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Democracy for America has endorsed Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), its first endorsement of a House incumbent for the midterm cycle.

In a release provided first to The Hill, Democracy for America (DFA) commended Gallego for consistently standing up to President Trump since Trump's November election and praised him for leading the efforts against Trumps hateful agenda.

Gallego isnt considered vulnerable in 2018. DFA plans to make additional endorsements in support of House challengers later this week.

We need more progressives like Ruben Gallego who are not afraid of taking a stand on their principles, especially when they are doing so alone. Progressives lawmakers have a special responsibility for leadership that sometimes involves dragging their colleagues out of the establishment way of thinking that can envelope them in Washington.

The group, which was founded in 2004 by former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean (D), has already been active in House campaigns this cycle and endorsed in almost all of the special elections this year with the exception of Democrat Archie Parnell, a former Goldman Sachs senior adviser who ran in South Carolinas open seat race.

DFA backed the Democratic nominees in Georgia, Montana and Kansas, which were special elections held to replace Trump Cabinet nominees. The group also backed Democrat Jimmy Gomez to fill the House seat vacated by now-California Attorney General Xavier BecerraXavier BecerraMajor progressive group rolls out first incumbent House endorsement California restricts state travel to Texas, other states over LGBT laws Gingrich: Media was right, special elections were a referendum MORE. Gomez was the only Democrat to win one of this year's five special elections.

Democrats are looking to flip 24 seats to regain control of the House majority, a tough feat even in a cycle when the party of the president historically loses seats in midterm years. The party was dealt a blow after a disappointing loss in the closely watched Georgia race, but national Democrats believe that the House is in play next year.

DFA has also gotten involved in Senate campaigns and announced its first slate of Senate endorsements earlier this year, backing Sens. Tammy BaldwinTammy BaldwinMajor progressive group rolls out first incumbent House endorsement Dems push for more action on power grid cybersecurity Overnight Regulation: Labor groups fear rollback of Obama worker protection rule | Trump regs czar advances in Senate | New FCC enforcement chief MORE (D-Wis.), Sherrod BrownSherrod BrownMajor progressive group rolls out first incumbent House endorsement Dems push for more action on power grid cybersecurity Senate Banking panel huddles with regulators on bank relief MORE (D-Ohio), Bernie SandersBernie SandersSanders: GOP healthcare bill 'barbaric and immoral' Sanders dodges question on FBI investigation into his wife Major progressive group rolls out first incumbent House endorsement MORE (I-Vt.) and Elizabeth WarrenElizabeth WarrenSenate Dems step up protests ahead of ObamaCare repeal vote Major progressive group rolls out first incumbent House endorsement Speaker Ryan, the fate of our policy toward Russia rests in your hands MORE (D-Mass.).

Baldwin and Brown face tough reelection races in states that Trump carried in 2016. Sanders and Warren are expected to easily win new six-year terms next year.

Democrats have a much tougher Senate map in 2018. They need to defend 25 seats, while Republicans need to only protect eight seats.

Ten of the seats Democrats must defend are in states carried by Trump. Trump carried Ohio by 8 points and delivered an even bigger surprise by winning Wisconsin, which hadnt gone red since the 1984 election.

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Major progressive group rolls out first incumbent House endorsement - The Hill

Moments after rightwing Republican Karen Handel won Americas costliest congressional race ever in Georgias sixth district, the de rigueur post-election quarrelling erupted: Why did Democrat Jon Ossoff lose, and what does it mean for the Democrats and American politics?

Many on the left bemoaned the defeat as yet another sign that the Democratic Party refuses to wake up to the populist moment.

Longtime sixth-district resident and scholar Billy Michael Honor nailed it in Huffington Post, observing that Ossoffs comfortably centrist and noncommittal message lacked any compelling progressive vision for the future. It also lacked any way to substantively convince the average politically uninterested citizen why they should give a damn about the Democratic Party. The message simply says, vote for us, we wont be as bad as the other group.

There is no evidence that a progressive populist would have fared better than Ossoff, who came closer than any recent Democrat to winning the solidly Republican district. But that doesnt mean the Democratic Party shouldnt be running bold unapologetic progressives in every district, win or lose, to shift the electorate and help mobilize a massive grassroots movement.

Beyond the particulars of the Ossoff race and the politics of Georgias 6th district, theres a deeper reason why this wont happen.

