Tulsi Gabbard won't accept PAC/Lobbyist money anymore, joining No-Pac Caucus

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@TulsiGabbard
I've decided to stop accepting PAC/lobbyist $$.  Bottom line: we can't allow our future to be driven and shaped by special interests.

Citizens United worsened the crisis of dark money influencing our country.  We need to get corporate money and lobbyists out of politics.


@RoKhannaUSA
Just got an email from @TulsiGabbard that she plans to join me as one of the 7 members of Congress to refuse PAC money. Right thing to do!


Reps. Khanna and O’Rourke were among just six members of the House of Representatives who did not accept contributions from PACs during the 2016 election. They are also the only two members who do not accept leadership PAC contributions. They are also forming The No PAC Caucus in an effort to encourage more members of Congress to join their pledge and support for campaign finance reforms measures.

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The Congresswoman from the Indian People's Party and The Congressman bought and paid for by Silicon Valley join together. Joy.

This is Andrew Cuomo level mind tricks, the difference being, of course, they aren't as outwardly blatant as Cuomo.

I mean god damn Ro Khanna's actual book basically places his ideology somewhere near a moderate Republican. It's all factional warfare.

Ro Khanna is nowhere near as progressive as Bernie & never probably will be, but why slander the guy with incorrect statements to make your point. Ro campaigned against the Iraq War in 2003/04, spoke out against the high cost of college in 2013/14 & campaigned on Single Payer in 2015/16 even before Bernie's campaign gained steam.

Silicon Valley? Seriously, is this taken from Breitbart? The guy had 0$ from any Pacs or Corporations or Lobbyists, his constituents live in Silicon Valley so naturally the individual donations will work in Financial or Software or similar sectors. Do you think Congressmen should turn down individual donations from people working in the software industry?

You do not have to support a candidate or every aspect (including Gabbard for that matter) but if you were a progressive, you would likely be happy that people are adopting more progressive ideals which Bernie campaigned for ! And you don't have to slander some to prove your point !

This graph isn't suited for atlas, maybe for Breitbart. It is entirely based on opposition party members co-sponsoring your bills & not on ideology or content of bills. Any1 can add 5-6 meaningless bills with 0 GOP co-sponsors & become an ideological partisan!

By this logic, Sheldon Whitehouse is more progressive than Warren ! And shouldn't you be happy if some becomes more progressive ?

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This graph isn't suited for atlas, maybe for Breitbart. It is entirely based on opposition party members co-sponsoring your bills & not on ideology or content of bills. Any1 can add 5-6 meaningless bills with 0 GOP co-sponsors & become an ideological partisan!

By this logic, Sheldon Whitehouse is more progressive than Warren ! And shouldn't you be happy if some becomes more progressive ?

Progressive Punch is based on actual votes, and rates her the 137th most progressive member of the House, of which there are 193 Democrats. Not to mention that her district is far more Democratic than many Democrats with higher scores.

Progressive Punch is one those crappy sites which ranks by what they perceive as arbitrary crucial votes, I look at Glass Steagal, Marijuana decriminalization or say Medicare for all. They have their own methodology, they take a lifetime score & rate it by what they think the district stands. It is entirely whimsical.

I have seen them rate on environment & some of their crucial votes were ridiculous & Bernie who comes from VT could never top because VT was a Dem bastion. He was ranked 11 or 12th below many people in overall crucial votes (no. only, not even as a comparison to District/State). It is clear Markey, Merkley & Sanders are 3 of the strongest when it comes to the environment with Sanders winning awards too.

And anyways, I have never thought that Gabbard was more progressive than bernie so I don't get all this ridiculous graphs, shouldn't people be happy that she now supports more progressive policies ?

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The Congresswoman from the Indian People's Party and The Congressman bought and paid for by Silicon Valley join together. Joy.

This is Andrew Cuomo level mind tricks, the difference being, of course, they aren't as outwardly blatant as Cuomo.

I mean god damn Ro Khanna's actual book basically places his ideology somewhere near a moderate Republican. It's all factional warfare.

Ro Khanna is nowhere near as progressive as Bernie & never probably will be, but why slander the guy with incorrect statements to make your point. Ro campaigned against the Iraq War in 2003/04, spoke out against the high cost of college in 2013/14 & campaigned on Single Payer in 2015/16 even before Bernie's campaign gained steam.

Silicon Valley? Seriously, is this taken from Breitbart? The guy had 0$ from any Pacs or Corporations or Lobbyists, his constituents live in Silicon Valley so naturally the individual donations will work in Financial or Software or similar sectors. Do you think Congressmen should turn down individual donations from people working in the software industry?

You do not have to support a candidate or every aspect (including Gabbard for that matter) but if you were a progressive, you would likely be happy that people are adopting more progressive ideals which Bernie campaigned for ! And you don't have to slander some to prove your point !

This graph isn't suited for atlas, maybe for Breitbart. It is entirely based on opposition party members co-sponsoring your bills & not on ideology or content of bills. Any1 can add 5-6 meaningless bills with 0 GOP co-sponsors & become an ideological partisan!

By this logic, Sheldon Whitehouse is more progressive than Warren ! And shouldn't you be happy if some becomes more progressive ?

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I don't think Maxwell's point was anything related to "progressivity", more based on the seeming hypocrisy of Khanna coming out with a "No PAC money", meanwhile he gets a whole bunch from Silicon Valley, as he represents them < Is my assumption.

