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by Tina Vásquez

This article was originally published at Prism

On April 8, a small news outlet covering Texas’ Rio Grande Valley published a story that sent shockwaves through the reproductive justice movement. Lizelle Herrera was arrested April 7 by the Starr County Sheriff’s Office and charged with murder for allegedly having a self-induced abortion, which is when a person chooses to perform their own abortion outside of a medical setting. According to her indictment, Herrera “intentionally and knowingly” caused “the death of an individual.” She was held at the Starr County Jail, and her bond was set at $500,000.

In the days since Herrera’s story was made public, there has been a great deal of reporting about whether her criminalization was simply “a hasty error” by a district attorney or a case that should be treated as “a warning” that “foreshadows [a] post-Roe future.” But for reproductive justice advocates in Texas who are forced to navigate some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the nation, Herrera’s case isn’t merely a sign of what’s to come; it’s a reality that low-income people of color overwhelmingly shoulder. It’s also the inevitable result of complicated, convoluted anti-abortion laws.

Herrera’s case was shocking but predictable. She is a woman of color who was criminalized for an alleged self-managed abortion in an overwhelmingly Latinx area of Texas that is disproportionately affected by the state’s anti-abortion laws. And⁠—consistent with research done by the legal advocacy organization If/When/How: Lawyering for Reproductive Justice⁠—Herrera’s case is part of a larger pattern. Marginalized communities under state surveillance and subjected to over-policing are the same communities most likely to be criminalized for pregnancy outcomes, including Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, disabled people, immigrants, and LGBTQ+ people.

As Prism previously reported, abortion stigma increases when it comes to self-managed abortion, and so does criminalization⁠—especially for people of color. The public details of Herrera’s story appeared to have all of the hallmarks of a case that would drag out for months, if not years—and advocates who spoke to Prism said they were preparing for the worst.

When the news of Herrera’s case came to light, organizers began discussing potential protests outside of court hearings. They were thinking through a public campaign to support Herrera in getting her charges dropped. The Frontera Fund, a Rio Grande Valley (RGV)-based abortion fund, quickly mobilized in Herrera’s defense. The group organized a protest at the Starr County Jail on the morning of April 9 and urged people to call and demand Herrera’s release. However, Herrera’s case moved at breakneck speed.

By the afternoon of April 9, If/When/How’s Repro Legal Defense Fund paid Herrera’s bail, and she was released to her family. On April 10, the Starr County District Attorney, Gocha Ramirez, issued a press release stating that Herrera’s arrest was improper. On April 11, he filed a petition to drop the charges. On April 12, five Texas district attorneys issued a statement supporting Ramirez’s decision to drop the murder charge against Herrera while also condemning the state’s effort to criminalize abortion. In a landscape where you can potentially be charged with murder for allegedly ending a pregnancy, the outcome of Herrera’s criminalization was not expected.

Herrera has not made any public comments regarding her story, and the events that led to her criminalization are still murky. What is clear is that misconceptions, misunderstandings, and misinformation have surrounded Herrera’s case. To help set the record straight, Prism spoke to the Texas director for policy and advocacy at the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice, Nancy Cárdenas Peña; If/When/How senior counsel and legal director, Farah Diaz-Tello; and the Frontera Fund’s Rockie Gonzalez and Zaena Zamora, who provided insights during an April 13 press conference.

Cultural context

Early reporting on Herrera’s case, especially in Spanish language media, mentioned that she may have obtained abortion medication in Mexico. While this remains unverified by Herrera and her attorney, advocates say it’s worth unpacking.

During a Frontera Fund press conference, executive director Zamora explained that while it’s essential to understand how abortion restrictions vary from state to state, it’s also important to understand how various communities navigate these restrictions—especially in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley (RGV).

The RGV spans four different counties and is home to more than a million people, a third of whom live below the federal poverty level and don’t have health insurance. Accessing reproductive health care in this region has never been easy, and for the region’s sizeable undocumented population, it may also come with increased risk of criminalization. The closest clinic offering abortion care is Whole Woman’s Health, located at the southern tip of the RGV in McAllen, Texas. Not only does this mean that undocumented immigrants may face Border Patrol checkpoints, but the McAllen clinic is also heavily policed because of the anti-choice protestors who harangue and surveil those seeking care.

Abortion care can also be very expensive in Texas, especially in the RGV where the starting cost for abortion medication is around $800, Zamora explained. In Mexico, the same medication costs less than $100. For those in border communities who are able to go to Mexico to access health care, cost is a primary motivating factor.

“It is culturally normal in the Rio Grande Valley to get your health care in Mexico,” said Gonzales, the Frontera Fund’s founder. “Growing up here, we didn’t go to American dentists or doctors. What we do is go to Mexico because it’s quick and because it’s cheap and because it’s good health care. We have all grown up that way. It’s very normal.”

Gonzalez expressed that it was difficult to hear how the media sensationalized the possibility that Herrera may have gone to Mexico to access abortion medication, as if it’s something “scandalous.”

“We want to pull people away from sensationalizing this, like [it’s some] horrible trek to go into Mexico to get this care behind dark alleys. No, it’s part of Sunday brunch to go to the pharmacy and get [medications] that you can’t buy over-the-counter here,” Gonzalez said.

The fact that it was a Latina from the RGV who was charged with murder and held on a half-a-million-dollar bond for allegedly self-managing didn’t come as much of a surprise to any of the reproductive justice advocates who spoke to Prism.

“We’ve been saying since the onset, every time you pass any type of abortion restriction, it’s going to affect—first and foremost—low-income people, people of color, and people [from] marginalized communities,” Zamora said.

And this certainly isn’t the first time that a Latina in the state has been criminalized for accessing care. In 2015, the arrest of Blanca Borrego had a chilling effect on immigrants seeking health care. The undocumented mother went to the Northeast Women’s Healthcare Clinic in Atascocita, Texas, for an appointment with her gynecologist. She allegedly presented clinic staff with a false I.D., and a staff member called the sheriff’s department. Sheriff’s deputies placed Borrego in handcuffs and arrested her in front of her children.

Tragic stories involving Latinas are not uncommon within the reproductive health, rights, and justice movements—including the story of Rosie Jimenez. The 27-year-old single mother from McAllen died in 1977 because of complications from an illegal abortion. She was the first known woman to die because of the Hyde Amendment.

Hyde, which is still in place today, eliminates federal Medicaid funding for abortion. So while abortion was legal in 1977, the Hyde Amendment pushed low-income people like Jimenez to seek out less expensive options because of the inability to use federally subsidized insurance for abortion care. As Alexa Garcia-Ditta wrote for The Texas Observer, Jimenez’s death remains “a powerful reminder of what happens when abortion becomes inaccessible.” The hospital where Jiminez died is now the site of McAllen City Hall. Located across the street is Whole Woman’s Health, the only abortion clinic serving the Rio Grande Valley.

Lessons learned

When it was still unclear what triggered Herrera’s criminalization and the direction her case would go in, there was a lot of chatter on social media about the need for abortion funds to work closely with bail funds and how the reproductive rights movement should join the movement to defund the police. The assumption seemed to be that this kind of cross-movement work isn’t already happening.

Organizations like If/When/How operate at the intersection of reproductive justice and criminal justice. More broadly, the reproductive justice movement was formed by Black women who recognized that the mainstream reproductive rights movement, which continues to be led by middle class and affluent white women, could not defend the needs of people of color and other marginalized people. Advocates in this movement have been clear that decreasing incarceration is a matter of reproductive justice.

Cárdenas Peña said more cross-movement work could be happening, but this work requires time—and that can be hard to come by in a state like Texas, where immigrant communities and abortion access are under constant attack.

“I will just be really honest with you, I think we’re struggling to meet the demands of the environment here in Texas where things feel like they are on fire every single day,” she said. “But we want people to know that we’re invested in this fight and we’re going to give it everything we’ve got.”

Even if people weren’t being criminalized for having abortions, criminalization, detention, deportation, and incarceration are still reproductive justice issues because they remove people from their communities, destroy families, and destroy people’s ability to make decisions about their bodies and their families, Diaz-Tello explained.