Its not that the Democratic Party cant wake up to Americans surging support for a bold challenge to the corporate stranglehold over our economy and politics. Its that it wont.

The Ossoff loss isnt the clearest illustration of the Democrats addiction to centrism and neoliberalismone could argue his brand of politics, like it or not, was a close fit for the center-right district. Still, what happened in Georgia is yet another blaring signal of the partys endemic refusal to embrace progressive populism. Its not that the Democratic Party cant wake up to Americans surging support for a bold challenge to the corporate stranglehold over our economy and politics. Its that it wont.

The Democratic Party leadership remains hopelessly bound to corporate power and profits. This fatal yet indefatigable marriage goes beyond the most obvious layer of corporate PACs and lobbyistsit spans the neoliberal agenda itself.

To become a true party of the people that stands courageously and consistently for workers, unions, low-income communities of all colors, and our ecological future, the Democratic Party must divorce itself not only from corporate cash, but from its deeper enmeshment with corporate power.

The dynamics that propelled the Trump nightmare and that plague a Democratic Party revival are deep-seated. When Trump stumbled his way into the White House, many commentators pronounced the death of neoliberalism and the corporate centrism that defined Hillary Clinton. Yet under Trump, corporate interests and the evisceration of the public sector are of course powering on full-throttle, deepening the alienated anger and dispossessionand the racism, immigrant-scapegoating and xenophobiathat helped enable Trump.

As Cornel West assessed shortly after the November 8 election, This lethal fusion of economic insecurity and cultural scapegoating brought neoliberalism to its knees. In short, the abysmal failure of the Democratic Party to speak to the arrested mobility and escalating poverty of working people unleashed a hate-filled populism and protectionism that threaten to tear apart the fragile fiber of what is left of U.S. democracy.

From Jimmy Carter to Bill Clinton to Barack Obama, the Democrats have helped pave the path for their own demise by failing to challenge the corporate power interests. These interests, along with Republican corporate allegiances, preclude the kind of change that workers, low-income people, immigrants and communities of color urgently need.

From Carter to Clinton to Obama, the Democrats have paved the path for their own demise by failing to challenge the corporate power interests.

This doesnt mean the Democrats dont deliver some changes that benefit these communities. But the partys entrenched corporate allegiances preclude delivering the kind of changesuch as universal single-payer health care, a true living wage, muscular union protections, and redistributing wealth and profits back into communitiesthat would uplift peoples lives and mobilize people to the polls.

In short, the Democratic Partys marriage with corporate interestseven if testy and stressed at times, like any marriagemeans that a bold progressive shift is not about waking up, but about breaking up.

With the 2018 midterms now looming, progressives face the same-old maddening choice of either pushing the Democratic Party to prioritize human and environmental needs over corporate interests, or building an alternative party movement.

Another path, Dave Lindorff argued recently in Counterpunch, would follow the model of the Civil Rights Movement and build a movement on the streets and in local communities that presents the political establishment with the untenable prospect of ongoing mass militant opposition to which it has to respond.

For the Democrats to be a true opposition party, Lindorff wrote, the party would have to be thoroughly deconstructed and rebuilt. The millionaire-packed Democratic National Committee leadershipthe lobbyists, the elected officials and the well-heeled donorswould have to be tossed out entirely, and replaced by genuine progressives, labor activists, environmentalists, representatives of various minority groups and (gasp!) socialists.

There are promising signs of a resurgent democratic socialism, particularly among millennials. Groups like the Democratic Socialists of America have soared in the months since the election. And the array of anti-Trump efforts, even if scattered, at least evidences a sizable mass of people ready to fight, and keep fighting.

Ultimately, however, these movements need a political home both in and out of the voting booth. And until they build one (either a new party or a potent pressure movement that can force the Democrats leftward), the Democratic Party is the only electoral game in town.

In this long, slow march, the first step is to stop expecting the Democratic Party to wake up and run candidates who challenge the very interests that undergirdand in fact inhabitthe partys infrastructure and identity.

The sooner progressives and the left embrace that reality, the better. The only way were going to get either a truly progressive Democratic Party or a viable alternative to it, is to name the fundamental problem. The party wont change until it is forced to divorce itself from corporate power and the neoliberal agendaa marriage that harms both the party and the public.

