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Ellison, a prominent ally of Bernie Sanders during both of the Vermont senators presidential bids, has received accolades from both flanks of the Democratic Party for his role in Chauvins trial. Neera Tanden, president of the Center for American Progress and a longtime critic of Sanders, tweeted that she is so grateful that Ellison was in charge of the case. Progressives such as Justice Democrats spokesperson Waleed Shahid praised his leadership. Rev. Jesse Jackson, the civil rights leader, also singled out Ellison for his role.

He is a living example of how the states top law enforcement should not only react to a crime, but also assemble the evidence and facts, said Donna Brazile, the former chair of the DNC. He has been phenomenal. Theres no other way to describe it. He filled a void. He provided steady leadership.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz announced last May that Ellison would be at the helm of prosecuting Chauvin a decision that came in the wake of Floyds family members, activists and lawmakers voicing concerns about the local prosecutor who had been leading the case until then.

Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman had been managing it and would have been in charge of the prosecution, but that changed after 10 state representatives sent a letter to Walz saying they and particularly their Black constituents no longer trusted Freemans ability to impartially investigate and prosecute the case.

Ellison, on the other hand, was a more natural fit. A former state legislator, he was Minnesotas first Black member of Congress and the first-ever Muslim elected to Congress, where he represented a Minneapolis-based district for over a decade. Early in his career, he worked for 16 years in civil rights law five of them as the head of the Legal Rights Center, a Minnesota firm that promotes racial and social justice. As a law school student, he led a protest against police brutality and the failure to charge transgressing officers in Minneapolis. He also has been singled out by cops in his own life, he said, because he is Black.

He was the right person for this moment. Him and his team, they changed the course of history, said Nina Turner, Sanders former campaign co-chair who worked with Ellison during the senators presidential bids. Hes very down-to-earth, very committed, very focused but also warm. With all of his intellect and skills that he has, he is a Black man in America and he understood from lived experiences the historic import, too.

In an interview, Jackson called Ellison tough and said he has the capacity to relate to all people, and give them a comfort level.

Yet Ellisons record has also attracted criticism. Minneapolis Police Lt. Bob Kroll, president of the local Police Officers Federation, said in 2018 when Ellison was running for attorney general that Keith Ellison has a long history, and its a negative history, with the Minneapolis Police Department I dont wholeheartedly believe that [he respects law enforcement]. I think hes got a different agenda that, quite frankly, is anti-law enforcement.

The same year, Ellisons ex-girlfriend posted allegations of domestic abuse on social media. He denied the allegations, which came near the height of the #MeToo movement and nearly derailed his campaign. Ellison defeated his GOP opponent, Doug Wardlow, by 4 percentage points in 2018, the smallest margin of any statewide Democrat on the ballot that year.

Ellisons reputation as an unabashed progressive was highlighted when he ran for DNC chair in 2017 he was endorsed by Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. He ultimately lost the race, a blow to the liberal wing of the Democratic Party as a whole.

Despite Ellisons 2018 victory and current momentum, his future political options are somewhat limited. Walz, a Democrat, is in his first term after winning by 11 points in 2018 and has broken fundraising records in advance of the 2022 gubernatorial election. And given the hits the governor has taken from progressives over his handling of criminal justice, Ellison actually did Walz a favor by securing the conviction of Chauvin.

Minnesotas senators, Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith, are also incumbent Democrats and by Senate standards, fairly young.

A spokesperson for Ellison declined to comment for this story.

He can become a transformative figure, and I think he has the capacity for many great things, said James Zogby, a DNC member who served with Ellison on the national partys platform drafting committee in 2016, Hed be a great senator, a great governor whatever Keith Ellison feels hes ready to do, hell be good at it.

Even if opportunities to advance his career are limited in the near-term, the rise of Black Lives Matter and the widespread belief that the countrys criminal justice system is flawed has elevated the role of attorneys general and district attorneys, giving Ellison a national platform going forward.

The best use of [Ellisons] talent is right where he is right now, said Turner, though she added that doesnt mean he wont go other places.

Next year, Ellison is up for reelection as attorney general. Wardlow, a former state representative whos been working as general counsel for MyPillow, the bedding company owned by Donald Trump ally Mike Lindell, announced in February he is running again.

On Tuesday, Ellison said he would not call the verdict in Chauvins case justice.

Because justice implies true restoration, he said. But it is accountability, which is the first step towards justice. And now the cause of justice is in your hands. And when I say your hands, I mean the hands of the people of the United States.

Link:
Progressives swoon over Ellison role in Chauvin trial - POLITICO

(EPA)

As Joe Biden prepares to lay out his sweeping economic agenda, including massive investments in childcare and education, Bernie Sanders is capitalising on the presidents ambitions to urge support for even larger investments in childcare and education, as well as renewing his signature push to expand federal healthcare coverage.

