BADASS Briefing - November 4, 2021

It’s still true. “When we vote, we win.” Nothing about our rallying cry changed in the past 72 hours. And we should be proud of our work and our vision to engage every Virginian in every corner of our beautiful state to understand and use their immense collective power to dictate their and our future.

In this moment of inflection and reflection, we should be proud of what we did right. We kept every seat in Northern Virginia. Imagine where we’d be without the strength, courage and determination of each of us. We canvassed, phone banked, raised money and wrote cards to make this world better. Even in loss, our organizing stemmed the tide.

We can be proud, not only of the elections of the past five years, but for our remarkable progress toward a just world: Medicaid expansion, voting rights, immigrant rights, revoking the death penalty, and so much more. These programs validate the power of being BADASS.

It’s OK to feel sad, frustrated and angry today. Make space for some self care, whatever that means to you: sleep late, have coffee with friends, take a walk.

With our blue wave, we have swells and troughs. We hit a trough. But we are still that powerful, beautiful wave.

Looking to the immediate future, we have a fantastic lineup for our Friday Power Lunch, Post-Election Blues & Reds, a call to action for the Mountain Valley Pipeline, and a virtual presentation of the art of René Dickerson.

Our hearts are broken yet we will get through this together. Thank you for all your hard work. We are honored to be in this grassroots community with you.

Love, Network NOVA Crew

We have a fantastic lineup of guests for our Post-Election Gabfest.

The big topic, the only topic of the day, is the election. We’ll start the show with a conversation about the election with those who have been on the ground since the beginning, our candidates.

Next Dr. Stephen Farnsworth (Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at University of Mary Washington) will help us unpack this election. Stephen will also tell us about his new book that looks at how comedy is used as a response to the political frustrations of the time: Late Night with Trump: Political Humor and the American Presidency.

Then we’ll talk to Dr. Jaime Settle (Associate Professor of Government at the College of William & Mary) about her research on the impact of social media on political behavior and her book Frenemies: How Facebook Polarizes America. Jaime will also tell us about the big research project she is involved in to investigate Facebook’s impact on the 2020 election.

We had an amazing pool of candidates this election. Matt Rogers (PolitiDope)—one of the people responsible for recruiting many of the candidates this cycle—will talk about how he convinced these great candidates to run and what needs to happen to finally have a candidate on the ballot in all 100 districts.

Things are still as crazy as ever on Capitol Hill. We will end the show with former Federal Prosecutor Gene Rossi, our Power Pundit, for a conversation on ALL THINGS LEGAL. Gene will help us unpack this week’s hot topics: the cases before the Supreme Court, the revelations from the Eastman Memo that shows just how much January 6 was a failed coup attempt, and the status of the criminal and civil lawsuits against Trump.

Amplify (comment, retweet & quote tweet) our tweet here

Post on your public Facebook page from here

Like and comment on instagram here.

Be a BADASS: Support the Friday Power Lunch

Call to Action: This fall we can stop the violence caused by the Mountain Valley Pipeline.

Mountain Valley Pipeline emissions would equal 26 coal fired power plants and the project threatens 236 of our Virginia waterways. Right now, together, we can end MVP’s destruction of common water and our shared future.

Reject MVP’s request for a new 401 Water Quality Certification from Virginia and stop this pipeline in its tracks by joining the Violation Vigil Project now.

What is the Violation Vigil Project?

The Violation Vigil Project is a full coalition activism campaign to give poignant, visual and aural representation to the hundreds of water violations caused by the MVP. In typical and excessively complicated language, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality claims that there is “reasonable assurance” that Mountain Valley Pipeline will not harm our waterways “if” MVP complies with the permit. But Mountain Valley Pipeline has already committed hundreds of documented water violations.

The evidence proves that there is NO “Reasonable Assurance”, NO Past “Compliance” and that there can be NO MVP.

You and 300 others are needed NOW to give voice to every single MVP water violation, to receive your Violation Poster and begin to use it, and to come together in Richmond on December 11, 2021 starting at 1 pm for the Violation Vigil convergence event with ritual and song.

Join the Violation Vigil Project here: https://tinyurl.com/3zhhsn7d

Share the Violation Project event here: https://fb.me/e/1zjRhUkIE Guidance, further resources and news on 401 Resistance, including how to make a public comment, is here: https://powhr.org/va401/

Collaborators include: Appalachian Voices, ARTivism Virginia, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Earthfolk Collective, Friends of Buckingham, Food & Water Watch, Green New Deal Virginia, POWHR Coalition, Richmond Interfaith Climate Justice League, 7 Directions of Service, Sierra Club Virginia, Virginia Interfaith Power & Light, Virginia Organizing, & Wild Virginia.

Thursday, Nov 4, 8pm Virtual

“The Virginia election is over with a complete sweep of the Statewide offices by the GOP and loss of control of the Virginia House. What does this mean for the Mid-Terms and the next Virginia election in 2022?”
Join the Center for Common Grounds on Thursday for a recap of what went wrong in the Virginia election and what we must change for 2022 .
Examine:

BIPOC voter turnout
Messaging appropriate for the South
New technology

Stay tuned: The Center for Common Grounds is planning a new series starting next week with Midwest Academy founder, Heather Booth and Congressman Jamie Raskin.

Sunday, Nov 7th, 5:00pmVirginia Grassroots Coalition Debrief

Join coalition members to share our feelings about the election, discuss our long-term goals, and start to recommend concrete steps towards those goals. This will be the beginning of this conversation, to be continued the following Sunday.Email luisaboyarski@gmail.com to attend.

Sunday, Nov 14th at 4:00pmVirginia Grassroots Coalition Monthly Meeting During our monthly meeting we will discuss our 2022 Legislative Priorities, have updates from our issue working groups, and return to our discussion from Nov 7th on our strategic goals and long-term plan. Email luisaboyarski@gmail.com to attend.

Monday 11/08/202107:00 PM EST

Virtual Virginia African American Cultural Center Presents René DickersonS

ign Up here

Learn more: https://www.vaaccvb.org/

Wednesday, December 1st, 6:30pm – Save the Date!

NARAL ProChoice Virginia Student Advocacy Fellows House Party

Jane Materna and Susan Dykstra will co-host a house party in support of the NARAL Virginia Student Advocacy Fellows program. The SAF is a paid fellowship for Virginia college students to study and practice reproductive freedom advocacy. At this time we plan to host the party virtually to mitigate the pandemic. The good news about hosting it virtually is that more of our alumni fellows will be able to attend “in person” so you’ll get the chance to talk with them one-on-one! To sponsor one fellow, the house party or for questions about the fellowship program contact Jane Materna (jmm@orgcapacity.com)

Virginia Statewide Summit on Racial Equity