such a bill within the first six months of his administration. But in the meantime, the CHC is separately working on their own reform proposal — the centerpiece of which is similarly a path to citizenship — that they plan to deliver to Biden and discuss if he takes office.
Biden has also proposed provisions that would ensure fair wages for temporary workers and give them and their employers more flexibility; prevent companies from hiring high-skilled foreign workers over qualified US applicants; support family-based immigration; preserve a visa lottery program for citizens of countries with low levels of immigration; increase the number of employment-based visas; create a new visa program that would allow cities to petition for more immigrants; increase the number of visas for domestic violence victims; and better protect unauthorized immigrants who report labor violations.
But some lawmakers, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), have argued that a piecemeal approach to reform is more likely to be successful. The House has experimented with that somewhat under Trump, passing bills reforming visas for agricultural workers and the current system by which green cards are allocated. But both of those proposals have failed to gain traction in the current Republican-led Senate.
Will you become our 20,000th supporter? When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions, we weren’t sure how it would go. Today, we’re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in. The reason is both lovely and surprising: Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it, too. We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy. That’s never been more important than today, during a public health crisis, racial justice protests, a recession, and a presidential election. But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive, and advertising alone won’t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will help keep Vox free for all. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-19--Laura Loomer, the anti-Muslim congressional candidate praised by Trump, explained

Laura Loomer is a former contributor to the conspiracy site Infowars and a self-described “ proud Islamophobe.
” She is famous for , among other things , spreading conspiracy theories about mass shootings and demanding that Uber and Lyft stop allowing Muslims to work as drivers .
She has been banned from Twitter , Facebook , Instagram , Paypal , Venmo , and GoFundMe for violating their policies on hate speech .
On Tuesday night , she won the Republican nomination for Congress in Florida ’ s 21st Congressional District — the stretch of southeastern Florida where President Trump is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ morning , the president voiced his support , tweeting about Loomer ’ s victory five separate times .
“ Great going Laura , ” Trump wrote in one tweet .
“ You have a great chance against a Pelosi puppet !
” Loomer does not , in fact , have a great chance .
FL-21 has been represented by a Democrat since 2013 and is generally seen as a safe seat for the party .
It would likely take a massive Republican wave election for Loomer to unseat incumbent Rep. Lois Frankel , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( The Loomer campaign did not respond to a request for comment on this story . )
But her victory is telling nonetheless .
In a healthy political party , extremists who cheer the deaths of migrants and were arrested for trespassing on the California governor ’ s mansion while wearing a sombrero wouldn ’ t get more than a handful of votes .
Instead , Loomer was endorsed by two sitting members of Congress — Reps. Matt Gaetz ( R-FL ) and Paul Gosar ( R-AZ ) — and feted by the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of a group of fringe Republicans winning congressional primaries in 2020 , the most notable of whom is Marjorie Taylor Greene , a Georgia-based believer in the QAnon conspiracy theory who won in a safe Republican district and is very likely heading to Congress .
This is not an isolated problem .
A closer look at Loomer , in particular , reveals that the causes of this rot run deeper than Trump and are very likely to continue remaking the Republican Party after he ’ s gone .
Loomer isn ’ t a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ she ’ s been a presence in the conservative media ecosystem for quite some time .
She first attracted attention in 2015 when , as a college senior at Barry University in South Florida , she secretly filmed a meeting with administrators in which she attempted to form a campus club supporting ISIS .
The video was released by Project Veritas , the conservative group that specializes in ( questionably edited ) sting videos .
Loomer worked for Project Veritas during the 2016 presidential campaign and learned to build a career out of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spotlight June 2017 when she stormed the stage at a performance of Shakespeare ’ s Julius Caesar in New York that dressed the Roman general like Donald Trump .
The disruption earned Loomer a booking on Sean Hannity ’ s show .
“ You were making a very strong point .
I applaud you for what you ’ ve done , ” Hannity told her .
Loomer parlayed the notoriety from the Julius Caesar incident into a kind of internet celebrity on the pro-Trump right .
The problem with celebrity , though , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ many opportunities to show yourself .
And Loomer proved to be someone with truly out-there opinions .
After an ISIS supporter killed eight people with a truck in November 2017 , she went on an Islamophobic rant on Twitter , blaming popular ride-hailing apps for employing Muslim drivers .
“ Someone needs to create a non Islamic form of Uber or Lyft because I never want to support another Islamic immigrant driver , ” she wrote .
The two services subsequently banned her , the first of many bans from high-profile tech platforms @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the conspiracy site Infowars to cover the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland , Florida .
She had suggested in a tweet that the students there speaking out against gun violence were plants : “ it ’ s obvious these kids are reading a screen or notes someone else wrote for them.
” In May 2018 , after a school shooting in Santa Fe , Texas , Loomer went even further — suggesting in a tweet that the entire thing was staged .
“ The doctor speaking to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , TX where victims of a school shooting were taken today said they just had a ‘ mass casualty drill ’ at the hospital around the same time of the school drill , ” she wrote .
“ I ’ m sorry , but I can ’ t help but notice these ‘ coincidences.
’ ” This particular cocktail of hate speech and conspiracy theory misinformation became the hallmark of Loomer ’ s political style , prompting the bans from major social media platforms .
The straw that broke the camel ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ came in November 2018 when Loomer tweeted that Rep. Ilhan Omar ( D-MN ) supported female genital mutilation because she is Muslim .
In response to the ban , which came a year after Twitter stripped her blue check mark as punishment for similar false and offensive claims , Loomer physically chained herself to Twitter ’ s headquarters in New York while wearing a Nazi-style yellow star ( Loomer is Jewish ) .
Since these bans , alleged social media censorship of conservatives has become Loomer ’ s cause du jour .
She @ @ @ @ @ @ @ publications like Breitbart as well as in Washington .
In December 2019 , President Trump retweeted a Loomer supporter calling for donations to her campaign .
In May 2020 , Rep. Gosar sent a letter to Attorney General Bill Barr calling on him to open an investigation into Loomer ’ s Facebook ban .
“ Facebook is in essence preventing Loomer from using that platform to speak to potential voters , to raise money , and in effect , Facebook is supporting her opponent , ” Gosar wrote .