“If we take seriously the idea that people should be free to make autonomous decisions about their reproductive lives, that has to include freedom from state control,” the attorney said.

Gonzalez issued the reminder that the Frontera Fund works at the intersections of criminal justice, reproductive justice, and immigrant justice, and without cross-movement organizing and relationships, it would have been impossible to provide a rapid response to Herrera’s criminalization. This was echoed by Cárdenas Peña, who said that failing to work in cross-movement collaborations isn’t an option for reproductive justice advocates in Texas.

As groups in the Rio Grande Valley scrambled to Herrera’s defense after her arrest was made public, some of the most powerful and well-funded national reproductive rights organizations were silent about the situation unfolding in Texas. Reproductive justice advocates who spoke to Prism said that silence was disappointing, but also expected. Tensions have long existed between large reproductive rights organizations and smaller groups doing work on the ground. Cárdenas Peña said it’s her guess that national reproductive rights organizations were waiting for more information about Herrera’s case to be released before deciding to publicly comment—and that’s a luxury grassroots groups in the RGV can’t afford.

While she acknowledged that organizers in the RGV can feel protective of their work and wary of outsiders, Cárdenas Peña said it’s for good reason. There is a long history of people coming into the RGV, fundraising off of the RGV, bringing some actions, and then leaving—and organizers in the state have been left having to deliver on the promises that were made to their community members.

Still, she said it’s in everyone’s best interest to work collaboratively across movements and among local, state, and national organizations.

“The RGV is very small and very mighty, but some help would definitely take a lot of work off our backs,” Cárdenas Peña said. “Lizelle isn’t the first case like this, and she won’t be the last. As we continue to talk about this kind of criminalization, RGV voices have to be at the center and at the forefront of these conversations.”

Based on reports, Lizelle Herrera was criminalized in part because a health care provider wrongly reported her to law enforcement for self-managed abortion. Prism spoke with a Texas-based abortion care provider and advocates who shared how widespread confusion about reporting requirements and abortion laws can turn doctors into agents of the state, and what’s needed to combat the dangerous misinformation in this space. Read more about reporting requirements and the criminalization of abortion here.

Tina Vásquez is a contributing writer at Prism. She covers gender justice, workers’ rights, and immigration. Follow her on Twitter @TheTinaVasquez.

Prism is a BIPOC-led nonprofit news outlet that centers the people, places, and issues currently underreported by national media. We’re committed to producing the kind of journalism that treats Black, Indigenous, and people of color, women, the LGBTQ+ community, and other invisibilized groups as the experts on our own lived experiences, our resilience, and our fights for justice. Sign up for our email list to get our stories in your inbox, and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

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by Roberto Camacho

This article was originally published at Prism.

The U.S. military utilizes a number of different recruitment methods to garner new enlistments, but their target audience has consistently remained the same: high schoolers, particularly young men from low-income and rural areas. Eighteen is the youngest age one can join the military without parental permission, but the armed forces still regularly market military propaganda in schools. Although the military does enjoy support within the public system, a grassroots movement of students, teachers, parents, and organizations has led efforts to reduce military recruitment presence and activities on high school campuses.

“We face an uphill battle not only because of the prominence of militarism in our society but [also] because there has been a lack of foresight by progressive people who aren’t thinking about what can happen 10 years down the line,” said Rick Jahnkow, former program coordinator for the nonprofit Project on Youth & Non-Military Opportunities (Project YANO) and a current member of the organization’s board of trustees.

The U.S. military has been an all-volunteer service since the end of the draft and the Vietnam War in 1973, making aggressive recruitment efforts essential to maintaining its 1.3 million-member active-duty global military force. Military recruitment in public schools isn’t new, but the level of access the military has to students and their information has increased alarmingly over the past several decades. Notably, recruiters got a significant boost when then-President George W. Bush signed the “No Child Left Behind” Act into law in 2002—under Section 9528 of the act, schools can lose their federal funding if they fail to allow military recruiters the same level of access to students and their private information as they do to other recruiters from community colleges and universities.

Students and their families can decline to share their private information with the military. But while some schools have chosen an “opt-in” approach where affirmative permission from parents is needed before recruiters can initiate contact, most use an “opt-out” method where student information is given to recruiters unless parents explicitly say no. Schools can also be opaque about parents’ options to limit access to their children’s information, which disproportionately affects time- and resource-poor households, such as single parents, parents who work multiple jobs, those who are English language learners, and families who are simply unaware of these policies to begin with, by making them easier targets for recruiters.

Helping to even the odds for students and their families are organizations such as the National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth (NNOMY), which includes Project YANO and Truth In Recruitment, a Santa Barbara, California-based group that works to ensure students understand the consequences of a military career and their alternative options. They provide advocacy and support to communities hoping to reduce recruitment activities and military presence on high school campuses. For example, Project YANO offers young people an alternative point of view to the often romanticized pitch given by recruiters, and much of that student outreach comes from members who are themselves armed forces veterans. However, advocates are under no illusions about the immense challenges they face by going up against the full might of the U.S. military’s financial and political resources, and its grip on American culture.

Baiting the hook for students in need

Unlike most other developed nations, the U.S. allows military recruiters to actively work within its educational system. ​​Recruiters visit thousands of high schools across the country annually, recruiting students who are still minors, setting up tables in cafeteri­as and hallways, during career fairs, and even at school sporting events. In many instances, they’re allowed to freely roam school grounds in search of students, or often sit with students eating alone in the cafeteria. Military recruiters will often spin elaborate yarns promising excitement, adventure, and being “all you can be” to entice young people.

In reality, military recruiters will often peddle false hope for honor and acclaim and make exaggerated promises of financial reward. This has been underscored by fluctuating enthusiasm for the military among youth. According to a 2020 poll conducted by the Department of Defense, 11% of respondents ages 16-24 said they were likely to serve in the military in the next few years. As a result, the U.S. military has ramped up its recruitment efforts, often resorting to deceptive tactics to prey on the naïveté and oftentimes desperation of many young people. Recruiters regularly sell the notion that in order to pay for college, learn valuable skills, or even serve their communities, joining the military is the right path.

However, the potential drawbacks of joining the military for recruits of color often manifest themselves in a variety of unsettling and troubling ways. In fact, according to a study organized by Blue Star Families’ called “Social Impact Research 2021: The Diverse Experiences of Military & Veteran Families of Color,” 42% of service members of color surveyed turned down an assignment or permanent change of station order because of concerns about racism and discrimination. Another 34% of veterans surveyed said that concerns about racial and ethnic discrimination were a factor in whether or not to remain in the military.

“We try to educate people on the limitation of those so-called ‘benefits’ that are being promised, when in fact they’re rarely anything that can truly be promised,” Jahnkow said.

U.S. Army Public Affairs was contacted for comment without response.

While the military has a number of different approaches to entice potential recruits, the prospect of funding for college has been among one of the key “benefits” recruiters have used to entice students leery of becoming trapped under a mountain of student debt. Jahnkow explained that recruiters will often use distorted financial incentives to sway students into enlistment because they know money to pay for college is a key motivator, especially in low-wage communities where youth are underrepresented in higher education. In fact, college benefits for military personnel aren’t guaranteed and depend on the circumstances around one’s discharge from the military.

“You have to get a full, honorable discharge in order to access those benefits,” said Kate Connell, former executive director and one of the co-founders of Truth In Recruitment. “If you get a gentle discharge or even a medical discharge you’ll lose those benefits.”

The promise of potential citizenship is another tactic that military recruiters often dangle before potential recruits who are undocumented. The military doesn’t and can’t grant U.S. citizenship directly to undocumented people, which is handled by an entirely different government agency.

“Only people who have legal residency can join the military,” Jahnkow said. “Anybody who is undocumented technically is violating the law if they succeed in enlisting because they have to conceal that fact.”

Currently, the only advantage that a legal resident could have by enlisting is having their application for citizenship sped up, although that isn’t guaranteed. Jahnkow also noted that although Latino people are still slightly underrepresented in the armed forces, recruiters have quickly shifted their strategies to court Latino communities as the fastest-growing population in the country after Asian Americans. Such tactics have included running ads targeting Spanish-speaking parents rather than students.

