Introduction

Injustice is ingrained in the personal, the public, the institutional, and the societal. It is implicit even where it is not explicit, and it is pervasive. As creators of this statement of beliefs, we acknowledge that we have blind spots in our identification of injustices. We commit ourselves to learning about and acting against injustice wherever it is found. Those of us with insulating privileges have a responsibility to do this work, following the lead of those most directly affected. We must tirelessly strive to eliminate the roots of hatred and bigotry and to build a society that is truly equitable in its actions, as well as in its word.

Table of Contents

Preamble

This platform reflects the shared beliefs and values of the members of the Washington State Democratic Party. As such, it provides the foundation that guides our evaluation of proposed legislation and candidates, and helps us achieve equitable, transparent, and effective policies and governance. We strive to align our actions with the beliefs and values stated here in order to build a society that is just and free for all our residents.

Implementation of this Platform:

We Believe:

  • The Platform must be implemented by those Democrats we have elected to represent us
  • All elected Democrats and Democratic Party officials should familiarize themselves with this Platform and formulate strategies to turn these beliefs into action
  • All elected Democrats should create, introduce, support, and pass legislation, laws, ordinances, policies, and plans to implement the pillars and planks in this platform
  • All Democrats have the right and responsibility to advocate for implementation of the planks and pillars in this Platform by contacting any officials elected to represent them where they are permitted to do so

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Agriculture, Aquaculture, Fisheries, and Forestry

We Believe:

