The primary reason that our political system is so thoroughly corrupt and broken is because it is currently perfectly legal for corporations, billionaires, and powerful special interest groups to influence our politics with unlimited amounts of money and resources. This essentially guarantees that the vast majority of our elected officials will simply be for sale to the highest bidder and will not be interested at all in representing the values of the American people.
Federally ban corporate lobbying.
Federally ban lobbyist bundling.
Establish 100% publicly financed elections.
Make corporate political contributions federally illegal.
Close the “revolving door” by stopping elected representatives and senior staff from selling off their government power for high-paying lobbying/"consulting" jobs.
Require paper ballots for all elections.
Strengthen anti-corruption enforcement by overhauling the broken Federal Election Commission and giving prosecutors the tools they need to combat corruption.
Switch to 100% renewable energy by 2025 and create millions of jobs while doing it. Invest in exclusively in clean, sustainable energy sources powered by the sun, wind, tides, and Earth’s heat.
Nationalize energy production and the grid. Private companies like PG&E have proven to be irresponsible, exploitative, and dangerous.
Create a national environmental and climate justice plan that recognizes the heightened public health risks faced by low-income and minority communities.
Build electric vehicle charging stations. In a country where nearly 30 percent of carbon pollution emissions come from the transportation sector, it is imperative that we end our dependence on gasoline.
Build high-speed, modern, safe, zero-emission passenger and cargo rail nationwide, serving long-distance riders as well as local routes in urban areas.
Completely eliminate public transit fares.
Update and modernize the energy grid. Some of our grid infrastructure has not been updated since it was first built in the 1920s and 1930s. Technology development in clean energy resources and electric grid improvements have enabled “smart” technologies, programs and policies to create a safer, more sustainable energy system.
Ban the procurement of fossil fuels, including coal, natural gas, and oil.
End all exports of fossil fuels, and end imports completely as soon as sufficient green grid technology exists to produce a base load that meets basic energy needs.
Ban the transport of fossil fuels on US soil. This includes ending the use of all pipelines routed through any US territory.
Hold energy and fossil fuel companies financially accountable for the environmental and public health damage their industries have done, including but not limited to damage from fracking, mountaintop removal, and offshore drilling.
Protect and restore public lands by promoting natural resource conservation and habitat preservation.
Cancel all existing medical debt.
Create a universal, single-payer healthcare system that provides care to every single person on US soil.
Expand basic Medicare to cover 100% of all prescription costs for everyone.
Cover all menstrual and family planning products at 100% under Medicare for All.
Federally ban private health insurance.
Incentivize the pursuit of medical education with increased stipends for med students, to increase the number of available medical workers and meet the needs of the aging Baby Boom generation.
Cancel all existing student loan debt.
Make public colleges and universities tuition-free with all curriculum available digitally, free of charge.
Federally prohibit student lending.
Provide and federally fund grants for education-related expenses (i.e. room & board, specialty supplies/equipment, and etc.)
Guarantee free meals to all college students and faculty.
Pay college students a stipend, based on area cost of living.
Fully fund a new Child Development Act, which guarantees free, high-quality, public childcare for all Americans and a thriving wage for childcare workers.
Increase the federal base salary for teachers to $60,000 per year, with overtime pay and pensions.
End all funding of schools via property tax. This creates a segregated education system based on neighborhood income, and has cemented racial inequity across the US.
Remove standardized testing requirements.
Federally eliminate homework from public school curriculum. Homework is outdated; the best education systems on earth have eliminated homework with excellent outcomes across the board.
End the use of prefabricated curriculum. We know that in education, one size does not fit all. Teachers should drive the educational experience for their students.
Fully fund K-12 education federally, based on need. This includes:
Expanded special education services.
Expanded vocational education at high school level.
Expanded arts and music programs.
Expanded counseling, mental health, and social services.
Free school breakfasts, snacks, and lunches for every child.
Improved nutritional standards and food preparation education.
Federally guarantee a job as a right to every person on US soil.
Eliminate carbon emissions by 2025 while transforming our economy from extractive global capitalism to a sustainable universal employment.
Fully fund a new Child Development Act, which guarantees free, high-quality, public childcare for all Americans and a thriving wage for childcare workers.
