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One tech company has created a slate of scripted influencers, each with their own storylines. But how is anyone supposed to tell the difference between what’s real and what isn’t?

In June, the UK tabloid the Mirror published a story about a TikTok video that discussed “the four biggest dating app red flags,” according to a creator named @sydneyplus, who said she worked at a dating site. Said red flags include standing in front of a fancy car (likely not their own), describing oneself as an “entrepreneur,” or being weirdly obsessed with their mom. The article is a typical hastily written web post capitalizing on trending content in order to drive pageviews, and was later picked up by the New York Post. The only problem was that @sydneyplus doesn’t work at a dating site, because @sydneyplus doesn’t really exist.

“Sydney,” a broke, blonde 20-something who lives on her sister’s couch and works in customer service at a dating site, is the invention of a team of writers, one actress, and a technology/entertainment/media company called FourFront. Co-founded by a former screenwriter named Ilan Benjamin, the company has so far launched 22 “stories,” or character arcs, eight of them ongoing since the spring. Sydney’s “story,” for example, was that she found out that her sister’s fiancé was cheating, while Ollie, a trans man, discovers that his father also transitioned.

“We’re basically creating an MCU-style universe of characters on TikTok,” says Benjamin. “Some succeed, some fail — it’s the TV pilot season model where we only invest in those that get traction and audiences love.” The company says it’s raised $1.5 million in seed funding so far.

Last week, Sydney, Ollie, and the rest of the characters — Tia, who discovers her boyfriend is African royalty; Carmen, a self-described sugar baby and bimbo; Chris, a father and Army veteran; and “Billy Hundos,” a “finance fuckboy,” among others — convened IRL in Los Angeles, ostensibly to participate in a contest to win a billion dollars. This also acted as FourFront’s “big reveal,” in which the characters hosted a live Zoom event and showed that they all exist within a single universe. In total, the characters have a combined 1.9 million followers and 281 million views.

Fictional influencers are not unique to the TikTok era. In June 2006, a soft-spoken 16-year-old named Bree began uploading video confessionals to YouTube under the username Lonelygirl15. Bree, however, was actually the invention of screenwriters Miles Beckett and Mesh Flinders, along with their lawyer-producer friend Greg Goodfried. (Interestingly, Goodfried is now the president of D’Amelio Family Enterprises, the company representing TikTokers Charli and Dixie D’Amelio.) Within months, millions of people tuned in, many turning to message boards to speculate about what was going on behind the scenes, and by September, sleuths had found trademark applications and pictures of the actress Jessica Rose, who played Bree. Some fans said they were “heartbroken” by the discovery, but the videos went on to air for another two years. Asked whether something like Lonelygirl15 could exist today, Flinders told the Guardian, “On YouTube now we wouldn’t get away with this for 30 seconds. People would know she’s fake immediately.”

But perhaps that’s less true for TikTok. While FourFront is adamant that most of its audience is aware that what they’re watching is the work of actors and writers, that’s nearly impossible to know for certain. “With everything that happened with QAnon and how alternate reality games have been weaponized, it’s important that we made our universe light and playful — no cult content, no dark content, and every one of our characters is openly fictional,” Benjamin says. Yet nearly all of the comments appear to engage with the characters just like they would with real TikTokers, giving advice and sharing reactions or their own experiences. Though FourFront has started using the hashtag #fictional on its videos and the word “fictional” in the characters’ bios, to expect that users who come across one of their videos on their For You page to put the clues together is asking quite a lot, considering most TikTokers use unrelated hashtags in their posts to gain more traction and choose intentionally weird bios to set themselves apart.

As a commercial rather than purely artistic venture, FourFront told Fast Company that its long-term revenue plan is to license their AI character voices to other companies, and to make money with some kind of subscription model or by selling tickets to live events starring their characters. “Why can’t I hang out with Harry Potter?” he said. “That’s the question this whole company began with: Why can’t we allow people to get closer to their favorite characters?”

The company also encourages its most invested followers to text their favorite characters on a separate messaging app and “unlock secrets,” using the AI language GPT-3 to respond. With an earlier character Paige, whose story concept was “all my friends blocked me!,” Benjamin says that when they told audiences at the beginning of the messaging session that it was a fictional story, 89 percent wanted to continue, and 42 percent “shared really intimate emotional data with the character.” (Benjamin says they do not plan to sell that data, but instead use it to improve their own storytelling.)

Those characters, by the way, are conceptualized and written by Benjamin and a team of writers, mostly recent grads from USC’s screenwriting program. Ollie’s bio describes him as “made with love by (rainbow flag emoji) actors and creators,” while Chris’s says “made by veteran actors and creators.” Actors, who film and direct themselves and then send footage to an editor, also contribute to the storylines. Cameisha Cotton, who plays Tia, says the idea was pitched to her agent in February as a web series, and that she’d done augmented reality projects beforehand. “They’re incredibly collaborative,” she says. “It’s the coolest SAG project I’ve ever been able to be a part of.”

FourFront is part of a larger wave of tech startups devoted to, as aspiring Zuckerbergs like to say, building the metaverse, which can loosely be defined as “the internet” but is more specifically the interconnected, augmented reality virtual space that real people share. It’s an undoubtedly intriguing concept for people with a stake in the future of technology and entertainment, which is to say, the entirety of culture. It’s also a bit of an ethical minefield: Isn’t the internet already full of enough real-seeming content that is a) not real and b) ultimately an effort to make money? Are the characters exploiting the sympathies of well-meaning or media illiterate audiences? Maybe!

On the other hand, there’s something sort of darkly refreshing about an influencer “openly” being created by a room of professional writers whose job is to create the most likable and interesting social media users possible. Influencers already have to walk the delicate line between aspirational and inauthentic, to attract new followers without alienating existing fans, to use their voice for change while remaining “brand-safe.” The job has always been a performance; it’s just that now that performance can be convincingly replicated by a team of writers and a willing actor.

“We’re telling stories that are a little bit larger than life, and I think a lot of influencers on TikTok do the same thing,” Benjamin says. It’s true — determining whether viral TikTok videos are “real” or created in earnest rather than ironically is the platform’s favorite sport. Tons of TikTokers play a character, to dramatic or comedic or aesthetic effect, but far fewer actually create a detailed narrative arc. If people really want to know whether someone like Sydney, Tia, or “Billy Hundos” is real, it’s not immensely difficult to figure out. But they fooled at least two newspapers, and if one of their videos came across my For You page, they probably would have fooled me, too. It almost feels like benevolent trolling, a nicer version of, say, a tweet designed to provoke outrage but really only ends up driving engagement to that person’s page. You sort of feel foolish taking the bait, but the internet is full of bizarre characters. How is anyone supposed to tell the difference?

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You only have to look at Republican fundraising tactics to gain a real appreciation for the sheer contempt Donald Trump and the GOP establishment feel toward their run-of-the-mill, nonbillionaire supporters. Trump’s perpetual grift-at-all-costs technique for money-grubbing went into overdrive as the 2020 election approached, when his campaign adopted a tactic called “dark pattern design,” tricking unsuspecting small-scale donors into committing to recurring donations through a prechecked box on his campaign website. This underhanded practice locked unsuspecting constituents into making regular payments through automatic deductions from their bank accounts or credit cards, a scam intended to bilk them for as much as possible until they discovered it. Ultimately, Trump and the Republican Party were forced to return over $77 million in such “donations,” a figure that accounted for approximately 20% of Trump’s total fundraising for the year.

