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A Roadmap to A Better Democracy By: Wes Messamore Reform activists from around the country gathered in the Country Music Capital of the World –– Nashville, Tennessee –– over the last weekend in March to celebrate an absolute tidal wave of policy victories in 2018; listen to inspirational speeches; share and learn the nuts and bolts of policy reform; and even to air fierce differences of opinion over the best way to reform elections in America and over other areas of public policy. How they buz

I’ve got some good news and some bad news. And once we put it all together, it’ll be news you can use — an easy way to join the Second American Revolution, now in progress. First, the bad news: You are being violated by your own government. Hustled and conned. We all are. Our voices and our votes. Our tax dollars, too. On a piece of parchment that birthed this country, our founders emphasized that lawmakers would derive “their just Powers from the consent of the governed.” That’s us. But those

There are hundreds, literally hundreds of organizations and individual campaigns working right now to fix the myriad of problems that face our political and electoral processes -- from the local to the national levels. The organizations tackle voter rights, primary election reform, ballot access, gerrymandering reform, campaign finance reform, alternative voting methods, electing candidates outside the two major parties, and more. The following are 10 of the biggest organizations working to ref

Last week, I joined a conference call with a dozen independent voter activists from around the country – all cabinet members of the “Eyes on 2020” campaign sponsored by Independent Voting, who are making a simple demand: Independents want full access to every stage of the 2020 presidential election process in every state. A recap of activities over the last several weeks was varied and impressive, touching on the many different ways independents are working on what is a civil rights campaign fo

The lead story in Wednesday’s Washington Post, was written by two reporters telling us what might happen to Democratic candidates running for president, in a race that doesn’t end until November 3, 2020 — a mere 615 days away. You might say I’m a political junkie, but I’m not reading speculative junk by two reporters about a subject I may know more about than they — if being in and around politics for 53 years counts for anything. As I’ve written, let the Democratic candidates run, and let med

As the new year begins, state legislatures around the country are convening to tackle the issues of the day. After seeing pro-democracy measures surge on the ballot in the 2018 midterms, it’s no surprise that efforts to address our broken elections continue to dominate discussion among the public and in the halls of power. Coming off of its historic first statewide implementation in Maine, ranked choice voting (RCV) has been a key part of this conversation in state legislatures from Massachuset

The 2020 presidential field is already taking shape. Nine Democrats have announced their campaigns since December, many of whose announcements went under the radar because the lack of media coverage: * Pete Buttigieg, Mayor of South Bend, Indiana * Julian Castro, former Mayor of San Antonio, Texas, and former HUD Secretary * John Delaney, former Maryland congressman and businessman * Tulsi Gabbard, Hawaii congresswoman * Kirsten Gillibrand, US Senator (NY) * Kamala Harris, US Senator (Cal

All rise. The fearsome gerrymander is back before the Supreme Court of the United States. In the days since SCOTUS announced its decision to review partisan district-drawing cases in both Maryland and North Carolina, the already hot topic of gerrymandering grew even more fiery, with both sides anxious to see what the nation’s highest court does - or doesn’t do -  to intervene. Last year, the court punted on a prior version of the same Maryland case it will revisit this term; it similarly decli

In December, I wrote an article on a particularly egregious case of the famous legislative "revolving door." After sixteen years in the South Dakota Legislature, Senator Deb Peters announced her resignation to take a job with the state's healthcare association. Two things about that story were particularly galling: Peters did not make her decision public until after starting her new role, and just a few weeks previously she stood for and won a seat in the South Dakota House. It turns out, as I

It has been one month since the 2018 midterm elections were decided. Much in our politics has changed: the Republicans built on their majority in the US Senate, while Democrats won back the House of Representatives and flipped several governorships and state legislatures. Political news coverage has also included topics such as the Mueller investigation, trade negotiations with China, new appointments in the Trump administration, and potential Democratic Presidential candidates in 2020. Meanwhi