Project YANO has been a primary source for Spanish language literature and information on curbing military recruitment nationwide for many years. Three-quarters of Project YANO’s board of trustees are fluent in Spanish, and the organization regularly collaborates with the Chicano student advocacy group Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (M.E.Ch.A.). They’ve even created brochures specifically made for Spanish-speaking parents to inform them about the inherent risks their children face if they pursue military careers.

“Most high school-aged students have English speaking skills,” Jahnkow said. “It’s the parents who can be easily misled by recruiters if they have very limited English skills.”

Normalizing military presence in school communities

In many ways, some of the biggest roadblocks to curbing military recruitment in public schools come not from the recruiters, but from school administrators. Historically, efforts to regulate the presence of military recruiters in schools, even in settings beyond public schools like higher education, have produced strong opposition. Many military and veterans groups claim that such steps are “anti-military” and undermine their ability to recruit members. In some cases, military recruiters have such close relationships with school administrations that they are a regular presence in high schools, so much so that students and staff perceive those recruiters as school employees. Advocates noted how the normalization of military recruiters as an everyday part of a school’s community doesn’t just increase their access to students; it creates a false sense of familiarity between students and recruiters that can make students more receptive to being recruited.  

In 2018, Truth In Recruitment helped spearhead a movement to remove a noncommissioned California National Guard recruiter who actually had an office on Santa Maria High School’s campus. Although the recruiter was officially listed as a “volunteer” who was supposed to facilitate an anti-bullying and holistic “rehabilitation” program, the office essentially served as a de facto recruitment center. Literature, pamphlets, and banners for the California National Guard were plastered both inside and outside of the recruiter’s office. A California Public Records Act request revealed that school policy dictated that volunteers could not use campus space to promote another business, and the recruiter was eventually removed. The school’s principal, however, was not happy and subsequently banned Truth in Recruitment from participating in career day events or giving presentations to students on campus.

Military efforts to recruit high schoolers were slowed down by the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent closure of campuses between 2020 and 2021. However, those same obstacles have also hindered anti-military recruitment groups from reaching students, even as children have returned to campus and schools have resumed more regular operations. As campuses have slowly reopened, some educators have noticed the disproportionate favoritism military recruiters receive in public schools, particularly those that serve low-income and communities of color.

Additionally, student activism around military recruitment in schools has lagged compared to other contemporary student movements, despite an overall drop in enthusiasm for the military among youth. Amaral speculates that student activists’ attention is currently more focused on other contemporary social issues that seem to more directly and immediately affect young people. While military recruitment and the broader anti-war movement are interwoven with many of those issues—such as low wages, immigration policies, xenophobia, and racism—the connections can be murky, especially within a culture that still valorizes military service and normalizes military recruitment targeting young people.

“I think a lot of people don’t understand how ingrained military culture is in the public school system,” Amaral said. “And given the dynamics of campuses that serve under-resourced, historically marginalized students, it seems that unfortunately organizing against military recruitment is far down on the list of priorities.”

Jessica Ortega, a Spanish and English language development (ELD) teacher at Oceanside High school, says that students can also be deterred from organizing on campus when a school administration has a cozy relationship with the military. Oceanside High lies a mere 3 miles from Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton and since many administrators hold the military in high regard, student activists would likely run into significant pushback.

“Although our student population is mostly kids of color, our administration and teachers are not,” Ortega said. “White teachers and principals believe the military will help the kids advance as adults.”

Planting seeds in hostile land

Some notable gains have been made in limiting military recruitment and presence on campuses. In the past, Project YANO has held presentations in schools, participated in career fairs, handed out flyers outside of campuses, and supplied material support to students who have led their own campaigns to limit military recruitment in schools. In 2009, it joined the student-led “Education, not Arms” coalition in demanding that the San Diego Unified School District prohibit programs for weapons training on shooting ranges that operated in 11 high schools through the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC). They also confronted the school district with the fact that students were involuntarily being placed in JROTC classes, noting that many low-income students and students of color were being diverted away from higher education and into the military. The effort was successful, with the San Diego Unified School District ultimately banning on-campus rifle training by the JROTC.

Other groups, such as Truth In Recruitment, have also made strides to curb military recruitment in the Santa Barbara public school system. In 2014, after a two-year campaign, the Santa Barbara School Board passed a district policy regulating recruiter access to students. The policy limits recruiters to two visits a year and bans soliciting student contact information directly from students and simulated weapons displays. It also requires distributing an opt-out form barring the release of student directory information and disallows any disruptions of normal school activities, such as recruiting during class time.

Unfortunately, the “normal” that officials and policymakers are so eager to have Americans return to includes a general lack of awareness and apathy toward how deeply military worship is embedded in American culture and what a military recruitment presence in public civilian institutions like schools can mean for vulnerable students from marginalized communities. Faced with the loss of both funding and momentum due to the pandemic, many anti-military recruitment groups are still trying to regain their foothold inside public schools.  

“The kind of issues that we are addressing are not the most popular ones, even among what we would call ‘progressive’ activists,” Jahnkow said. “Trying to confront and counter the effects of militarism and its effects on people and communities is just not something that draws a lot of support.”

Despite a lull in activism, organizers, parents, and teachers remain dedicated to ensuring that schools don’t become de facto recruiting stations and that all students are fully informed about their options, understand the risks of enlisting, and have equal access to educational opportunities. Jahnkow noted that given the number of potential military conflicts looming on the horizon, counternarrative efforts to military recruitment pitches in schools are even more critical.

“What Project YANO and other orgs really do is seed planting, but the military has been seed planting on a daily basis in schools everywhere for decades,” Jahnkow said. “And until people who oppose these wars get involved in the education system where the seeds are being planted, they will forever be marginalized in their efforts to mobilize opposition against those wars.”

Roberto Camacho is a Chicano freelance multimedia journalist from San Diego, California. His reporting typically focuses on criminal justice reform, immigration, Chicano/Latino issues, hip-hop culture, and their intersections to social justice.

Prism is a BIPOC-led nonprofit news outlet that centers the people, places, and issues currently underreported by national media. We’re committed to producing the kind of journalism that treats Black, Indigenous, and people of color, women, the LGBTQ+ community, and other invisibilized groups as the experts on our own lived experiences, our resilience, and our fights for justice. Sign up for our email list to get our stories in your inbox, and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

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Quarterly fundraising reports for federal candidates covering the period from Jan. 1 to March 31 were due at the Federal Elections Commission on April 15 by 11:59 PM ET. Below is our chart of fundraising numbers for every Senate incumbent up for reelection this cycle (excluding those who’ve said they’re retiring) and any notable announced or potential candidates.

As always, all numbers are in thousands. The chart, and an explanation of each column, can be found below. You can also view this chart in spreadsheet form. In addition, we’ve put together a companion chart for the House.

This post was originally published on this site

Quarterly fundraising reports for federal candidates covering the period from Jan. 1 to March 31 were due at the Federal Elections Commission on April 15 by 11:59 PM ET. Below is our chart of fundraising numbers for every House incumbent (excluding those who’ve said they’re retiring) and any notable announced or potential candidates.

As always, all numbers are in thousands. The chart, and an explanation of each column, can be found below. You can also view this chart in spreadsheet form. In addition, we’ve put together a companion chart for the Senate.

Note that in states that have completed the congressional redistricting process, we have assigned candidates to the districts they are seeking in November; in states that have not, we have used current district numbers. Where candidates have not yet announced their intentions, we have assigned them to the districts we expect they will run in based on the best information available.

“CA-22” with an asterisk refers to the June 7 special election, which is being held under the old district lines.

Listen and subscribe to Daily Kos Elections’ The Downballot podcast with David Nir and David Beard

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Let’s continue our Black Music Sunday tour of jazz clubs and the music that made them famous, picking up where we left off after visiting The Cotton Club. Just one club in jazz history can boast that over 100 live albums were recorded there—many of which have since gone on to become classics. I’m speaking, of course, of New York’s Village Vanguard, which opened in 1935 and is still going after all these years, even after an 18-month closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Max Gordon, the Vanguard’s founder, opened the club as a Greenwich Village venue for beat poetry and folk music, but by the late 1950s, jazz was the club’s main attraction. The list of musicians who have played the Vanguard reads like a who’s who of jazz: Miles Davis, Horace Silver, Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, Gerry Mulligan, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Jimmy Giuffre, Sonny Rollins, Cannonball Adderley, Anita O’Day, Charlie Mingus, Bill Evans, Dexter Gordon, Roy Haynes, Betty Carter, Stan Getz, Carmen McRae … I can’t begin to list them all.

