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Jun. 27, 2021 08:45PM EST
New coalition forms to fight Republican legislature in Texas
Texas advocacy and political groups will launch a new coalition Monday to fight Republican efforts to change voting laws in their state and support Texans in need after the pandemic and last winter's paralyzing storm, Axios has learned.
Why it matters: While Democratic lawyers are fighting proposed or enacted changes in voting laws in battleground states, a grassroots response will be critical if the party and its backers hope to have any effects on the 2022 midterms and 2024 presidential election.
Driving the news: The Republican-controlled Texas state legislature will start a special session July 8, when its leaders are expected to take another crack at passing what advocates say would be one of the most restrictive voting bills in the country.
The "Texas for All" coalition trying to thwart that effort includes state-based groups like the Texas Freedom Network, Workers Defense Fund, Texas Organizing Project, Texas Civil Rights Project, Planned Parenthood Texas Votes, the Texas Democratic Party and almost 30 others.
- The launch includes a $2.5 million fund, most of which will be used for $1,000 direct grants for Texas households, including those still struggling after the power outage caused by the snow and ice storm this year.
- "Texas for All stands together as allies and friends to take care of one another — because our government simply refuses to care for Texans," the coalition writes in its first letter, which addresses voter suppression efforts in the state.
- Funds also will be used for digital ads and organizing tools targeting Gov. Greg Abbott and other state Republican leaders.
Between the lines: Many of these groups have already worked together to advocate for voting rights and other issues; now they're formalizing the alliance and plan to meet regularly.
- They've also taken inspiration from coalitions elsewhere.
- "Being able to come together and align our strategy really allows us to align our power, our ability to galvanize people, to reach more people together," Texas Freedom Network executive director Val Benavidez told Axios. "And I think that those are definitely things that we've seen in other states like Georgia."
- Republican lawmakers passed a restrictive voting bill in Georgia this year.
Reality check: Advocates and Democrats have managed to slow-roll the passage of the bill that some say would make it harder for people of color to vote, and lawmakers' decision to boycott and block a vote last month was seen as an important victory.
- But Texas Democrats have few options for stopping Republicans from ultimately passing the bill, and with the filibuster still intact in the U.S. Senate, they're unlikely to get help from Congress.
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Jul. 03, 2021 11:00AM EST
The world's population growth is slowing, and that's OK
Population growth is continuing to slow in the U.S. and China — the world’s top two economies — but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Why it matters: While population trends can be difficult to change, there is unlikely to be a “point of no return" where they can't be reversed — if government leaders proactively address the foundational causes, like the burdens and costs of child care or fears of immigration.
- Population growth impacts economic growth because it can increase innovation, workers, and goods produced and consumed.
By the numbers: The United Nations projects that the world population will grow to 9.7 billion people in 30 years, from about 7.7 billion as of 2019.
- More than half of that growth will be concentrated in nine countries, including the U.S.
- Over the same time period, China will be one of 55 countries or areas where population is expected to decline by at least 1%.
- Globally, the number of young people entering their reproductive years now is larger than their parents’ generation — so even if the global level of fertility were to fall immediately to around two children per woman, births would still exceed deaths for several decades, according to the U.N.
Yes, but: “We focus way too much on the percent growth like quarterly GDP,” American Enterprise Institute adjunct fellow Lyman Stone tells Axios. “We should think about what people want. What level of immigration people want. What age would people like to die.”
- The U.S. is currently failing to achieve the average social preference across all three demographic trackers — immigration, life expectancy, and fertility are all trending down.
- “When pretty normal desires are not being fulfilled, that’s an indicator that society has a problem," Stone says.
Americans still want multiple children, but they’re worried about child care costs, their own student debt, a lack of family leave policies, and a pause in their careers.
- These concerns are also limiting family growth in China — on top of a severe gender imbalance caused by the country’s one-child policy and male child favoritism.
While Beijing has relaxed restrictions on the number of children families can now have in China, the new policy seeks more to bolster its workforce than to promote population. That’s because at the same time, the Chinese Communist Party is also raising the country’s retirement age, eliminating a key source of child care for Chinese families.