  • Expediting a comprehensive plan for recovery of threatened or endangered Columbia and Snake River salmon and steelhead and Southern Resident orcas by…
    • Proactively replacing the services which the dams now provide with investments in alternatives for clean energy, and in agricultural irrigation, and improved shortline rail transportation
    • Providing other transitional support for regional industry
    • Breaching the Lower Snake River dams after benefits have been replaced
  • Public lands must be preserved, protected and managed as a public trust for the health of current and future generations of people, plants, and wildlife, including habitat for each species and must consider climate change mitigation and adaptation
  • State and National policies must protect and restore biodiversity, ecosystems and watersheds with specific protections for wild salmon and resident orca populations.
  • Sustainable farming, ranching, fishing, logging, and land management are critical to the health of the climate and environment
  • Strong growth management policy and law reduces sprawl while protecting agriculture, critical areas, forest, and water
  • Responsible and sustainable exercise of land management – including farming, ranching, fishing, and logging practices – are critical to restoring and maintaining the health of our climate and ecosystems.
  • It is important to strengthen and uphold environmental laws including, but not limited to such as the Clean Water Act (CWA), the Clean Air Act (CAA) and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) aka Superfund, the Endangered Species Act, and to fund and support the work of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
  • All public water holdings and diversion of agricultural water for commercial use should not be privatized
  • We support bills and laws that protect whistleblowers in the agriculture industry
  • Tariffs that negatively impact local agriculture should be opposed.
  • Public Lands must remain public, and not be evaluated for worth without considering their full ecosystem services and intrinsic values.
  • The use of lead, which bioaccumulates in species, should be eliminated and replaced with non-hazardous material in fishing and hunting gear
  • Practices in agriculture that encourage food security, support family farm incomes, encourage organic and restorative farming practices, eliminate monopolistic practices, and minimize methane emissions and other hazardous and environmentally damaging wastes by reducing factory-farming should be encouraged.
  • Urban areas should have increased assistance for development of urban forest management plans and urban forest ordinances that increase protection for trees and support increasing urban tree canopy
  • Local farmer’s markets, community supported agriculture (CSA boxes), and cooperative markets, should be created and supported.
  • Our critical environmental areas should be protected, including wilderness areas, older “legacy” (pre-1945) and old growth forests, wildlife habitat areas
  • Our critical environmental areas should be protected, including wilderness areas, old growth and legacy forests, wildlife habitat areas and corridors, wetlands, lakes, rivers, streams, riparian areas, Washington waters, aquifers, coastlines, continental shelf, oceans, and other bodies of water through vigilant monitoring and planned growth management
  • Restorative soils program should be implemented to incentivize healthy agriculture and forestry management practices which would concurrently enhance soil productivity and microbial biodiversity, reduce local waterways pollution, and improve soil CO2 sequestration
  • In incentivizing restorative soil programs which enhance profitability and soil productivity, reduce pollution of nearby waterways, and improve soil CO2 sequestration, and may include grazing animals
  • We must improve fisheries by expanding funding and restoration efforts including:
    • Replacement of culverts
    • Riparian and cold-water connection restoration
    • Better facilitating fish passage, habitat restoration, and pollution-reduction programs goals, with detection of pollution sources and enforcement of violations
    • Alternative fishing gear
    • Supporting wild fish runs and hatchery “wild stock” production, and daylighting streams and creeks where possible
  • Building and providing resiliency within farm and fishing communities to deal with economic effects of climate change, especially as new renewable solar and offshore wind energy projects are developed to address concerns of loss of jobs and livelihood.
  • Fisheries and forests should be managed for climate resiliency taking into account rapidly changing ecological conditions and year-to-year variability, rather than pursuing maximum sustainable yields.
  • In incentivizing and providing grants to assist property owners in transitioning their landscaping to native, diverse, drought-tolerant plants
  • Use of native plant species in landscape management should be promoted.
    • Projects on public lands should prioritize the use of species native to the project site, where doing so would contribute to the overall ecosystem health of the site.
  • Private property owners should be encouraged, through incentive and grant programs, to restore ecosystem health to their property through the use of native species. In continuing to remove barriers put in place by private organizations that make it more difficult for property owners to use native, diverse, and drought-tolerant landscaping
  • The use of native, diverse, drought-tolerant plants should be required on public lands, except where park uses require a different form of groundcover
  • In investing in stewardship of our forest and our forest communities affected by climate change and resulting in hotter and drier seasons causing massive and catastrophic wildfires, and increased susceptibility to pest infestation that threaten this state’s forests and streams and timber-related jobs
  • In investing in a just transition for timber workers displaced due to environmental considerations including retraining for new living-wage jobs both within and outside forestry, such as strengthen our forests and communities for wildfire, to more sustainably manage forests and their products, and to realize the full potential of carbon capture and other ecosystem services our forests provide.
  • Increasing jobs in our rural timber communities to strengthen our forests against wildfire, to use sustainable forest biomass from forestry thinning to make renewable products, through the manufacture and use of advanced engineered wood products, and in the best forest management practices to realize the full potential of carbon capture.
  • In rapid after fire response to address potential sediment runoff and soil erosion
  • Antibiotic resistant pathogens pose a threat to human, animal and environmental health. Producers should be required to minimize or discontinue their indiscriminate use of antibiotics in aquaculture, poultry and livestock production in order to protect food security.
  • In reviewing and updating all farm programs, rapidly phasing-out federal farm subsidies for large-scale and publicly traded corporate farms, and vigorously enforcing antitrust laws that apply to agribusiness
  • In fixing and updating critical infrastructure, in particular, fully funding the Public Works Trust Fund, Drinking Water State Revolving Fund and Clean Water State Revolving Fund to ensure all have access to safe, clean water
  • In prioritizing funding of research and extension for climate mitigation and adaptation methods for agriculture, aquaculture, fishery and forestry at Washington state universities
  • In enhanced protection of riverine and marine ecosystems must be protected from tanker, and cargo-vessel, collisions and derelict vessels and cruise ship’ unlawful discharges and spills, particularly spills of. of petroleum-based products, and bilge water pumping operations containing invasive aquatic species, requiring that all fossil-fuel tankers be double-hulled and enforcing penalties for violations.
  • In protecting wild salmon and all other native marine life, and mitigating both flood damage and low water fish impacts by restoring instream and riparian habitats in accordance with the NW Treaty Tribes Tribal Habitat Strategy and the Columbia Basin Restoration Initiative
  • We should expand state laws and enforcing current regulations to eliminate pollution, and protect the health of Washington state waters at the source, including point source and nonpoint source discharges
  • Food should be clearly labeled in support of consumer choice, including date packaged, full and complete disclosure of nation of origin, genetically modified organism status, irradiation, and organic certification
  • In third party independent environmental reviews of study findings, reports, and policy recommendations produced in universities within Washington state forestry programs funded by the timber industry and its assigns
  • Agricultural practices that are inhumane should be banned. Farming animals for fur should not be permitted.
  • To encourage land practices that improve and restore ecosystem health, we support increased funding of Conservation Districts.
  • Native flora and fauna species are important to maintain the delicate balance of ecosystems, that preserving endangered species is of the utmost importance, and that endangered species should be studied, monitored, managed, and protected to safeguard biodiversity for future generations.
  • Implementing regulations to ensure humane treatment of animals in farming practices, including standards for housing, transportation and slaughter.
  • Preventing over-harvesting of marine wildlife through monitoring strict limits and harvest closure where necessary

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Business, Financial Services, Gaming & Trade

We Believe:

On Corporate Power

  • In the power of co-ops and local/rural initiatives to keep ownership and profits close to communities
  • The state has a duty to protect people, their data, and public interests and assets from exploitation by corporations, through assessing and collecting restitution for damages to individuals and public assets from corporate actions
  • Public institutions are created primarily to serve, protect and promote the interests of the public and future generations, not corporations, through sustainable management of infrastructure, natural resources, habitat, opportunity and human health
  • Prevent exploitation of working people. Organizing millions of workers into unions is an effective way to reduce poverty and restore balance to an economic and political system dominated by giant corporations and billionaires.
  • Workers as members with equal standing on boards of directors would improve the balance of power between CEOs/owners and employees.
  • Government contracts should be granted exclusively to companies that provide living wages, competitive benefits, retain employment within the United States, are supportive of unions, fully comply with federal and state labor laws, and promote environmental stewardship. 
  • The government should not subsidize corporate agriculture, or oil, gas, chemical, and pharmaceutical companies.
  • In closing “Carried Interest” loopholes in Capital Gains Taxes
  • Antitrust laws should be enforced to rein in mega-mergers and prevent the monopolization of our economy
  • Bailouts of corporations should be limited to national emergencies. 
  • Religious and/or Faith-based organizations should never receive a bailout or tax exemptions
  • Bank bailouts should benefit their customers and not the shareholders, and fiduciary duties of banks should be reviewed by independent organizations and federally regulated.
  • In the need to reverse the effects of the Citizens United decision
  • In legislation that recognizes that corporations are not human beings and accorded privileges only, not rights. Government regulations should prioritize society’s well-being first over corporate profit
  • In regulation and taxation as a normal cost of doing business
    • Reinstate Glass-Steagall to separate commercial from investment banking
    • Enforcing Dodd-Frank to control abusive financial and banking practices
    • Restore the enforcement power of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)
    • Continue funding of the Workforce Investment Opportunity Act to increase the self-sufficiency of young adults and adults with disabilities by providing career counseling, job training, information, and referral services
    • Strengthen and enforce antitrust laws such as the Clayton Act
  • In transparent, readily accessible accounting in governments and corporations
  • The Corporate Transparency Act should be stringently enforced and be extended to S Corporations and Partnerships.
  • The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is one of the most important legal tools citizens and reporters have for furthering government transparency in the United States and should be further modernized and funded.
  • In public or cooperative ownership of all utilities including internet services.
  • Import taxes and tariffs should take into consideration on the country of origin’s environmental regulations, wage and labor laws, and their enforcement
  • Corporate fiduciary responsibilities should be scaled to encompass the assessment of financial, environmental community impact, social justice aspects and implications of business activities. 
  • Support small businesses. Continue funding the Small Business Administration (SBA) and state-level small business programs and initiatives. Continue supporting minority, women, and veteran-owned business programs. Assess impacts to small businesses when determining legislation. Prepare legislation to address the needs of small businesses.
  • In reforming laws that permit private companies to mandate arbitration with consumers, employees, and investors into private arbitrations for disputes, thereby ensuring Americans their rightful access to fair legal remedies.
  • In creating a Reparations and a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to rectify the injustices and enduring generational economic impacts on African Americans in the US stemming from our nation’s history of chattel slavery and other discriminatory practices, some of which persist today.
  • In the cessation of all sub-minimum wages, irrespective of one’s age, physical or mental abilities.
  • The National Labor Relations Board requires full funding to ensure it has the necessary resources to protect workers’ rights to unionize.
  • In fully funding the National Labor Relations Board with the resources needed to safeguard the rights of workers to organize in anti-union environments.
  • Minors should be provided additional protections in the workforce, including limits on hours and types of work allowed.
  • The need for comprehensive legislation regulating artificial intelligence that encompasses accountability for misuse, data privacy, transparency, and the protection of the most vulnerable.

On Culture and the Arts

  • Freedom of expression is a fundamental human right which is expressed through culture and the arts
  • Culture, the arts & humanities are core expressions of the values that make our country great
  • Government should sponsor programs that celebrate and promote the cultural diversity of our country
  • Programs focused on Culture and the Arts that foster greater public understanding by providing a truthful depiction of our varied cultures and histories.
  • Multi-media public broadcasting, including community-based public radio and public access television are vital to the development of a healthy society
  • Public art enhances the livability of public spaces, from parks to schools to libraries, and should be available in every community
  • Artists should be paid for the use of their intellectual property including on the internet
  • Artists and cultural organization workers should be involved in the planning and implementation processes of public art works
  • Investment in the arts provides both cultural and economic benefits by creating job opportunities for local creative professionals, and access to enriching programs that lift up local economies and generate income
  • Funding should be set aside to subsidize artists’ workspaces and live-work spaces such as lofts, especially as part of building preservation.
  • Public funding of the arts should not be used for religious purposes
  • Artists should be compensated for their work when it is done for the government.
  • Federal, state, and local libraries, performing arts centers and museums should be well-funded, accessible, affordable, and diverse in their offerings
  • Cultural and arts education should be funded, available and accessible as a core subject in K-12 public schools
  • Federal and state government should make cultural and arts education available and accessible to all as a core subject in our K-12 public schools
  • Federal, state, and local governments should provide easy, equitable access to public art events, performances, exhibits, and installations for all communities, featuring diverse artists.