Pass the Rebuild America Act, which will create more than 13 million public sector jobs by investing in our crumbling infrastructure.
Provide at least 12 weeks of paid family leave, two weeks of paid vacation, and one week of paid sick days to all American workers.
Include abortion coverage under Medicare for All. Abortion should be free, on-demand, and without apology or explanation.
Pass the Paycheck Fairness Act;. We must achieve pay equity for women and AFAB (assigned “female” at birth) non-binary folks.
Create stringent federal penalties for revenge pornography blackmail or distribution.
Expand the WIC program and increase benefits for pregnant women/AFAB (assigned female at birth) individuals, and their infants, so that every low-income family receives the nutrition they need to live healthy lives.
Fully fund a new Child Development Act, which guarantees free, high-quality, public childcare for all Americans and a thriving wage for childcare workers.
Anti-SW legislation unfairly targets low-income women (and LGBTQ+ persons) while failing to address exploitative/predatory actors in the sex work industry.
Mandate and fund testing the entire backlog of rape kits possessed by every law enforcement agency in the US.
Our military can gather intelligence. The Central Intelligence Agency is an unaccountable institution with a long history of uninterrupted brutality that often undermines US and UN security interests.
All of them. Every single one.
The Constitution clearly requires all military action be authorized by Congress. The President should never have been given this unilateral power in the first place.
Ban “nuclear first strike” scenarios entirely. Actively and rapidly work to eliminate nuclear weapons from the US military’s arsenal.
Deliberately dismantle imperialism. This means ending military occupation and intervention, closing all foreign military bases, and restructuring our economy to end reliance on extractive, environmentally destructive global capitalism.
End the IMF and World Bank. The US should not bully other countries into enacting devastating austerity and allow for vast extraction of their resources.
Eliminate the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and reassign immigration processing to the Department of Labor. The US military is responsible for homeland security.
Renew our commitment to collaborative international diplomacy. We must conduct international relations within the United Nations, where even historically-impoverished nations have representation. We must end unilateral military action by the US and NATO, and engage in good faith with the will of the international community.
Right now, adjusted to hourly pay, the average entry-level military job pays below the federal minimum wage. About 10% of the military budget currently goes to personnel; we should pay our service members well and bring them out of harm’s way to deal with the true national security threat: climate change.
The US must respect the decisions upon which the UN arrives democratically and stop trying to police the world.
Petition the Senate to join the Rome Statute and recognize the authority of the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Prosecute all war criminals. Any individual who is guilty of war crimes under ICC’s definition should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, with no exceptions.
Abolish torture (“enhanced interrogation techniques”) and prosecute individuals responsible for torture programs, which violate international law.
Refocus trade policy from “free trade” to fair trade. Workers and the environment should be prioritized in all international trade deals.
We cannot financially support a state, run by a right-wing ethno-nationalist party, that is actively committing genocide against the Palestinian people.
Normalize diplomatic and trade relations with Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, China, North Korea, Iran, and all other nations currently being sanctioned in what is essentially the arbitrary continuation of the Cold War.
Recognize and support the will of the Puerto Rican people, whether that be independence, statehood, or any other arrangement. Repeal the Jones Act.
Offer and provide support for statehood, as part of the US or a sovereign nation, to all territories currently under US control.
Federally ban private military contractors and prosecute PMC corporations that contract with foreign nations. War should not be an industry.
Nationalize all military weapons production and make profiting from a government weapons contract federally illegal.
Declaring missing and murdered indigenous women a national emergency and aggressively act to prevent the problem from further escalating.
Support Tribal Sovereignty and Tribal Jurisdiction.
Uphold the Trust Responsibility: We must honor the treaties and federal statutes that are the foundation of the trust relationship. We need to maintain a White House Policy Advisor for Native American Affairs to ensure that tribal issues are consistently addressed and coordinated throughout the federal government.
Fight for increased local control over the administration and operation of tribal housing programs and for full funding of the Indian Housing Block Grant Program.
