Turning NY19 True Blue
Why John Faso Has to Go
Make no mistake…
if we can flip NY 19 and other “purple” districts we can freeze this administration’s terrifying pro-nuclear war, anti-environment agenda. Because if you think Republicans have largely been stymied, you’re sadly incorrect. John Faso votes with Trump 86 percent of the time. He may represent a purple district, but he votes as if he’s in a safe red one. He’s not, and we cannot let that stand.
But before we tell you how you can fight back, it’s important to understand John Faso’s record against women, children, the elderly, and his default to letting the White House run roughshod over your rights.
On Women and Children and the Elderly
While it didn’t get as much attention as the (thankfully) failed vote by the Senate to ban abortions after 20 weeks in January—never mind that abortion that late in a term is both rare, and nearly always because the fetus has a catastrophic ailment—John Faso voted in favor of the same legislation in the House this past fall.
Faso has voted directly against the health care interests of women, children, the disabled and the elderly.
Last June, Faso voted in favor of the cynically dubbed Protecting Access to Care Act of 2017, a bill that sides with insurers, against the rights of patients who have been injured by medical malpractice. States like Texas that have passed such laws have been found to be in violation of the Constitution.
Faso voted in favor of repealing the Affordable Care Act. More infamously, he went directly after federal funding to you and I by offering his own amendment that would have gutted New York State resources for Medicaid, an amendment that would have disproportionately impacted the children and poor of his own district.
Equally disheartening, Faso hasn’t spoken up to defend the children of his own district. What did Faso say when Scott Pruitt moved to table a ban on a harmful pesticide that can cause severe learning disabilities in children, rejecting his own agency’s analysis that said the chemical should be banned? He said nothing. He represents hundreds of thousands of people living near farms, with farms very near the homes of nearly all of his constituents. We need someone who actually represents us—not chemical companies.
On Working Families
Faso voted yes on a bill that would strip the rights of overtime workers to receive immediate pay, another cynical bill that would allow employers to demand overtime work, with delayed pay, letting workers “bank” the pay, but doing little to guarantee they’d receive it.
Faso said zilch when the Trump White House pulled out of a measure that would have given women the right to seek compensation for not getting equal pay.
Faso has done absolutely nothing to encourage job growth in the area, and unlike his predecessor, Chris Gibson, hasn’t worked with local job growth engines, like SUNY New Paltz.
On Gun Safety
Faso voted against New York State sovereignty (yes, against state’s rights, a supposed bedrock of Republican doctrine) when he voted in favor of anyone from an “open carry” state having the right to come to New York and brandish weapons—with their state laws overriding our own. Police nationwide oppose the bill because they fear it will endanger police as well as citizens.
Enough is Enough
If your blood is good and boiling now, that’s good, because we have the tools to unseat Faso, by partnering with Indivisible groups across the United States. In 2017, 86 percent (yes, really!) of calls to members of Congress were made by women. 70 percent of Indivisible group members, and the majority of group leaders, are women. In a recent TIME magazine cover story, the focus was on Indivisible, and how its grass-roots strength comes from women organizers and female candidates fed up with the status quo, ready to take on entrenched men in power.
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