Nor can I list all the albums recorded live there, so allow me to introduce you to just a few.

I’ve probably been to every major jazz club in the States, and quite a few in other countries, but I can’t count the number of times I’ve been to the Vanguard. I lived right around the corner for a period of time, making it even easier to just pop in. 

In order to understand what makes the Vanguard so special, it’s important to discuss its ownership. Lorraine Gordon, who took over the Vanguard after the 1989 death of her husband Max, is the only jazz club owner to have been honored as a National Endowment of the Arts (NEA) Jazz Masters Fellow. Lorraine, who passed in 2018, lived to the age of 95; after her death, her daughter Deborah took over running the club.

Lorraine’s NEA honors came in 2013; this short clip of an interview with her at the time details how she got involved in the New York jazz scene, and how the Vanguard’s history as an iconic jazz venue (and her relationship with Max) began.

As noted above, there is no way to squeeze even one-tenth of the music recorded at the Vanguard into just one story. But I’ll start at the beginning, with tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins, who recorded the first full-length live album in the club. Rollins’ website offers his bio:

Walter Theodore Rollins was born on September 7, 1930 in New York City. He grew up in Harlem not far from the Savoy Ballroom, the Apollo Theatre, and the doorstep of his idol, Coleman Hawkins. After early discovery of Fats Waller and Louis Armstrong, he started out on alto saxophone, inspired by Louis Jordan. At the age of sixteen, he switched to tenor, trying to emulate Hawkins. He also fell under the spell of the musical revolution that surrounded him, bebop.

He began to follow Charlie Parker, and soon came under the wing of Thelonious Monk, who became his musical mentor and guru. When he was living in Sugar Hill, his neighborhood musical peers included Jackie McLean, Kenny Drew, and Art Taylor, but it was young Sonny who was first out of the pack, working and recording with Babs Gonzales, J.J. Johnson, Bud Powell, and Miles Davis before he turned twenty. “Of course, these people are there to be called on because I think I represent them in a way,” Rollins has said of his peers and mentors. “They’re not here now so I feel like I’m sort of representing all of them, all of the guys. Remember, I’m one of the last guys left, as I’m constantly being told, so I feel a holy obligation sometimes to evoke these people.”

In the early fifties, he established a reputation first among musicians, then the public, as the most brash and creative young tenor on the scene, through his work with Miles, Monk, and the MJQ.

For the 60th anniversary of the recording of Rollins’ Vanguard album, A Night at the Village Vanguard,  jazz critic and author Nate Chinen dove into the history and interviewed the legend—then 87—for NPR in 2017.

“The Vanguard was sort of the premier room at that time,” [Rollins] recalls, speaking by phone from his home in Woodstock, N.Y. “A lot of guys played there, and they all seemed to express the music without any sort of impediment. I felt particularly comfortable.”

In the original liner notes to the LP, released on Blue Note Records in 1958, Leonard Feather notes that it “constitutes a double premiere.” He’s referring to A Night at the Village Vanguard being both the first live documentation of Rollins as a bandleader and the first album recorded the Village Vanguard, a wedge-shaped basement room regarded, then and now, as “one of New York’s foremost havens of contemporary jazz.”

Feather doesn’t make much of it, but A Night at the Village Vanguard is a slightly misleading title, because the album also includes material recorded at an afternoon matinee. The evening trio features bassist Wilbur Ware and drummer Elvin Jones, an assertive rhythm team that combined high-end volatility with the feeling of firm traction underfoot. In the afternoon, Rollins used Donald Bailey on bass and Pete La Roca on drums — a pairing with plenty of firepower but less mystery and nuance.

Joseph Neff, senior editor at The Vinyl District, wrote his own paean to Rollins’ album in 2014.

What these musicians achieved is amongst the very greatest jazz ever laid to tape. Surely no release in Rollins’ discography ranks higher, with the horn solos in “Old Devil Moon” alone more than justifying the full cost of this LP. And as he plays, Jones and Ware are in constant communication with the saxophonist and each other. Rollins is still clearly the leader; he called the tunes and was the one who chiseled the marble of this splendid audio sculpture down to a three-piece in the first place.

But all it takes is a listen to the vibrant elasticity, the assured balance of the rhythmic imperative in tandem with the desire for melodiousness, in Ware’s opening bass-line on “Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise” to comprehend that in the creation of this music, hierarchy was on nobody’s mind. So logically Ware’s solos are ceaselessly interesting and never in service to formula, with this feature easily extending to Jones’ responsive work at the kit.

Over half a century later it’s Rollins that impresses most though, mainly because few have sounded this nervy while unfurling so naturally, his improvising free-flowing but reliant on vital swing. But while he was always connected to a savvy classicism, he also wasn’t chained to it. For example, by imbuing the concise “Striver’s Row,” the first of Rollins’ tunes, with increased freedom, the group simultaneously references bebop and transcends it.

Here’s the whole album—just 43 minutes long.

Next up: John Coltrane. I wish I could say I was at the Village Vanguard for this session, but alas, when it was recorded in 1961, I was only 14. I’ve featured ‘Trane here before and shared the impact he and his wife Naima had on me, but I’ve never written about his first live album. I was surprised, when exploring the album’s initial critical reception, to learn that many of the people paid to weigh in were upset by it, and felt compelled to pontificate and pass judgment on their bailiwick of “jazz.” The critiques at the time were so harsh that Downbeat Magazine gave Coltrane and Eric Dolphy a chance to “answer the jazz critics” in April 1962.

Much of the vituperation thrown at Coltrane was fueled by his association with Dolphy. 

Dolphy’s playing has been praised and damned since his national jazz-scene arrival about two years ago. Last summer Dolphy joined Coltrane’s group for a tour. It was on this tour that Coltrane and Dolphy came under the withering fire of DownBeat associate editor John Tynan, the first critic to take a strong—and public—stand against what Coltrane and Dolphy were playing.

In the Nov. 23, 1961, DownBeat, Tynan wrote, “At Hollywood’s Renaissance Club recently, I listened to a horrifying demonstration of what appears to be a growing anti-jazz trend exemplified by these foremost proponents [Coltrane and Dolphy] of what is termed avant-garde music. “I heard a good rhythm section… go to waste behind the nihilistic exercises of the two horns.… Coltrane and Dolphy seem intent on deliberately destroying [swing].… They seem bent on pursuing an anarchistic course in their music that can but be termed anti-jazz.”

The anti-jazz term was picked up by Leonard Feather and used as a basis for critical essays of Coltrane, Dolphy, Ornette Coleman and the “new thing” in general in DownBeat and Show. The reaction from readers to both Tynan’s and Feather’s remarks was immediate, heated and about evenly divided.

Journalist and music critic Ben Ratliff wrote a very long piece for The Washington Post last year about “Coltrane and the essence of 1961.” Sadly, Ratliff spends most of the story discussing what was going on in the world in 1961, and not much time discussing the music. 

A culling from those nights was released as a single LP in February 1962, with only three tracks. They were the serious and easeful “Spiritual,” which later helped define a sort of music lately called “spiritual jazz”; his version of the standard “Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise,” which (via this recording) helped define the straight-ahead jazz mainstream; and, for all of side B, the volatile 12-bar blues in F called “Chasin’ the Trane,” which starts abruptly, as if from a tape splice, and flies forward in lunges, defining nothing and beholden to nothing. It ends when it ends and it could conceivably go on much longer. It doesn’t know the meaning of “sufficient.” Sometimes it gets unbearably exciting. It can make the listener think: What exactly is going on here?

One key feature of the Vanguard’s history is that it will forever be the birthplace of the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra. Resonance Records produced this short documentary about the Feb. 7, 1966 debut of the band. I most enjoyed the interviews with the recording engineers and musicians.