- In the U.S., President Biden’s plan to start sending monthly payments to families with children is seen as a way to recognize the young as a societal good, not private responsibility.
The big picture: Population is a measure of how many options people have for business partners, customers and romantic relationships — the numbers for which are all likely to improve with a larger society, says Stone.
- What also matters more than absolute population growth is the age distribution of population, especially for economic growth.
- “If you have a lot of young people and relatively fewer older adults, you basically get the distribution China had in 1990, which will guarantee a [large] labor force for economic growth,” says Emma Zang, assistant professor of sociology at Yale University.
- There’s no consensus on how many people the planet can support, since there’s no guarantee that populations will grow as projected or that people will consume food and energy in the same wasteful ways as they have.
The bottom line: If countries want population growth to pick up, leaders must first fix the underlying causes for a slowdown.
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Jul. 10, 2021 03:36PM EST
The rise of the anti-"woke" Democrat
A growing number of Democrats are ringing the alarm that their party sounds — and acts — too judgmental, too sensitive, too "woke" to large swaths of America.
Why it matters: These Democrats warn that by jamming politically correct terms or new norms down the throats of voters, they risk exacerbating the cultural wars — and inadvertently helping Trumpian candidates.
Top Democrats confide that they're very aware of the danger. Already, we've seen a widespread pullback in the "defund the police" rhetoric.
- Former NYPD captain Eric Adams, who this week won New York City's Democratic mayoral primary, showed his party the power of a message that supports police while including justice and reform.
- "If we are for SAFETY — we NEED the NYPD!" Adams says on his campaign site. "At the same time," he acknowledges, "we face a crisis of confidence in our police."
Democratic strategist James Carville has been warning his party about this for months, telling Vox in an April interview:
- "You ever get the sense that people in faculty lounges in fancy colleges use a different language than ordinary people? ... This is not how voters talk."
Conservative columnist Peggy Noonanwrote this week in the Wall Street Journalthat she believes the left is misreading its position and "overplaying its hand."
- She cited a new essay by Kevin Drum, formerly of Washington Monthly and Mother Jones, who wrote: "[T]he truth is that the Democratic Party has been pulled far enough left that even lots of non-crazy people find us just plain scary — something that Fox News takes vigorous advantage of."
On the flip side, "How to Be an Antiracist" author Ibram X. Kendi, who directs Boston University's Center for Antiracist Research, wrote in The Atlantic on Friday that Republican operatives "have conjured an imagined monster to scare the American people and project themselves as the nation’s defenders from that fictional monster."
What we're hearing: Moderate and swing-district lawmakers and aides tell Axios' Margaret Talev and Alayna Treene that the party could suffer massive losses in next year's midterms if Democrats run like Sen. Elizabeth Warren is president.
- One former Senate aide said it's "bye-bye majority" if Democrats run on "extreme wokeness."
Between the lines: The big question is how different the midterms will be from 2020. People voted for Democrats in November when the same talking points and ideas were being discussed. The presidency was at stake, but the other cultural or social issues were the same.
What to watch: This tension is a huge test for President Biden. He knows that the rising left in his party, while great for fundraising and media coverage, could be electorally disastrous.
Axios' Kim Hart and Alayna Treene contributed reporting.
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Jul. 17, 2021 05:21PM EST
1M Cubans use U.S. software to skirt government's social media blackouts
More than 1 million people in Cuba every day are using an anti-censorship tool supported by the U.S. government to circumvent their own government's social media blackouts, Bloomberg reports.
The big picture: Censorship-circumvention software company Psiphon Inc. has facilitated the transfer of over 600 terabytes of data from users in Cuba since Sunday, per Bloomberg.
- Psiphon receives funding from the Open Technology Fund, a U.S. government nonprofit that supports global internet freedom technologies.
Driving the news: Cuba limited access to some social media and messaging apps following anti-government protests that started last Sunday Axios' Ina Fried reports.
- President Biden said Thursday that the United States is looking into whether it is able to restore internet access that was shut down by the Cuban government.
Go deeper: Open Technology Fund sues administration for $20M in missing funds
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