I don’t want to go into– for the 30th time– the whole long story about how I helped my congressman first get elected in 2000 and then was mortified when he joined the Blue Dogs and started voting like a Republican. Needless to say, my support turned to anger and I never voted for any of his reelection bids– and stopped talking to him.
But things have changed. It wasn’t even that he quit the Blue Dogs and started voting more like a Democrat. He still wasn’t a progressive and identified with the New Dems instead.
But then he took a bow on the national stage and became best-known for something else instead. Yep, my member of Congress is Adam Schiff, Trump’s chief antagonist and someone who is handling the Republicans on the House Intel Committee as perfectly as anyone could possibly hope he would (short of setting up an impromptu firing squad).
Last week, I asked award-winning illustrator Nancy Ohanian if she would consider doing a caricature of Schiff. That’s it, up top. Nancy sent me a few autographed 12″x16″ copies of it.
If you’d like one, contribute any amount to any Blue America-endorsed congressional candidate on this page or by clicking on the thermometer on the right. (We will pick 3 random winners on Tuesday evening at 6pm, PT.)
Unless the Democrats keep their House majority, Schiff will be replaced as chairman of the Intel Committee by Devin Nunes, the ranking member who has been acting as Trump’s chief defender throughout the hearings– and for the two-plus years previous to the hearings.
Last week, writing for L.A. Magazine, Bryan Smith penned a feature, Adam Schiff Is Ready to Rumble, that will be music to the ears of his constituents, my neighbors. In 2016 Hillary eviscerated Trump in this district, 72.1% to 22.3%, and last year Schiff was reelected with 78.4%.
If I’m reading the signs correctly, Trump will do even worse next year and Schiff will do even better. In Smith’s words, “The mild-mannered, vegan congressman from Burbank has become the GOP’s worst nightmare… Before the impeachment inquiry Schiff was known for eschewing fame while representing a town– Hollywood– built on it.”
We’re not asking you to contribute to Schiff’s election campaign. He doesn’t need it; he’s rolling in contributions.
Instead, we’re asking you to keep him in the chairman’s seat by helping to elect solid progressives like Kara Eastman, Marie Newman, J.D. Scholten, Jason Butler, Kina Collins… these candidates.
In June of 2017 Schiff signed on as a co-sponsor of Pramila Jayapal’s Medicare for All act. This year, he was an original co-sponsor of Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s Green New Deal Resolution. He was also an original co-sponsor of Bobby Rush’s Raise the Wage Act— the $15 minimum wage bill. And when Lloyd Doggett introduced his tougher-than-Pelosi bill to lower drug prices (H.R. 1046), Schiff was one of the 108 co-sponsors on February 7, 2019– day one.
Maybe he’s changing. (Maybe he’s getting ready for the race to win the Feinstein Senate seat when she finally decides to give it up.)
For now, we’re just glad he’s doing such a fantastic job honoring his sworn oath to Us, the American People– ‘to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic!’
If you want a chance to win the print – just make a contribution of any size to one or more of the fantastic Blue America Better House 2020 candidates on this page.
Here’s the illustration again– it’s really much better looking full-sized.
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