Trump’s dirty methods weren’t limited to his voting base. From the very start of his campaign in 2016, the supposed multimillionaire business mogul built a well-earned reputation for stiffing the venues—most often cash-strapped municipalities—that he selected for his rallies. The Trump family skipped out of the White House in January this year owing nearly $2 million in unpaid debts to cities across the country. From Spokane to Albuquerque to Wildwood, New Jersey, these debts were incurred by credulous local officials who provided the police protection and security those rallies required in the full expectation they’d be reimbursed. To date there is no indication that any of those debts were ever paid. The Trump organization has told these cities to try to seek reimbursement through the Secret Service, effectively thumbing their nose at them.

On a national level, the fundraising arm of Republican Party has apparently adopted this mentality after four years of watching and learning from Trump. Their latest tactic, as shared by Forbes reporter Andrew Solender, involves cajoling and intimidating individual donors with personal threats and insults. 

The following is taken directly from a text ad recently released by the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC):

You’re a traitor… You abandoned Trump. We were told you were a tried & true, lifelong patriot. But when Trump said he’d run for President if we took back the House from Nancy Pelosi  … You did nothing. Was Trump wrong about you? This is your final chance to prove your loyalty or be branded a deserter. We’re giving you one final chance to stand with Trump. You only have 17 minutes.”

The ad itself appears below:

From an outsider’s perspective, it’s difficult to fathom why anyone receiving this text would feel anything but annoyance and disgust. It’s next to impossible to conceive of any Democratic fundraising entity, for example, employing this blatant of an approach. To understand why the NRCC feels this tactic might be successful, some insight into the nature of what the Republican Party has now become is necessary. In the context of this particular ad, there is actually more going on than meets the eye.

First, the recipient is provided with a fait accompli: “You’re a traitor.” Not, “You will be a traitor (if you fail to do this),” nor even an exhortation to “not” be a traitor. The bare fact is that the recipient’s betrayal is a given, something already accomplished, because he or she “abandoned Trump.” Note that the betrayal here is not towards the Republican Party, certainly not the NRCC, but to the individual persona of Donald Trump. Does anyone want to be a traitor? Of course not: The intent here is to immediately put the reader on the defensive. 

Next, the recipient is informed of the reasons for and depth of their betrayal. They’re told that by breaking faith with Trump, they have let others down, specifically those who wrongly mistook them as a “tried & true, lifelong patriot.” This belief in their patriotism was also shared by Trump; the reader has grievously broken that faith by doing “nothing,” which actually means not contributing to the NRCC.

Lastly, a “final” warning is presented—an opportunity to make amends—and the reader is informed that failure to do will result in their being branded as a “deserter,” forever ostracized and vilified by the Republican Party, and, implicitly, of course, by Donald Trump.

Of course, this is cult mentality at its finest. Two near-universal hallmarks of cults are the elevation of an authority figure to near-deity status, and the threat of “shunning” and ostracism for those who try to leave. Claims of “special” knowledge that only cult members possess—such as Trump’s promotion of the Big Lie—and an overriding “us versus them” mentality are also common characteristics of such groups. Nor should we ignore the distinct possibility that, as disciples of authoritarianism, many Republicans actually crave being addressed and debased by such terminology; it’s worth noting that when asked his opinion about these texts, Illinois Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger acknowledged their effectiveness.

The fact that this text boils down to a mere solicitation for money shouldn’t obscure the more profound and troubling fact that one of this country’s two major political parties has become so beholden to a single personality that all significant decisions it now makes, including how to raise funds, are inextricably tied to that person’s fortunes. 

The fact that this individual has a proven, lethal track record of treachery, deceit, and complete indifference to basic principles of good faith—let alone the welfare of the country and all norms of human decency—makes that solicitation all the more remarkable. There has never been a state of affairs quite like this in our country’s history; the closest analogue was McCarthyism nearly 70 years ago, but even Joe McCarthy’s sordid, demagogic personality didn’t permeate the Republican Party the way Trump has.

Yet when McCarthy finally fell from grace, his name became a curse practically overnight. All of his power to control, intimidate, and bully others simply vanished into thin air. Republicans so eager to emulate Donald Trump, now clinging so desperately to his coattails out of cowardice and opportunism, would probably do well to remember that.

Their wealth has exploded during the pandemic.

We have noted in the past that the "QAnon" movement is not a set of new conspiracy theories, but a recasting of some of the most popular neo-Nazi, white supremacist, antisemitic themes of the last century for broader conspiracy consumption. Nazi-era antisemitic conspiracy theories declared that "Jews" were secretly controlling the world, that they were working to undermine governments and cultures, and that they drank the blood of children in secret rituals.

QAnon's version is identical: A shadowy cabal of "globalists" is secretly controlling the world, is working to undermine governments and cultures (for example, through a "great replacement" of Americans with new nonwhite immigrants, as supposedly funded by wealthy Jewish American George Soros), and is secretly trafficking children to harvest compounds from their blood. The most bizarre of Nazi and neo-Nazi themes have found eager new homes in the brains of supposed "real" Americans who have invariably settled on the same targets and solutions as their neo-Nazi enablers: Round up the "globalists”—meaning liberals, socialists, Democrats, those who fight for LGBT rights, those who treat immigrants with decency—and jail them. "Lock them up." Purge them.

The "everyday" Americans who have adopted QAnon beliefs as their own, insisting that the "child trafficking" or blood "harvesting" or something-something George Soros conspiracies are real, are Good Nazis. They are the sort of citizens who made Nazi Germany tick. They are sweet, patriotic parents of somebody, or children of somebody, and all they know in life is that their enemies must be defeated, even if defeating them means toppling democracy and/or supporting the most incompetent of tax-dodging lying rapist perverts.

Whether they can be reformed once they've gone down that rabbit hole is a subject for others to engage. Myself, I expect not. Human beings do not accidentally fall into believing their not-white or not-Christian or not-Republican neighbors are barely human saboteurs plotting behind the scenes to do whatever evil you might imagine. They started out that way, then fell into conspiracy holes that were pleasing because they ticked off all the boxes their previous paranoias needed to tick off.

The movement itself, however, has been drifting back to the rawer antisemitism that first crafted it.

VICE News reports that John Sabal, the influential QAnon promoter who will this week host a major QAnon conference at which four aspiring Republican lawmakers are scheduled to speak recommended on Sunday to his followers a notorious neo-Nazi conspiracy film blaming Jews as the architects of communism, World Wars I and II, and the sabotage of Naziism. "The most important historical film of all time," Sabal touted.

The posts were removed after they were "highlighted by extremist researchers," reports VICE—and Sabal claims through his partner that he never actually watched the film or knew that it was antisemitic. And yes, this is the "QAnon" provocateur with enough clout to collect Republican candidates from across the nation.