In 2016 NPR’s Jazz Night In America highlighted the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra’s 50th year at the Vanguard.

In 1965, the trumpeter and composer/arranger Thad Jones and the drummer Mel Lewis found themselves with a book of big band music originally intended for the Count Basie Orchestra — and nobody to perform it. So they made their own. They handpicked some of New York’s top talent and called rehearsals on Monday nights, when the studio musicians could actually make it. And by the time they debuted on a Monday in February 1966 at the famed Village Vanguard, they were already a force to be reckoned with — soon to become the most influential big band of the last 50 years. The Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra, now the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, still plays every Monday night.

You can watch the full episode below.

The Thad Jones Archive offers this biography.

Thad Jones, trumpeter, cornetist, bandleader, arranger and composer, was born near Detroit in Pontiac, Michigan on March 28, 1923. He is one of three brothers who have had prominent jazz careers: Hank Jones, the oldest of the three, has had a long career as a master pianist; the youngest, drummer Elvin Jones one of the most influential drummers in the modern era.

After Army service including an association with the U.S. Military School of Music and working with area bands in Des Moines and Oklahoma City, Thad became a member of the Count Basie Orchestra in May 1954. He was featured as a soloist on such well-known tunes as “April in Paris,” “Shiny Stockings” and “Corner Pocket.” However, his main contribution was his nearly two dozen arrangements and compositions for the Basie Orchestra, including “The Deacon,” “H.R.H.” (Her Royal Highness, in honor of the band’s command performance in London), “Counter Block,” and lesser known gems such as “Speaking of Sounds.” His hymn-like ballad “To You” was performed by the Basie band combined with the Duke Ellington Orchestra in their only recording together, and the recording “Dance Along With Basie” contains nearly an entire album of Jones’ uncredited arrangements of standard tunes.

Jones left the Basie Orchestra in 1963 to become a freelance arranger and studio player in New York. With former Stan Kenton drummer Mel Lewis, he started a once-a-week rehearsal band of leading studio musicians who needed a creative outlet after the long hours of the then-thriving New York studio recording scene. Armed with only a handful of arrangements, they approached Village Vanguard club owner Max Gordon and were booked for three Mondays in February 1966. This first engagement at the legendary jazz club carried on continuously, gained an international reputation for Jones and the ensemble, and made several foreign tours including a historic 1972 Soviet Union trip. During this time, he also collaborated as an arranger in projects with trumpeter Harry James, and a Bessie Smith tribute with vocalist Teresa Brewer.

Rick Mattingly, of the Percussive Arts Society, and former Senior Editor of Modern Drummer magazine, wrote this detailed bio of Mel Lewis for the Percussive Arts Society Hall of Fame website.

Mel Lewis, whose real name was Melvin Sokoloff, was born in Buffalo, New York. He began playing professionally at age fifteen and worked with the bands of Lenny Lewis, Boyd Raeburn, Alvino Rey, Tex Beneke, and Ray Anthony. When Lewis joined Stan Kenton’s band in 1954, many jazz critics credited him with being the first drummer to make the Kenton band swing […]

Lewis moved to Los Angeles in 1957 and worked with the big bands of Terry Gibbs and Gerald Wilson, and with pianist Hampton Hawes and trombonist Frank Rosolino. He also co-led a combo with Bill Holman. In 1962 he made a trip to Russia with Benny Goodman. In addition, Lewis did a variety of studio sessions while in L.A. (My favorite trivia fact about Mel is that he was the drummer on the early ’60s rock song “Alley Oop.”)

After returning to New York in 1963, Lewis worked with Ben Webster and Gerry Mulligan. In 1965, Mel and trumpeter Thad Jones (Elvin’s brother) formed the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra, which began a steady Monday-night gig at the Village Vanguard club in February 1966. The band also recorded frequently, and the group toured the Soviet Union in 1972.

Enjoy the band’s Vanguard album, recorded live in 1967.

While scrolling through the list of all the jazz artists who recorded live albums at the Vanguard, there was an obvious dearth of women. It’s not that women never played or sang at the club; rather, the live album pickings are pretty damn thin. Thankfully, two of my all-time favorite female jazz artists—Betty Carter and Shirley Horn—as well as Mary Stallings, a vocalist you may not be familiar with, are on that list.

Pianist and music editor Kyle Kevorkian wrote Carter’s bio for Musician Guide.

Carter was born Lillie Mae Jones on May 16, 1930, in Flint, Michigan. She grew up in Detroit and as a high school student studied piano at the Detroit Conservatory of Music. It was a time when a brilliant and bold new music was sweeping the country–bebop, the postwar jazz style that was being pioneered by the great saxophonist Charlie “Bird” Parker, and horn player Dizzy Gillespie. Lillie Mae was immediately turned on to it. She often “played hookey at the soda joint across the street from my high school and listened to the jukebox, which was filled with bebop singles,” she told Pulse! “We would sit around and learn the solos, and go to see them whenever they came to town–we met Bird and Dizzy when they came to our school.” Soon she was singing Sunday afternoon cabaret gigs; by the age of 18 she had sat in with Bird, Dizzy, trumpeter Miles Davis, and other greats. Her first employer, though, was not a bebopper but a veteran of swing music–the vibraphonist and bandleader Lionel Hampton. In a 1988 interview with AP writer Campbell, Carter recounted their first meeting: “I went with some classmates to hear Lionel’s band. We were standing in front of the bandstand. A guy said, ‘Why don’t you let Lillie Mae sing?’ That was my name then. He said, ‘Can you sing, Gates?’ I said yes. He said, ‘Then come on up, Gates.'”

The impromptu audition landed her a job. From 1948 to 1951 she toured with Hampton, standing in front of his big band and scatting (improvising with nonsense syllables) segments of the tunes they played. “I didn’t get a chance to sing too many songs because Hamp had a lot of other singers at the same time; but I took care of the bebop division, you might say,” she told Pulse! with a chuckle. “He’d stick me into songs they were already doing, so I was singing a chorus here, a chorus there; I didn’t realize at the time what good training that was. And I had the late Bobby Plater teach me to orchestrate and transpose, which I really needed later on.” While she was learning from Hampton she was also learning from his wife. “I had this role model of Gladys Hampton to emulate. She took care of the band, saw to it that everything ran smoothly, that everybody got paid and such. That was the first time I’d ever experienced dealing with a woman who was the boss–and she was a black woman. It was very unusual at that time, and still is.”[…]

In 1952, after two and a half years of “doing what Hamp wanted me to,” as she told AP writer Campbell, “I struck out to find out what more I could do with myself. I came to New York and got work right away at the Apollo Bar, a couple of doors from the Apollo Theater.” Thus began a grueling period of dues-paying. “I did the usual, playing dives and joints, wherever I could,” she told Pulse! “There were a lot of places around to do the hustling then…. Besides all the clubs that were in New York, we had Philadelphia to work with, and Boston, and Washington, D.C.; all up and down the East Coast there were lots of places to work. And Detroit was still good then, and Chicago.” It was a golden time of opportunity. “There was a big, beautiful music world for us in the ’50s,” she told the Daily News Magazine. “We played and learned together, because we all loved music and musicianship. It wasn’t about money–we weren’t making any of that–it was about a whole community. No one had to dominate. We liked each other. I’d hang around clubs with Sarah Vaughan or Ruth Brown. I played on bills with Sonny Til and the Orioles, the Temptations, Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, Miles Davis. It didn’t matter what you did; you just had to be good at it. At the Apollo, you could play classical music if you did it well…. Someone should write a book about those days. There was such joy. We thought that world would never end.”

I had the good fortune to interview Carter for my radio show in Washington, D.C., and later, spend time with her in her home in New York City. I also saw her perform live numerous times. Though the YouTube upload of this amazing live album by Betty Carter at the Vanguard has some pops and crackles from the vinyl (find pristine clips here), I chose this video because it’s the complete 21-minute album.

When you listen you can feel the rapport Carter had with her audience.

Pianist and vocalist Shirley Horn, who I featured here in April 2021, played the Vanguard in 1991; a film of her performance was released in 2006. Horn’s stylings are both understated and exquisite. 

