ORGANIZING NOTES
July 8, 2025
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Resolution Submission to the Massachusetts Democratic Party’s 2025 State Convention
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The National Democratic Party lost the last election because the policies and candidates it embraces favor the wealthy and the super-rich. The Massachusetts Democratic Party is no different. Ask your DTC or Ward Committee to endorse the Resolution below, (feel free to adapt for your local conditions) and send it to the Chair of the Massachusetts DemocraticParty, Steve Kerrigan.
Model Resolution
Resolution Submission to the Massachusetts
Democratic Party’s 2025 State Convention
To support the inclusion of Working Class people within the Mass. Democratic Party
WHEREAS: Every major analysis of the 2024 election agrees that the defection of working class voters from the Democratic Party – more than their embrace of Trump – explains the disappointing results, as true in Massachusetts as the rest of the country..
WHEREAS: To help stem this disturbing trend, the Massachusetts Democratic Party MUST become an activist party that fights on behalf of working class families.
WHEREAS, the following three bills have been identified by the Massachusetts labor movement and many progressive groups as extremely important to working class people:
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$20 Minimum Wage (H.2107 / S.1349)
Key Points: This bill proposes to gradually increase the minimum wage in Massachusetts. It starts by setting the minimum wage at $16.25 and then incrementally increases it over several years, reaching $20.00 by 2027. The bill also requires the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development to annually adjust the minimum wage based on the rate of inflation, starting in 2027. Additionally, the bill sets the minimum wage for tipped employees at 60% of the overall minimum wage, also subject to annual inflation-based adjustments.
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Wage theft ( H.2094/ S.1066)
Key Points: Protects workers from common wage theft violations such as failure to pay wages, failure to pay the minimum wage, or failure to abide by overtime laws.
It protects workers from independent contractor misclassification, ensuring workers are able to receive the benefits they are entitled to. Protects workers against retaliation from their employer for reporting violations and increases the power of the attorney general’s office to enforce wage theft laws.
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Corporate Fair Share (H.3110 / S.2033)
Key Point: Massachusetts only taxes corporations with offshore profits at 5%, while most other states tax those profits at 40-50%. Mass needs this income because of the shortfall in the state budget and pending federal cuts. The slogan is, “Tax Overseas Profits.”
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED:
1. The Massachusetts Democratic Party will do everything in its power to support the legislation identified above so that working class people do, in fact, see the party as supporting them.
2. The Massachusetts Democratic Party will identify resources (to hire a minimum of 4 organizers) to support candidates who support and prioritize the bills above
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED: That the Chair of the Massachusetts Democratic Party shall form a subcommittee to develop this policy that includes the organizers of this resolution and mutually agreed upon members of the State Committee. The subcommittee will be charged with formulating this policy and recommending procedures, including any bylaws or charter changes, if needed, to implement and
enforce it.
This policy and associated procedures, and any additional supporting resolution or bylaws changes, will be prepared and submitted for a vote at the September 13 State Democratic Party Convention:
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Support the Make Polluters Pay Campaign, Time for the Oligarchs to pay for the damage
they have Done – Sign the Petition!
Trump’s Big Brazen Betrayal reverses most of the progress made in the last 3 years and
empowers the Climate Criminals and Corporate Robber Barons of the Fossil Fuel Industry, to
continue heating the planet and make life ever more difficult for the rest of us.
We CAN fight back here in Massachusetts. Pass the Make Polluters Pay legislation (H.
1014 / S.588) and force the carbon barons to pay for their lies and the damage they have
caused. Sign the Petition!
For decades, fossil fuel corporations have made record profits while destroying our shared
environment. And for decades, taxpayers have picked up the tab for cleaning up the mess.
Worse still, where do those record profits go? The same place practically all of the enormous
profits of the US economy have gone for the past [40] years. The wealthiest of the wealthy, the 1%.
Well, Enough is Enough! The principle of Make Polluters Pay is simple: those who make a
mess should clean it up. Any well-behaved 5-year-old would tell you this is fair.
The window for lessening the worst impacts of climate change is closing, and the Trump
administration is doing its best to slam it shut! We CAN say NO. It’s time all of us said Enough is Enough! Sign the Petition. Urge your Representative and Senator to co-sponsor.
Onward
Climate Crisis Working Group
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Acting on the Lessons of Mamdani’s Victory
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Zohran Mamdani’s decisive 12 percent victory over Andrew Cuomo in New York’s Democratic Mayoral primary is exciting and instructive for Massachusetts progressives.
It demonstrated that progressives can win important elections; we do not always need to compromise and back a liberal.
However, in the current climate, the choices of candidates and contests are still critical. Districts in which demographics, issues, and organization are favorable to progressives can be identified by careful research. As important, supporting militant progressives in fights they are unlikely to win drains our material and human resources. Progressives need to work in the electoral arena between elections to build organizations in districts we can win. While there are exceptions, we are passive until a candidate steps forward and solicits our support.