This isn't an isolated incident. VICE reports that other QAnon figures have similarly embraced the film, though none as prominent as Sabal has been. The "Q" movement is also attracting much attention and support among German neo-Nazis, who after all have a closer connection to many of the Q-adopted tropes now being exported by American conspiracists.

It hasn't stopped national Republicans from courting conspiracy leaders and allied militias, either.

QAnon may have taken some of its heaviest hits from being uniformly and absurdly wrong in all its preelection and post-election predictions about, well, everything, and from its top founder and likely Q pretender Ron Watkins, who distanced himself slightly after Trump's loss. (He's now running for Congress himself—in Arizona, of course.) That doesn't mean it's dead.

It's unclear, however, if QAnon believers are becoming more enamored with antisemitism than they once were or if the movement is sloughing off now-bored, less-radical Americans, leaving behind a more radical, neo-Nazi-adjacent core. Conservatism in general is increasingly flirting with antisemitic speech and candidates: In Idaho, a Republican with a long history of antisemitic speech, one who claims "all Jews are dangerous," is enjoying his local party's support for joining the local school board.

Extremist rhetoric in general is being rewarded rather than scorned by Republican voters. It's probably not surprising that the Republican slide into fascism could not help but stoke the same antisemitic sentiments that past versions have relied on. The QAnon, Trump, and Republican movements are all coalescing into one ball of hate and hoaxes; in the House and Senate, party leaders are at worst helping to promote the conspiracies, and at best remaining silent in efforts to ride the hate to new election victories.

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Five members of the Congressional Committee have accused Amazon's top executives of either misleading or blatantly lying to it about its business practices and said they are considering an investigation following publication of two damning reports last week. From a report: Reuters and the Markup reported last week that Amazon uses the data of third-party sellers on its platform to inform and create its private-label products. Both the outlets also noted that Amazon then gives preference to its own portfolio over those of the rivals when customers look up for products. The letter, addressed to Amazon chief executive Andy Jassy, says it's offering Jassy "a final opportunity to provide exculpatory evidence to corroborate the prior testimony and statements on behalf of Amazon to the Committee." In the letter, the lawmakers also said the committee is considering whether it would be appropriate to refer the Department of Justice to launch a criminal investigation into the subject.

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couchslug writes: Canon, best nown for manufacturing camera equipment and printers for business and home users, is being sued for not allowing customers to use the scan or fax functions in multi-function devices if the ink runs out on numerous printer models. David Leacraft filed a class action lawsuit against Canon USA, alleging the company engaged in deceptive marketing and unjust enrichment practices.

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The astronauts and cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station had to initiate emergency protocols after the spacecraft tilted and turned by 57 degrees on Friday. All is well now, but the Roscosmos and NASA ground teams had to spring to action and alert their personnel in space after noticing the change in orientation. According to The New York Times, the incident happened while cosmonaut Oleg Novitsky was testing the engines aboard the Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft that's currently docked with the station. 

NASA spokesperson Leah Cheshier told the publication that "the thruster firing unexpectedly continued" when the engine testing was scheduled to end. By 5:13 AM Eastern time, the ISS lost control of its orbital positioning. Russian controllers in Moscow immediately told Novitsky that the station turned 57 degrees, while NASA's mission control in Houston told its astronauts to begin emergency procedures. Flight controllers were able to regain control of the station around 30 minutes later. The Soyuz spacecraft that caused the incident is expected to fly a Russian fillm crew — that same one that flew to the ISS to shoot the first feature film there earlier this month — back to Earth.

"During the Soyuz MS-18 engines testing, the station’s orientation was impacted. As a result, the International Space Station orientation was temporarily changed. The station’s orientation was swiftly recovered due to the actions of the ISS Russian Segment Chief Operating Control Group specialists. The station and the crew are in no danger," Roscosmos said in its announcement.

As The Times notes, this is the second such emergency on the station. Back in July, the thrusters on Russia's Nauka module fired "inadvertently and unexpectedly" causing the ISS to tilt by about 45 degrees. At the time, NASA spokesperson Rob Navias said the ISS lost "attitude control," which is also what happened in this case, and that the event was quite rare.

Most of us are old enough to remember when Republicans eager to court the evangelical Christian vote would recoil in (not entirely genuine) horror at any hint of antisemitism in any political candidate, particularly on a GOP slate. But for the new post-insurrection Trumpian Republican Party, it seems not only to be no problem, it’s practically an asset.

Case in point: Dave Reilly, an unrepentant antisemite who believes “Judaism is the religion of anti-Christ” is running for the local school board in Post Falls, Idaho, with the wholehearted endorsement of the Kootenai County Republican Central Committee (KCRCC). When pressed about their candidate, the GOP chair doubled down, insisting that the press reports about his bigoted views—based on Reilly’s own published tweets and articles—were “false,” and that Reilly’s story was “a remarkable one of salvation and is an inspiration to those struggling with life's challenges.”

“I believe Dave is a good man who will make an excellent Trustee and will resist the Progressive/Marxist indoctrination of our children,” retorted KCRCC chair Brent Regan on Facebook. “I encourage you to ignore the false accusations and continue your support of ALL of our recommended candidates.”

When establishment Republicans have called Regan out for supporting Reilly, he has claimed they were making “accusations without complete information,” and claimed that the information in the Daily Beast article by Kelly Weill that kicked off the controversy in early October did so “with quotes either fabricated or taken out of context.”

As Weill and the blog Angry White Men documented, Reilly’s history of posting antisemitic and white nationalist talking points on social media is extensive. His views first attracted attention in 2017, when he avidly promoted the deadly “Unite the Right” white nationalist march in Charlottesville, Virginia, while ostensibly covering the event for WHLM-AM radio in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, a station owned by his father.

“Good morning. The #AltRight slept tight and #Antifa is still sleeping. Probably hungover or dope-sick. See yall at Lee Park. #Unite the Right,” one of his preevent tweets read. Reilly then resigned while putting out a statement denouncing “Nazism, the KKK, Racism, White Supremacism, and political violence,” adding: “The accusations that I am a White Supremacist, Nazi, Racist or anything of this kind is pure slander.”

Over the ensuing years, Reilly then embarked on a career of rubbing shoulders with racists, notably the white nationalist “Groyper” movement led by Nicholas Fuentes and embraced by pundit Michelle Malkin, who has endorsed Reilly’s candidacy in Post Falls as well. Reilly attended one of their conferences. He also made multiple appearances on the white nationalist YouTube channel “Red Ice.”

He tweeted that “Judaism is the religion of anti-Christ,” that “all Jews are dangerous,” and opined more Americans should believe antisemitic stereotypes.

On Twitter, Reilly’s antisemitism was rampant. “Jews pretend to be white when it’s expedient for them,” he tweeted last January, which is why “white privilege is a thing.” Later that month, he shared an article claiming 61% of Americans agreed with at least one antisemitic stereotype. “Good news! Let’s get those numbers up!” he tweeted.

As Weill documented:

When Poland announced its withdrawal from a Holocaust event in January 2020, Reilly expressed his approval (“Poland FTW”), and when he was questioned again about his attendance at Unite The Right, he claimed that criticizing his presence alongside white supremacists was inherently Jewish behavior (“the idea that one can be contaminated by association is Jewish,” he wrote).