“ This is a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and the value of which far exceeds the campaign limitations.
” Gosar , along with Rep. Gaetz , endorsed Loomer during her primary .
Positioning her as a victim of Big Tech censorship — a major concern on the right today — works to help normalize her , to bring her into the mainstream of political debate .
The story of Loomer ’ s primary victory appears to be fairly straightforward .
Her fame among very online right-wing voters , as well as support from Trump and prominent far-right Republicans like Gaetz and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ $ 1 million during the primary — outraising both her lesser-known Republican opponents and Frankel , the Democratic incumbent .
She won 14,478 votes in the primary , about 43 percent of the total — enough for a solid plurality in six-way race .
Her extremism doesn ’ t appear to have been an anchor .
It was her selling point .
It ’ s worth reiterating that Loomer is vanishingly unlikely to win the general .
House races are fundamentally linked to the national climate : For a Republican to win in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about 9 points more Democratic-leaning than the average , there would need to be some kind of massive groundswell of pro-Republican sentiment .
This is not what appears to be happening .
But while the prospect of Rep. Loomer shouldn ’ t cause anyone to lose too much sleep , the fact of Candidate Loomer should .
She is living proof that the more sober elements of the Republican Party have lost the ability to contain the fringe — perhaps permanently .
Think about Loomer ’ s pathway to prominence and primary victory @ @ @ @ @ @ @ movement , a job with Project Veritas , and got signal-boosted by Fox News .
She formed a hard core of support on social media , a right-wing fan base that survived bans from major platforms thanks to promotion on far-right outlets popular with the GOP base like Breitbart .
And then she was embraced by elected Republicans , like Gaetz and Gosar , propelling her to victory in the primary .
For most of this time , there wasn ’ t much of a secret as to who Laura Loomer was .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ s a conspiracy theorist and anti-Muslim bigot ; that ’ s her whole deal .
These are red flags that a functioning political party would pick up on .
In a healthy party , someone like Loomer would be very unlikely to get even an entry-level job — and if she did , through some mistake in vetting , her career would be short-lived .
Instead , she ’ s been consistently elevated by influential figures in the conservative movement .
The more sober-leaning Republicans were either unwilling or unable to stop this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this .
In this cycle alone , six sympathizers with the QAnon movement— an outlandish conspiracy theory that posits Trump as America ’ s champion against a secret ring of pedophiles who run the government — have won Republican primaries .
One of them , Marjorie Taylor Greene , is overwhelmingly likely to win a seat in Congress .
Though Trump has stoked these fires , he didn ’ t start them .
The real problems — an irresponsible leadership and an alternative media infrastructure that doesn ’ t seem to have a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ outlast him .
The Republican primary electorate has been remade by these forces over the course of decades to include a massive bloc of voters driven by racial grievance and conspiratorial thinking .
Loomer won “ not in spite of being a crazy , but because she is a crazy , ” conservative journalist Jonathan Last writes in the Bulwark .
“ It is unclear to me what suite of policy options professional Republicans and conservatives could possibly offer these voters to compete with the psychic payoffs they get for voting for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Even if Trump loses in 2020 , even if he loses big , the problem of a GOP that elevates voices like Loomer will still loom over American politics .
And it ’ s entirely unclear what , if anything , the rest of the country can do about it .
Will you become our 20,000th supporter ?
When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions , we weren ’ t sure how it would go .
Today , we ’ re humbled to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in .
The reason is both lovely and surprising : Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it , too .
We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy .
That ’ s never been more important than today , during a public health crisis , racial justice protests , a recession , and a presidential election .
But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive , and advertising alone won ’ t let us keep @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this moment requires .
Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation , but it will help keep Vox free for all .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Laura Loomer is a former contributor to the conspiracy site Infowars and a self-described “proud Islamophobe.” She is famous for, among other things, spreading conspiracy theories about mass shootings and demanding that Uber and Lyft stop allowing Muslims to work as drivers. She has been banned from Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Paypal, Venmo, and GoFundMe for violating their policies on hate speech.
On Tuesday night, she won the Republican nomination for Congress in Florida’s 21st Congressional District — the stretch of southeastern Florida where President Trump is registered to vote. And on Wednesday morning, the president voiced his support, tweeting about Loomer’s victory five separate times.
“Great going Laura,” Trump wrote in one tweet. “You have a great chance against a Pelosi puppet!”
Loomer does not, in fact, have a great chance. FL-21 has been represented by a Democrat since 2013 and is generally seen as a safe seat for the party. It would likely take a massive Republican wave election for Loomer to unseat incumbent Rep. Lois Frankel, which seems exceptionally unlikely in 2020. (The Loomer campaign did not respond to a request for comment on this story.)
But her victory is telling nonetheless. In a healthy political party, extremists who cheer the deaths of migrants and were arrested for trespassing on the California governor’s mansion while wearing a sombrero wouldn’t get more than a handful of votes. Instead, Loomer was endorsed by two sitting members of Congress — Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and Paul Gosar (R-AZ) — and feted by the president himself.
Loomer is now part of a group of fringe Republicans winning congressional primaries in 2020, the most notable of whom is Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia-based believer in the QAnon conspiracy theory who won in a safe Republican district and is very likely heading to Congress.
This is not an isolated problem. A closer look at Loomer, in particular, reveals that the causes of this rot run deeper than Trump and are very likely to continue remaking the Republican Party after he’s gone.
Who is Laura Loomer?
Loomer isn’t a household name for most Americans. But she’s been a presence in the conservative media ecosystem for quite some time.
She first attracted attention in 2015 when, as a college senior at Barry University in South Florida, she secretly filmed a meeting with administrators in which she attempted to form a campus club supporting ISIS. The video was released by Project Veritas, the conservative group that specializes in (questionably edited) sting videos.
Loomer worked for Project Veritas during the 2016 presidential campaign and learned to build a career out of political stunts. She grabbed the national spotlight June 2017 when she stormed the stage at a performance of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in New York that dressed the Roman general like Donald Trump. The disruption earned Loomer a booking on Sean Hannity’s show.
“You were making a very strong point. I applaud you for what you’ve done,” Hannity told her.
