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The liberal resistance to President Donald Trump hasn't managed to capture any new congressional seats for Democrats but it's having a major effect on politics at a more local level.

In Jackson, Miss., progressives elected a candidate last month who promised to make his Deep South town "the most radical city on the planet." In Cincinnati, a liberal favorite earned more support than the incumbent mayor in the first round of voting this spring.

And in Philadelphia, a Black Lives Matter advocate won the Democratic primary in May to be the next district attorney in a city where even Democratic law enforcement officials have traditionally taken a hard line.

"We have a president who any sentient person recognizes is a wannabe dictator," said Larry Krasner, who won the Democratic Party's primary for district attorney in Philadelphia. "That's the kind of thing that can wake you up in the morning, make you lace up your shoes, and go vote. So, yes, I think that had impact."

Indeed, while Trump's election has whipped progressives into a frenzy and driven new activists and big dollars into high-profile federal races for the House and Senate, it's in cities and towns that the vociferous response against the president is transforming politics.

The effect has major implications for the Democratic Party, both in the agenda it pushes and its electoral bench of future candidates for higher office.

Krasner is the crown jewel of liberal success in local elections this year, winning a competitive multi-candidate primary in a city where the winners of Democratic primaries almost always win the general election. The civil rights attorney an open critic of the city's police who is closely aligned with the Black Lives Matter movement is on track to take office just eight years after the retirement of former District Attorney Lynne Abraham, who over the course of nearly two decades in office earned the moniker "Queen of Death" for the frequency with which she sought the death penalty.

Liberals also have had success elsewhere: In Cincinnati, for instance, City Councilwoman Yvette Simpson won 45 percent of the mayoral race vote in May's election, earning more support than even the incumbent mayor. Democracy for America, a nationwide liberal group based in Vermont, endorsed Simpson.

They also scored a major victory in Jackson, Miss., where Chokwe Antar Lumumba became mayor-elect just three years after narrowly losing the mayor's race. Lumumba already has a national presence, after thrilling an audience of several thousand liberals gathered last month at a conference in Chicago, where he vowed to govern not as a calculating centrist but as a progressive champion.

Trump hasn't explicitly been at the forefront of any of these campaigns. But officials involved say the backlash he has elicited has left liberal voters hungry for aggressive candidates who promise big changes.

"In the Age of Trump, the political power of bold progressive visions and the social movements that generate them has increased substantially," said Joe Dinkin, spokesman for the unabashedly liberal Working Families Party.

The Working Families Party endorsed Lumumba, and its Pennsylvania chapter endorsed Krasner.

The national liberal groups involved in these races say they're also focused on even more obscure races than those for mayor or district attorney. Democracy for America, for instance, endorsed a candidate in a Library Board race in a western Chicago suburb, arguing that progressives should seek to press their advantage in every race.

"I don't think there's a position too small to start building progressive power, especially with all the energy you're seeing among progressives this year not just in opposing Trump, but also recognizing how important it is to push for progressive policies like minimum wage to universal health care," said Vivek Kembaiyan, DFA spokesman.

The effect of electing unapologetic liberals to local positions will be consequential immediately Krasner supporters argue that his election literally could mean life or death for some people.

But progressive strategists are also eyeing the long-term effect of putting so many liberal candidates in local office. For a party that often looks to citywide officials as its next generation of leaders, installing progressives now means that future governors, House members and senators share the activists' liberal values.

"Electing the next progressive president or a new generation senator or governor, really that work begins immediately and it begins at the local level, in city council and in mayor's offices and changing the way DAs think about their jobs," Kembaiyan said. "That's what it's going to take."

Liberals have had more success in municipal races even before Trump's election. In New York City, for instance, the election of Bill de Blasio in 2013 was a triumph of a liberal-backed candidate over the party's Democratic establishment.

The movement's ambition grew further still after the unexpectedly competitive presidential campaign of liberal icon Bernie Sanders.

"Bernie's movement expanded people's view of what was possible," Dinkin said. "And the Trump presidency has made people hungrier for a more aggressive vision of change."

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Angered by Trump, liberals are transforming city politics - MyAJC

A man was arrested for telling staffers to Sen. Jeff Flake that liberals will solve their Republican problem by getting "better aim," and made a reference to the shooting at a practice for the congressional baseball game last month.

Jason Samuels, Flake's communications director, told Tuscon News Now a protester was arrested on Thursday morning after making threatening statements to staffers.

"You know how liberals are going to solve the Republican problem? They are going to get better aim," he said. "That last guy tried, but he needed better aim. We will get better aim."

The protester was likely referencing last month's shooting in Alexandria, Virginia.

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., was wounded along with four others at baseball practice in preparation for the annual Congressional Baseball Game. Scalise remains in the intensive care unit at a Washington, D.C., hospital.

Flake, R-Ariz., was one of the first people to tend to Scalise on the field after the gunman, James Hodgkinson, had been subdued by Capitol Police.

