Obama Excites America With Announcement To Organize Liberals

0
2125

The 2020 election season is already well underway, and as concerned interests continue to prepare to take on President Donald Trump and the wide swaths of the GOP behind him, former President Barack Obama has helped roll out a new tool. Called Redistricting U, the program is set to deliver in-person training to activists all across the United States to help them impact the redistricting process in their states for the better following the 2020 census, when — in 2021 — it’ll again be time to redraw Congressional district lines.

Obama shared this week on Twitter:

Training is at the heart of organizing. It’s why I’ve always made it a priority – from my 2008 campaign until now. And it’s why I’m proud to announce @allontheline’s in-person training initiative, Redistricting U.’

The program is available to anyone. At this stage, the group behind it — All On The Line — describe themselves as on a mission to end gerrymandering (meaning district lines that favor one political party over another), and they’re asking for email addresses and zip codes if you’d like to be notified when Redistricting U will have training available nearby.

Both the upcoming 2020 census and Congressional district lines across the country have figured prominently in the national political conversation recently. The Trump administration had been pushing to include a question about citizenship on the census, but they dropped that after repeated rulings against them across the federal court system. If implemented, the question could have had the effect of pressuring fearful immigrant communities away from the census. If they weren’t counted, Congressional representation for their communities could have shrunk based on the false population numbers.

Besides that issue, Republicans have already maintained a proven track record for implementing or seeking to implement Congressional district lines that favor them. In perhaps one of the most high-profile recent examples of the issue, ahead of the 2018 midterm elections, the Pennsylvania state Supreme Court threw out that state’s entire Congressional district map and demanded a redraw. The 2018 map has some significant changes compared to the earlier one — for example, it splits only 13 counties, while in the old one, a whopping 28 counties were divided in one way or another by the snaking lines.

Check out Twitter’s response to Obama…

63a5ec58-screenshot-2019-08-28-at-10.17.59-am Obama Excites America With Announcement To Organize Liberals Donald Trump Politics Social Media Top Stories 22850618-screenshot-2019-08-28-at-10.17.37-am Obama Excites America With Announcement To Organize Liberals Donald Trump Politics Social Media Top Stories cc1d58df-screenshot-2019-08-28-at-10.17.18-am Obama Excites America With Announcement To Organize Liberals Donald Trump Politics Social Media Top Stories 5e4b35df-screenshot-2019-08-28-at-10.16.49-am Obama Excites America With Announcement To Organize Liberals Donald Trump Politics Social Media Top Stories 3273605a-screenshot-2019-08-28-at-10.16.36-am Obama Excites America With Announcement To Organize Liberals Donald Trump Politics Social Media Top Stories

Featured Image via screenshot