Loomer parlayed the notoriety from the Julius Caesar incident into a kind of internet celebrity on the pro-Trump right. The problem with celebrity, though, is that it can give you too many opportunities to show yourself. And Loomer proved to be someone with truly out-there opinions.
After an ISIS supporter killed eight people with a truck in November 2017, she went on an Islamophobic rant on Twitter, blaming popular ride-hailing apps for employing Muslim drivers. “Someone needs to create a non Islamic form of Uber or Lyft because I never want to support another Islamic immigrant driver,” she wrote. The two services subsequently banned her, the first of many bans from high-profile tech platforms.
In 2018, Loomer teamed up with the conspiracy site Infowars to cover the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. She had suggested in a tweet that the students there speaking out against gun violence were plants: “it’s obvious these kids are reading a screen or notes someone else wrote for them.” In May 2018, after a school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas, Loomer went even further — suggesting in a tweet that the entire thing was staged.
“The doctor speaking to media outside the hospital in Santa Fe, TX where victims of a school shooting were taken today said they just had a ‘mass casualty drill’ at the hospital around the same time of the school drill,” she wrote. “I’m sorry, but I can’t help but notice these ‘coincidences.’”
This particular cocktail of hate speech and conspiracy theory misinformation became the hallmark of Loomer’s political style, prompting the bans from major social media platforms. The straw that broke the camel’s back on Twitter, for example, came in November 2018 when Loomer tweeted that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) supported female genital mutilation because she is Muslim. In response to the ban, which came a year after Twitter stripped her blue check mark as punishment for similar false and offensive claims, Loomer physically chained herself to Twitter’s headquarters in New York while wearing a Nazi-style yellow star (Loomer is Jewish).
Since these bans, alleged social media censorship of conservatives has become Loomer’s cause du jour. She’s found allies in popular far-right publications like Breitbart as well as in Washington. In December 2019, President Trump retweeted a Loomer supporter calling for donations to her campaign. In May 2020, Rep. Gosar sent a letter to Attorney General Bill Barr calling on him to open an investigation into Loomer’s Facebook ban.
“Facebook is in essence preventing Loomer from using that platform to speak to potential voters, to raise money, and in effect, Facebook is supporting her opponent,” Gosar wrote. “This is a campaign contribution that has not been reported and the value of which far exceeds the campaign limitations.”
Gosar, along with Rep. Gaetz, endorsed Loomer during her primary. Positioning her as a victim of Big Tech censorship — a major concern on the right today — works to help normalize her, to bring her into the mainstream of political debate.
The story of Loomer’s primary victory appears to be fairly straightforward. Her fame among very online right-wing voters, as well as support from Trump and prominent far-right Republicans like Gaetz and Gosar, helped her raise more than $1 million during the primary — outraising both her lesser-known Republican opponents and Frankel, the Democratic incumbent. She won 14,478 votes in the primary, about 43 percent of the total — enough for a solid plurality in six-way race.
Her extremism doesn’t appear to have been an anchor. It was her selling point.
What Laura Loomer means
It’s worth reiterating that Loomer is vanishingly unlikely to win the general. House races are fundamentally linked to the national climate: For a Republican to win in a district like FL-21, which is about 9 points more Democratic-leaning than the average, there would need to be some kind of massive groundswell of pro-Republican sentiment. This is not what appears to be happening.
But while the prospect of Rep. Loomer shouldn’t cause anyone to lose too much sleep, the fact of Candidate Loomer should. She is living proof that the more sober elements of the Republican Party have lost the ability to contain the fringe — perhaps permanently.
Think about Loomer’s pathway to prominence and primary victory. She came up through the conservative movement, a job with Project Veritas, and got signal-boosted by Fox News. She formed a hard core of support on social media, a right-wing fan base that survived bans from major platforms thanks to promotion on far-right outlets popular with the GOP base like Breitbart. And then she was embraced by elected Republicans, like Gaetz and Gosar, propelling her to victory in the primary.
For most of this time, there wasn’t much of a secret as to who Laura Loomer was. It’s obvious that she’s a conspiracy theorist and anti-Muslim bigot; that’s her whole deal. These are red flags that a functioning political party would pick up on. In a healthy party, someone like Loomer would be very unlikely to get even an entry-level job — and if she did, through some mistake in vetting, her career would be short-lived. Instead, she’s been consistently elevated by influential figures in the conservative movement. The more sober-leaning Republicans were either unwilling or unable to stop this.
Loomer isn’t alone in this. In this cycle alone, six sympathizers with the QAnon movement— an outlandish conspiracy theory that posits Trump as America’s champion against a secret ring of pedophiles who run the government — have won Republican primaries. One of them, Marjorie Taylor Greene, is overwhelmingly likely to win a seat in Congress.
Though Trump has stoked these fires, he didn’t start them. The real problems — an irresponsible leadership and an alternative media infrastructure that doesn’t seem to have a moral floor — preceded him and will outlast him. The Republican primary electorate has been remade by these forces over the course of decades to include a massive bloc of voters driven by racial grievance and conspiratorial thinking.
Loomer won “not in spite of being a crazy, but because she is a crazy,” conservative journalist Jonathan Last writes in the Bulwark. “It is unclear to me what suite of policy options professional Republicans and conservatives could possibly offer these voters to compete with the psychic payoffs they get for voting for the Trumps and Loomers of the world.”
Even if Trump loses in 2020, even if he loses big, the problem of a GOP that elevates voices like Loomer will still loom over American politics. And it’s entirely unclear what, if anything, the rest of the country can do about it.
Will you become our 20,000th supporter? When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions, we weren’t sure how it would go. Today, we’re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in. The reason is both lovely and surprising: Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it, too. We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy. That’s never been more important than today, during a public health crisis, racial justice protests, a recession, and a presidential election. But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive, and advertising alone won’t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will help keep Vox free for all. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-20--What’s really going on with the Lincoln Project, the anti-Trump PAC that’s pissing off lots of peopl

What’s really going on with the Lincoln Project, the anti-Trump PAC that’s pissing off lots of people

You ’ ve been online , so you ’ ve probably seen them .
You ’ ve definitely seen them if you ’ re on Twitter .
They ’ re punchy .
Provocative .
They don ’ t look like political ads you ’ ve seen on TV before .
And they ’ re aimed directly at Donald Trump .