Finally, Mary Stallings. Her website offers this biography.

Born and raised in San Francisco, the middle child of 11 siblings, Stallings started performing professionally before the age of 10 with her mother and two older sisters in a family gospel group. She got her first real taste of jazz at home, sitting in at rehearsals with her uncle, tenor saxophonist and bandleader Orlando Stallings. Stallings’ career got off to an early start in the late ’50s and her supple voice landed her in rarified air: performing with such luminaries as Ben Webster, Cal Tjader, Earl Hines, Red Mitchell, Teddy Edwards, and the Montgomery brothers (Wes, Monk, and Buddy) in Bay Area night clubs such as Hungry i, The Purple Onion and El Matador.

Perhaps Stallings’ best-known recording was the 1961 Cal Tjader Plays, Mary Stallings Sings on Fantasy Records, which brought engagements in Tokyo, Manila and Bangkok along with work up and down the West Coast. She spent a year in the late 1960s performing in Nevada with Billy Eckstine, and toured South America with  Gillespie’s band in 1965 and 1966. She has shared the bill with such luminaries as Joe Williams, Tony Bennett and Ella Fitzgerald. From 1969-1972, she enjoyed a successful three-year residency in the Count Basie Orchestra. After touring with the Basie orchestra, she devoted her time to raising her only child, R&B singer Adriana Evans.

And since it’s a Sunday, here’s “A Sunday Kind of Love,” from Stallings’ album, recorded live at the Vanguard, in 2001.

No exploration of the musical legacy of the Vanguard would be complete without pianist and composer Bill Evans, who was virtually a fixture at the club. 

Robert Dupuis at Musician Guide describes Evans’ early musical beginnings.

Evans studied piano at age six, soon adding violin and flute to his arsenal,but he later claimed “it was always the piano.” Disdaining formal practice as a child, he worked his way through stacks of used sheet music marches, songs, and classical music that his mother had bought. Thus did he acquire a skill at sight reading that served him all his life. He earned a scholarship to Southeastern Louisiana College and in 1950 was awarded degrees both in music (as a piano major) and in music education. Though he often avoided the specific exercises prescribed in college courses, he regularly demonstrated his ability to play the concepts those exercises were purported to teach by encompassing them in his playing of compositions. With uncharacteristic bravado, he told writer/lyricist Gene Lees, “They couldn’t flunk me because I played the instrument so well.”

[…]

Throughout his years at college Evans played not only in the school groups, but on his own as well. After graduation, he worked with the band of Herbie Fields before being drafted into the U.S. Army. While playing flute in the Fifth Army Band throughout his 1951-54 assignment at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, near Chicago, by night Evans became a part of the city’s jazz scene. During this period he played with the bands of Tony Scott and Jerry Wald, among others. Evans collaborated with avant-garde composer George Russell for several years beginning in about 1956, integrating modal music (stressing structure and form) into jazz playing and producing such recordings as “All About Rosie” and “Concerto for Billy the Kid.” In 1957 Evans was featured on the “East Coasting” album with bassist Charles Mingus.

Though Evans etched his first Riverside album as a leader and drew increasing attention from music insiders, it was his eight-month stint with trumpeter Miles Davis’s sextet in 1958 that propelled the pianist toward stardom and instilled some measure of self-confidence. This all-star group included such luminaries as alto saxist Julian “Cannonball” Adderley, tenorman John Coltrane, and bassist Paul Chambers.

A website dedicated to Evans continues his story and describes his artistry.

After his collaboration with Miles Davis, resulting in several albums in one year, Evans worked with his own trio, until 1961 when Scott LaFaro was tragically killed in a car crash. Bill Evans was a quiet revolutionary whose Bud Powell, Ravel  and Chopin based pianisms introduced a more florid way of playing ballads. Evans was an incredibly lyrical pianist, but he had the ability to be forceful and ambitious as well. Evans’ expressive piano work inspired a whole generation of players who appreciated his unique harmonic approach, his introspective lyricism, and his unhurried improvisation along with an analytical perfection.His chords have its own intrinsic colour, which creates a particular climate. Evans’ essence was defined by his tasteful economy of expression. The notes he chose not to play were fully as crucial as the ones he did, “the breath in between the phrase”. The following statement by the famous classical pianist Arthur Schnabel certainly applies to Bill Evans: “The notes I handle are no better than many pianists, but the pauses between the notes, that is where the art resides!” No pianist plays “deeper” in the keys, extracting a richer, more complex piano sound than Bill Evans. Most jazz pianists tend to think“vertically” in terms of chords and are concerned with the rhythmical placement of these chords than with melody and voice leading. His sparse left-hand voicings support his lyrical right-hand lines, with a subtle use of the sustaining pedal. The long melodic line, which, says Bill Evans, is “the basic thing I want in my playing because music must be always singing”.

Music writer S. Victor Aaron shares his views on the album that has now become a classic: the Bill Evans Trio’s 1961 Sunday At The Village Vanguard.

The album opens with “Gloria’s Step,” with its descending chord patterns that start somewhat bright and work its way down to a somber mood. Evans interprets the melody in short but rich phrases, and Lafaro is playing lines of his own that exhibit limitless range and yet never ignores what Motian and Evans are doing. After a solo brimming with full chords, Evans gives way to LaFaro who makes his bass sing and finds himself making a home in the upper register. As the second take of this song, it’s the best overall performance of the entire day.

LaFaro’s other tune, “Jade Visions,” was performed for the first time that night and played a second time at the end of the evening set. As the last song this trio ever played together, “Jade Visions” is a slow-paced meditative piece centered around a bass riff. Evans plays with much thoughtfulness, adding nomore notes than needed, understanding that to do so would obscure that keyriff. Motian, ever the master colorist, put that skill to great use for this song.

The rest of the songs chosen for the day are covers, most of which were familiar movie and show tunes. Throughout his career, Evans had a penchant for selecting easily recognizable, often overworked numbers and recasting them as harmonically robust songs that became distinctively his own. A notable exception to this Broadway pattern is the choice of Miles Davis’ “Solar,” but even then, it’s adorned with chunks of minor scale motifs in Evans’ remarkable hands. All of these tracks of course feature LaFaro contributing expressive solos from an instrument not previously known to be so impressionistic.

Sit back, relax, and chill with Bill.

That, dear reader-listeners, concludes this edition of Black Music Sunday, but trust that I have lots more music from the Vanguard in store for you in the comments. I look forward to hearing your favorites as well.

This post was originally published on this site

We begin today with an exclusive by George Arbuthnott and Jonathan Calvert of The Sunday Times in Londongrad writing that Ukraine began asking Great Britain for lethal military assistance right after Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea and through the terms of three Conservative prime ministers and were refused. Until recently.

In the years after the invasion of Crimea, there would be much rhetoric directed against the Kremlin from successive British prime ministers and foreign secretaries. However, the words were not matched by action and a series of clear opportunities were missed to challenge Putin and his London-based allies. […]

There were many calls for Britain to confront Putin in a way that would demonstrate the high cost he would have to pay for breaking international law. The pressure to take decisive action greatly increased after the Salisbury chemical weapon attack.

As a result, two parliamentary inquiries — by the foreign affairs committee in 2018 and the intelligence and security committee in 2020 — called for sanctions to be imposed on the oligarchs in London. The committees’ recommendations, however, were largely ignored by the May and Johnson governments. While he was foreign secretary, Johnson sidestepped implementing the findings of the foreign affairs committee and later, as prime minister, delayed the release of the intelligence committee’s report. Britain did not independently sanction any oligarch with known UK assets until Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24.

There were a number of reasons for this inertia. A significant one, some claim, was the cosy relationship between the government and wealthy Russians who entertained ministers; gave money to the Conservative Party; brought wealth into London; and acquired important national assets such as a newspaper and Premier League football clubs.

What’s notable about this reporting by The Sunday Times is that a few of the former government ministers were willing to go on the record for this story. The Sunday Times also notes that even the Trump Administration summoned the will to at least sanction a few oligarchs whereas the Brits did not impose any sort of sanctions or restrictions until July 2020; a rather eye-popping bit of news for this liberal on this side of the pond.