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Early Learning & K-12 Education

We Believe:

On Education

  • The backbone of our democracy is a free, high quality, universal Pre-K through 12 grade public-school system, designed to develop lifelong learners prepared to think critically and participate in our civic society
  • All people have the right to attend schools where their physical, emotional, and cultural safety is assured; their background and identities are valued and affirmed; Education means investing in all people and preparing them to live, work, and thrive in a multicultural, multilingual, and highly connected world
  • No one should be denied an education because of membership in any socioeconomic, linguistic, or ethnic group, or because of a disability
  • Every school must be adequately funded to have the staff and resources it needs to provide a full education, extracurricular and enrichment, after school activities, and appropriate services for all students
  • Our schools should help our children learn critical social and emotional skills, and identify and address mental health concerns, with adequate funding from the state in order to address the youth mental health crisis.
  • Societal inequality impacts educational equity and must be addressed as it impacts the whole person: physically, mentally, socially and emotionally for the benefit of all learners.
  • Every public school must receive sufficient state resources to provide a rich and equitable curriculum in every neighborhood of our state.
  • The establishment clause of the First Amendment applies to public schools as with the government as a whole
  • Privacy laws regarding student and employee information should be respected and enforced
  • Early learning includes high quality and accessible childcare, home visiting services, Head Start and Early Childhood Education and Assistance Programs and deserves equal support and funding from the State to ensure high quality, accessible and culturally relevant childcare is affordable to families through state-funded tuition and program support. Programs should include support for a diversity of early learning centers and home-based programs with access to learning and development specialists and therapists

On Pre-K Education

  • Teacher to student ratios must be calculated using the number of classroom teachers only and kept within research based best practices for optimal student growth.
  • Special education services should not have enrollment caps arbitrarily assigned which limit funding, should have ample staff training and support, inclusivity in classrooms, multi-tiered layers of support, adequate school district reimbursement access, and discontinue isolation in school facilities.
  • Enacting educational policies that protect Queer, Transgender, and gender non-conforming youth from bullying, harassment, and violence in schools and communities and promote the inclusion of Queer, Transgender, and gender non-conforming Americans.
  • In the importance of state supported early education, especially for working families, from birth to pre-K, such as affordable, high-quality childcare, learning and development specialists, and therapists, as this is a peak time of childhood development and learning
  • Lowering the compulsory school age for children from 8 to 5. Washington is the only state with an age requirement that doesn’t start until age 8
  • In ensuring that childcare providers are adequately compensated and providing quality childcare is a sustainable profession. 
  • Supporting early learning dual language programs is a critical way to ensure access for all children and develop a love of learning, to engage families, and to recognize the benefits of bilingual skills on brain development and the economy.
  • In providing grants for early learning facilities to be built, expanded and upgraded to serve more families across our state, especially in childcare deserts.
  • Early childhood development is a vital component of success throughout a person’s life, and access to high quality childcare has lasting positive effects on family, economic security and opportunity for both individuals and their families

On School Funding

  • In providing a tuition-free, universal pre-k program for all children 3-5 years old to support equitable school readiness
  • Consistent with Article IX of our State Constitution and the Washington State Supreme Court, education is Washington State’s paramount duty, and the first priority is ample funding for the common schools.  We believe that public education, vested in the common schools, means fully funding local school districts that are governed by locally elected school boards. All efforts to privatize our schools including un-elected appointed school boards, vouchers, and other programs and policies that represent privatization efforts are inconsistent with our State’s Constitution and the intent of our founders. The full funding of education for all our children in our public schools without requiring school districts to propose regressive property tax funded bonds and levies is the paramount duty of the state per Article IV, Section 1, of the Washington State Constitution
  • That rural schools, schools with small tax bases, and schools with unusual numbers of special education or newcomer ELL students face special funding challenges that need attention
  • Funding must be used to support educational activities that further student learning and not used to test students beyond acquiring data needed to evaluate if the system is progressively moving students up the learning continuum.
  • Funding extends beyond educators and administrators to include paraeducators and support staff such as councilors
  • Public funds should directly support public schools in Washington. Voucher schemes, tuition tax credits, or other financial tools that use tax monies to fund private schools or other educational programs or systems that undermine public education should be avoided.
  • In the full funding of special education by both the state and federal governments so all public schools in Washington State are in full compliance with IDEA, FAPE, and ADA, respectively. 
  • Public schools should be free of commercialization including corporate funding of programs and pre-K through grade 12 food sales
  • Free school food programs should be available throughout the year for all students, including breakfast and lunch, that meet or exceed state nutritional standards and support healthy habits and classroom learning, so that all students have an equal, stigma-free opportunity to succeed
  • That free breakfast and lunch school meals for all students support healthy habits and classroom learning in an equal, stigma-free environment
  • Plant-based options and alternatives to animal products in school meals should be available to meet all students’ dietary and ethical requirements
  • All mandates from the judicial and legislative branches of state and federal governments should be fully funded, including district-specific full funding and support for students with disabilities who are mainstreamed with 504 Plans, Individual Education Plans, and/or who are identified as highly capable
  • In funding for high-quality, out-of-school-time programs, including before school, after school, and summer, to support working families and maintain school-year learning achievement
  • In school infrastructure being an equally as important part of the state constitutional paramount duty to fully fund education” including buildings, technology, capital projects like new roofs, heat systems, ventilation that meets OSHA Indoor Air Quality Standards), and when needed updating school buildings to green building practices; new school infrastructure should focus on green initiatives (energy efficiency, solar panels) funded by the state and federal government