Reilly also tweeted two pictures of billboards, which had been doctored to read “when Jews hold power they abuse it” and “all Jews are dangerous,” and promoted conspiracy theories about “Jewish subversion.” “Judaism is the religion of anti-Christ,” he tweeted at one point in February 2020.

The targets of Reilly’s bigotry include women and the LGBTQ community. He tweeted that women’s suffrage was “a mistake” and that “women should not be allowed on social media.” He also accused Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg of “dabbling in human trafficking” for adopting a child with his husband Chasten Buttigieg.

After leaving WHLM, Reilly worked as an editor for E. Michael Jones, the leader of an antisemitic “traditionalist Catholic” group based in Indiana and the publisher of Culture Wars magazine, which is noted for running such articles as "Judaizing: Then and Now," "John Huss and the Jews," "The Converso Problem: Then and Now," "The Judaism of Hitler," "Shylock Comes to Notre Dame.” In 2019, a Reilly piece for the magazine titled “Generation Identity Crisis” claimed that “Jewish sociologists” had used “Marxist social engineering” to ignite a “mass movement of left wing agitation and sexual liberation … [leading to an] almost complete breakdown of social norms.” He also wrote that “the Catholic Church has been infiltrated by homosexuals, Jews, and bad leadership.”

Michelle Lippert, a retired professor of philosophy at North Idaho College and current school board member, told KXLY-TV that Reilly’s candidacy is worrisome. “I’ve read pieces he’s written. I’ve seen his tweets. I’ve listened to podcasts that he’s participated in and it’s clear that he’s very anti-Semitic he is misogynistic, homophobic, and he has an appreciation of white supremacy,” Lippert said.

For his part, Reilly—who only moved to Post Falls in 2020—has mainly claimed martyrdom at the hands of the media and liberals. He told The Coeur d’ Alene Press that he has “been subjected to incredible financial, social and personal hardships because he was a public supporter of Donald Trump.”

“As a result of these attacks on me and my family by radical left-wing activists, I have been able to more closely imitate Jesus Christ, who was mocked, scourged, put on a show trial, spat upon and ultimately killed,” Reilly said. “I’m extremely blessed to be able to participate in that suffering for Christ’s sake.”

His primary rebuttal to the accurate characterization of his worldview as antisemitic is the same as Regan’s: holding up his endorsement by a local man of Jewish descent named Alan Golub, who they both describe as “the son of a Holocaust survivor.” What they omit from their description is that Golub, a wealthy Bitcoin promoter, does not appear to be a practicing member of the traditional Jewish faith; rather, he is listed as the primary agent for Aman Ministries, a nonprofit group with a website devoted to a mishmash of Hebraic and Christian fundamentalism, in the manner of Jews for Jesus.

In the meantime, both Reilly and Regan have come under sharp criticism from the pro-Israel group StandWithUs Northwest, which attempted to open a dialogue with both men and was rebuffed. On Facebook, the group noted: “If you look at our statement,  you will see that our ‘allegations’ are actually screen shots of tweets that Reilly himself posted.

Reilly continued lying about StandWithUs, alleging numerous untrue things about us, in an attempt to deflect from his own antisemitic writings.”

This doubling-down approach by Trumpian Republicans on efforts to call out the GOP’s embrace of far-right extremism was reflected Jan. 6, when Reilly was a speaker at a rally in Coeur d’Alene organized to protest Trump’s defeat in the election. He told the crowd that the November elections were fraudulent.

“This election was rigged and it was stolen from us, the American people,” he said. “There’s more votes in Pennsylvania than registered voters.”

Before the mob in Washington began its assault on the Capitol, the Idaho crowd heard Reilly denounce police officers and the FBI for lacking integrity; called Democrats pedophiles; and claimed the CIA has been smuggling drugs, children, and money. He also attacked then-Vice President Mike Pence.

“Mike Pence just released a letter saying he’s not going to do what he’s supposed to do,” he told the audience, which booed loudly, with shouts of “traitor”. The event’s emcee then took the microphone and announced: “Supposedly they’re taking the Capitol and taking out Pence.”

The crowd cheered.

Last week, the Texas Senate approved its latest redistricting plan for the 33 districts that could soon make up the state. In addition to adding two new districts to account for population growth, the plan drastically alters current districts in major metros like Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, and Austin. In a piece published Friday, the Texas Tribune zeroed in on four proposed districts in the North Texas region that highlight the lengths the majority-Republican House will go to in order to remain power and bolster their numbers.

First up is TX-33, a district in the Dallas-Fort Worth area that was created in 2010 by a panel of federal judges who worked to preserve the voting rights of Black and brown voters, per the Voting Rights Act. The very provisions that brought TX-33 into existence are no longer in place, however. The Supreme Court struck down a section of the Voting Rights Act in 2013 that required federal preclearance in states and areas with a history of voter disenfranchisement towards marginalized groups.

Lawmakers in Texas for the first time are redistricting without federal oversight and appear to be using this opportunity to change the demographic makeup of the districts they may soon represent. The Texas Tribune notes that the plan to turn TX-33 whiter involves creating “a bizarre finger northward into Dallas County,” which you can see in this interactive map.

Hispanic voters especially would be impacted and pushed into a different district, TX-6, which has been expanded to include six additional majority-white counties stretching to the south and the east. According to the Texas Tribune, this change would amount to “a hypothetical 20-point margin of victory for Trump.”

Hispanic voters in Texas certainly contributed to Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election, though the state ultimately went red. According to Austin ABC affiliate KVUE, Biden won the Hispanic vote in Texas by 19 points. Hispanic voters aren’t the only demographic Texas Republicans have zeroed in on with their latest redistricting plan.

The Asian voting population, which is one of the fastest-growing groups in Texas, would also feel the negative impacts of the redistricting proposal. Collin County, where the Asian population has more than doubled over the past decade, would see many of its majority-Asian neighborhoods split apart into two districts: TX-3 and TX-4. The plan would decrease the number of Asian eligible voters from 10.8% to 5.6% in TX-3.

It would boost the population of Asian eligible voters in TX-4, but minimally compared with the more than 73% of white eligible voters that would encompass the planned district. Asian voters are a particularly strong voting bloc for Democrats. A 2020 presidential election exit poll conducted by NBC News found Joe Biden received an estimated 63% of the Asian American vote. Asian voters also helped turn Georgia blue in 2020 and voted in records numbers in the state.

Republicans’ redistricting plan treats the fact that minorities are at the center of Texas’ population growth as if the increase of people of color in the state is a threat. A prior proposal had the same problem and even got the attention of LULAC, which issued a rebuke against it.

“The largest growth in Texas between 2010 and 2020 was Hispanics, who added to the population boom in the state. Yet, today’s map all but assures that anyone except a Latino gets a new seat in Congress.” LULAC President Domingo Garcia said in a statement.

Passing the Freedom to Vote Act could put an end to Republicans’ power grab in Texas and across the country. Urge the Senate to pass the Freedom to Vote Act, which lawmakers will vote on next week. It puts an end to gerrymandering, requires automatic voting registration, and gives those with felony convictions the right to vote.