In order to create economic opportunities, we must invest in education from early childhood through higher education. We must fight to fully fund the Bureau of Indian Education and strengthen self-determination to enable culturally tailored learning unique to each tribal nation and help to retain qualified teachers for Native youth. We should build upon the integrated work of the Generation Indigenous Initiative to ensure that every Native American child can reach their full potential. We should fight for plans that allow students to refinance federal debt, lower interest rates, triple federal work-study jobs, and provide for free tuition at all public colleges and universities.
Healthcare is a human right. We should support a Medicare-for-all system that would complement the healthcare provided by the Indian Health Service. We need to work to fully fund the Indian Health Service, strengthen regional management and recruitment of committed IHS health care personnel, demand audits of IHS operations, and ensure that Native Americans have adequate, safe, and affordable access to primary care providers, including oral health and mental health practitioners as well as substance abuse treatment options.
All tribes must have the right to protect and restore their lands. I support streamlining the land-trust transfer process and will work to reverse the Carcieri Supreme Court decision that resulted in an unjust two-tier system of tribes.
Invest in upgrading our roads and bridges, drinking water and wastewater, freight and passenger rail, and electric, telecommunications and broadband networks, creating millions of good-paying jobs across the country. Such investment will help address the “digital divide,” where lack of internet access means that Native American communities are at risk of falling even further behind in their ability to access employment, educational, and assorted opportunities made available by modern information technology. Lastly, all federal grants open to state and local governments will also be open to tribes.
Protect Sacred Places and Native American Cultures: Native Americans must be empowered to maintain and pass on traditional religious beliefs, languages and social practices without fear of discrimination or suppression. Native children are the future of tribal nations; the Indian Child Welfare Act is critical to survival and must be enforced with the original intent of the law. Furthermore, tribal cultures, sacred places, religious practices, and landscapes must be federally protected.
Examine the Executive Order 13175 “Consultation and Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments” to ensure that consultation means more than mere listening sessions. Moreover, all voices — tribal leadership and grassroots alike — must be heard. Expand the annual White House Tribal Nations Conference that brings tribal leaders, cabinet members and the White House together to find solutions to common problems with specific requirements, deliverable on a timeline.
Stand with Native Americans to fight for voting rights, and defend the enfranchisement of minority communities across the country.
End the scourge of bias and discrimination against Native peoples in federally funded institutions. Eliminate offensive public school mascots that reflect outdated stereotypes and perpetuate racism against Native Americans.
Abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and establish an Office of Citizenship, Refugees, and Immigration Services under the Department of Labor.
Federally ban the creation of state border patrol agencies and eliminate all such agencies that currently exist. Redirect all funding to processing centers that connect/provide immigrants and refugees with resources for housing, work, and healthcare upon arrival.
Prosecute all ICE and CBP agents who committed human rights violations.
Grant amnesty to every single undocumented person in the United States, and implement a path to citizenship with expediency. Whistleblowers go first.
Provide whistleblower visas for immigrants who report labor violations or exploitative work conditions.
There are concentration camps on US soil. Our "immigrant detention" programs are cruel, inhumane, and dangerous. We must close every single one of these camps, now, and stop locking up and/or deporting people immediately.
Repair all structural harm to “sanctuary cities” who have been deprived of resources for their humane position on immigration.
Expand refugee programs and improve the housing conditions for all refugees during resettlement. Remove stringent requirements for linguistic assimilation and employment, and expand mental health services for refugees.
De-gender (or add nonbinary gender options, where applicable) all public documents, federally.
De-gender all school dress codes. Guarantee protection from gender-normative discrimination as a result of dress in all workplaces.
Remove punitive/prohibitive requirements for legal name changes and create fee waivers for ID replacement as the result of a legal name change.
Declare trans murder and suicide rates a national emergency. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, more than half of transgender male teens surveyed reported attempting suicide in their lifetime, while 29.9 percent of transgender female teens said they attempted suicide. Among non-binary youth, 41.8 percent reported a suicide attempt. Combined with a historically-unprecedented uptick in violence against trans Americans, immediate corrective action on the federal level is required.
Remove “transmedicalist” language from all education materials relating to trans individuals; the “transmedicalist” viewpoint is deliberately antagonistic to nonbinary individuals and is not rooted in any scientific understanding of gender.
Federally prohibit firing trans employees for enforcing their gender/pronouns with customers, clients, or other individuals in the workplace.