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Of course not, but two things: One, the same logic should apply to all industries, no? Like when Hillary was beaten over the head by Bernie and his supporters for getting something like $50,000 from workers in the fracking and natural gas industry, and not the industry itself. Two: Khanna has a Super PAC which was the biggest spender in his 2016 election campaign, by far. So, I wouldn't call him the shining example of grassroots campaigns.

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I cannot speak for Maxwell, but I certainly am glad that politians are looking to the American people on this, and the American people are solidly against unlimited money being pumped into our representative democracy. That being said, I do entirely sympathize with Maxwell's point, as he (Khanna) is not a lifetime advocate for getting money out of politics, grassroots funding, etc. But I do sincerely hope this is a genuine desire of his.

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I wouldn't throw around "Breitbart" so carelessly. It means very little when callously stated, especially by people who exemplify similar traits of the network. On the issue, I think GovTrack does a pretty admirable job at tracking ideology, they nail everyone pretty consistently. If you don't take that one, then you can look at Progressive Punch's ranking of all House Members, where Gabbard is given an "F" ranking (out of the A-F scale, mind you). There are certainly other examples, and by no means does this make her a conservative, etc. She just isn't the shining bastion of leftism that many claim her to be.

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Here
is Warren's... On here she is the furthest left of everyone, including Bernie. So, no, according to that sample, Whitehouse is a bit to the right of Warren, as I think you had assumed.

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As stated, don't want to speak for Maxwell here, but I think it of course depends on the issue. But I am certainly glad Khanna has taken the right step, I just hope it isn't a hypocritical ploy.

I have never said gabbard is the most progressive &, but when she goes left, we should be happy. (Gabbard has a rating of 95 in 2017-18 & 91 in her lifetime)

If people go by Progressive Punch, can people be consistent & claim that Ro Khanna is a strong progressive? Khanna has an A Rating, ranked 27th on this arbitrary "Crucial" votes & has a 99.49 rating overall. Only 15 people with a 100% rating & 3 people with 99.5% rating have a better rating than Ro Khanna in progressive punch in 2017-18.

(Keith Ellison has a ranking of "C" in progressive punch in 2017-18 & is 88th in raw score btw !)



People should be happy if Cuomo gets Single Payer or Tuition Free college. If Booker comes out for a Single Payer, people should be happy. You don't have to like Cuomo or Booker's Presidential campaign, but if they do something progressive, you should be happy. Gabbard was a center-left politician who has moved leftwards. It is much less of a flip-flop than say Gillibrand who even took pride in calling herself conservative, was officially a part of a blue dog caucus & had very conservative conditions but now is taking the most left leaning positions & is co-sponsoring every single even obscure uber left wing Bernie or Warren bill.

Should Gillibrand's massive left turn  be supported as a Senator? Yes, people should be happy if she becomes more progressive - Doesn't mean you will trust her to be the President !

Coming to Ro Khanna, from your article -

"We know nothing about this Super PAC," Law wrote in an email. "We do know that Ro repeatedly asked Congressman Honda to sign Elizabeth Warren's 'People's Pledge,' to keep outside money out of this congressional race. Congressman Honda refused."

Ro Khanna asked any Super-pacs to not support him & didn't take any more from Lobbyists, Pacs, Leadership pacs, is part of the No pac caucus & with Beto has introduced a bill to end all pacs. Damn right, he ain't as progressive as Bernie (& may never be) ! But to even compare working professionals of Silicon Valley making individual small $ donations with Fossil fuel lobbyists trying to stop climate change regulations is a bit weird !

Sanders campaign never talked about individual contributions, Bernie has got money from many coal miners & fossil fuel people in small $, people who believed in him ! Jeff Weaver specifically talked about Priorities, the Super pac raising millions from Fossil fuel industry & 57 fossil fuel lobbyists donating to Hillary's individual campaign, including 11 bundling in more than 1 Million.

A Greenpeace tally says she has collected “$1,259,280 in bundled and direct donations from lobbyists currently registered as lobbying for the fossil fuel industry.” Additionally, Greenpeace found “$3,250,000 in donations from large donors connected to the fossil fuel industry to Priorities Action USA,” the main Super PAC backing Clinton’s campaign.

Again I still don't get the criticism of Khanna & Gabbard, Bernie's natural heir is Elizabeth Warren or Jeff Merkley. But if some congressman takes a positive progressive position, shouldn't people be happy? Or will they trash that candidate because candidate X said something bad 3 years ago?

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Putin and Assad will just run proxy campaigns for her.

ISIS will run a proxy campaign for her opponents.

I've never gotten why her Syria trip is trashed as a bad move.

If ISIS (or any other rebels) win, she can play Obama vs. Iraq while pointing at the resulting disaster AND paint herself as a realist on foreign policy.

If Assad wins she can say convincingly that he was better than the people he was fighting, play the realist and "I was right" cards. (Extra points here if disgruntled Islamic radicals pull off a major terror attack on the West/US in the meantime.)

If it's still going on, she can point out that she would have ended the conflict long ago if she were in charge.

Among anyone at all likely to vote for her, there is no downside.

When has a candidate who has not even been a Governor or a Senator won the Democratic nomination? It has not happened in more than a 100 years - From FDR to Truman to JFK to LBJ to Carter to Clinton to Obama, they were all Governors or Senators!

Has Gabbard done anything to even show interest? She is busy trying to keep her seat in Congress where she faces an assault from Neera Tanden & the Clinton hacks! Maizie Hirono is running for re-election for Senate in 2018 which means no seat will be vacant by 2024 (at the earliest).

Gabbard is only 36. And given her age, even if she decides to run for POTUS, 2028 election may be the earliest possible for her (And she may never run !)