Considering that Rupert Murdoch and News Corp owns The Sunday Times, I must say that conservatives are in disarray all over the place, it seems.

Dan Balz of The Washington Post writes that the only thing that animates House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is keeping his hopes of becoming Speaker of the House alive.

After offering critical remarks about Trump on the House floor in the days after the Capitol attack, McCarthy lost his nerve. He made a pilgrimage to meet with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Florida, the supplicant asking the monarch for forgiveness. They were photographed together, the public record of the visit Trump’s apparent punishment for the earlier criticism.

McCarthy has since been craven in bowing to Trump’s wishes, fearing that crossing the former president could compromise both his party’s hopes of capturing the majority in November’s midterm elections and his own desire to lead a Republican-controlled House next year as speaker. He also has been weak in the face of calls to discipline the most extreme members of the House GOP conference — those who have been the most loyal to Trump and his conspiracy theories, including the false claim that he won the 2020 election.

[…]

This is what the Republican Party in the House of Representatives now stands for — the abandonment of a principled conservative leader and the possible elevation of a politician whose abiding principle is the pursuit of power, one who has bent and bowed before a former president whose actions he denounced and knew were wrong.

Heather Cox Richardson writes for her Letters From an American blog naming the names of some the Congresspersons who plotted to overthrow American democracy.

Let’s be clear: the people working to keep Trump in office by overturning the will of the people were trying to destroy our democracy. Not one of them, or any of those who plotted with them, called out the illegal attempt to destroy our government.

To what end did they seek to overthrow our democracy?

The current Republican Party has two wings: one eager to get rid of any regulation of business, and one that wants to get rid of the civil rights protections that the Supreme Court and Congress began to put into place in the 1950s. Business regulation is actually quite popular in the U.S., so to build a political following, in the 1980s, leaders of the anti-regulation wing of the Republican Party promised racists and the religious right that they would stomp out the civil rights legislation that since the 1950s has tried to make all Americans equal before the law.

But even this marriage has not been enough to win elections, since most Americans like business regulation and the protection of things like the right to use birth control. So, to put its vision into place, the Republican Party has now abandoned democracy. Its leaders have concluded that any Democratic victory is illegitimate, even if voters have clearly chosen a Democrat, as they did with Biden in 2020, by more than 7 million votes.

Renée Graham of the Boston Globe notes that Russian President Vladimir Putin has a new pupil: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

Like Donald Trump, his political mentor turned detractor, DeSantis appears to be taking his budding dictator cues straight from the Kremlin. Last month, when he signed into law the execrable Parental Rights in Education bill, which bars teachers from discussing sexual orientation and gender identity with children in kindergarten through third grade, DeSantis said that teaching young kids that “they can be whatever they want to be” is “inappropriate.” Those who’ve dubbed it the “Don’t Say Gay” law are promoting “woke gender ideology,” he said.[…]

Putin is an autocrat who has ruled Russia since 1999. In a ruthless move, DeSantis is consolidating power with his GOP-centric reconfiguring of Florida’s congressional districts that — and stop me if you’ve heard this one before — would have a disproportionate impact on Black voters. The change will likely cut the number of Black Democratic representatives in Congress while boosting Republican chances to pick up House seats in November. Even a sit-in on the Florida House floor Thursday led by Black Democrats could only delay but not prevent its passage.

And in an act of pure retaliation, DeSantis went after Mickey Mouse. After pressure from LGBTQ employees, Walt Disney Company officials denounced and pledged to help repeal the “Don’t Say Gay” law. On Thursday the Florida legislature revoked Disney World’s special tax district status that has allowed the 25,000-acre theme park complex near Orlando to operate as a separate municipality since 1967. There’s no doubt DeSantis will sign it into law to send a pointed warning to other companies that might consider publicly bucking him or his policies.

Paul Krugman of The New York Times writes that a recession may— or may not— happen.

The other type of nuclear weapons are tactical, or nonstrategic, which the U.S. is more worried about today. They are shorter-range—they travel up to three hundred miles—and often have lower-yield warheads. (Some, though, carry more kilotons than the Hiroshima bomb.) They are designed to take out tank or troop formations on a battlefield—not wipe out a city. In the history of nuclear weapons, there has never been a treaty—bilateral or international—that limits developing or deploying tactical nukes anywhere. During the Cold War, the U.S. and the Soviet Union produced thousands each, with Moscow controlling up to twenty-five thousand. Afterward, the U.S. dismantled most of its tactical arsenal and withdrew most of those weapons from Europe. Russia kept more of its stockpile. There is now a vast disparity in tactical arsenals. Last month, the Congressional Research Service reported that Russia has up to two thousand tactical nukes, while the U.S. has around two hundred.

Today, Russia also has many more delivery systems for tactical nuclear weapons—submarine torpedoes, ballistic missiles on land or sea, artillery shells, and aircraft—while the U.S. has only gravity bombs that can be dropped from warplanes. “They have more diverse capabilities than we do,” McKenzie concluded. More than a hundred U.S. tactical nukes are again situated in Europe, at bases in five nato countries: Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, and Turkey. Most of Russia’s are on its western front, near the borders of NATO members.

Four scenarios may lead Russia to use a nuclear weapon, according to Kimball of the Arms Control Association. To coerce Kyiv or its NATO allies to back down, Putin could carry out a “demonstration” bombing in the atmosphere above the Arctic Ocean or the Baltic Sea—not for killing, but “to remind everyone that Russia has nuclear weapons.” Russia could also use tactical weapons to change the military balance on the ground with Ukraine. If the war expands, and NATO gets drawn into the fight, Russia could further escalate the conflict with the use of short-range nuclear weapons. “Both U.S. and Russian policy leave open the possibility of using nuclear weapons in response to an extreme non-nuclear threat,” Kimball said. Finally, if Putin believes that the Russian state (or leadership) is at risk, he might use a tactical nuclear weapon to “save Russia from a major military defeat.” Russia has lost some twenty-five per cent of its combat power in the last two months, a Pentagon official estimated this week. Moscow’s military doctrine reserves the right to use nuclear weapons “in response to the use of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction” against Russia or its allies, and also in response to aggression via conventional weapons “when the very existence of the state is threatened.” In military jargon, the country’s policy is “to escalate to de-escalate,” Richard Burt, the lead negotiator on the original start accord, which was signed by Gorbachev and George H. W. Bush in 1991, told me. “The idea is to so shock the adversary that a nuclear weapon has been used, to demonstrate your resolve that you’re willing to use a nuclear weapon, that you paralyze your adversary.”

Steffan Klusmann of Der Spiegel writes that it is time for German Chancellor to stand up to Russian aggression.

According to a recent survey, many Germans now doubt their chancellor’s abilities. Just under two-thirds don’t consider him to be a strong leader. Is Olaf Scholz, who likes to attest to his own leadership, ultimately the wrong chancellor for these challenging times?

What is certain is this: He’s stuck in a dilemma that is difficult to resolve. His goal is to avert harm to the German people, and he has taken an oath of office to that end. Germany must not be dragged into the war under any circumstances, because Putin is capable of anything. Yet this is precisely the crux of the matter, and Scholz probably doesn’t want to talk about it publicly because it could be interpreted as a betrayal of Ukraine: What if Putin doesn’t get anywhere in the Donbas either? What if the arms supplies from the West actually enable Zelenskyy’s troops to withstand the Russians’ superior force?

For Putin, that would be tantamount to disgrace. In Scholz’s Chancellery, officials now assume that the Kremlin boss could then use nuclear weapons as a last resort. But what if those bombs fall not on Ukrainian soil but instead on Warsaw or Berlin? That Putin isn’t solely concerned with Ukraine, but with a reordering of the balance of power in Europe – they have understood that much in the Chancellery. This means, conversely, that they are no longer ruling out any possibility any longer.

Hans von de Burchard of POLITICO Europe points out that the German Green Party has become uncharacteristically hawkish because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Green Party is also gaining in popularity in Germany.

Habeck, the economy and climate minister, and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock — the Cabinet’s leading Greens — helped overturn a long-standing policy, of both Germany and their own party, to send defensive weapons to Ukraine. And they have since gone significantly further — pushing Social Democrat Scholz publicly and privately to send heavy weapons to aid Kyiv.