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Man arrested outside Jeff Flake's office said liberals will get 'better ... - Washington Examiner

Liberals are aggressively trying to debunk a recent study by the University of Washington that found that Seattle's recent move to a $13-an-hour minimum wage had left the city's low-wage workers much worse off.

The study is potentially a major threat to the national movement for a $15 minimum wage, presenting the first significant evidence that such efforts may be doing more harm than good.

Liberals have criticized the report's methodology, arguing that its findings are out of step with past studies on the minimum wage, although increases to Seattle's current level were unprecedented until recently. Mark Long, co-author of the study, shrugged off such criticisms, saying it was to be expected given the groups' politics.

"The [minimum wage] advocates have been critical because our report makes their job harder," Long, a professor with university's Evans School of Public Policy and Governance, told the Washington Examiner. If the study had found results more to the advocates' liking, they wouldn't be complaining about the methodology, he said.

For $15 minimum wage fans, the report released June 26 as a working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research was a rude shock. It found that the city's increase to $13 an hour in 2016, up from $9.32 in 2013 and part of a planned phase-in to $15 for most employers by 2018, had sharply reduced wealth among low-wage workers because of job losses and reductions in hours worked. Businesses did both to mitigate the sharp increase in labor costs they faced.

"The lost income associated with the hours reductions exceeds the gain associated with the net wage increase of 3.1 percent.... [W]e compute that the average low-wage employee was paid $1,897 per month. The reduction in hours would cost the average employee $179 per month, while the wage increase would recoup only $54 of this loss, leaving a net loss of $125 per month (6.6 percent), which is sizable for a low-wage worker," the study concluded. It found that payrolls for low-wage workers declined by an average 5.8 percent after the $13 rate went into effect, reducing those workers' income by $120 million.

That was before the final $15-an-hour rate is phased in, suggesting the situation for those workers would get even worse. Liberals have been trying to shoot down the results ever since.

"Don't believe the headlines about a flawed minimum wage study. The Seattle economy is booming," tweeted David Rolf, president of SEIU Local 775 and author of "The Fight for $15," on Monday.

Fight for $15, an activist group funded and run by the Service Employees International Union, argued in a web posting that the study was "not credible" because it was "funded by a hedge fund manager's foundation who made a fortune at Enron." The group did not explain any relevance to the university's findings.

The liberal Center for American Progress posted an article called "Five flaws in a new analysis of Seattle's minimum wage," while the liberal Economic Policy Institute published an even lengthier critique. Liberal economists such as Jared Bernstein weighed in as well.

David Cooper, a fellow at the Economic Policy Institute, said the study was too far out of line with what other minimum wage studies had found. He argued that it didn't matter that no other studies had looked at rates as high as $13 because Seattle's increase wasn't that large relative to its prior level. "Because this was only looking at the increase from $11 to $13 in Seattle it is not outside the scope of what has been studied before," Cooper said. He said a study on the Seattle minimum wage released last week by the University of California, Berkeley, which showed no ill effects from the increase, was more credible because it was in line with earlier studies.

Other critiques noted that the University of Washington study was not peer-reviewed, didn't include data from "multi-site" employers such as chain restaurants, and had some unusual results, such as finding increases in employment for those earning more than $19 an hour.

That's all nonsense, argued Ryan Bourne, an economist with the free-market Cato Institute think tank. The University of Washington study "is one of the only robust papers we have had on this level of the minimum wage in the U.S." The different results from prior studies suggests those reports missed important effects. "The critics have this completely back to front," Bourne said.

Long said the multi-site employers weren't included because their wage and hour data wasn't available. The researchers compensated by conducting a separate survey of those employers. "What we found was that the multi-site employers were more likely to relocate or shift their work capital. That suggests we are, if anything, underestimating the impact" of the $13 rate on employer cutbacks, he said.

It is true that the paper had not been peer-reviewed but it is undergoing the process now, he said. That's why it was released as a working paper through the National Bureau of Economic Research: so the authors could get feedback from fellow economists. Thus far, the reactions from academics and researchers has been highly positive, Long says. The loudest complaints have come from the biggest advocates of a $15 rate.

Originally posted here:
Liberals try to refute Seattle minimum wage study - Washington Examiner

Deutsche Welle

India: Liberals rise up against nationalism Deutsche Welle A recent mob attack on a train in India left a 15-year-old Muslim youth dead, presumably for carrying beef. The incident has prompted liberal Indians to brave criticism and raise their voices against so-called cow vigilantes and Hindu nationalists. and more »

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India: Liberals rise up against nationalism - Deutsche Welle

TheSpec.com

Liberals spell out rules on infrastructure cash TheSpec.com OTTAWA Provinces and territories that want a slice of new federal infrastructure money will have to prove it will accelerate economic growth. This is the demand under terms laid out by the Liberals for the government's long-term funding program ... and more »

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Liberals spell out rules on infrastructure cash - TheSpec.com