"One of Python's long-standing weaknesses, its inability to scale well in multithreaded environments, is the target of a new proposal among the core developers of the popular programming language," reports InfoWorld: Developer Sam Gross has proposed a major change to the Global Interpreter Lock, or GIL — a key component in CPython, the reference implementation of Python. If accepted, Gross's proposal would rewrite the way Python serializes access to objects in its runtime from multiple threads, and would boost multithreaded performance significantly... The new proposal makes changes to the way reference counting works for Python objects, so that references from the thread that owns an object are handled differently from those coming from other threads. The overall effect of this change, and a number of others with it, actually boosts single-threaded performance slightly — by around 10%, according to some benchmarks performed on a forked version of the interpreter versus the mainline CPython 3.9 interpreter. Multithreaded performance, on some benchmarks, scales almost linearly with each new thread in the best case — e.g., when using 20 threads, an 18.1x speedup on one benchmark and a 19.8x speedup on another.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Bernie Sanders has been calling on Joe Manchin to support President Joe Biden’s full agenda for weeks. On Friday night, Manchin signaled he’s had enough of that.

In response to an op-ed from Sanders (I-Vt.) published in Manchin’s hometown paper on Friday night, Manchin snapped back: “This isn’t the first time an out-of-stater has tried to tell West Virginians what is best for them despite having no relationship to our state.”

“Congress should proceed with caution on any additional spending and I will not vote for a reckless expansion of government programs. No op-ed from a self-declared Independent socialist is going to change that,” Manchin said in a statement on Friday evening shortly after the op-ed published. Sanders caucuses with Democrats but is still technically an independent.

Sanders has taken his campaign to pass Democrats' $3.5 trillion spending proposal to media venues across the spectrum, including Fox News. Manchin has occasionally responded, albeit not in the fashion he did on Friday night. Sanders’ move to land an op-ed in Manchin’s backyard seems to have crossed the line for the West Virginia senator.

In that piece, Sanders lays out how his proposed Medicare expansion and drug pricing reforms would help West Virginia, a historically poor state that is aided by many federal programs. Sanders also makes the case for climate action, paid leave expansion and other programs in the bill that could face omission if Manchin insists on shrinking it.

Sanders also specifically targets Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), who both oppose the $3.5 trillion number and are trying to shave it down.

“Poll after poll shows overwhelming support for this legislation. Yet, the political problem we face is that in a 50-50 Senate we need every Democratic senator to vote ‘yes.’ We now have only 48. Two Democratic senators remain in opposition, including Sen. Joe Manchin,” Sanders wrote.

Sanders’ office ran a draft by Manchin’s after the op-ed was submitted to the paper but before it published, according to aides in both offices. Both senators serve on Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s leadership team and come from polar opposites of the Democratic Caucus. They are often diplomatic, even when disagreeing in public.

Last week, however, Sanders began pressuring Manchin and Sinema to speed up their languid negotiations on the final piece of Biden’s agenda, which also covers health care and education expansion. The two gave dueling press conferences, then Sanders held an availability with reporters last Friday to continue leaning on Manchin and Sinema.

The two are at odds over the scale of how to finalize Biden’s agenda, a microcosm of the difficulties Democrats face in getting all 50 of their senators on board to pass anything through the party-line budget reconciliation process. Manchin has said he supports a $1.5 trillion spending program, viewing that as a compromise position. But Sanders initially wanted $6 trillion, and therefore views his deal with centrist Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) at $3.5 trillion as a concession.

Manchin and Sanders have plenty of history: Sanders won West Virginia’s Democratic primary in 2016, defeating Manchin-backed Hillary Clinton in the state. And a year later Sanders’ wife appeared alongside Manchin’s primary opponent in his 2018 reelection race.

Now, Sanders is imploring Manchin not to obstruct Biden’s agenda. In his view, having just two senators reluctant to move forward is an unsustainable position that undercuts Biden.

Manchin sees things differently. And it doesn’t make it any easier for Schumer to get the unity he needs to pass his agenda.

“Millions of jobs are open, supply chains are strained and unavoidable inflation taxes are draining workers’ hard-earned wages as the price of gasoline and groceries continues to climb. Senator Sanders’ answer is to throw more money on an already overheated economy while 52 other Senators have grave concerns about this approach,” Manchin said, lumping himself firmly with Sinema and the 50 Senate Republicans.

Arizona Republican Attorney General Mark Brnovich must be under a lot of stress. He is considered the Republican Party’s best chance at turning Sen. Mark Kelly’s seat red this coming election. He’s the front-runner for the nomination to run against Sen. Kelly. But he’s also, up until recently, been on the list of MAGA-lite officials who aren’t delusional enough to support all of the fact-free conspiracy theories Trumpers would like investigated. Trump has attacked Brnovich for not complying with his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, and has endorsed more overtly fascist candidates to replace run-of-the-mill fascists like Gov. Doug Ducey.

After Trump aimed one of his oafish attacks on Brnovich in May, Brnovich began adding more ultra-right-wing histrionics to his platform. This included writing some strongly worded letters to the Department of Justice about how they were being soft on immigration and calling the DOJ’s well-warranted leeriness over the Cyber Ninja election fraud farce-recount debacle in Arizona partisan. Recently, Brnovich has added some anti-vaxx nonsense to the public exhibits showing how low he will go to win his party’s nomination. It is all a posturing toward the two-dimensional, 1990s action star concept of masculinity that Donald Trump represents.

On Friday, Mr. Brnovich took that fragile masculinity to its foregone conclusion and tweeted this video of himself, showing everyone his nunchucks skills. Literally.

The video.

That’s real. He and someone or someones said you know what a good idea is? Why don’t I/You do that nunchuck thing you’re always doing. The Arizona attorney general then gave someone his phone, that person is either much taller than Brnovich or they got up on a stool, and then somebody says allrighty, let’s do this. Then, 54-year-old Mark Brnovich shows you his sweet nunchucks skills. As you might imagine, the responses were *chef’s kiss*.

What might really be happening is explained in one tweet.

Here’s an important breakdown of Arizona’s Republican field.

Warning: strong language ahead.

And the 1990s.

And 1990s cinema.

And my personally favorite.

Surprising absolutely no one, Tucker Carlson took U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s paternity leave as an opportunity to sling homophobic comments about Buttigieg and his husband, Chasten. Buttigieg began his paternity leave in August in order to spend time with the couple’s twins, Joseph August and Penelope Rose. Buttigieg, mind you, has already started making some work appearances at the time of writing, though a number of outlets—including Politico and local CBS outlets—are covering his leave as his being missing in action amid supply chain issues. I wouldn’t describe someone who has made appearances on CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, NPR, and others within the past week alone as MIA, but okay. 

“Pete Buttigieg has been on leave from his job since August after adopting a child,” Carlson ranted during a Thursday night segment of his show. “Paternity leave, they call it. Trying to figure out how to breastfeed. No word on how that went.” Ah, precisely the snide, homophobic, misogynist, and dismissive verbiage we’ve come to expect from Fox News. 