They ’ re all made by the Lincoln Project , a political action committee led by high-profile Republicans who want to topple Trump , using firepower they ’ ve previously trained on Democrats .
And over the course of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from an insidery novelty , to an online sensation , to one that is raising real money .
It might have a meaningful effect on this fall ’ s election .
Emphasis on “ might.
” The Lincoln Project ’ s strategy and tactics are a moving target , so it ’ s hard to get a grip on what it ’ s really doing and whether it will work .
But the group most definitely has the attention of political insiders — some think it could be a useful ally to Joe @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that it ’ s not much more than a publicity stunt .
Either way , the Lincoln Project has your attention , whether you realize it or not .
What will it do with it ?
An audience of one The Lincoln Project is a high-concept pitch : What if Republicans political operatives who used to spend their time fighting Barack Obama turned their sights on Trump ?
And , along the way , maybe most of the Republican Party they helped create ?
It ’ s a catnip narrative , with echoes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Vader , at the very last minute , switching sides to help Luke Skywalker defeat the Emperor .
It is also a narrative that drives some Democrats nuts .
They argue that the Lincoln Project is at best a sideshow , doing things other campaigns have done and are doing that will have minimal impact on the 2020 election .
( More recently , the group has been creditably accused of plagiarizing memes and videos ; something that ’ s commonplace on social media but Not A Good Look for a group that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and experience . )
At worst , they mutter , it may be a project that isn ’ t really meant to help Democrats , but to do something else .
Though they don ’ t know what that is .
Here ’ s what we know about the Lincoln Project right now : It is led by several “ Never Trump ” men who have many years of credentials at the top tier of Republican politics .
Rick Wilson , for instance , worked on presidential campaigns for George H.W .
Bush @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ; John Weaver worked for both candidates .
George Conway is a conservative lawyer who helped Paula Jones pursue a sexual harassment suit against Bill Clinton ; now he is best-known as a high-profile Trump critic married to Trump advisor/surrogate Kellyanne Conway , .
After launching in the New York Times late last year , the campaign has steadily attracted interest from political junkies , and increasingly , mainstream media ( a rep for the group has not responded to requests for comment ) .
And in recent months , they have started @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the second quarter of this year , they raised $ 17 million , according to federal election filings .
But they have yet to spend much money running their ads .
So far they have spent less than $ 8 million on ad buys , according to political ad tracker Advertising Analytics .
For context : Democratic PAC American Bridge , has spent $ 30 million on media so far ; Priorities USA , another Democratic PAC , is spending $ 2 million per week in battleground states .
We also know @ @ @ @ @ @ @ news footage and turned around at internet speed — are consistently popular .
At least on Twitter , where they often rack up millions of views , along with commentary from frustrated Democrats who want to know why their own party can ’ t do the same thing .
Which gets at a significant part of the Lincoln Project ’ s appeal , at least among the extremely online set .
Finally , the argument goes , someone is using the same tactics Trump used in the 2016 race — against Trump .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ if Biden wins , and the Lincoln Project gets credit for some of that , then maybe the future of political messaging and elections looks a lot like what we saw Trump harness in four years ago — except now , everyone ’ s doing it .
You can see it most strikingly in the group ’ s ad mocking Trump ’ s halting walk after an appearance at West Point , a direct and intentional echo of Trump ’ s attacks on Hillary Clinton ’ s supposed frailty four years ago .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ s ads and comments attacking Clinton ’ s health didn ’ t exist in a vacuum — they piled onto months of conservative media talking points , echoed and amplified by Fox News , about the topic , which bubbled up easily into social and mainstream media .
In this election , there doesn ’ t appear to be a version of a 4chan-to-Breitbart-to-Fox News-to-the-New York Times cycle for the left — a way to move conversation , memes , and activation from the edges of the internet all the way to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ internet to keep at it .
( Despite efforts to create it. )
.
So you can feel the longing on Twitter that maybe the Lincoln Project will do the trick .
But the Twitter-centric nature of the Lincoln Project ’ s work — so far — is also the main critique from Democratic campaigners .
They argue that getting eyeballs on viral anti-Trump content — particularly on Twitter — means you ’ re reaching people who are already voting against Trump .
“ I think [ the ads ] are helpful , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Obama aide who is now co-host of Pod Save America .
“ I think they are not as helpful as a lot of people think.
” Pfeiffer ’ s argument , echoed by other Democrats who are working on this year ’ s race , is that the Lincoln Project ’ s most barbed ads , which tend to generate the most attention and virality , are the ones least likely to convert an undecided voter , or a wavering Trump voter , to move over to Biden — if they see them @ @ @ @ @ @ @ still work on Trump , ” he says .
“ But they have to introduce new information to people , and they have to reach people where they are.
” Democratic operatives I ’ ve talked to who think the Lincoln Project is overhyped often point to Republican Voters Against Trump , another PAC with — just like the name says — the same mission statement as the Lincoln Project .
But their ads , which can also generate retweets and views on Twitter , focus specifically on first-person testimonials , which they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ votes : This leads to another one of the major critiques you hear about the Lincoln Project : To date , at least , the project doesn ’ t seem interested in actually tipping a swing state , which could actually move a close election .
Instead , the biggest chunk of their ad spending — about $ 2 million , per ad tracking firm Medium Buying — has been in Washington , DC , where voters have nearly no impact on the election .
Another $ 200,000 has been spent in New @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percent of the vote in 2016 .
The Lincoln Project says , for now , that they are mostly interested in one voter : Trump .
And they are trying to reach him when he watches TV , either in the White House or at his estate in Bedminster , New Jersey , 40 minutes west of Manhattan .
In theory , Trump will literally see the ads during “ executive time , ” which are supposedly purposely built to upset him — “ to use his mental infirmity and addiction to television @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” as Schmidt told the Washington Post .
More plausibly , the Lincoln Project is hoping to needle Trump by getting the people who shape the discussion about politics , in Washington and New York , talking about and responding to the ads .
It doesn ’ t matter how it gets to him , or the people around him , or the people supporting him , as long as it gets there .
The logic behind that strategy : If the Lincoln Project can distract Trump by focusing on them , or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ something else , it ’ s worth it .
And they say it ’ s working : They point to Trump tweets mocking the group , for instance .