Include gender affirmation surgery as “necessary care” under Medicare for All, free, on-demand, and without justification required.
Federally ban "conversion therapy".
Federally legislate to end “trans panic” murder defense. Transphobia is not an excuse for violence and it is outrageous that "trans panic” defense is accepted in our criminal justice system.
Federally ban intersex mutilation.
Currently it is legal in all 50 states to force trans persons into facilities based on the gender they were assigned at birth when they are incarcerated. This is cruel and unusual punishment and must end immediately nationwide.
Develop and implement LGBTQ+-inclusive public education, PreK-16. Anti-LGBTQ bullying in school can quadruple the likelihood of suicide. LGBTQ students are up to three times more likely than their peers to be physically threatened or assaulted at school and 91% more likely to be bullied or harassed.
Provide community space for LGBTQ+ students. Schools should be prepared to support LGBTQ students by maintaining LGBTQ+ clubs such as GSAs and offering LGBTQ+-specific school counseling.
LGBTQ+ history and identities should be included in public school curriculum to counter the deliberate historical erasure of the community’s history.
Students and administrators alike will (as Teaching Tolerance advises) guarantee that “all school community members [have] a thorough understanding of the part they play in making their school an environment that welcomes all students.”
Eliminate all anti-discrimination law exceptions that the US military currently receives. This includes but is not limited to a ban on trans service members. Expand all federal workplace protections to apply to LGBTQ++ persons.
Create a homelessness relief program specifically targeting LGBTQ+ youth, who are disproportionately represented in unsheltered populations across the board.
Federally ban "conversion therapy".
Federally legislate to end “gay panic” murder defense. Homophobia is not an excuse for violence and it is outrageous that “gay panic” defense is accepted in our criminal justice system.
Guarantee every American the absolute right to vote. This includes individuals with felony convictions and those who are currently incarcerated.
Create a federal initiative process similar to those already common on the state level.
End gerrymandering by creating independent, fully transparent redistricting commissions that follow strict guidelines to ensure accurate representation for all voters, regardless of political party.
Create a nationwide automatic voter registration system.
Allow voting at home via mail-in voting, or in person at the polls.
Make Election Day a national holiday.
Increase the number of polling locations, starting in African-American and poor communities, which were the first victims of coordinated voter suppression efforts.
Support state efforts to award Electoral College votes to the national popular vote winner via a Congressional resolution.
Federally fund pilot programs to test efficacy of alternatives to the first-past-the-post system, including RCV (ranked-choice voting), STAR (scored, then automatic runoff), Approval Voting, and multiple-round elimination voting methods. Voters should not be perpetually stuck choosing the lesser of two evils.
Require all states to hold open primaries. Voters should choose their representation based on whose vision they want, not which party they chose to align with months before the election.
Lower federal voting age to 16. We must de-couple voting and civic participation from "adulthood". Young people deserve a say in their future.
Under our current system, a person making $130,000 a year and a person making $10,000,000 a year contribute exactly the same amount to the Social Security system. This is an unfair and regressive tax policy that amplifies the income and wealth inequality within our economy.
Increase Social Security benefits to all recipients. Current benefit amounts are woefully insufficient.
Require companies with more than $1 billion USD in annual revenues to match their workers’ Social Security contributions in addition to employer-paid Social Security.
Require companies with more than 20 employees to pay into pension funds that all their workers qualify for, regardless of hours worked per week or job description.
Require all states to fully fund pensions for all public workers.
Pass federal red flag measures that allow family/community members to petition a court for the temporary removal of firearms from a person who may present a danger to themselves or others.
Federally mandate and provide safety training and continued education for all licensed firearm owners.
Ban bump stocks and eliminate hellfire switches from all federal firearms permits.
Empower judicial removal of firearms possession rights from convicted domestic violence offenders. There is a strong correlation between past domestic violence and the most heinous mass shootings.
Mandate background checks for all firearm sales, including personal sale.
Fully federally fund the modernization and optimization of existing background check systems, and make them compatible across all 50 states.
Ban corporate political lobbying, including the NRA.
Demilitarize our police forces at all levels.
Require de-escalation training for all law enforcement professionals and licensed firearm owners.