On Curriculum

  • Because research shows that one in five students miss school because of lack of clean clothes and when their schools have washers and dryers their attendance increased as much as 93%. Therefore, Washington public schools should be equipped with washers and dryers for the use of students’ families that need access to a washer and dryer for washing student school clothes.
  • Education includes scientifically accurate academic, social-emotional, behavioral, and cultural supports for all learners
  • In promoting Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math education for all students, with special awareness and engagement for female and non-binary learners.
  • In promoting access to education for all learners, establish and support K-12 dual language to promote language and cultural learning for multilingual students and students whose first language is English, and K-12 newcomer programs. 
  • In promoting civics and social studies education to develop a well-informed citizen electorate with including the experiences of historically marginalized groups historical perspective
  • In promoting literature and arts education, which encourages empathy and understanding of the human condition, and supports the social and emotional learning needs of students.
  • In promoting economic education to foster financial literacy and develop an understanding of the systems that impact livelihoods and society as a whole
  • A foundation of civics and social studies, financial literacy and economics must be woven throughout our educational system in order to develop a well-informed citizen electorate with multi-ethnic historical perspective, including the Since Time Immemorial Curriculum
  • Financial education should be added to the curriculum of K-12 schools.
  • In promoting media literacy to encourage critical thinking skills and teach students to recognize and authenticate sources of information including A.I. and misinformation.
  • Outdoor environmental education as mandated by Washington State Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction should be supported and expanded
  • Each school should have an adequate library, a qualified professional librarian, and books and materials reflecting a wide variety of beliefs and experiences, including voices of different races, gender identities, and other marginalized groups

On Restorative Justice / Discipline

  • A course in Interpersonal Communications should be required for graduation, offered first in 9th grade, to equip students with the interpersonal communication tools needed for success in all domains of life.
  • In all students’ First Amendment right to access of information, to read freely, to learn in a safe environment without fear of prejudice or censorship, as granted to them by the United States’ Constitution.
  • Schools should be kept free of bullying and harassment and any other act of physical, emotional or sexual violence, by implementation of comprehensive anti-bullying campaigns with a focus on digital literacy to combat cyber-bullying
  • School districts should be seeking curricula and instructional material that is diverse and inclusive, and should be supported in doing so with adequate funding
  • All schools should adopt discipline policies that conform with state law and with model policies to focus on restorative justice and supportive interventions for behavioral problems or substance abuse issues, instead of suspensions, punishments, or isolation. Furthermore, schools should be supported with resources and expert assistance for policy adoption and staff retraining
  • In ending regular police presence in schools via school resource officer (SRO) programs, as they criminalize typical student behavior and contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline, disproportionately impacting students of color

On Elections

  • Elected school boards should solicit input, and openly work to include the input of the entire community they serve and actively represent their interests
  • Students should have a voice in local school boards
  • Educators should have a voice in their local school boards without fear of retaliation
  • School bonds and levies should only require a simple majority for passage

On Staffing

  • In the importance of recruiting and retaining educators, especially those in underrepresented groups like people of color and marginalized groups
  • In mandatory mentoring programs for new educators in their first 3 years that includes release time for observations and feedback
  • In working with our labor union partners to ensure that all educators, including education support professionals, are receiving respectful, professional compensation and high-quality benefits
  • In equitable funding of technical, vocational, 2- and 4-year colleges, especially with regards to pay at all levels (administration, faculty, classified staff), scope of work and employment contracts

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Higher Education & Workforce Development

We Believe:

  • In high quality continuing education and career training, including school-to-work partnerships and apprenticeship programs, in addition to traditional higher education for adult workers
  • In fully funding tuition-free and debt-free public college, universities, Historically Black Colleges/Universities (HBCUs), minority serving institutions, and trade-schools
  • In student loan forgiveness for existing tuition debts as outlined in the Higher Education Act.
  • Low-interest, publicly administered student loans should be available to every student.
  • Public colleges and universities should be given operating support to remove as many financial barriers to entry as possible and capital support to ensure safe, affordable, and quality housing for all students who want to live on campus.
  • Public colleges and universities should be given operating support to remove as many financial barriers to entry as possible and capital support to ensure safe, affordable, and quality housing for all students who want to live on campus.
  • We believe in a continuing commitment to increase need-based student aid programs, while also focusing on increasing enrollment and retainment of low-income and underprivileged students.
  • In prioritizing funding of research and extension for climate mitigation and adaptation methods for agriculture, aquaculture, fishery, and forestry at Washington state universities
  • The state should ensure stabilization funding in the case of local budget shortfalls, in order to minimize staff reductions and minimize negative impacts to class size
  • In expanding the Economic Security for All model, which is a pro-equity anti-racism poverty reduction model that provides people with a career plan to reach self-sufficiency, a supportive career coach, wrap around supportive services, free college or job training, and monthly incentive payments to holistically move people from poverty to living-wage jobs. This model works and treats people with dignity. It should be expanded in Washington and nationally.