Or the fact that Trump spent an extended stretch of his failed rally in Tulsa , Oklahoma , talking about his West Point walk , following the Lincoln Project clips .
And now they ’ re claiming credit for the demotion of former Trump campaign head Brad Parscale in mid-July , pointing to reporting from New York magazine ’ s Olivia Nuzzi .
Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was getting rich at Trump ’ s expense and asked him about it , according to Nuzzi .
Maybe that ad , which popped up in May , really did worry Trump for a second .
Or maybe it planted a seed of doubt in his mind about Parscale , who got pushed out two months later .
On the other hand : Nuzzi ’ s story has copious details on the many other reasons Trump would can Parscale , ranging from the poisonous , backbiting vibe of the entire Trump ecosystem , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fact that polls show Trump is losing the race .
Beyond that , it ’ s hard to argue that you need a dedicated team and millions of dollars to throw Donald Trump off balance .
We ’ ve been watching him closely for five years , and that this point we can say , with confidence , that he ’ s always distracted .
This is a president who follows up his tweet suggesting that this year ’ s election should be postponed with another one promoting a Long Island pizza place @ @ @ @ @ @ @ darker motivations to the group ’ s work .
“ It ’ s cynical self promotion , ” says a Democratic operative working on this year ’ s campaign , who spoke on the condition of anonymity .
The operative argued that Schmidt and company are trying to reach political and media elite in Washington and New York — not to influence their votes , but to burnish their reputations .
“ This is not an accident that they ’ re not talking to voters , ” says another Democratic campaigner .
Other @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Project rounds up to defeat Trump will eventually be used for something else — maybe even for actual Republicans at some point .
They argue that well-meaning donors who think they ’ re helping an anti-Trump group don ’ t realize they ’ re helping the people who helped create Trump , by creating a political climate that made his election possible .
We ’ ll have a better idea of what the Lincoln Project really wants to do in the next few months .
The group ’ s founders , acknowledging their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ no longer identify with , have said they ’ re not solely concerned with Trump .
That ’ s why they ’ ve spent money targeting a handful of Republican Senators in vulnerable races , including Susan Collins in Maine and Steve Daines in Montana ( you can see J.L .
Cauvin , who imitates Trump for a living , trying to tie them to the President in these Lincoln Project videos ) .
They ’ ve also said they intend to ramp up their ad buys in the coming months , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” on ads aimed at both Trump and other Republicans in swing states ; this week the group announced a $ 1 million buy targeted in Ohio and three other swing states .
And if that ’ s going to happen , they ’ ll need to raise more money , which means that some of those viral videos may serve a purpose , after all .
“ If they can raise enough money against the buzz they create , they can raise enough money to run a very targeted campaign , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strategist who runs Georgetown University ’ s Institute of Politics and Public Service .
“ In a race like this , you can be more effective with a scalpel rather than a bazooka.
” Will you become our 20,000th supporter ?
When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions , we weren ’ t sure how it would go .
Today , we ’ re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in .
The reason is both lovely and surprising : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it , too .
We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy .
That ’ s never been more important than today , during a public health crisis , racial justice protests , a recession , and a presidential election .
But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive , and advertising alone won ’ t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires .
Your financial contribution will not constitute @ @ @ @ @ @ @ keep Vox free for all .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

You’ve been online, so you’ve probably seen them.
You’ve definitely seen them if you’re on Twitter.
They’re punchy. Provocative. They don’t look like political ads you’ve seen on TV before. And they’re aimed directly at Donald Trump.
Like this:
Hey @realDonaldTrump, you can’t trust your campaign, your staff, or your family.
They’re all talking about you — and we know it for sure. You might be the only one who doesn’t. pic.twitter.com/BcuBMCptUP — The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) July 7, 2020
And this:
Former U.S Navy Seal Dr. Dan Barkhuff wants to know if @realDonaldTrump is a coward who can't stand up to Putin or if he's complicit.
Well, Donald, which is it? pic.twitter.com/rZUsgSpDv2 — The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) June 30, 2020
And this:
“He is a f&*king moron.” - Rex Tillerson, Trump’s former Secretary of State pic.twitter.com/ZbsJ9300mu — The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) August 14, 2020
They’re all made by the Lincoln Project, a political action committee led by high-profile Republicans who want to topple Trump, using firepower they’ve previously trained on Democrats.
And over the course of the last year, the group has moved from an insidery novelty to an online sensation to one that is raising real money. It might have a meaningful effect on this fall’s election.
Emphasis on “might.” The Lincoln Project’s strategy and tactics are a moving target, so it’s hard to get a grip on what it’s really doing and whether it will work. But the group most definitely has the attention of political insiders — some think it could be a useful ally to Joe Biden and actual Democrats; others suggest that it’s not much more than a publicity stunt. Either way, the Lincoln Project has your attention, whether you realize it or not.
What will it do with it?
An audience of one
The Lincoln Project is a high-concept pitch: What if Republican political operatives who used to spend their time fighting Barack Obama turned their sights on Trump? And, along the way, maybe most of the Republican Party they helped create?
It’s a catnip narrative, with echoes of great stories you love: Darth Vader, at the very last minute, switching sides to help Luke Skywalker defeat the Emperor.
It is also a narrative that drives some Democrats nuts. They argue that the Lincoln Project is at best a sideshow, doing things other campaigns have done and are doing that will have minimal impact on the 2020 election. (More recently, the group has been credibly accused of plagiarizing memes and videos, something that’s commonplace on social media but Not A Good Look for a group that prides itself on political and digital savvy and experience.)
At worst, they mutter, it may be a project that isn’t really meant to help Democrats but to do something else. Though they don’t know what that is.
Here’s what we know about the Lincoln Project right now: It is led by several “Never Trump” men who have many years of credentials at the top tier of Republican politics. Rick Wilson, for instance, worked on presidential campaigns for George H.W. Bush; Steve Schmidt worked for John McCain; John Weaver worked for both candidates. George Conway is a conservative lawyer who helped Paula Jones pursue a sexual harassment suit against Bill Clinton; now he is best-known as a high-profile Trump critic married to Trump adviser/surrogate Kellyanne Conway.