Create a national structure to provide stable funding for rapid expansion of union membership: the Revitalize Unions Now (RUN) Act. The RUN Act will:
Provide training and administrative resources for new unionization efforts.
Subsidize union dues at 100% for all union members, including retired union workers who continue to pay dues.
Extend federal unemployment benefits to striking workers and guarantee the right to strike to all federal workers.
Guarantee the right of all public workers to collectively bargain.
Require all non-unionized businesses with 20 or more employees to hold quarterly votes on unionization.
Require all non-unionized businesses with fewer than 20 employees to pay no less than ⅔ of total profits in bonuses/dividends to all employees.
End all forced arbitration. Workers deserve their day in court.
Pass federal legislation similar to the Raise the Wage Act (H.R. 582 in 2019) to guarantee all American workers a living wage as quickly as possible. Create incentives for shared ownership/co-ops to increase workers' total share of the economy and the product of their labor.
Federally ban "At-Will Employment" statutes. Pass federal legislation guaranteeing just-cause employment for all workers.
Eliminate all overtime exemptions for jobs that pay less than triple the median US wage. Eliminate all overtime exemptions for farm, transportation, and all other "heavy work" or hazardous jobs.
Create a progressive overtime pay standard that increases the rate of additional hourly pay on an exponential curve.
Utilize civil asset forfeiture to acquire all companies found guilty of violating workers' right to unionize and other workplace protections, and transfer full ownership of of the offending company to the workers at that company.
Make it easier to form a union, with a simple majority of workers voting in favor via majority sign-up (or "card-check") elections.
Expand and enforce penalties on companies that violate labor laws, including for firing workers who try to organize a union. These moves are illegal, but nowadays are only penalized by forcing employers to repay some wages to the fired workers, a punishment so light that many employers treat it as just a cost of doing business. I will vote to create stringent penalties in order to shut down this illegal behavior.
Amend the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 to transition from enterprise bargaining to a hybrid system of national and sectoral bargaining. Historical data are clear on which system is better for workers, and we must adopt that system.
Repeal Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act. This law allows workers to get all the benefits of their local union without paying union dues. It pits underpaid workers against their own interests and is deliberate class warfare.
Federally guarantee workers the first right of refusal for any sale, merger, acquisition, outsourcing, or insolvency in their workplace.
Establish a workers’ public investment bank to fund the purchase of companies to transition to worker ownership during “right-of-refusal” situations.
Pass the Protecting the Right to Organize Act (H.R. 2474 in 2019), which amends the National Labor Relations Act and related labor laws to extend additional protections to union workers.
Eliminate all exemptions from existing workplace protections in federal law. This includes domestic and agricultural workers, who currently do not enjoy protections under FLSA and NLRA.
Pass federal legislation guaranteeing fair scheduling requirements that apply, without exception, to all US employers.
Federally guarantee workers 50% representation on the board of all companies with annual revenues in excess of 50 million USD. Massive corporations that exclusively serve investors have proven to be socially and environmentally destructive. The people making decisions must change.
Abolish all agencies and policies focused solely on deportation, detention and suppression of migration, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Patrol, border militarization, and the denial of the right to seek asylum.
Prosecute individuals in all above-mentioned agencies who have engaged in human rights abuses during the course of their work.
Federally prohibit the use of solitary confinement for punishment. Solitary confinement is torture and has no place in a modern justice system.
Create a system that allows for citizen recall of any supervising law enforcement officer.
Require comprehensive bias training for every law enforcement officer, member of the judiciary, and court employee; this includes but is not limited to: the LGBTQ+ community, racial/ethnic minorities, minority religious groups, mental health conditions, people with disabilities, and immigrants. Include stringent requirements for continuing education to respond to the needs of marginalized communities.
End lifetime appointments for judges.
Standardize court practices federally. Consistency in legal procedure and interpretation is the only way to achieve equity in justice.
Federally abolish the capital punishment - this should not be left to the states. Capital punishment is morally wrong, inherently “cruel and unusual”, and historically weaponized against communities of color.
Pay reparations to the descendants of African slaves, fully funded by a wealth tax. This is a deliberate redistribution of historically plundered wealth to the impacted communities from whom it was stolen (who still suffer a massive, totally unaddressed wealth gap.)