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​Environment, Energy & Technology

We Believe:

On Energy, Environment, and the Climate Crisis

  • The Climate Commitment Act is indispensable in reducing our state’s greenhouse gas emissions and must be defended from repeal
  • Washington State must continue to be a leader among state, national and international efforts to mitigate climate change through protecting public lands, eliminating ecosystem destruction, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, protecting farmlands, and maximizing forest carbon sequestration.
  • Committed action and accountability will lead us to meet Washington State’s climate goals for 45% reduction of carbon pollution below 1990 levels by 2030 and a net-zero carbon-emission economy by 2050, for example:
    • Phasing out existing and preventing new fossil fuel infrastructure, including coal, natural gas and methane hydrate, pipelines, mining, processing, and import/export terminals
    • Supporting efforts to end offshore fossil fuel drilling consistent with the Coastal Zone Management Act, including the prevention of methane hydrate mining, drilling, extraction, and processing.
  • The US military is the largest institutional consumer of fossil fuels and generator of climate emissions, and is a threat multiplier of climate change, and the US DOD bears a responsibility to cut climate emissions in half by 2030 for the survival of humankind.
  • A fully funded infrastructure is needed for electrification and energy efficiency, including
    • Improved rail transportation via existing services such as Amtrak
    • A statewide infrastructure to support electric vehicles
    • Major improvements in rail infrastructure and service
    • Enhanced and expanded power grid, to adequately support new power generation sources
    • Our electrical transmission and distribution networks must be strengthened to accelerate the transition to clean energy and withstand disruption from climate change
    • Increased support for renewable and sustainable, non-fossil, energy programs to supply electricity to the power grid
    • Research and deployment of utility scale energy storage, distributed generation, heat pumps, and smart grid technology
    • Uniform access to the electrical grid for sustainable energy sources, implementing strong net metering standards, equitable rate structures and establishment of standard interconnection rules, uniform procedures and technical requirements for connecting renewable energy systems to the electric utility’s grid
  • Environmental policies should be based on the best available science and be informed, as appropriate, by Traditional Environmental Knowledge (TEK) from local Native American Nations and communities
  • We defend the parts of earth’s systems that are unable to defend themselves, including
    • The incorporation of the principles of Rights of Nature into governance policies at all levels of government
    • In putting first, the land and sea on which the livelihood of so many depend
  • Advancing racial and economic justice means advancing environmental justice for all, including recognition that
    • Low-income and minority communities have disproportionately suffered from environmental degradation
    • At-risk communities need to be consulted about projects that affect them
  • The health of the economy is tied to the health of the environment and that the cost of aggressive action to mitigate the climate crisis will ultimately be less than the cost of taking no action
  • Government investments, including state pension programs, should divest from fossil fuels
  • Energy subsidies or incentives may be given exclusively to safe, renewable energy sources
  • Energy Utilities should be publicly owned
  • Since electrification of the economy and expanded use of electronics depends on various rare elements, we need strong recycling programs for batteries, electronics and other products which would otherwise require destructive mining and limited natural elements.
  • There is no place for the burning or transportation of coal
  • Nuclear power facilities must be safely decommissioned as soon as cleaner, fossil-free alternative energy systems can meet the demands of our power grid.
  • In not externalizing harms such as with waste disposal, including waste from energy production whether renewable, fossil fuel based, or nuclear; it must not be sent to disadvantaged neighborhoods here or abroad.
  • In protecting fresh water and fresh water sources, regulating the use of groundwater to avoid overuse, and planning to anticipate future freshwater needs, including the infrastructure necessary to accommodate population growth
  • We must end subsidies for and divest from funds which utilize and profit from all aspects of fossil fuels in our state and local economies
  • The role of regulatory agencies is to protect the public and that strict regulations must be maintained in the public interest, including:
    • Strict regulation of the transport of fossil fuels and hazardous materials
    • In fully funding cleanup of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation pursuant to Hanford Cleanup Agreement milestones
    • Maintaining the Superfund Tax that requires polluters to pay cleanup costs including methane leaking on currently operating or abandoned wells.
    • Ending fracking and crude oil exports
    • Aggressively regulating toxins in commerce using the Toxic Substances Control Act
    • Create a reparations program funded by corporations for people whose health has been negatively impacted by the pollutants they have created.
    • Expanding environmental remediation programs to allow more contaminated sites throughout the state to be eligible for remediation funding
    • Providing sufficient state funding for clean air agencies to conduct necessary permitting and enforcement actions in a timely manner
  • Increase the rate of recycling by requiring deposits and refunds on plastic and glass beverage bottles, as many states do.
  • We must limit contamination of the environment by harmful waste materials, such as plastics, heavy metals, toxic chemicals, and radioactive materials, via reduction in use, reclamation and recycling, or proper disposal or storage.
  • Plastics are already heavily contaminating our waterways and affecting our fisheries, so we need to remove plastic waste from the environment. And most plastic is not recycled, nor can it be easily recycled, so we should invest in research for recycling or for decomposing plastic waste so it is harmless.
  • The crisis in plastic recycling needs solutions including-
    • Placing primary responsibility on manufacturers to reduce unnecessary plastic and fund effective recycling systems.
  • In supporting a national energy policy to minimize global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels and pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
  • In supporting the national energy policy to minimize global temperature rise
  • In establishing and implementing a national price on carbon-based pollution to account for the costs of increased air pollution and climate change from fossil fuels, and adopting a carbon fee and dividend program that distributes the fees collected to every citizen in the form of monthly dividend checks
  • In making investments and developing industrial policies that can rapidly scale domestic manufacturing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, cut waste and inefficiency, and catalyze deployment and innovation in industrial technologies and processes that will sustain globally competitive American manufacturing jobs, with the focus on replacing fossil fuel industry jobs with living wage jobs in a revitalized non-carbon economy
  • We need plans to build energy efficient, low-income and affordable housing, with and sustainable local community infrastructure., We can put our people to work eliminating pollution, protecting clean water, and building healthier communities
  • Tribal involvement in all siting decisions of clean energy projects and transmission lines must be implemented at the earliest inception of planning to avoid damage to traditional indigenous spaces and to avoid costly, unnecessary delays in build out of projects and transmission lines.
  • In incorporating Traditional Environmental Knowledge (TEK) from local Tribal organizations in the planning and execution of land and water restoration activities
  • In fully funding cleanup of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation pursuant to Hanford Cleanup Agreement milestones
  • Expanding electricity production with non-fossil energy sources, increasing transmission capability, and building a smart grid are key to decarbonizing our economy
  • Manufacturers should be held responsible for the true cost of pollution
  • A successful transition to a cleaner energy future requires all major sources of carbon-free energy: wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, and nuclear.
  • In utilizing all clean energy resources, including nuclear, until the existential threat posed by global warming is fully neutralized
  • There should not be premature shutdown of carbon-free electricity producing nuclear power plants currently in operation, unless required for safety reasons
  • Clean energy subsidies should be prioritized over fossil fuel subsidies
  • Energy conservation should remain one of the key practices toward a sustainable carbon-free energy future
  • In requiring local authorities to include climate change in their comprehensive planning
  • The Growth Management planning process should be fully funded statewide
    • Expanding the Growth Management Act to include climate mitigation, adaptation and racial equity by ensuring priority is placed on reducing carbon emissions and co-pollutants that disproportionately harm lower income communities and communities of color.
    • Amending the Growth Management Act to add climate change and salmon recovery as goals and requiring a net gain of ecological function as the standard for all planning and permitting processes.
  • Swift implementation of critical science is needed to quantify greenhouse gas emissions associated with all types of electricity generation that haven’t been evaluated, and to ensure planning results in power that is actually clean
  • Focus on, fund work for, and enact new laws as necessary to address technology issues including but not limited to cybersecurity threats, online privacy, online safety, identity theft, consumer data, misinformation, and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
  • Fully fund and expand efforts to prevent and respond to wildfires throughout the state, fund research into the health effects of wildfire smoke, fund and support efforts to ensure that worker safety is addressed, and update community emergency plans as needed.
  • In policies to incentivize manufacturing facilities, such as pulp and paper mills, food processors, steel and metal producers, refineries, and cement manufacturers Emission Intensive and Trade Exposed entities described in the Climate Commitment Act to incorporate the best available technology to continually reduce greenhouse gas emissions and retain jobs within Washington state.
  • It is a human right to have access to clean water free of carcinogens, toxins, and heavy metals.