Christopher D. Cook is an award-winning journalist who writes for Harpers, The Atlantic, the Los Angeles Times, Mother Jones and others. He is the author of Diet for a Dead Planet: Big Business and the Coming Food Crisis, and a contributing writer for The Progressive. Visit him at http://www.christopherdcook.com.

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Why the Democrats Won't Wake Up - Progressive.org

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Harvard Progressives Are Sly Wall Street Journal (subscription) Harvard Progressives Are Sly. A conservative dean at any American law school is worth noting. What is surprising, however, is that there are not more. June 25, 2017 12:35 p.m. ET. Save Article. Sign In to Save Subscribe to WSJ. Text Size. Small. Medium.

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Harvard Progressives Are Sly - Wall Street Journal (subscription)

Progressive is the most popular buzzword in big-city Democratic politics in these times when a socialist came close to winning the partys nomination for president.

And Chicagos left-leaning activists could be as good at resisting the right-winger in the White House as anybody in the country.

Often, though, it looks like progressives aint ready to join together and play power politics.

A prime example is Cook County Clerk David Orrs announcement that he would not run again after completing his term next year.

OPINION

For many months, the word among progressives was that Orr would step down in the middle of his term, clearing the way for County Commissioner Jesus Chuy Garcia to replace him and get a jump on the 2018 election. Orr had supported Garcias mayoral challenge from the left in 2015, which forced Rahm Emanuel into an embarrassing runoff election.

In the end, Orr gave Garcia little notice when he was finally ready to make his big announcement Wednesday, on the eve of the county Democratic Partys slate-making session. Meanwhile, the very un-progressive county recorder of deeds, Karen Yarbrough, has maneuvered into pole position for the job-rich clerks office.

Looking at her offices history of patronage hiring allegations, its safe to say Yarbrough is no progressive. As vice chair of the state Democratic Party, shes very close to Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.

In the wake of this mess, one left-leaning Chicago politician grumbled that uniting his fellow progressives was as difficult as herding blind cats with no sense of smell.

A blind cat can at least smell its way to its food, the progressive pol said.

But Garcia says he doesnt want to be clerk after all and may place a much bigger and more important target the mayors office in his sights again.

It doesnt make my blood circulate thinking what kind of clerk I could be, Garcia told me Friday.

He confirms that he had discussions with Orr beginning about a year ago in which the clerk told him he might resign early.

As it turned out, Garcia said, he got a call from Orr informing him of his announcement only the night before the clerk publicly revealed he would complete his term and then call it quits.

Davids announcement came up pretty suddenly, Garcia said.

After thinking about the clerks job for a couple days, Garcia said, It doesnt move my spirit.

Comments by Garcias current boss, county Board President Toni Preckwinkle, foreshadowed his pivot.

Chuy Garcia is the floor leader of mine, Preckwinkle said on WTTW-Channel 11s Chicago Tonight on Thursday. I hold him in very high regard. Im not sure what hes going to decide to do. Ive heard rumors he has other interests as well.

Like running for mayor? asked the interviewer, Paris Schutz.

He has other interests as well, Preckwinkle repeated, circumspect as ever.

Garcia laughed when I read that line back to him.

Thats classic Toni, he said.

But Garcia didnt hesitate to say, Ive been seriously looking at taking another run [at the mayors office] in 2019.

How would a 2019 effort succeed where the last run came up short?

Many who didnt support me have expressed buyers remorse, Garcia said. Theres a lot of remorse, particularly in the African-American community.

Pointing to violent crime and to the bleak financial outlook of city government and Chicago Public Schools, Garcia said, I think the city is not better off than we were two years ago.

Still, he would not commit to running for mayor because, he said, it would be the toughest task facing any mayor in 35 years.

The challenges for somebody seeking to move the city in a different direction are very serious, Garcia said.

And before he could try to herd the whole city onto a new path, he would have to find a way to get Chicagos progressives to move in the same direction.

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Can progressive politicians pull in the same direction? - Chicago Sun-Times

Democrat Jon Ossoffs loss in the Georgia special congressional election has demoralized progressives who hoped it would signal an anti-Trump wave that could turn the House from red to blue in 2018.