In an ideal world, we wouldn’t have to discuss what Carlson says or thinks, but given that he has an enormous platform thanks to Fox News, what he spews is important—at least, to some people. Carlson has spouted off conspiracy theories about COVID-19, invoked white nationalist conspiracy rhetoric while talking about immigration, and argued that progressives talking about race have hurt the nation. He’s a big fan of giving sexist smears air time, has no issue stomping on vulnerable trans youth, and, at this point unsurprisingly, loves to rant about Black Lives Matter and bolster hysteria about antifa. 

Thankfully, many folks on Twitter—where the clip of Carlson’s homophobia has gotten a lot of attention—are speaking up both in support of Buttigieg and paid paternity leave in general.

The kicker? As pointed out by LGBTQ Nation, Fox News actually offers six weeks of paternity leave—and some from the network have openly praised the policy. 

Sign the petition to Fox News: It is time to fire Tucker Carlson.

You can watch Carlson’s rant below if you’re able to stomach it. You can also relive the delight of Buttigieg hitting it out of the park while being interviewed by Chris Wallace not once, but twice on Fox News. 

Follow me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or at my website.

Nine months after one of the most violent days in the history of our country, investigations are still ongoing as more than 670 people have been charged with involvement in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection. Despite the overwhelming amount of evidence depicting the violence of the day, some officials are continuing to play dumb and ignore the brutality that occurred. To date, officials have reviewed more than 15,000 hours of footage, making it the largest digital crime scene in history.

The best part is that most of these videos have come from the rioters themselves. Participants in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection not only sent photos and footage to friends and family but posted to their social media accounts. In a recent incident, the government obtained at least eight videos of the Capitol insurrection after a Massachusetts man pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor Thursday. The man, identified as Brian McCreary, was famously photographed at the Capitol riot alongside the infamous ‘QAnon shaman,’ Jacob Chansley.

McCreary’s plea comes nine months after he first told FBI investigators that it was not Trump supporters but "antifa" who stormed the halls of government. He was arrested Feb. 3, during which his cell phone was confiscated.

On Thursday McCreary accepted a misdemeanor plea of entering or remaining in a restricted building, a charge that carries a maximum of one year in prison but sentencing guidelines of zero to six months, according to the Court House News Service.

During McCreary’s hearing, U.S. Chief Judge Beryl Howell noted that McCreary provided eight video clips to the FBI that documented the violent mob.

“When you were filming, did you hear — as captured on video — ‘where are they counting the fucking votes?’” Howell asked to confirm that McCreary partook in different activities inside the Capitol.

“A lot of people were yelling, your honor,” McCreary said. “I was trying to capture what was happening.”

McCreary also admitted to following the mob inside the Capitol and realizing he should have known that he wasn’t supposed to be there.

“I realized upon reflection that that should have been obvious to me,” McCreary said.

Among the videos of the violent mob, one showed rioters attacking Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman. Goodman a Black Capitol Police officer, heroically diverted a mob of angry Donald Trump supporters away from the Senate chamber during the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection. Video footage shared to social media depicted him acting quickly and selflessly as angry mob members stormed the building.

Two others pleaded guilty Thursday, bringing the total number of guilty pleas up to 103. Last week, U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan shared that he was afraid some rioters were taking early plea deals with no remorse for their actions, and were only saying whatever they thought prosecutors wanted to hear.

“It’s become evident to me in the riot cases … that many of the defendants who are pleading guilty are not truly accepting responsibility. They seem to me to be trying to get this out of the way as quickly and as inexpensively as possible and stating whatever they have to say in guilty pleas and hoping to get probation and leave,” Hogan said.

Most of the 100 rioters who have pleaded guilty have admitted to a lesser crime than what they were originally charged with, including parading, demonstrating, or picketing in the Capitol—Class B misdemeanors that carry a maximum sentence of six months in jail. As a result, many of these individuals avoid being tried on multiple charges, some of which carried more potential prison time.

Other newly released Jan.6 insurrection videos include the infamous Eric Munchel, coined the "zip-tie guy," and his mother, Lisa Marie Eisenhart, who worked their way through protesters to end up in the U.S. Senate gallery during the insurrection.

According to the Nashville Tennessean, a federal judge overseeing the case against Munchel and Eisenhart ordered the release of the 50-minute video that was recorded on a cell phone that the son wore on his vest during the riot. "I'm going to get me some of them motherf***ers," Munchel said in the video as he and his mother grabbed handfuls of plastic handcuffs or zip ties.

Both Munchel and Eisenhart are awaiting trial on federal charges.

Officials are strategically using footage posted online by those who attended the riots to prosecute them. As time continues to pass, more individuals are being charged daily.

“The country is watching to see what the consequences are for something that has not ever happened in the history of this country before,” U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said, “for actions and crimes that threaten to undermine the rule of law and our democracy.”

Hate was on full display Thursday at the Texas Capitol, where state House members spent nearly 12 hours debating House Bill 25 before passing the legislation in a vote of 76-54. The bill targets trans student-athletes in Texas public schools under the guise that it’s ensuring that “sufficient interscholastic athletic opportunities remain available for girls to remedy past discrimination on the basis of sex.”

In reality, the bill forces children to play on sports teams that correspond with the gender on their birth certificate. The House clarified on Thursday that the gender listed on a birth certificate must be entered at or near the time of birth and thus cannot be modified unless there was a mistake due to a clerical error.

The University Interscholastic League, which oversees youth sports programs in Texas, leaves the task of checking birth certificates up to schools and school districts. There is one exception to the restrictive bill, which is expected to sail through the Senate and be signed into law: if there are no girls’ sports teams at a school, girls can join the boys’ team.

Texas Republicans have tried over and over to force anti-trans student-athlete bills through the House, only to fall short of their goal. There have been three prior attempts to move bills like this forward. Rep. Valoree Swanson, who authored HB25, was gloating over her near-victory by the time lawmakers were set to vote. There wasn’t a happier politician in the House chambers once the special session had concluded.

Throughout the day, Swanson made it clear she was focused on pushing through HB25 at all costs. She talked over fellow lawmakers and activists and had conversations with others as she was being questioned about the bill. Frequently, Rep. Erin Zweiner stopped in the middle of her remarks to call out Swanson for not paying attention.

Swanson did little to hide her transphobia, making a point of refusing to use the terms “cisgender” and “transgender,” instead choosing to use discriminatory phrases like “biological male” and “biological female.” Swanson even bragged about her own experience as a cisgender woman, notably when being questioned by Rep. James Talarico.

The process of amending a birth certificate in Texas is lengthy, costly, and can be a bit of a gamble depending on the county judge granting the request. Swanson and other lawmakers effectively shut the door on even that possibility for trans children by passing amendments that prevent modified or updated birth certificates from being used to determine which team a child should join when enrolled in sports.

Talarico was among a handful of representatives who appeared to mine their own trauma and share deeply personal stories in an attempt to defeat HB25. Rep. Ann Johnson described her experience growing up as a lesbian and her fears of coming out. Activists and even children have testified about the damage HB25 will do to kids in Texas, but Swanson and her ilk refused to listen.

