Action Alerts – Week of August 27th – CNY Solidarity Coalition

CNY Solidarity members and supporters:
Please find below the weekly ACTION ALERTS from Indivisible NY24 and our legislative action teams. The New York State primary election is 17 days away, and the general election is 71 days away. Please mark your calendars (Sept. 13 and Nov. 6), confirm your voter registration, and make sure your friends and family are all registered too. (The registration deadline has now passed for voting in the primary, but you have until Oct. 12 to register for the general election.) Indivisible’s online voter registration tool is available here.

Highlights this week include a Katko public forum in Auburn on Thursday evening and CNY Solidarity tabling at the State Fair on Saturday. If you’d be willing to help arrange a carpool from Syracuse on Thursday, please let us know, and if you’d be willing to help out with a shift on Saturday, please sign up here.

Today (Aug 27)

Defend the Special Counsel Investigation with Action, not Words

Over the past week, Rep. Katko has verbally indicated his support for Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation. He has said that it’s not a witch hunt, and that it should be allowed to continue to its conclusion without obstruction. But he still hasn’t joined his seven Republican colleagues (and lots of Democrats) who have signed on to one of the two versions of the Special Counsel Independence and Integrity Act (HR 5476 and HR 5505). Today, let’s tell Rep. Katko to put his money where his mouth is. (In other words, let’s call his office and respectfully ask him to sign on as co-sponsor of this important bill.) Katko’s numbers are 315-423-5657 (Syracuse), 315-253-4068 (Auburn), or 202-225-3701 (DC).

Tuesday (Aug 28)

Make Onondaga County a True Sanctuary

From our state legislative action team (SLAT): Please contact both candidates for Onondaga County Sheriff with the critical question below. At your discretion please forward responses to the CNY Solidarity discussion list (if you’re a subscriber). To the candidates for Onondaga County Sheriff: Do you pledge to instruct Onondaga County Sheriff Deputies and all other of your personnel to never ask for citizenship information from all people they encounter in any and all situations? Contact info is friendsofmikemontes@gmail.com and http://www.conwayforsheriff.com/contact-gene.html

NY Attorney General Debate

Spectrum News is hosting a debate among the four Democratic candidates for state Attorney General tonight at 7pm. If anyone is aware of a local debate-watch party (or wants to organize one!), please let us know.

Wednesday (Aug 29)

Nixon v. Cuomo Debate Watching Party

Syracuse DSA is hosting a gubernatorial debate watch party. 6-8:30pm at Beer Belly Deli, 510 Westcott St. in Syracuse. Note the location change. More details here.

Thursday (Aug 30)

Katko Public Forum in Auburn

Rep. Katko is running scared and finally holding open public forums with constituents. At last week’s forum in Wayne County, he and multiple panelists spoke about veterans’ issues for the first hour, but during the second hour, he took questions on any subject. His next event appears to have a similar format, but with infrastructure as the focus for the panel. It’s important that we turn out in numbers to ask tough questions, and it would be great to have volunteers willing to livestream and video record the event (if allowed). 6pm at Cayuga Community College’s Student Lounge, 197 Franklin St. in Auburn. More details here.

In preparation for asking questions, check out Indivisible NY24’s new fact sheet summarizing Katko’s voting record in 2017-18, available here.

Friday (Aug 31)

No formal actions today, but if you’re supporting candidates in the Sept. 13 and/or Nov. 6 elections, we encourage you to reach out via their websites or FB pages and see what volunteer opportunities they have available. The key to these elections will be a) grassroots, volunteer, direct voter contact efforts (i.e., canvassing and phone-banking); and b) recurring, small-dollar donations from thousands of supporters. If anyone needs help making connections with any local campaigns, reply to me and I’ll get you started.

Saturday (Sept 1)

State Fair Tabling

CNY Solidarity will be tabling all day at the state fair today. If you’d be willing to help out with a shift, please sign up here.

Support Unionized Workers

NABET-CWA Local 51211 is asking for help in their struggle to get a fair contract with WSYR News Channel 9. The Unionized Broadcasters at WSYR have agreed to meager pay increases to help the company through hard times for more than a decade. Now times are good. The out of town owner, Nexstar Media, is drowning in cash. Yet they are offering NABET-CWA Members raises of LESS THAN 1% per year, even smaller raises than 4 years ago. Nexstar will not even guarantee that jobs in TV will pay more than minimum wage over the life of the two year deal they are offering. The workers will be holding an informational picket at the State Fair today. Anyone who can join, please RSVP to Anthony Vecchio, badboychevelle@verizon.net. WHEN: Noon to 4pm today. WHERE: Gather at the NYS Fairgrounds GATE 1.

Sunday (Sept 2)

No CNY Solidarity actions today, but see the note under Friday above.

Save the date for these upcoming events

Mon., Sept. 3: Labor Day Parade @NYS Fair, 10am at State Fairgrounds.

Tue., Sept. 4: Onondaga County Legislature meeting. 12:30pm at 401 Montgomery St. in Syracuse, room 407. If anyone would be willing to speak at the meeting against the pending proposal to criminalize aggressive panhandling, please let us know. More details here.

Sept. 4: Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on Brett Kavanaugh begin today.

Wed., Sept. 5: NY-24 candidate Dana Balter town hall in Cayuga County, 6-8pm, Seymour Library, 176-178 Genesee, Auburn 13021. More details here.

Thur., Sept. 6: Deadline to request absentee ballot by mail for state primary.

Sept. 8-9: Indivisible has declared this a nationwide weekend of action leading up to the November elections. More details soon.

Sun., Sept. 9: NY-24 candidate Dana Balter town hall in Oswego County. 6pm at the American Foundry, 246 W. Seneca St. Oswego 13126. More details here.

Thur., Sept. 13: Election day (primaries for state offices). Yes, it’s a Thursday. Polls open noon – 9:00pm. To put it on your Facebook calendar, click here.

Sun., Sept. 16: CNY Solidarity meeting, 3-5pm, location TBD.

Mon., Sept. 17: Journey of the Peacemaker, a talk by Freida Jacques, sponsored by our Beyond War and Militarism Committee. 6:30pm, ArtRage Gallery, 505 Hawley Ave in Syracuse.

Sun., Sept. 23: Indivisible NY-22 Summit. 9:30-12:30, Cazenovia Hampton Inn.

Sun., Sept. 23: Westcott St. Cultural Fair, 12-7pm.

Wed., Oct. 10: Teach-in on the rule of law in the U.S. 6:30-8:30pm at University United Methodist.

Oct. 12: NYS voter registration deadline for general election.

Oct. 30: Deadline to request absentee ballot by mail for general election.

Tue., Nov. 6: Election day (general election for all offices).

Today and every day, be sure to follow us online and on social media.

Check out our website: www.cnysolidarity.org

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In solidarity,

Tom

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