After launching in the New York Times late last year, the campaign has steadily attracted interest from political junkies and, increasingly, mainstream media (a representative for the group has not responded to requests for comment).
And in recent months, they have started to raise real money from donors — according to federal election filings, they raised $17 million in the second quarter of this year. But they have yet to spend much money running their ads. So far, they have spent less than $8 million on ad buys, according to political ad tracker Advertising Analytics. For context: Democratic PAC American Bridge has spent $30 million on media so far; Priorities USA, another Democratic PAC, is spending $2 million per week in battleground states.
We also know their ads — often made using news footage and turned around at internet speed — are consistently popular on Twitter, where they often rack up millions of views along with commentary from frustrated Democrats who want to know why their own party can’t do the same thing.
Which gets at a significant part of the Lincoln Project’s appeal, at least among the extremely online set. Finally, the argument goes, someone is using the same tactics Trump used in the 2016 race — against Trump. You can fill in the ellipsis … if Biden wins, and the Lincoln Project gets credit for some of that, then maybe the future of political messaging and elections looks a lot like what we saw Trump harness in four years ago — except now, everyone’s doing it.
You can see it most strikingly in the group’s ad mocking Trump’s halting walk after an appearance at West Point, a direct and intentional echo of Trump’s attacks on Hillary Clinton’s supposed frailty four years ago.
Is the President of the United States physically well? pic.twitter.com/6R4GExT0KL — The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) June 13, 2020
On the other hand: Trump’s ads and comments attacking Clinton’s health didn’t exist in a vacuum — they piled onto months of conservative media talking points, echoed and amplified by Fox News, about the topic, which bubbled up easily into social and mainstream media.
In this election, there doesn’t appear to be a version of a 4chan-to-Breitbart-to-Fox News-to-the-New York Times cycle for the left — a way to move conversation, memes, and activation from the edges of the internet all the way to the center of mainstream media, which encourages the internet to keep at it. (Despite efforts to create it.) So you can feel the longing on Twitter that maybe the Lincoln Project will do the trick.
I don’t want anyone in the Lincoln Project involved in setting policy if Biden gets into office, given their history of supporting horrendous things, but they know how to make effective ads. Why are the Democrats not making ads like this? https://t.co/wfNXiS4nPz — Matt Novak (@paleofuture) August 14, 2020
But the Twitter-centric nature of the Lincoln Project’s work — so far — is also the main critique from Democratic campaigners. They argue that getting eyeballs on viral anti-Trump content — particularly on Twitter — means you’re reaching people who are already voting against Trump.
“I think [the ads] are helpful,” says Dan Pfeiffer, a former Obama aide who is now co-host of Pod Save America. “I think they are not as helpful as a lot of people think.”
Pfeiffer’s argument, echoed by other Democrats who are working on this year’s race, is that the Lincoln Project’s most barbed ads, which tend to generate the most attention and virality, are the ones least likely to convert an undecided voter or a wavering Trump voter to move over to Biden — if they see them at all.
“Negative ads can still work on Trump,” he says. “But they have to introduce new information to people, and they have to reach people where they are.”
Democratic operatives I’ve talked to who think the Lincoln Project is overhyped often point to Republican Voters Against Trump, another PAC with — just like the name says — the same mission statement as the Lincoln Project. But their ads, which can also generate retweets and views on Twitter, focus specifically on first-person testimonials, which they think will be more effective in moving votes:
‼ Jeffrey voted Trump in 2016, and it's safe to say he won't be doing so again.
He takes you on a ride....You gotta watch the whole thing. (Warnings: 1. NSFW 2. Wicked "Good Will Hunting" Energy) pic.twitter.com/foIo4lmaDA — Republican Voters Against Trump (@RVAT2020) July 13, 2020
This leads to another one of the major critiques you hear about the Lincoln Project: To date, at least, the project doesn’t seem interested in actually tipping a swing state, which could actually move a close election.
Instead, the biggest chunk of their ad spending — about $2 million, per ad tracking firm Medium Buying — has been in Washington, DC, where voters have nearly no impact on the election. Another $200,000 has been spent in New York City, where Trump received 18 percent of the vote in 2016.
The Lincoln Project says, for now, that they are mostly interested in one voter: Trump. And they are trying to reach him when he watches TV, either in the White House or at his estate in Bedminster, New Jersey, 40 minutes west of Manhattan.
In theory, Trump will see the ads, which are supposedly purposely built to upset him, during “executive time” — “to use his mental infirmity and addiction to television to freeze him and manipulate him,” as Schmidt told the Washington Post.
More plausibly, the Lincoln Project is hoping to needle Trump by getting the people who shape the discussion about politics, in Washington and New York, talking about and responding to the ads. It doesn’t matter how it gets to him or the people around him or the people supporting him, as long as it gets there.
The logic behind that strategy: If the Lincoln Project can distract Trump by focusing on them or their ads instead of doing ... something else, it’s worth it. And they say it’s working: They point to Trump tweets mocking the group, for instance. Or the fact that Trump spent an extended stretch of his failed rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, talking about his West Point walk, following the Lincoln Project clips.
And now they’re claiming credit for the demotion of former Trump campaign head Brad Parscale in mid-July, pointing to reporting from New York magazine’s Olivia Nuzzi. Trump saw this micro-targeted ad suggesting that Parscale was getting rich at Trump’s expense and asked him about it, according to Nuzzi.
This is just another example that @realDonaldTrump is the worst manager America has ever seen. Don, you got conned … by your IT guy. pic.twitter.com/ssO5CERqBu — The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) May 20, 2020
Maybe that ad, which popped up in May, really did worry Trump for a second. Or maybe it planted a seed of doubt in his mind about Parscale, who got pushed out two months later.
On the other hand: Nuzzi’s story has copious details on the many other reasons Trump would can Parscale, ranging from the poisonous, backbiting vibe of the entire Trump ecosystem to the Tulsa fiasco to the fact that polls show Trump is losing the race.
Beyond that, it’s hard to argue that you need a dedicated team and millions of dollars to throw Donald Trump off balance. We’ve been watching him closely for five years, and at this point we can say, with confidence, that he’s always distracted. This is a president who follows up his tweet suggesting that this year’s election should be postponed with another one promoting a Long Island pizza place.