The presidents first primetime address to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday will begin the process of dealing with the structural problems facing this country, the progressive Vermont senator said in a video posted to social media.

Mr Bidens plan would provide universal preschool for millions of three- and four-year-old children, provide for two years of tuition-free community college enrolment, and build funding for childcare and federal paid family and medical leave, among other proposals.

The senator said the US needs to move aggressively to combat the nations high rates of child poverty and bridge disparities in childcare and education.

It is insane that hundreds of thousands of bright young kids cannot afford tuition costs, or end up leaving school before graduation so deeply in debt that theyre paying off that debt for decades, he said. That is pretty crazy stuff.

He also urged Congress and the administration to summon the courage to take on the healthcare industry, the pharmaceutical industry to lower the cost of health insurance and prescription medicine.

I would hope that right now in this session what we can begin the process is expanding Medicare, he said.

The senator supports a nationalised health insurance system through a Medicare For All proposal by expanding the federal healthcare programme for elderly Americans to everyone, rather than through private for-profit insurance networks.

In this legislative session, he is joining calls to lower the age of Medicare eligibility from 65 to 55, which could open the plan to 40 million more Americans. A growing number of congressional Democrats have also urged the White House to expand eligibility.

Story continues

Democrats have also called on the administration to expand Medicare benefits to cover dental, vision and hearing benefits by negotiating with pharmaceutical companies to lower the price of prescription drugs, which would save the programme $450bn and increase revenues by $45bn over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

On Wednesday, a study commissioned by Mr Sanders revealed that Americans pay two to four times more for prescription medicine compared to other wealthy countries.

The senator, and Progressive Caucus chair Pramila Jayapal, have also proposed the College for All Act, which would grant tuition-free community college for all students, and allow students from families earning under $125,000 to enrol in public colleges and universities tuition-free and debt-free.

Senator Elizabeth Warren and US Rep Mondaire Jones have also proposed the Universal Child Care and Early Learning Act, a $700bn plan to establish a network of childcare centres across the US in partnership with state and local governments and school districts.

The proposal aims to fix our broken child care system and ensure that women and families are not left behind in our recovery, she said in a statement. Expanding quality childcare would create jobs, increase productivity, and have lifelong benefits for childrens development and growth.

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Bernie Sanders video rallies progressives ahead of Bidens speech to Congress - Yahoo News

Progressive Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota is reintroducing three policing bills she hopes will be incorporated into the bipartisan package lawmakers have been fine-tuning for weeks as pressure mounts on Congress to pass meaningful legislation that will impose new police practices across the country.

All three bills were first introduced in the last Congress, but their reintroduction now underscores the pressure that the left continues to place on police legislation negotiations. Given their narrow majority in the House, Democrats can lose only a handful of votes and still pass legislation through the chamber, meaning any widespread opposition from progressives could spell trouble for the bill.

The most significant legislation Omar is reintroducing would establish an independent federal agency to investigate deaths that happened under police custody, officer-involved shootings and uses of force that resulted in severe bodily injury. The board would be composed of eight members appointed by the President and at the advice and consent of the Senate.

Were in the midst of a national reckoning that recognizes our history of systematic racism and we need to have systemwide reforms, Omar said in an interview with CNN. History shows that the criminal justice system is not equipped to prosecute itself.

Speaking about the role the federal agency would play, Omar added, Its really important that we recognize there is a need for a separate agency to investigate police use of force in an unbiased manner.

A member of The Squad, Omar is also seeking to make it a federal crime for an officer to kill or cause bodily harm to a civilian during a protest and to introduce a resolution that calls on Congress to stand with peaceful protesters as instances of police brutality continue.

Omars new legislation, which she views as important additions to the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which already passed the House, comes as a bipartisan group of lawmakers are trying in earnest to find a compromise on police reform.

Democratic Rep. Karen Bass of California, Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina and Democratic Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey have huddled repeatedly on Capitol Hill to try to find a compromise bill that responds to the public pressure for Congress to get something done on this issue, and Omar hopes Bass will incorporate her legislation into the final package.

Weve been in constant conversations with Karen Bass office as Congress negotiates a broad criminal justice package, and I hope these ideas can be included in the final package, Omar said, adding that she has full confidence in Bass ability to negotiate a deal that will have widespread support. We have really clear indications that this is something people are interested in. Were going to continue to push for it and make the case for it.

A key potential concession to emerge out of these talks is a proposal floated by Scott where accountability, or qualified immunity, would be taken off of individual police officers and placed instead on entire police departments.

Progressives immediately shot that idea down.

No, progressive Freshman Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York told CNN, when asked about the compromise. Individual police officers absolutely should be held accountable.

Rep. Cori Bush told CNNs Abby Phillip on Inside Politics that she would refuse to vote for new policing reform legislation that compromised on qualified immunity.

