Voters in Alabama and West Virginia approved ballot initiatives on Tuesday that will update the state constitutions to declare that abortion rights are not guaranteed, a move that will severely curtail reproductive rights in the states. In Oregon, voters blocked a similar ballot initiative that would have prevented taxpayer dollars from covering abortions for Medicaid beneficiaries and public employees.
Pro-choice and anti-choice advocates in all three states campaigned for weeks pr...
ThinkProgress
Voters just gave more than 300,000 people health care
Residents in Idaho, Nebraska, and Utah voted to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) Tuesday, granting health coverage to more than 300,000 low-income people.
Although all three states historically voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential elections, activists gathered enough signatures to put Medicaid on the ballot in each red state and residents managed to set partisan politics aside.
This means upwards of 62,000 people in Idaho, roughly ...
Beto O’Rourke loses Senate race, but reshapes Texas forever
EL PASO, TEXAS — Democrat Beto O’Rourke came close in his bid to unseat Republican Sen. Ted Cruz but lost Tuesday by a narrow 3-point margin. Even so, O’Rourke’s race proved candidates in the Lone Star State can run on a serious progressive platform and draw a substantial following.
Beto fans were devastated by the loss, but took heart in what he and his supporters were able to do. Texas — one of the nation’s worst voter turnout states — was...
Eric Trump: Obama has a ‘personal problem’ with my dad
Eric Trump said Tuesday that President Obama has a “personal problem” with his father, President Trump, and is trying to take credit for his father’s accomplishments.
Trump, the president’s second eldest son and an executive vice president of the family’s eponymous business empire, spoke with Fox & Friends for Fox News’ all-day Election Day coverage and was asked by co-host Brian Kilmeade whether he thought Obama’s decision to s...
A progressive’s guide to watching Election 2018
On Tuesday, Americans will elect 435 U.S. Representatives, 35 U.S. Senators, 36 governors, more than 6,000 state legislators, and a whole lot of statewide, county, and local officials. They’ll also vote on hundreds of ballot initiatives, referenda, and constitutional amendments. While the biggest question — which party will control Congress — will likely get the most media attention, there are many others that will matter a great deal for the future of the republic.
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On eve of election, Spanberger slams Bannon’s visit, Brat’s ‘lies’
HENRICO, VIRGINIA — Fresh off a campaign event at Buz and Ned’s Real Barbecue in Henrico, Virginia, Abigail Spanberger was nearing the finish line of her first political campaign — and a most improbable down-to-the wire battle against a vulnerable incumbent, Rep. Dave Brat (R-VA).
Spanberger spoke to ThinkProgress about what it’s like having an opponent in Brat who admitted that he and his fellow Republicans “lie all the time.”
She also sha...
A guide to how Democrats can take back the House in the midterms
Two years after President Donald Trump’s stunning upset win (despite receiving nearly three million fewer votes than his opponent), Democrats finally have a chance to regain control of one (or both) chambers of legislature. This would mean an opportunity for Congress to finally offer meaningful checks and balances on the Trump administration after the midterm elections, this Tuesday, Nov. 6.
Democrats need to flip 24 seats to win the House. Twenty-five GOP-controlled districts...
Democrats winning the popular vote won’t be enough to save Americans’ health care from Republicans
The 2010 election was a historic disaster for the Democratic Party. Republican House candidates won the national popular vote by 6.8 percentage points and took a commanding majority as a result. It marked the end of President Obama’s legislative agenda and the beginning of an era when Republicans demanded massive concessions just to keep the government open.
Now imagine that 2018 is the mirror image of 2010 — that is, that Democrats win the popular vote by the exact same...
Meet the state Senate candidate who’s trying to convince Tennessee’s 1 percent to support Medicaid
WILLIAMSON COUNTY, TENNESSEE — Kristen Grimm has just realized she forgot to clean out her minivan. She gushes her apologies as she pulls open the driver’s side door, revealing a passenger seat littered with palm cards and newspapers. Her backseat, filled with yard signs, an extra coat, and a change of shoes is also not rider-ready.
But her dismay about the messy car doesn’t — or rather, it can’t — last long before she’s on to the next thing: A phone call from a fr...
Republican Attorney General reportedly let his Senate campaign consultants direct his state office
Missouri Attorney General and Republican U.S. Senate candidate Josh Hawley allowed “out-of-state political consultants” to give “direct guidance and tasks to his taxpayer-funded staff,” according to a report by The Kansas City Star.
Among other things, The Star reports that Hawley’s political consultants helped oversee the attorney general office’s rollout of “Missouri’s lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, which Hawley announced in June 20...