Some Lincoln Project critics assign darker motivations to the group’s work. “It’s cynical self-promotion,” says a Democratic operative working on this year’s campaign, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The operative argued that Schmidt and company are trying to reach political and media elite in Washington and New York — not to influence their votes, but to burnish their reputations. “This is not an accident that they’re not talking to voters,” says another Democratic campaigner.
Other Democrats simply worry that money the Lincoln Project rounds up to defeat Trump will eventually be used for something else — maybe even for actual Republicans at some point. They argue that well-meaning donors who think they’re helping an anti-Trump group don’t realize they’re helping the people who helped create Trump, by creating a political climate that made his election possible.
We’ll have a better idea of what the Lincoln Project really wants to do in the next few months. The group’s founders, acknowledging their role in building a Republican Party they no longer identify with, have said they’re not solely concerned with Trump.
That’s why they’ve spent money targeting a handful of Republican senators in vulnerable races, including Susan Collins in Maine and Steve Daines in Montana (you can see J.L. Cauvin, who imitates Trump for a living, trying to tie them to the president in these Lincoln Project videos).
They’ve also said they intend to ramp up their ad buys in the coming months and spend “tens of millions of dollars” on ads aimed at both Trump and other Republicans in swing states; this week the group announced a $1 million buy targeted in Ohio and three other swing states.
And if that’s going to happen, they’ll need to raise more money, which means that some of those viral videos may serve a purpose, after all.
“If they can raise enough money against the buzz they create, they can raise enough money to run a very targeted campaign,” says Mo Elleithee, a longtime Democratic strategist who runs Georgetown University’s Institute of Politics and Public Service. “In a race like this, you can be more effective with a scalpel rather than a bazooka.”
Will you become our 20,000th supporter? When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions, we weren’t sure how it would go. Today, we’re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in. The reason is both lovely and surprising: Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it, too. We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy. That’s never been more important than today, during a public health crisis, racial justice protests, a recession, and a presidential election. But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive, and advertising alone won’t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will help keep Vox free for all. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-20--The Democratic convention highlighted gun violence. Here’s what Biden plans to do about it.

In one of the standout moments at the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday , former Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords retold her story — explaining how she went from being the victim of an assassination attempt to a gun violence crusader .
“ We are a nation ready to end gun violence , ” Giffords said , endorsing former Vice President Joe Biden ’ s presidential run .
She ended her speech with a call for those watching to “ vote , vote , vote.
” Biden does have a record , and a plan , in favor of gun control @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a top Democrat in getting both federal background checks and a 10-year assault weapon ban enacted .
Biden has often boasted that he has “ taken on the National Rifle Association ( NRA ) on the national stage and won — twice.
” As part of his presidential campaign , Biden introduced a sweeping gun control plan that includes universal background checks , an assault weapons ban , more resources toward the enforcement of existing gun laws , a public push for the development of “ smart guns , ” and incentives for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ laws , which let courts confiscate guns from people deemed a risk to themselves or others and develop gun-licensing systems .
With mass shootings and more typical everyday gun violence regularly making headlines , there ’ s a lot of support for Democrats to act on gun control — with more recent support coming from movements like March for Our Lives , which formed after the 2018 Parkland , Florida , school shooting in which a gunman killed 17 people and injured 17 others .
But there are still questions about how likely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one , it would almost certainly require Democrats to retake the Senate — an electoral feat on top of winning the White House .
And if Democrats do take the Senate , it ’ s unclear if they ’ d prioritize action on gun violence over Covid-19 , the economy , climate change , health care , and criminal justice .
Biden ’ s plan would make sweeping changes to federal gun laws , with universal background checks , an assault weapons ban , and red flag laws checking off much of what @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years .
Biden ’ s plan would also close several loopholes in existing law , repeal a law that made it harder to sue gun manufacturers and sellers when they make or sell guns they should have known would be diverted to criminal uses , limit the number of guns an individual can purchase to one per month , require safe storage , finance strategies to combat urban violence , and fund more research into preventing gun violence .
( For more specifics , read Biden ’ s full plan . )
Still @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as far as some of Biden ’ s Democratic rivals did during the primary .
Sens .
Cory Booker and Elizabeth Warren , for example , proposed a federal licensing system — one that would require everyone in the US to obtain a license to buy and own firearms .
But Biden ’ s plan only includes financial incentives for states to adopt licensing , which they could decline to do .
In the past , Biden has criticized the concept of licensing , saying it “ will not change whether or not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of weapons they can buy , where they can use them , how they can store them.
” The research , however , has found licensing is among the more effective proposals for reducing gun deaths , more so than universal background checks or an assault weapons ban .
Biden ’ s plan also doesn ’ t include , as Booker and former Rep. Beto O ’ Rourke previously called for , a mandatory buyback program — essentially , a confiscation scheme — for assault weapons .
Instead , his plan has a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can sell assault weapons .
But if gun owners don ’ t sell their assault weapons , they ’ ll have to go through a background check and register the weapons , like they ’ re already forced to do with machine guns today .
Tougher gun laws are backed by the research .
A 2016 review of 130 studies in 10 countries , published in Epidemiologic Reviews , found that new legal restrictions on owning and purchasing guns tended to be followed by a drop in gun violence — a strong indicator @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lives .
The big question : Will Biden ’ s plan really happen ?
Many forms of gun control poll very well , with universal background checks in particular regularly getting 80-plus percent support from Americans over the past few years .
The reality , though , is Congress hasn ’ t passed a major gun control law since the measures in 1993 and 1994 .
The concern is what ’ s known as the intensity gap : Opponents of stricter gun laws are willing to vote based on that one issue , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t .
So if Congress were to pass sweeping gun control legislation , there ’ s a chance that supporters of the law would be disproportionately punished by voters , while those who vote against the law may get more support .
This has been a problem for decades .
As Republican strategist Grover Norquist said in 2000 , “ The question is intensity versus preference .
You can always get a certain percentage to say they are in favor of some gun controls .
But are they going to vote on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Probably not , he suggested , “ but for that 4-5 percent who care about guns , they will vote on this.
” It ’ s possible this has changed .
With years of frequent mass shootings and the rise of the March for Our Lives movement , it ’ s not out of the question that the political momentum has tipped toward supporters of gun control .