We compromise on so much. You know, we compromise, we die. We compromise, we die, the Missouri Democrat said on Sunday. I didnt come to Congress to compromise on what could keep us alive. If you dont hurt people, if you dont kill people, if you are just and fair in your work, then do you need the qualified immunity anyway?

Omar herself told CNN, I cant imagine supporting a piece of legislation that doesnt include that.

Speaking more broadly about why progressives would be against taking accountability away from individual police officers, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York told CNN, When you have that broader shift these departments dont get held accountable.

And, when theres no person, whether its a chief, or whether its an officer themselves or their supervisor, then it basically starts devolving into the system that we have now, the progressive lawmaker added.

Addressing how the outcome of the Derek Chauvin trial should inform the kind of legislation on police reform that is needed, where the officer who committed the crime was tried and found guilty, Ocasio-Cortez said, We shouldnt water down legislation to avoid that kind of accountability.

Ocasio-Cortez, whos also a member of The Squad, warned against lawmakers passing legislation just to satisfy the outside pressure being felt since the Chauvin trial concluded.

I think one of the worst outcomes is that people pass a bill, pat themselves on the back for passing a bill, but if that bill doesnt actually change our existing systems, then its just people giving themselves an excuse to say that they did something when they didnt actually, Ocasio-Cortez said, adding that getting into the substance of the proposals should be the priority because the details really do matter.

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First to CNN: Ilhan Omar reintroduces policing legislation as progressives eye ongoing bipartisan talks - KTVZ

The U.S. is in the middle of an ideological paradigm shift. After decades in the political wilderness, progressives now dominate culture and are poised to dominate economic policy as well. To some, this represents a terrifying prospect. But alternating ideological programs are an important part of how nations advance; the progressives need to have their serve.

President Joe Bidens economic program is the most strongly progressive agenda that any president has pursued since Lyndon Johnsons Great Society in 1964. It would transform welfare benefits, spend large amounts on infrastructure, science, education, housing and the environment, transform U.S. trade and industrial policy, and make big efforts toward racial equity. If his agenda passes in anything like the forms being currently proposed, it will alter the entire shape of the U.S. economy. And that will come on top of the cultural dominance that progressives have increasingly enjoyed for a decade.

The ascendancy of progressivism is naturally generating dismay among conservatives. The danger is that theyll respond by using un-democratic means to try to halt the Biden Revolution in its tracks. That could include even more severe gerrymandering, electioneering or even further political violence like the Jan. 6 insurrection. Even if violence doesnt erupt again, conservatives could turn to unhelpful ideas like the so-called Great Replacement theory the belief that Americas political and social changes are being caused by immigration. That idea is already leading Republicans to endorse immigration restrictions that would deeply wound our economy.

Such fiery, last-ditch resistance isnt warranted. Ideological resurgences like this are reasonably common in U.S. history. It happened in 1933 with the start of the New Deal, and again in 1981 with the Reagan Revolution. Each of those programs started out addressing the problems of the day, and ended up overreaching, opening space for renewed victories by the opposing party.

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The New Deal, despite its early missteps, ended up creating enduring progressive institutions that transformed American society for the better. Social Security, modern labor law, unemployment benefits and banking regulation were among the programs biggest successes. These were followed by Johnsons Great Society programs, which were effective in reducing poverty.

But by the 1970s, cracks in the Democrats approach were beginning to show. High inflation and slow growth during that decade prompted a move toward tax cuts, tight money, deregulation and the addition of stringent work requirements to the welfare system. That backlash eventually congealed into Ronald Reagans market-centric economic program, which also added elements like free trade and a labor approach less favorable to unions.

That market-centric program which was deepened and extended by Bill Clinton seemed to deliver robust income growth in the 1980s and 1990s. But by the 2000s, it, too, had clearly overreached. George Bushs tax cuts failed to stimulate business investment while they increased government deficits more than supply-side economists had predicted. Productivity growth, which ought to be unleashed by deregulation, fell after 2004. Wage growth, which should theoretically have gotten a boost from both tax cuts and deregulation, ticked up in the 90s but never attained the levels of the postwar boom.

Then in 2008, the financial crisis and the subsequent Great Recession demonstrated very clearly and painfully that deregulation had been taken too far. Meanwhile, the Reagan program was unable to address other problems in the economy, such as the rise of inequality.

In other words, Reaganomics started out as an attempt to address the problems of its time, but it eventually overreached. The same will undoubtedly happen to Bidenomics someday, if it isnt strangled in its crib.

Its not yet clear what form that overreach will take. Perhaps excessive enthusiasm for government-directed construction will lead to expensive boondoggle projects. Or high debt and deficits will eventually lead to rising inflation. New industrial policies might lead to misallocation of resources toward dead-end technologies, as sometimes happens even in the most skillfully managed systems. Or perhaps welfare benefits will eventually become so excessive that they start discouraging work on a large scale.