Federally fund the creation of Restorative Justice Offices in every state to implement Restorative Justice Best Practices (including accountability metrics, democratic control, and non-carceral policing standards) set forth by the Movement for Black Lives and other impacted communities.
Establish direct-democratic community control of local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, ensuring that communities most harmed by destructive policing have the power to hire and fire officers, determine disciplinary action, control budgets and policies, and subpoena relevant agency information.
Source federal racial justice policy exclusively from impacted communities. We have adopted much of this policy from Campaign Zero (by the Movement for Black Lives) and the rest is derived from direct interaction with racial justice activists.
Demilitarize our police forces so they don’t look and act like invading armies. Invest in community policing. Only when we get officers into the communities, working within neighborhoods before trouble arises, do we develop the relationships necessary to make our communities safer together.
Pay reparations to individuals who were incarcerated or had property seized due to marijuana-related offenses.
Create an independent, transparent, 100% civilian-controlled agency that allows for good officers to report the actions of bad officers without fear of retaliation and provides accountability structures to immediately dis-empower and remove individuals who abuse their power from their positions.
Demand police forces that reflect the diversity of our communities, including in the training academies and leadership.
Federally fund and require body cameras for law enforcement officers to ensure that they’re held accountable for their actions.
Require that body cameras be enabled for the entirety of all law enforcement shifts, and render the cameras impossible for the users to disable.
Require that footage collected by body cameras be made public within 24 hours of any officer-involved shooting.
Require police departments and states to collect data on all shootings and deaths that take place while in police custody, and to make that data public.
Require Police officers to be trained to de-escalate confrontations and humanely interact with people who have mental illnesses.
Restore voting rights to every American who currently cannot vote due to a felony conviction. This includes currently incarcerated persons.
Make Election Day a national holiday to increase voters’ ability to participate.
Enact prepaid vote-by-mail nationwide.
Make no-fault absentee ballots an option for all Americans.
Automatically register every American to vote when they turn 18 or move to a new state. The burden of registering voters should be on the state, not the individual voter.
End discriminatory laws and the purging of minority-community names from voting rolls.
Ensure that there are sufficient polling places and poll workers to prevent long lines from forming at the polls anywhere.
Ban all for-profit prisons, which create incentive to arrest, jail and detain non-violent offenders in order to keep prison beds full.
End the failed “War on Drugs” and eliminate mandatory minimums which result in sentencing disparities between black and white people.
Federally legalize marijuana.
Federally decriminalize all drug use and treat the opioid and methamphetamine epidemics like a public health emergency.
Allow people in states which legalize marijuana like Colorado to be able to fully participate in the banking system and not be subject to federal prosecution for using marijuana.
Investigate local governments that are using implicit or explicit quotas for arrests or stops. Federally ban arrest quotas.
Stop local governments that are relying on fines, fees or asset forfeitures as a steady source of revenue.
Require governments funded by civil asset forfeiture to pay reparations to individuals whose property/assets were unfairly seized by a predatory system of policing.
Protect low-income and minority communities, who are hit worst by the effects of climate change, while also protecting existing energy-sector workers as they transition into clean energy and other jobs.
Require equal enforcement of environmental, civil rights and public health laws across all communities.
Address the inadequate environmental cleanup efforts of ‘Superfund’ hazardous waste sites in communities of color.
Stop the unequal exposure of people of color to harmful chemicals, pesticides and other toxins in homes, schools, neighborhoods and workplaces, and challenge faulty assumptions in calculating, assessing and managing risks. End discriminatory zoning and land-use practices & exclusionary policies.
Federally mandate cleaner manufacturing processes, renewable energy systems, and safe product designs that end pollution and the use of toxic chemicals while providing safe jobs and other economic benefits for people of color.
Federally decriminalize the use of all drugs.
Treat opioid/meth addiction as public health emergencies. Carceral solutions to addiction make the problem worse; addiction is a disease that requires treatment.
Hold pharmaceutical executives accountable for their role in over-producing and over-selling opioid painkillers while minimizing the risks of opioid addiction/overdose.
Release and expunge the records of all individuals incarcerated for nonviolent drug offenses like simple possession.