But has it been enough ?
If Democrats take over the Senate and White House , they ’ ve promised an extremely ambitious agenda — @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reform that builds on the Affordable Care Act , a Green New Deal , a wide-ranging economic plan with “ Build Back Better , ” and criminal justice reform .
With so much on their plate , Democrats will have to set priorities .
The question is if they will , or even should , prioritize gun violence over all those other issues , given that whatever they do first is likely to inspire some sort of backlash among more conservative voters ( for example , the Affordable Care Act helped trigger the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be seen .
But it means that the most important question on gun violence may not be what policies Biden and Democrats support , but whether they will actually pursue such policies once they ’ re in power .
Will you become our 20,000th supporter ?
When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions , we weren ’ t sure how it would go .
Today , we ’ re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in .
The reason is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it , too .
We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy .
That ’ s never been more important than today , during a public health crisis , racial justice protests , a recession , and a presidential election .
But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive , and advertising alone won ’ t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires .
Your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , but it will help keep Vox free for all .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

In one of the standout moments at the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday, former Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords retold her story — explaining how she went from being the victim of an assassination attempt to a gun violence crusader. “We are a nation ready to end gun violence,” Giffords said, endorsing former Vice President Joe Biden’s presidential run. She ended her speech with a call for those watching to “vote, vote, vote.”
Biden does have a record, and a plan, in favor of gun control. In the 1990s, he was a top Democrat in getting both federal background checks and a 10-year assault weapon ban enacted. Biden has often boasted that he has “taken on the National Rifle Association (NRA) on the national stage and won — twice.”
As part of his presidential campaign, Biden introduced a sweeping gun control plan that includes universal background checks, an assault weapons ban, more resources toward the enforcement of existing gun laws, a public push for the development of “smart guns,” and incentives for states to adopt “red flag” laws, which let courts confiscate guns from people deemed a risk to themselves or others and develop gun-licensing systems.
With mass shootings and more typical everyday gun violence regularly making headlines, there’s a lot of support for Democrats to act on gun control — with more recent support coming from movements like March for Our Lives, which formed after the 2018 Parkland, Florida, school shooting in which a gunman killed 17 people and injured 17 others.
But there are still questions about how likely gun control is to pass. For one, it would almost certainly require Democrats to retake the Senate — an electoral feat on top of winning the White House. And if Democrats do take the Senate, it’s unclear if they’d prioritize action on gun violence over Covid-19, the economy, climate change, health care, and criminal justice.
What Biden’s gun control plan does
Biden’s plan would make sweeping changes to federal gun laws, with universal background checks, an assault weapons ban, and red flag laws checking off much of what activists have demanded over the past few years.
Biden’s plan would also close several loopholes in existing law, repeal a law that made it harder to sue gun manufacturers and sellers when they make or sell guns they should have known would be diverted to criminal uses, limit the number of guns an individual can purchase to one per month, require safe storage, finance strategies to combat urban violence, and fund more research into preventing gun violence. (For more specifics, read Biden’s full plan.)
Still, the plan doesn’t go as far as some of Biden’s Democratic rivals did during the primary. Sens. Cory Booker and Elizabeth Warren, for example, proposed a federal licensing system — one that would require everyone in the US to obtain a license to buy and own firearms. But Biden’s plan only includes financial incentives for states to adopt licensing, which they could decline to do.
In the past, Biden has criticized the concept of licensing, saying it “will not change whether or not people buy what weapons — what kinds of weapons they can buy, where they can use them, how they can store them.” The research, however, has found licensing is among the more effective proposals for reducing gun deaths, more so than universal background checks or an assault weapons ban.
Biden’s plan also doesn’t include, as Booker and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke previously called for, a mandatory buyback program — essentially, a confiscation scheme — for assault weapons. Instead, his plan has a voluntary buyback program through which gun owners can sell assault weapons. But if gun owners don’t sell their assault weapons, they’ll have to go through a background check and register the weapons, like they’re already forced to do with machine guns today.
Tougher gun laws are backed by the research. A 2016 review of 130 studies in 10 countries, published in Epidemiologic Reviews, found that new legal restrictions on owning and purchasing guns tended to be followed by a drop in gun violence — a strong indicator that restricting access to guns can save lives.
The big question: Will Biden’s plan really happen?
Many forms of gun control poll very well, with universal background checks in particular regularly getting 80-plus percent support from Americans over the past few years.
The reality, though, is Congress hasn’t passed a major gun control law since the measures in 1993 and 1994.
The concern is what’s known as the intensity gap: Opponents of stricter gun laws are willing to vote based on that one issue, while supporters of gun control usually aren’t. So if Congress were to pass sweeping gun control legislation, there’s a chance that supporters of the law would be disproportionately punished by voters, while those who vote against the law may get more support.
This has been a problem for decades. As Republican strategist Grover Norquist said in 2000, “The question is intensity versus preference. You can always get a certain percentage to say they are in favor of some gun controls. But are they going to vote on their ‘control’ position?” Probably not, he suggested, “but for that 4-5 percent who care about guns, they will vote on this.”
It’s possible this has changed. With years of frequent mass shootings and the rise of the March for Our Lives movement, it’s not out of the question that the political momentum has tipped toward supporters of gun control.
But has it been enough? If Democrats take over the Senate and White House, they’ve promised an extremely ambitious agenda — with action on Covid-19, health care reform that builds on the Affordable Care Act, a Green New Deal, a wide-ranging economic plan with “Build Back Better,” and criminal justice reform.
With so much on their plate, Democrats will have to set priorities. The question is if they will, or even should, prioritize gun violence over all those other issues, given that whatever they do first is likely to inspire some sort of backlash among more conservative voters (for example, the Affordable Care Act helped trigger the Tea Party).
It remains to be seen. But it means that the most important question on gun violence may not be what policies Biden and Democrats support, but whether they will actually pursue such policies once they’re in power.
Will you become our 20,000th supporter? When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions, we weren’t sure how it would go. Today, we’re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in. The reason is both lovely and surprising: Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it, too. We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy. That’s never been more important than today, during a public health crisis, racial justice protests, a recession, and a presidential election. But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive, and advertising alone won’t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will help keep Vox free for all. Contribute today from as little as $3.