Indivisibles,

The deadline for Congress to fund the government is swiftly approaching, so of course, things are getting more confusing by the minute. On top of that, Trump is embroiled in yet another corruption scandal, this one involving an allegation that Trump asked Ukrainian leaders to dig up dirt on Former Vice President Joe Biden. But instead of digging in on Trump's many scandals (something Congress should be doing through an impeachment inquiry), we’re here to break down what's going on with the adults this week.

Last week, the House passed a short-term funding bill (also known as a “continuing resolution,” or CR) that would keep the government open through November 21. The CR would largely maintain the status quo,which includes rejecting the White House’s request for additional funding for Trump’s deportation machine. And by the way, you can thank all of the amazing pressure you and the Defund Hate coalition put on each and every one of them, especially during the recent Week of Action.

So what does this mean? Simple: our asks for the funding fight in November are the same as they always were:

• Cut overall funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
• Get rid of the slush fund for ICE that gives Trump a blank check for deportation and detention, and
• Prevent ICE from stealing money from other agencies by keeping the current House draft bill language the same

You can read more about the ongoing fight to #DefundHate in our resource here.

Ok, we said we wouldn't get into the scandalous details of Trump's newest impeachable offense, but just can't help ourselves. The truth is that the whistleblower’s complaint outlines even more corrupt behavior from Donald Trump. It suggests that he asked the Ukrainian president to launch a sham investigation into Joe Biden as a way to damage Biden in the upcoming presidential campaign (gasp!). And that happened while at the same time, Trump’s administration was withholding military aid from Ukraine without Congressional approval (double freaking gasp!).  In fact, Trump’s own lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, has publicly acknowledged that the Trump administration has pressured Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. 

Look, we don’t need to convince you at this point that Trump deserves to be impeached for any number of reasons, but if we don't get Democrats to act, it will put our fragile democracy even more at risk. Check out the to-dos below for an updated call script to tell your member of Congress that you expect them do what's right and support impeachment inquiries, and soon.

And now for your weekly to-dos:

 Your 4 weekly to-dos 

1. Call your member of Congress right now and demand that they cut funding for ICE and CBP in this fall’s funding bill. Even if they kick the deadline to November, Congress will eventually have to finalize a deal to fund the government for the next year. Help make sure they don’t give Trump additional money for his deportation machine by calling your members of Congress to demand they #DefundHate.
2. Urge your Representative to impeach Trump. Donald Trump has committed numerous impeachable offenses -- and every time Democrats refuse to hold him accountable, it only emboldens him more. Over half of House Democrats have already called for impeachment; check out this list to see if your MoC is a supporter, and if not use our script to make a call and demand that they join the chorus.
3. Tell your member of Congress to stop Trump’s march to war with Iran. Congress has a major opportunity to block Trump from going to war with Iran. Use our call script to call your member of Congress and tell them to support the Khanna-Gaetz Amendment to the upcoming National Defense Authorization Act, which would explicitly block Trump from starting a war with Iran!
4. Demand that your Senators support comprehensive background checks. Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans aren’t doing anything to address the crisis of gun violence in America, even though the House has already passed legislation to improve our system of background checks. Call your Senators and tell them to demand a vote on S. 42!

 2020 Update 

We’re only four months out from the Iowa caucus and we’re sliding into the last week of this fundraising quarter. Candidates have been hard at work in early states to drum up voters and donors -- let’s dig into where they’re succeeding, their debate requirements for the rest of the year, and how our movement is feeling about the field after the debate earlier this month:

• Senator Warren leads the field in a major Iowa poll. For the first time, Sen. Warren has surpassed Vice President Biden and Sen. Sanders in the Des Moines Register/CNN poll of likely caucus goers in Iowa. We know that winning polls does not equal winning votes, but her increasing popularity shows that Iowans are responding positively to her unabashedly progressive message.

• The DNC has new requirements for the November debate. We’re just a couple weeks away from the Democratic field meeting once again to debate in Ohio, but the standards for admission will be changing in November. According to new DNC rules, candidates will need at least 165,000 unique donors and must achieve at least 3% in 4 qualifying polls (alternatively, they must get 5% in two early state polls). These shifting rules mean that we can expect the field to continue to narrow in the weeks ahead.
  
  
• Indivisibles still overwhelmingly prefer Warren if the election were today. After the debate earlier this month, we asked Indvisibles to participate in an online survey to gauge who was winning their support at this point in the primary. With only four months left until the Iowa caucus, Senator Warren continues to gain steam among our movement. With 46% of respondents choosing her, Warren easily won on the question “who would you vote for today?”. She also holds the highest net favorability from Indivisibles (75%), beating out Mayor Buttigeig (37%) and Senator Harris (20%). 

 We Are Indivisible: A Blueprint for Democracy After Trump

Last week, we emailed you about our newest news: Leah and Ezra’s book, which is being published November 5th. Over the next few weeks, we’ll give you a preview of Chapter 1 in the newsletters. Here’s how it starts:

On November 8, 2016, we hosted the worst house party of our lives.

The day started off well. We’d just come off a weekend canvassing for Hillary in Philadelphia with a dozen friends. We’d voted at the elementary school across the street from our house in Washington, D.C. 

Around 7:00 p.m., our friends -- a collection of former Hill staffers, think tank policy wonks, and Obama administration officials -- started to arrive at our house. We opened the champagne at 7:30 p.m. The mood was celebratory; the biggest concern was that Democrats might not take the Senate. Somewhere around 9:00 p.m., it became clear that this was not, in fact, the biggest problem we needed to worry about. To Be Continued... 

You can read more about the book at book.indivisible.org and use the links at the top of the page to pre-order your copy.

 Support the Movement 

We’ve got another breaking update: FreedomWorks (a branch of the GOP’s media machine) launched a Twitter tirade against us last week, launching a series of tweets calling us a part of the “Radical Left.” 

Groups like FreedomWorks believe that the government should only work for the wealthy, white elite. That’s why they’re scared of a movement like ours -- they’ve seen what we can accomplish together, and they’re doing whatever they can to preserve their status quo. They hope that by attacking us, they can shut us down.

We know this won’t be the last attack we face, and we need to be ready to fight back. Can you send a donation today to help us prepare for everything the right-wing throws at us and support all our progressive work?

 IndivisWin of the Week 

Indivisibles from coast to coast joined the Climate Strike Friday with young activists as they made the world listen. This is just one example of Indivisibles uplifting the voices of young people around them. 

We don't know about you but this weekend of activism has amped us up to do even more to bring about progressive change in our country. So while the Trump administration set on denying science, burying scandal, and fund more and more concentration camps for immigrant families, we need to come together -- every person in our movement -- to resist and fight and continuing working towards a future thats cleaner, safer, and more inclusive of everyone. Are you with us?

In solidarity,
Indivisible Team