Void all patents issued for pharmaceuticals; federally prohibit private ownership of healthcare-related intellectual property.
Cover all prescriptions at 100% under Medicare for All. Prescriptions are part of healthcare, and healthcare is a human right.
Pass the TIME Act. While the Fair Labor Standards Act created better wages and working conditions for most Americans, it contained a provision that excluded people with disabilities from its protections, especially the minimum wage. Nearly 80 years later, the law still contains that provision, known as Section 14(c). The Transitioning to Integrated and Meaningful Employment Act, or TIME Act, will phase out Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) over a three year period.
Protect and expand the Social Security Disability Insurance Program (SSDI). Remove barriers to individuals who can’t afford a lawyer to help them apply for SSDI.
Increase employment and educational opportunities for persons with disabilities. In the year 2020, it is unacceptable that over 80 percent of adults with disabilities are unemployed. Fully fund the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and vocational education programs. Expand funding for Aging and Disability Resource Centers (ADRCs), which aim to provide “one-stop shopping” for information on long-term services and support.
Guarantee long-term care at home as a right to all Americans. Nobody should have to leave their home to receive long-term, necessary care. A modern healthcare system preserves the dignity of the people it treats.
Fight for the U.S. ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Establish federal marriage equality for individuals with disabilities.
End all exceptions in wage laws and workplace protections for individuals with disabilities (beyond the reach of the TIME Act). Federally guarantee pay equity to all people, regardless of ability.
Guarantee free, clean, drinkable water as a human right to every person on US soil.
Fund all necessary infrastructure upgrades to deliver this Right to Water in every residence and public building in the United States.
Legalize personal rainwater collection (with reasonable limits to prevent negative impacts to vulnerable watersheds).
Expand and enforce protections for all naturally-occurring bodies of water within the jurisdiction of US federal law, including aquifers and coastal waters.
Direct the US military to completely clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. If we can put a rover on Mars, we can take the plastic out of the ocean.
Prepare all major cities for climate change. This will include redesigning not just coastal cities, but every major metro area to resist specific, model-predicted environmental destabilization based on area.
Pass an aggressive buyback program to replace all gas automobiles with electric cars to solve the “last mile problem” during transition to more advanced transit infrastructure.
Rezone major metropolises, prioritizing mixed high- and medium-density residential development with access to transit, ample green space, and minimum carbon footprint.
Utilize kinetic energy capture technology for walkways in heavy foot traffic areas; populated cities can offset their extremely high energy demand by utilizing this existing kinetic energy, which is otherwise wasted.
Redesign roads to increase safety while maintaining traffic flow via road diets, installation of roundabouts, and machine learning traffic signals.
Invest in further development of tidal capture, wind, and battery storage technology to supplement massive recent strides in solar energy capture.
Aggressively reforest all rural land not designated as “prime farmland” with native flora.
Develop modern, vertical commercial agriculture systems in current agricultural centers to offset farmland loss as a result of reforestation without displacing workers or leaving them unemployed.
Acquire all privately owned golf courses by eminent domain and replant them with native flora. Golf courses have massive negative environmental impact and are extremely resource-intensive with regard to land and water.
Create a comprehensive, zero-emissions, fare-free rail system that services long-distance and local routes. Invest enough in this project that the rail system actually outperforms car travel.
Invest in solar energy and put money back in the pockets of consumers. I will introduce/co-sponsor the house version of the Low Income Solar Act to increase low-income families’ access to solar energy by making it more affordable for people who own their own home and incentivize access to community solar projects.
Pass stringent energy- and footprint-efficiency requirements for all new commercial and residential construction.
Invest in making all existing American homes more energy efficient. For every dollar invested in energy efficiency technologies, like weatherization and efficient light bulbs, energy customers can enjoy up to four dollars in savings.
End “factory farming” of animals. Mass meat production models currently in use have a massive carbon footprint and degrade the environment.
Ban antibiotic use for growth promotion. Antibiotics should be used exclusively to treat illnesses in livestock populations; the dangerous overuse of antibiotics in farming is contributing to the development of “superbugs” that resist treatment.
Void all patents for seed genetics. Food crops are not intellectual property; they’re a human need. Advancements in food science belong to civilization, not shareholders.
