Dear fellow MoveOn member,
I spend much of my time worrying about our nation's big problems and thinking about solutions. Things like what the implementation of a wealth tax would do to solve income inequality. What we can do to address the climate crisis today. And how legalizing marijuana can help curtail mass incarceration.
But here's the truth: We need our elected officials to push for big ideas too in order for them to become reality.
Luckily, we have an opportunity right now to help shape the 2020 election and ensure that big ideas to help push our country forward and make life better for millions of Americans take center stage—to show voters what they can vote for, instead of just against.
Next Saturday, June 1, MoveOn is hosting their first-ever in-person forum with presidential candidates in San Francisco, CA, where each candidate will present "one big idea" that they'll push forward if elected. Cory Booker, Juliรกn Castro, Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar, Beto O'Rourke, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren will ALL be there.
This is a unique and critical opportunity to get candidates on the record about bold progressive ideas, which can help to shape the campaign going forward—and to jump-start an idea-centered and robust debate in the weeks leading up to the first Democratic debate at the end of June.
Here's the catch: MoveOn has given me a peek at the budget for this event, and it nearly made me spit out my coffee. Pulling off an event of this size requires buckets of money—to secure a venue, coordinate security and logistics, promote it, and more. It is a huge lift and has to be done right. Which is why I'm asking:
MoveOn will host this event, stream it live, have large sections of it covered by cable news, and then create videos capturing each of the big ideas (which will then get seen millions of times). I know MoveOn's power to push a video. (After all, I make 10 or so videos with them every year!) And MoveOn's social media and earned media reach will elevate these particular big ideas and the notion that we need big, bold visions in the weeks to come, to set the stage for the first Democratic debate.
In 2016, rather than focusing on big ideas, media and the public debate focused more on squabbles between candidates and insults thrown back and forth between their supporters—and that gave an opening for Donald Trump to drive a wedge between voters and win.
We cannot let the 2020 campaign become a media circus defined by the biggest personalities or infighting between candidates.
We cannot let consultants and pundits convince candidates that fighting for bold, progressive ideas is dangerous, pushing them to stick to the middle of the road.
We must make our voices heard and ensure that candidates know that the majority of Americans support progressive policies like Medicare for All, higher taxes for the wealthy, controls on out-of-control corporate greed, ambitious initiatives to tackle the climate crisis, and more.
This is our opportunity not just to define what the 2020 election will look like but also what real progressive governance can be. It's time to get candidates on the record, and it is on us to hold them accountable to those priorities.
I am so happy to see MoveOn taking the lead on this work, and I can't wait to watch the Big Ideas Forum next week. I also can't wait to see the media coverage, MoveOn's videos grabbing tens of millions of eyeballs, and the robust debate of big ideas that will follow—setting a tone in the critical weeks leading up to the first Democratic debate.
I hope that you'll join me and chip in $3 to help make sure the event is a success.
Thanks for all you do.
–Robert Reich
Want to support MoveOn's work? The MoveOn community will work every moment, day by day and year by year, to resist Trump's agenda, contain the damage, defeat hate with love, and begin the process of swinging the nation's pendulum back toward sanity, decency, and the kind of future that we must never give up on. And to do it MoveOn needs your support, now more than ever. Will you stand with MoveOn?
Click here to chip in $3, or whatever you can afford.
No purchase, payment, or contribution necessary to enter to win. Void where prohibited. Entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. on May 26, 2019. You may enter by making a donation here. Alternatively, you can enter without making a donation. One winner will receive the following prize package: two round-trip airline tickets to San Francisco, at a total value, including taxes, of no more than $1,500; two nights in a San Francisco hotel, at a total value, including taxes, of no more than $500; two tickets to the forum; in-town transportation costs up to $200, to be reimbursed by MoveOn, provided receipts are submitted to mopainvoice@bill.com by June 30, 2019. Total prize value not to exceed $2200.00. Odds of winning depend on number of eligible entries received. Promotion open to all U.S. citizens, or lawful permanent U.S. residents who are legal residents of the 50 United States and District of Columbia and 18 or older (or of majority under applicable law). Promotion subject to Official Rules and additional restrictions on eligibility. Sponsor: MoveOn.org Political Action, 1442 Walnut Street #358, Berkeley, CA 94709.
Contributions to MoveOn.org Political Action are not tax deductible as charitable contributions for federal income tax purposes. PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/?t=11.&akid=234963%2E10220574%2EqY6ZYz Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. This email was sent to Eddie Alfaro on May 23rd, 2019. To change your email address or update your contact info, click here. To remove yourself from this list, click here.
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