They also made a point of shooting down amendments meant to help trans children. An amendment requiring mental health services for trans children failed, as did an amendment exempting trans children with mental health issues from HB25’s restrictive policies.

The Texas Senate has until Tuesday night to decide the fate of HB25. Gov. Greg Abbott has already signaled his support and plans to sign the bill once it hits his desk. 

The Equality Act could undo harmful policies like HB25, as it prevents discrimination against LGBTQ+ youth in any school that receives federal funding. One of the biggest barriers to the Equality Act’s passage is the filibuster, which Republicans have used to stymy progressive legislation. Call on lawmakers to do the right thing and end the filibuster.

The “blue ribbon” commission appointed by President Joe Biden to study the problem of Republican court packing, particularly at the U.S. Supreme Court, has gone beyond being an ineffective and useless body (as most blue ribbon commissions usually are) to being downright dangerous. It released a draft report Thursday, ahead of a scheduled Friday meeting, full of Federalist Society narratives and Republican lies.

The commission was formed in April. In the intervening months, the Supreme Court has allowed Texas to ban abortion and prevented the Biden administration from conducting executive business by blocking both the COVID-19 emergency eviction moratorium and the ending of the Trump administration’s “remain in Mexico policy.” All of that was done as part of the shadow docket—emergency appeals that were not argued before the Court, and in unsigned opinions. In regular session, they gutted the Voting Rights Act and made it harder for workers to organize. All that has happened in the six months of the commission’s existence.

And yet, the commission warns that a proposal to expand the Supreme Court to achieve some ideological balance might “reinforce the notion that the Justices are partisan actors.” Gosh, who could have any idea that the justices are partisan? Certainly not this blundering commission. They also argue that “it is far from clear that ideological balance is in and of itself a desirable goal.” Which is pretty much what you would expect a commission weighted down with Federalist Society members to argue. After all, they’re winning.

They’re winning, and they are denying it. The commission set out as a fact for discussion that “First, even as the Court is at the center of escalating partisan conflict, its rulings have not fallen consistently along ‘party lines,’ where Justices appointed by Republicans always vote in a predictably conservative fashion and Justices appointed by Democrats vote in a consistently liberal one.” That “always” is doing a helluva lot of work there, and the commission goes on to try to prove that assertion by saying “a significant portion of the Court’s work is not highly ideological,” so that’s why the court isn’t ideological. Never mind all those other ideological cases, where Republicans are winning.

Just to emphasize how pro-Republican this commission and its conclusions are, it repeated the Republican lie that the blockade of President Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, in an election year was normal procedure. It quotes Sen. Chuck Grassley, asserting that “it’s been standard practice over the last 80 years to not confirm Supreme Court nominees during a presidential election year.” It has not been standard practice. Justice Anthony Kennedy, a Reagan nominee, was appointed in 1988. The commission knows that’s a lie, because they were told that in the August testimony of Aaron Belkin, founder of Take Back the Court, who warned them that the testimony they heard from critics of Supreme Court expansion was a lie.

“The simple fact is that these witnesses produced no actual precedent for Senate Republicans’ actions, because none exist,” Belkin testified. “And in making their case, they pretend a Senate controlled by Democrats did not confirm Anthony Kennedy in 1988, the final year of Ronald Reagan’s presidency. But that confirmation did happen, so conservatives attempt to define it out of existence with technically-accurate statements intended to create an inaccurate understanding of history.”

Just to demonstrate how bad an unbalanced this draft report is, there’s this:

Yes, there was evidentiary evidence—Blasey Ford’s testimony. That’s evidence. Furthermore, as Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse has been  doggedly reminding the public, the FBI utterly botched the investigation, creating a sham of a process.

Whitehouse also provides a detailed critique of the report. Let’s just say, he’s not a fan.

This commission demonstrates the lie that is “bipartisanship” in 2021. It’s been a lie for years and years, but now it’s reached utter insanity. Let’s hope that the memory of what that word once meant to Senate Democrats—and to Joe Biden—doesn’t blind them to the reality when they evaluate this report. And that they proceed to toss it in the bin.

In what feels like the inevitable (and deeply disturbing) result of pushing “other side” and “middle ground” rhetoric, a school administrator in Texas has been caught advising teachers to include a book that has an “opposing” view if they choose to include a book about the Holocaust in their classroom library. Yes, really.

In audio obtained by NBC News, Gina Peddy, the Carroll Independent School District’s executive director of curriculum and instruction, is heard discussing how teachers can comply with House Bill 3979. During the training session about which books teachers were allowed to include in their classroom libraries, Peddy suggested that if they include a book about the Holocaust, they should also provide a book from an “opposing” perspective. The training came within days of a parent complaining that an elementary school teacher included an anti-racism book in her class library. 

“Just try to remember the concepts of [House Bill] 3979," Peddy explained in the less than two-minute audio clip which was secretly taken by a staff member during the Friday meeting. The legislation, which will go into effect in December, mandates that teachers in Texas offer up multiple perspectives and views when it comes to learning or discussing “widely debated” or “controversial” issues.

Of course, at this point in our society, this sort of bill means that racist, classist, ableist, and otherwise regressive, offensive ideas are about to get the same credence and learning time as actually important, progressive models. It also means that students (not to mention teachers who are pressured to include those materials) may be exposed to legitimate trauma from having to consume and “learn” or “debate” those harmful viewpoints. And if you’re wondering if this all is connected to the Republican hysteria about critical race theory (CRT), you’re correct. 

An elementary school teacher who spoke to NBC News and asked to remain anonymous told the outlet that teachers are “literally afraid” they’ll be punished over what books they have in their classrooms. “There are no children’s books that show the ‘opposing perspective’ of the Holocaust or the ‘opposing perspective’ of slavery,” the teacher told the outlet. “Are we supposed to get rid of all of the books on those subjects?”

Here is the audio, as released from NBC News.

“We are in the middle of a political mess,” Peddy is heard saying at the beginning of the recording. “And you are in the middle of a political mess. And so we just have to do the best that we can.” After a teacher pointed out that they’re scared, Peddy said they’re professionals and she trusts them. “We will fight it together,” she said. “We will.”

According to NBC News, teachers then pushed for more examples of appropriate books, arguing they didn’t understand the new guidelines. And here is the key part of dialogue from the recording, where Peddy provides an example:

GP: “Make sure that if, if … you have a book on the Holocaust, that you have one that has an opposing … that has other perspectives.”

Teacher: “How do you oppose the Holocaust? What?”

GP: “Believe me, it’s come up.”

Teacher: “So, Number the Stars ...?” (For reference, Number the Stars is an often-assigned book for young readers about the Holocaust, written by Lois Lowry.)

Karen Fitzgerald, a spokesperson for the district, gave a statement to NBC News about the situation. 

"Our purpose is to support our teachers in ensuring they have all of the professional development, resources and materials needed,” Fitzgerald said in part. “Our district has not and will not mandate books be removed nor will we mandate that classroom libraries be unavailable.” She stressed that the district “recognizes that all Texas teachers are in a precarious position with the latest legal requirements" and that if teachers are unsure about including a specific book, they should meet with their principal and team to discuss. 