All of these future overreaches are easy to imagine, but they havent happened yet. And if Republicans manage to halt the Biden program by making use of the inequities of our electoral system, veto points in the legislature, and even threats of violence, it will be badly premature. Bidenomics needs to take its swing it needs a chance to solve the problems of today, even if it ends up being inadequate to the problems that crop up 40 years from now.

So Republicans should adopt the attitude that my colleagues Michael Strain and Karl Smith have taken in their criticisms of the Biden agenda: to warn of pitfalls and dangers without waxing apocalyptic. Conservatives need to be the loyal opposition to criticize the progressive program and slowly prepare their own comeback. Because that comeback will arrive someday; the right will get its turn at the serve again.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

To contact the author of this story:Noah Smith at nsmith150@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story:Susan Warren at susanwarren@bloomberg.net

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Biden's Progressive Agenda Isn't the Apocalypse; It's a Cycle - Bloomberg

Environmental justice concerns have been at the forefront in discussions of U.S. environmental policy. They have been central, in particular, to discussions of proposals for a nationwide carbon tax to address climate change. While economists tend to favor a carbon tax as the most cost-effective way to promote reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases, progressives and EJ groups often oppose this option on the grounds that it is regressive that it would disproportionately burden low-income households.

Our own research, conducted independently, finds that this claim is unfounded. We find that a carbon tax is inherently progressive, narrowing the income gap between rich and poor households. Beyond that, we find that it can potentially raisereal incomes of low-income households.

It is true that one outcome of a carbon tax works toward regressivity. A carbon tax would lead to higher prices of goods and services, especially those that are carbon-intensive (e.g., electricity and gasoline). There is ample evidence that low-income households spend a disproportionate share of income on these carbon-intensive goods and services; as a result, the higher prices from a carbon tax tend to have a regressive impact.

If this were the whole story, the carbon taxs overall impact would indeed be regressive.

However, several other features of a carbon tax make it progressive. As some have noted, a carbon taxs revenue can be returned to households in ways that promote progressivity. TheClimate Leadership Councils carbon dividend approach, in which the revenues are recycled in the form of a dividend check of the same amount to every U.S. household, would significantly work toward progressivity.

While this form of revenue-recycling may have many attractions, we find that such targeting is not needed to make the carbon tax progressive. Our work shows that a carbon tax isinherentlyprogressive a feature that has been overlooked in policy discussions. The carbon taxs inherent progressivity gives policy makers more options in policy design they can consider devoting some or all of the revenues to other purposes (such as providing compensation to displaced workers, or financing investments in infrastructure) while maintaining progressivity.

The inherent progressivity stems from other economic responses to the tax.

First, transfer programs in the United States, including Social Security and food assistance from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), are partially or fully indexed for inflation. Lower income households, who rely more heavily on payments from these programs, are more protected from the higher prices of carbon-intensive goods and services.

Second, while much of the cost of a carbon tax is passed through to consumers, a significant fraction of the cost would be borne by owners of capital (i.e., shareholders). Thats because the industries most likely to be affected by a carbon tax are highly capital-intensive. This effect on capital returns is progressive since shareholders tend to have higher incomes.

The two responses above are sufficient to bring about an overall progressive impact.

A third outcome, environmental in nature, would augment the progressivity. In addition to reducing emissions of carbon dioxide (the main objective of the policy), a carbon tax would lower emissions of several local air pollutants correlated with CO2. The associated health benefits are likely to be especially important for low-income households another progressive impact.

Meanwhile, alternatives to the carbon tax, including regulation and tax subsidies, aremuch less progressive and dont provide benefits to minority and low-income households in the same way that a well-designed carbon tax could.

Beyond the dimension of progressivity, the carbon tax has further attractions related to fairness. While progressivity focuses on the relative burdens to low- versus high-income households, theabsoluteimpact on income is an important ethical consideration. A 2017 U.S. Treasurystudy estimated that households in each of the lowest seven income deciles would on average experience an increase in overall income if the CLCs revenue-recycling approach were adopted.

Claims that a carbon tax is regressive are simply incorrect. They stem from a narrow focus on just one of the several important channels through which a carbon tax affects people. A more comprehensive assessment reveals that it is progressive and can enhance the quality of life of individuals across the income spectrum.

Gilbert Metcalf is the John DiBiaggio Professor of Economics at Tufts University. He was the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Environment and Energy at the U.S. Department of the Treasury in 2011 and 2012.Follow him on Twitter @GibMetcalf

Lawrence Goulder is the Shuzo Nishihara Professor of Environmental and Resource Economics at Stanford University. He has served on several scientific advisory committees to the U.S. and California environmental protection agencies.

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Economists: A US carbon tax would be progressive | TheHill - The Hill