Currently, a handful of companies control nearly all of the seed and chemical production required for agriculture; this monopoly must be broken to allow necessary developments in research to advance.
End commercial use of synthetic fertilizer. These fertilizers sterilize the ground and run off into nearby bodies of water, creating toxic algal blooms.
Invest in soil renewal and watershed management. We must revive the soil and water in ecosystems that our “modern” agriculture methods have destroyed.
Eliminate subsidies for monoculture crops. We must diversify our food production, moving away from nitrogen-intensive, low-nutrition feed/food crops like corn to a higher percentage share of nitrogen-fixers (legume crops, alfalfa, and etc.)
Ethanol, while cleaner and cheaper than oil, still releases carbon emissions and pits energy needs against food production in a dangerous way.
Create and fully fund a functional, accountable federal program to house, support, and provide mental health treatment to all individuals impacted by domestic violence, trauma, and partner/child abuse - the SAFER Act (Stop Abuse; Fund Emanicpatory Resources)
Pass federal legislation that allows victims of abuse to exit a lease without financial or credit repercussions.
Mandate and fund testing the entire backlog of rape kits possessed by every law enforcement agency in the US.
Dramatically expand funding to agencies like Child Protective Services, Adult Protective Services, and domestic violence shelters to address the enormous shortfall these critical social services currently face.
Lower the legal threshold for intervention by the state on behalf of abused and neglected children;. The current high burden of proof is more a result of inadequate resources than any scientific understanding of what abuse actually is.
Federally audit enforcement of protections for immigrants who want to leave their engagements/marriages due to abuse so nobody has to choose between an abuser and deportation.
Build 15 million publicly-owned homes over the next 10 years.
Pass a universal Tenants’ Bill of Rights.
Pass federal rent control legislation with zero exemptions.
Pass a federal rent freeze with a sunset clause tied to national homelessness rates.
Federally ban “homestay” rentals, which create artificial scarcity in housing markets with proximity to tourism industry and open loopholes in renter protections.
Ban property tax on primary residences, federally, as part of comprehensive progressive tax legislation. Stop funding education with property taxes.
Repeal the Faircloth Amendment so HUD can build public housing again.
Reinvigorate Federal Housing Programs that build publicly-owned housing for families, for the elderly and for the disabled.
Deliberately expand Fair Housing programs and actively repair the generational damage done by housing discrimination and redlining.
Utilize civil asset forfeiture to acquire the properties of individuals found guilty of housing discrimination and utilize the seized properties for public housing.
We need to provide full funding to all existing project-based rental assistance contracts.
We must increase funding for the housing choice voucher program to target families who need support the most and provide greater economic stability to the more than 3 million households struggling to remain in safe, secure and affordable housing today.
Support First Time Home-buyers. We should expand the Department of Housing and Urban Development and USDA Rural Development assistance programs for first time home-ownership, particularly through down payment assistance and direct guaranteed loans.
Expand Pre-Purchase Housing Counseling. Study after study shows that people who receive counseling before buying a home are more likely to succeed at home-ownership.
Implement Credit Score Reform to repair the damage done to credit scores of millions of families due to foreclosures or other financial hardships from the 2008 housing market crash.
Prevent Predatory Lending. We must require that all mortgage costs are clear, risks are visible, and nothing is buried in fine print.
Protect Homeowner Mortgage Interest Benefits. We need to expand homeowner mortgage interest benefits to the 19 million otherwise eligible homeowners who do not itemize their taxes. We must also close the “second home & yacht loophole”, a cartoonish tax giveaway to the rich.
Reinvigorate HARP, which was designed to assist homeowners who are current on their mortgage payments but owe more than their home is worth, by allowing them to refinance their underwater mortgages at lower interest rates. While the average homeowner saves about $2,500 per year, many people who theoretically qualify don't benefit because of various application barriers and inadequate outreach.
Expand Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling. We need to expand National Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling programs to help underwater homeowners. The best solution is to keep homeowners in their homes.
Nationally adopt Housing First practices. When investing in direct relief for unsheltered persons, all government programs should utilize the Housing First model, which has proven to improve outcomes when compared with mitigation-based approaches to homelessness.