As Daily Kos has covered, schools have taught some really, really disturbing lessons. For example, one Texas charter school received major backlash after having middle schoolers list “positive” parts of life as a slave. In Wisconsin, a teacher resigned after an investigation into a disturbing question about how to “punish” slaves.

We’ve also covered teachers using racist symbols when talking about Asian Americans, a teacher who blamed Breonna Taylor for her own death while teaching via Zoom, and elementary schoolers who were made to pick cotton and sing slave songs during a field trip. Getting structural racism out of our schools is going to be a long, long fight, but it’s one we simply cannot give up on, especially when Republicans are so eager to fight us on it. 

It’s not always clear what the public wants. But a new poll shows strong support for taxing the rich to pay for Democrats’ Build Back Better Act.

As debate over Democrats’ Build Back Better Act has intensified, the $3.5 trillion social spending bill has remained strikingly popular in polls. That may be both a blessing and a curse for lawmakers because it’s now clear that the bill will need to shrink to pass. And like Congress, Americans don’t all agree on which of its big-ticket items are most important.

But at least one thing seems clear from public surveys: People want to pay for the bill by taxing the rich.

A Vox and Data for Progress poll, conducted October 8-12, found that 71 percent of voters support raising taxes on the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans to pay for the bill. Eighty-six percent of Democrats and 50 percent of Republicans backed the idea. Other tax provisions focused on the wealthy that could be included in the bill — such as tax increases on corporations and capital gains — found 65 percent or more support overall.

Sixty-three percent of voters in the poll said they supported the $3.5 trillion overall plan that includes spending on health care, long-term care, child care, and clean-energy jobs.

Ethan Winter/Data for Progress

It’s less clear which priorities voters most want to spend that money on. When asked to choose the most and least important parts of the Build Back Better Act’s many policies, taxing the rich was most frequently cited as a top priority, with 13 percent of respondents choosing the measure. (The poll surveyed 1,224 likely voters and had a sampling margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.)

Expanding Medicare benefits to cover dental, vision, and hearing also showed strong support, with 12 percent of respondents ranking it the highest priority, and another 12 percent picked policies to increase access to long-term care for older adults and people with disabilities. Republicans were especially supportive of the provisions for health care and long-term care for older adults, compared to Democrats, who most frequently cited the tax increases and clean-energy measures as top priorities.

Democrats face tough choices in keeping a promise of “transformative” policies in the Build Back Better Act: Do programs need to be made permanent, increasing their price tag? Should funding child care or prekindergarten win out over expanding Medicare benefits? How fast must the country move to cut fossil fuels and fight climate change?

This is Democrats’ first chance in years at crafting major legislation not directly tied to the pandemic — and given the electoral map’s skew toward Republicans, it could be their last for another decade.

The popularity of the Build Back Better Act so far may or may not make it easier for lawmakers to get the bill over the finish line. In the Vox/Data for Progress poll, voters were presented with arguments for and against removing a particular provision to reduce costs, such as Medicare benefits expansion or clean-energy policy. Only about a third of voters or fewer supported the cuts. And respondents showed a diversity of opinion on what’s most important in the bill.

That likely reflects the fact that Democrats’ big bill touches on important issues for people at various stages of life, said Ethan Winter, a senior analyst for Data for Progress.

Ethan Winter/Data for Progress

Winter noted that a policy like free prekindergarten would be especially favored by a young parent, while expanding Medicare benefits appeals more to older adults — who make up a larger swath of the electorate. The somewhat stronger support for tax increases on the wealthy and spending on care for older adults suggests those ideas are a core appeal of Democratic politics, for both the party’s base and swing voters.

“People elect Democrats because they will raise taxes on the rich to do modest economic redistribution, and [policies] for seniors are always very popular,” Winter said.

Polls have shown solid majority support for most pieces of the bill as standalone policies. (The child tax credit expansion has seen majority approval but seems to fare worse in polling when voters are explicitly asked about making the expansion permanent.)

The bill’s popularity could shift as Americans learn more about it and are exposed to partisan messaging; an October CBS News poll found that few Americans say they know much about what’s in the bill, and only a third think it will affect them directly, despite many provisions focused on helping middle- and lower-income families.

And there’s a potential warning sign for Democrats in a new Gallup poll: In a September survey, 52 percent of voters said the government is doing too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses — basically returning to the average level surveyed in the past decade. In 2020, as the pandemic pummeled Americans and the economy, 54 percent of voters said they wanted the government to do more.

On climate issues, 57 percent of voters in the Vox/Data for Progress poll said tax credits for electric cars in the Build Back Better plan would make them more likely to purchase one.

Sixty-three percent of voters expressed support for the clean electricity program, a key component of the bill’s climate crisis strategy that now appears in danger of being scrapped or significantly cut back. When asked about removing this provision of the bill after hearing arguments for and against government intervention in the energy industry, 53 percent of voters wanted to keep the clean electricity plan, and 36 percent wanted to remove it.

Democrats’ bill is popular. So why are they shrinking it?

Americans largely seem to like the Build Back Better Act. Most don’t seem fazed by the $3.5 trillion price tag. The strong support for tax increases on the rich — after big tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations under President Donald Trump — suggests skeptical centrist Democrats may have other concerns in backing cuts to the bill.

The precariousness of the bill largely comes down to Democrats’ very thin majorities in the House and Senate. That gives Joe Manchin, a senator from a Trump-voting coal state, the power to dictate demands on climate provisions as well as the overall size of the bill.

It also means another centrist senator, Kyrsten Sinema, is a key figure in the negotiations, even though it’s not totally clear what she wants in the bill — and she left this week for Europe on a fundraising tour. (While Manchin’s approval in his home state of West Virginia has remained fairly steady overall, Sinema’s resistance to the legislation has caused her approval rating to plummet among Democrats and prompt stirrings of a primary challenge in Arizona, a state more evenly split between Republicans and Democrats.)

Manchin, Sinema, and other moderate Democrats have sometimes appeared at odds with each other on tax increases and how to pay for the bill, making things even more complicated.

At New York magazine, Eric Levitz chalks pushback by some House Democrats up to America’s skewed representation in Congress and the decline of labor as a lobbying force. Plus, perhaps, old-fashioned stubbornness: Many Democrats in Congress came of political age in the era of Bill Clinton, deficit reduction, and welfare reform. “I think that’s why we can’t have ($3.5 trillion worth of) nice things: Labor is weak, Congress is malapportioned, and some old rich Democrats have annoying beliefs,” Levitz wrote.

No matter what happens with the Build Back Better Act, it won’t end debates around what pursuing popular policies really means. Even if the final bill is embraced by the public, it might not lead Democrats to electoral victory, either.

But if Democrats are just looking for legislation that most Americans want, taxing the rich to pay for policies that help families, seniors, and the planet seems like a safe bet so far.

Update, October 16, 9:40 am: This story has been updated to reflect news that the Build Back Better Act’s clean electricity program may be cut, and to include a new Gallup poll on the role of government.

(804): I WILL go to space. And if we find aliens I WILL fuck one. It’s the Marine Corps way.

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