The shift is the latest chapter in the relatively short history of a party that grew out of environmental, pacifist and anti-nuclear movements in the late 1970s and early 1980s and has now begun its second spell in national government. […]

The Greens’ stance is striking a chord across Germany, too. Habeck, who is also at the forefront of efforts to wean Germany off its dependency on Russian energy, has become the country’s most popular politician, according to an Insa poll last week. Baerbock came second in that ranking — ahead of Scholz, who topped the chart not so long ago.

Finally, the second round of the French presidential election is being held today, with incumbent President Emmanuel Macron expected to win a second term and defeat the far right’s Marine Le Pen.

I was intrigued by this article at France 24 about how French pollsters project their election winners without using “exit polls.”

Unlike in most other democracies, where those projections are based on exit polls, French pollsters base their estimates on ballots that have actually been counted. Those estimates are updated throughout the evening as the vote count progresses.

“The main difference with an exit poll is that instead of asking people outside the polling station how they voted, we look straight at their ballots,” says Mathieu Doiret of the Ipsos polling institute, FRANCE 24’s partner for the presidential election. “This means we have to wait for the first polling stations to close at 7pm, whereas exit polls can be worked on throughout the day.”

Like other pollsters, Ipsos relies on feedback from hundreds of polling stations scattered across France. The sample is chosen to ensure it is representative of the diversity of French constituencies while also matching the overall result of the last presidential election, which is used as a benchmark.

There are turnout numbers available for the French overseas departments.

Here are the final polls and the approximate time that we should know the winner of the French presidential election.

Everyone have a great day!

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Among the 25 recordings recently selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry are a number of milestone records by Latino artists, including Linda Ronstadt’s exquisite Canciones de mi Padre. The Spanish-language album covered songs by beloved Mexican composers, including Rubén Fuentes and Gilberto Parra.

“Canciones de Mi Padre is an album I’ve always wanted to make because of my Mexican heritage,” said Ronstadt, who was born and raised in the Sonoran desert along the southern borderlands. Released in 1987 “despite her music label’s disapproval,” the mariachi record won a competitive Grammy, was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame last year, and remains the biggest selling non-English album in U.S. music history, NBC News said.

“While Linda Ronstadt is best known for her work in country, rock and pop music, she often referenced her Mexican-American roots,” the Library of Congress said in a statement. “In 1987, she paid full tribute to her heritage with her album ‘Canciones de Mi Padre,’ recorded with four distinguished mariachi bands.” 

Listen to Jennifer Fernandez Ancona from Way to Win explain how Democrats must message to win on Daily Kos’ The Brief podcast with Markos Moulitsas and Kerry Eleveld

In a take that aged like milk left out in the sun, Rolling Stone magazine initially insulted the record as “the party-gag album of the year,” Gustavo Arellano wrote in the Los Angeles Times in 2017. But the album has not only remained a beloved favorite among Latinos—Ronstadt said that she recalled looking out into her audience and seeing “three generations of families there”—it’s credited with introducing these compositions and music style to new listeners.

“I love the musical traditions that came with it,” Ronstadt said. “I always thought they were world-class songs. And I thought they were songs that the music could transcend the language barrier.” Ronstadt has also had a long history as a fierce defender of migrant rights, in 2020 accepting the Dolores Huerta Award from Farmworker Justice.

Career-defining recordings by Puerto Rican entertainer Ricky Martin and Cuban group Buena Vista Social Club were also selected for induction alongside Ronstadt. In the statement, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden said that 1,000 nominations were received this year. “The National Recording Registry reflects the diverse music and voices that have shaped our nation’s history and culture through recorded sound. The national library is proud to help preserve these recordings,” she said.

The Library of Congress has in recent months taken significant steps to increase Latino representation across various mediums.

In December, Selena, the biopic depicting the life of beloved Tejano superstar Selena Quintanilla-Pérez, was inducted into the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry. In a statement, the Library of Congress hailed both Selena and the Gregory Nava-directed film as “touchstones in Latin American culture,” adding that the singer’s “infectious appeal crossed over to audiences of all kinds.” More recently, the Library of Congress said it would include thousands of immigrant stories in the Handbook of Latin American Studies Web Archive.

The Immigrant Archive Project, which has steadily worked to archive these stories, also accepts requests for unique story submissions. The Library of Congress said that “as the internet has become an increasingly important and influential part of our lives, we believe the historical record would be incomplete if websites like [these] are not preserved and made a part of it,” NBC News reported.

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Ever wonder about the work and team behind Daily Kos’ formidable advocacy? Well, then this breakdown is for you!  

The Daily Kos Activism team provides progressive advocacy groups, civic engagement organizations, and Democratic candidates, elected officials, and committees with grassroots resources—email and SMS list sign-ups, small-dollar fundraising, GOTV and event RSVPs, petition signatures, and deliveries, as well as constituent letters and phone calls to elected officials—at scale to help their campaigns succeed.

One of our biggest priorities is supplying the Daily Kos community with tools to take impactful action on the most critical issues of our time. Sustained grassroots activism has delivered big results at every level of government. Let’s take a look at the tools we provide below.

Letter Campaigns and Petitions

One of the most effective ways of communicating our position to our elected officials is through constituent letters. We build grassroots momentum by mobilizing activists around a particular demand. When you send a constituent letter through a Daily Kos campaign, the letter is sent directly to your elected official, governmental body, or corporate decision-maker.

Daily Kos also organizes petitions to generate grassroots support for an issue. Petitions only require that you sign your name in support. Once a petition campaign ends, we deliver the signatures to the appropriate official, either in person or via email. We often write blogs and highlight petition signature deliveries on social media.

Email

More than 3 million people subscribe to Daily Kos’ email list. Email is the primary driver for actions. Users who have signed up for our email list will receive petitions and letter campaigns dealing with today’s most pressing issues. Participating in our campaigns is an efficient way for the community to voice their support and concerns.

Call Campaigns and SMS

Calls to decision-makers are our most effective tool. We often coordinate with other progressive organizations to create a groundswell of calls on a specific day. We have found that Daily Kos readers are most likely to make a call when they receive an action alert via text, which is why most of our call campaigns are now run through mobile texting. When you sign up for our text message program, we will send you notifications with new call campaigns you can participate in to make your opinions known.

In 2018, Daily Kos began using SMS text messaging. Thanks to our SMS program, we have dramatically increased the number of phone calls we can generate for our lobbying campaigns—especially when it comes to “rapid-response” efforts—and can more effectively track our impact. We use SMS for action alerts, fundraising, and sharing good content such as video clips from Daily Kos’ The Brief podcast.

If you’d like to sign up for the text messaging program, you can do so here.

Long-term campaigns

Effecting change is never quick or easy. It often requires constant, ongoing action. Our long-term campaigns focus on creating momentum toward progressive goals. Currently, that includes voting rights, judicial campaigns, reproductive freedom, abolishing the filibuster, expanding social safety net programs like the child tax credit, making the rich pay their fair share, and reforming the U.S. Postal Service. We plan strategic actions designed to spotlight issues and influence policy conversations.

So far this year, we have generated more than 40,000 phone calls and 2 million constituent letters to Congress in support of President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better agenda. We have also generated over 338,000 letters supporting voting rights and over 630,000 letters and petition signatures supporting Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court nomination. And that’s just the beginning.

These issues are prevalent, systemic, and deeply ingrained in our society. We at Daily Kos are committed to keeping them at the forefront of the national conversation.

The power of collective action

Daily Kos doesn’t have billions of dollars to spend on lobbyists. We don’t have a constant stream of Koch or corporate money pouring into our coffers. But we do have readers like you who care about the future of this country and are willing to put in the work to make it a better place. 

It’s your persistent advocacy that fuels our Activism team. Your stories, fears, and hopes influence our leaders to act. That’s the power of collective action. That’s the power of Activism.

We couldn’t do any of this without Daily Kos readers. Thank you for continuing to fight alongside us! There is so much more to share. Please follow our new activism group for all the updates from our team.