Winning requires a political platform founded on an explicitly pro working class agenda.
No party has the loyalty of working class voters. By 2024, the remnants of the belief in the dedication of the Democratic Party to working class politics were shredded. W-C voters fragmented into stay-at-homes, Trump supporters, and Dem loyalists. Mamdani’s campaign centered on economic problems and pro-working class solutions. That allowed him to build a broad coalition that included youth, many people of color, and W-C voters. Notably, however, the major NYC unions backed Cuomo. It is encouraging that most of these unions, unlike the Party leadership, are backing Mandani in the November election.
Ranked Choice Voting is important for more progressive victories.
In this ranked choice primary, Mamdani had cross-endorsement agreements with Brad Lander, the city comptroller, and Michael Blake, a former state assemblyman. This meant that they did not attack each other. In February, Mamdani was trailing badly with only 3% support in the polls. In the first count of the primary, Mamdani won 43.5% and Cuomo 36.5% of the ballots. In the second round, Mamdani got 100,000 additional votes, and Cuomo got only 54,000 votes. RCV relieves voters of the fear that voting for the progressive in a winner take all vote might result in a “wasted” vote and the victory of a conservative.
Candidates can defeat the pro-Israel lobby
The November vote revealed that in many districts, a significant number of traditionally Democratic voters were so opposed to the pro-Israeli, anti-Palestinian policies of the Democratic Party that they stayed home. Mamdani’s outspoken opposition to support for colonialism mobilized many November 2024 stay-at-homes. That took courage and very careful statements of his positions. These need to be studied. Continue reading here
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It’s Time to Implement Single Payer / Medicare for All Healthcare in Massachusetts
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For the past twenty years, despite multiple legislative sponsors, cosponsors and state-wide popular support the Joint Committee on Health Care Financing of the state government has refused to approve the bills, Bills H.1405 and S.860, An Act Establishing Medicare for All, out of committee so that it can be debated in Ways and Means or the next designated committee.
Given the crisis of healthcare costs, health services dysfunction and probable Federal Medicaid cuts, the only reasonable approach to healthcare delivery in Massachusetts is a state based, single payer trust fund with global budgeting. Economic modeling shows savings of at least $37 billion even with improved health services delivery to all age groups and including dental, long term care, vision and hearing. This is enough to cover the likely Federal Medicaid cuts.
ORMA is joining with Mass-Care to mobilize all our voices to pressure the Joint
Committee on Health Care Financing, (JCHCF) to reverse their outrageous refusal to respond to the system breakdowns and spiraling cost of our current healthcare system and begin the process of adopting a state-based, single payer healthcare network with global budgeting.
Please sign this petition and ask the Joint Committee on Health Care Financing to report Bills H.1405 and S.860 favorably out of committee.
Please sign a letter to both your legislators asking them to call upon the JCHCF to approve the Medicare for All bill out of committee. Lastly, if you can, call your legislators and deliver the same message to drive our point home. Research shows that both modes of communication are greater than either one alone.
Please consider volunteering with the ORMA working group on Medicare for All.
Thank you for your advocacy!
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This protest is being organized by Groundice.org. Check out their website for more actionns. Remeber, we need to let people aiding the fascists that we will remember their actions when all of this is over.
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Join LUCE Immigration Justice Network in demanding better from Governor Healey! These aren’t out-of-reach demands, they are responsible and lawful steps grounded in our constitutional values.
States have the authority and the obligation to opt out of voluntary ICE cooperation, stop sharing data with federal agencies, bar ICE from state courthouses, and hold federal actors accountable for violations of civil rights and due process. Sign HERE!
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We invite you to stand in solidarity outside the ICE Enforcement & Removal Operations Office in Burlington every Wednesday from 11am-1pm. Together, we can show love & support for immigrants, express our shame at ICE, and bear witness to the cruel and unconstitutional actions of our government. Regardless of your views on any other political issues, if you support immigrants and their constitutional rights and are committed to nonviolence you are welcome to join. Details and Sign Up HERE
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Science Says Plastic Bag Bans Really Do Work
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A new study found that, in places with plastic bag bans or taxes, volunteers at shoreline cleanups collected 25 to 47 percent fewer plastic bags as a total fraction of items collected, compared to places with no plastic bag policies.
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If you would like to work with ORMA Members on
- Climate Change
- Community-Based Alternative Emergency Response Teams
- Ranked-Choice Voting
- Housing For All
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ORMA depends on your support to continue Bernie’s Political Revolution to create a society, a politics, and an economy that works for everyone, not just billionaires, corporations and the political elite.
If you value Organizing Notes and its twice a month distribution schedule, please make a donation to ensure its continued existence.
Invest in Change Now!
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Please send requests for action items, articles or upcoming events
for the next Organizing Notes to
beccobrien.orma@gmail.com by Saturday, July 5th
We’d love to have you send us your favorite pictures of Bernie here in MA!
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Campaigns End, Movements Endure
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