The left is fractured, with disagreements between the Bernie and Hillary wings of the Democratic Party threatening to undercut its ability to turn out the base, appeal to independents and win over disillusioned GOP voters. The question remains whether the so-called resistance can transform itself from a throng of angry voices into a majority capable of creating lasting progressive change.

As activists take up this challenge, they should study the playbook of one of the most successful social justice movements in history: the fight for LGBTQ equality. In short order, our movement beat back the AIDS epidemic, ended sodomy bans, won access to military service and marriage and ultimately more than doubled public approval of gay identity.

There were several keys to the movements victories. But one lesson in particular applies to todays deeply divided politics: Success came when LGBTQ advocates learned to speak the language of those they most needed to enlist rather than those who already agreed with them.

Striving to see our cause through the eyes of folks we didnt know well, who were indifferent and sometimes actively opposed to our goals, meant adopting a principle from the world of social work: Changing peoples hearts and minds requires meeting them where they are. To some, framing our goals in terms aimed at more conservative audiences was tantamount to selling out. Yet we learned that such pragmatism could achieve more and more durable social change than ideological purity.

The battle for marriage equality is a case in point. For years, LGBTQ activists, who were largely (but not exclusively) creatures of the left, avoided making marriage a priority. Many considered it conformist, even retrograde, at odds with the most radical, passionately held ideals of gay liberation.

When activists did include marriage on their agenda, they tended to speak of it in legalistic terms that stressed entitlement to equal rights; they emphasized the deprivations lack of insurance and tax benefits, for instance associated with being denied a license to wed. Those tactics werent ineffective; they helped create domestic partnership protections in many towns and states, and by 2004 notched one all-out victory: Same-sex couples gained the right to wed in Massachusetts in a state Supreme Court decision.

Yet social conservatives were stirring a backlash and also racking up wins, proactively passing same-sex marriage bans in dozens of states. As troubling, public approval of marriage equality, which had been rising throughout the 1990s, plateaued at around 34% in 2000. LGBTQ advocates had the support of staunch liberals, but they were failing to win over the next batch of supporters needed to build a majority coalition: the moderates of the moveable middle.

So marriage advocates scrutinized their message. Backed by donors dedicated to winning the battle, gay rights organizations hired pollsters to conduct focus groups of moderate liberals and conservatives who supported gay rights but not gay marriage. The results hit strategists like lightning. When straight people were asked why they cared about marriage, they mentioned love, commitment and family; yet they thought gay people wanted to marry for different reasons: the rights and benefits. The moveable middle wasnt moving because its members didnt recognize same-sex couples wish to wed as similar to their own.

In response, several gay groups created new campaigns that framed the issue in starkly personal terms. What if you couldnt marry the person you love? asked one ad field-tested in Santa Barbara to counter Californias infamous Proposition 8. Although most Southern Californians voted in favor of the anti-gay-marriage ballot measure, in Santa Barbara County it lost by 10 points.

We quit talking about legal benefits, talking from the head, said Tim Sweeney, a longtime gay activist. Instead, the marriage equality battle would turn on core values. The trick was to appeal to human empathy rather than to merely emphasize demands or appear to be subversive.

By 2011, a slim majority of Americans were telling pollsters they supported same-sex marriage. It was no coincidence when, the next year, President Obama announced his support as well. When he did, he adopted the movements language of common values, saying that incredibly committed monogamous same-sex relationships among White House staffers had changed his mind. Likewise, three years later, when Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy penned his majority opinion in Obergefell vs. Hodges, he referenced the emotional resonance of marriage, citing its nobility and worthiness, in guaranteeing it to same-sex couples. Marriage equality, now supported by 60% of Americans, was the law of the land.

Some on todays left act as though the only way to achieve their goals is by catering to the most liberal leanings of the group. A very progressive manifesto is how Bernie Sanders recently characterized what Democrats need to win back power. Yet its far from clear that a to the barricades image is the best way to advance progressive aims. Indeed, it was a positive message based not on outrage but common human values that took gay marriage from fringe to respectable to just plain normal.

Pragmatic engagement with those who werent the natural supporters of LGBTQ rights made lives tangibly better for gay people and inched us all closer to realizing a truly progressive vision.

Nathaniel Frank is author of Awakening: How Gays and Lesbians Brought Marriage Equality to America and director of the What We Know project at Columbia Law School.

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Attention progressives: Take a lesson from LGBTQ successes and ... - Los Angeles Times