On Technology

  • Digital Equity, the condition in which individuals and communities have the information technology capacity that is needed for full participation in society and the economy of our country, is a matter of social and economic justice.
  • International trade agreements that protect and strengthen consumer privacy, tech equity, and digital data protection, and that rein in Big Tech’s corporate monopoly power over jobs, health, communication, and surveillance.”
  • Expediting a comprehensive plan for recovery of threatened or endangered Columbia and Snake River salmon and steelhead and Southern Resident orcas by proactively replacing the services the dams now provide with investments in alternatives for clean energy, and in agricultural irrigation, and improved shortline rail transportation; providing other transitional support for regional industry; breaching the Lower Snake River dams after benefits have been replaced
  • Both now and in the future, Washington State should be a leader in developing state regulatory frameworks surrounding AI and ML, especially in industries like financial services and healthcare which pose a greater risk of biased outcomes.
  • Safeguarding our fundamental rights to privacy and freedom from discrimination must be given the highest priority
  • As Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) technologies are adopted and implemented by companies around the globe across both the public and private sectors, the government must regulate their use in order to ensure accountability, transparency, fairness, and adherence to ethical standards to minimize negative impacts to our communities
  • The US must sustain global leadership in science and technology. Research & development helps foster innovation and drives emerging technologies that will shape future industries
  • Government leaders must be actively involved in ensuring these emerging technologies are adequately tested and safe for our communities before widespread implementation

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Health Care

We Believe:

  • Health care is a basic human right.
  • In a commitment to a comprehensive range of healthcare services that includes health promotion and disease prevention. Ensuring public health and managing public health crises are governmental duties. Hence, establishing sustainable public health infrastructures is crucial to fostering overall well-being for everyone.
  • Comprehensive health care encompasses access to the full spectrum of reproductive health care services including contraception and abortion, and to gender-affirming health care, alternative health care, and end-of-life care. Further, all Washington residents must have easy access to comprehensive health care that is culturally and linguistically competent, financially and physically accessible, and not subject to faith-based restrictions
  • An affordable universal, single-payer system is essential for delivering equitable and effective health care that meets both individual and public health needs.
  • Healthcare services should be publicly owned and operated
  • Women’s reproductive rights must be protected by federal legislation.
  • Health care should not result in bankruptcy or significant financial hardship for individuals and families
  • Teens have autonomy and agency over the decision to have an abortion, therefore, parental notification or consent laws for minors seeking an abortion should be opposed.
  • All health care insurance systems should be non-profit.
  • Health care systems, treatment options, public health, and emergency response plans should not deny or restrict access to comprehensive care or prioritize care based on racial or ethnic identity, marital status, intellectual, mental, or physical disability, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, religious beliefs, socioeconomic status, immigration status, or residency status.
  • Medicare should be expanded to eliminate privatization and should include all benefits now offered by Medicare Advantage plans.
  • Medicare Part D privatized/for-profit drug coverage should be discontinued. Medicare should have its own pharmaceutical coverage, negotiating fair prices for drugs and premiums. There should be amnesty on exorbitant late-joining penalties for those who could not afford the private insurance premiums
  • Drug and medical services pricing should be transparent, readily available and drug formularies should only be dictated by doctor and patient, not by pharmacy benefit managers.
  • Taxpayer-funded research and development for vaccines and pharmaceuticals should serve the public interest rather than fueling exorbitant profits for commercial enterprises.
  • Taxpayer-funded institutions must be transparent in any use of animals and must commit to phasing out any use of animals when other means of research are known and available.
  • All Washington residents should have parity in accessing and coverage of physical and behavioral health care, including easy and affordable access to mental health screening and resources, in-patient and out-patient treatment, and substance use treatment and recovery.
  • The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services must have expanded powers by law to negotiate prices for medical devices and drugs in a timely manner.
  • Telehealth is a growingly useful tool for a wide variety of patients and providers, post Covid pandemic. When appropriate for care, use of video conferencing, and telephone in case where internet access/speed is an issue, should be supported by health care facilities and insurance, not phased out.
  • The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and National Institutes of Health (NIH) should operate autonomously with expanded funding, free from politically motivated limitations.
  • Washington state residents are best served by healthcare and behavioral health professionals who come from and are connected to the communities they serve. Adequate funding should be provided for the recruitment, education, training, and retention of such health care and behavioral health professionals, particularly those working in underserved areas and populations. Full funding should be provided for the education of all medical, nursing, mental health, substance use, and other professionals who pursue a career in local, state or federal Public Health agencies.
  • Providing education grants and student-debt forgiveness for primary care providers, nurses, advanced practice providers, and behavioral health professionals in exchange for service to underserved populations, with a focus on recruiting individuals to serve their own communities.
  • Providing education grants and student-debt forgiveness for primary care providers, in exchange for service to underserved populations
  • We have an acute shortage of all levels of long-term care workers. Training and retention programs are needed to address this critical shortage.
  • A safety net should be provided for rural hospitals and community health centers.
  • Cannabis should be removed from schedule 1 status.
  • Antitrust and patent law violations by pharmaceuticals that lead to artificially high drug prices should be aggressively prosecuted.
  • Programs to train, recruit and retain credentialed and non-credentialed behavioral health workers should be expanded.
  • All healthcare mergers, acquisitions, and consolidations should be highly regulated to ensure continued access to comprehensive health care and prevent any negative impact on marginalized or rural communities.
  • Financial and social services, including respite care support for family caregivers should be expanded, support for family caregivers should be expanded and social services, including respite care.
  • Ensuring prompt Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of new treatments based on solid data from reputable clinical trials that demonstrate both safety and effectiveness is a vital human service.
  • Abortion is a valid and critical part of reproductive healthcare, and access to safe and legal abortion must continue to be further protected through a state constitutional amendment.
  • A health and dental care medical loss ratio of 85% should be established to require that 85% of insurance premium payments for health and dental go to direct patient care, not Executive compensation.
  • In ensuring a woman’s right to choose abortion without interference from any governmental, ideological or religious entity.
  • We should require transparency in billing from insurance companies and healthcare providers. Patients need better itemized bills and a breakdown of cost and savings so every Washingtonian can easily understand and compare healthcare costs.
  • Health care for a person shall be managed by that individual and chosen healthcare provider without the imposition of government laws that individual shall have autonomy over their body.
  • Training programs for all health care professionals should require nutrition courses.
  • Require testing and regulation of dyes and other potentially harmful ingredients in cosmetics and in clothing.
  • Healthcare organizations, companies and agencies will institute union supported staffing models to improve patient safety and staff safety. This promotes a necessary culture of safety needed in all healthcare settings.
  • Advanced practice providers can practice to the full scope of their training without antiquated supervision practice models. This will increase access to care for our communities throughout the public and private healthcare system.
  • Development of “orphan drugs” for the millions of Americans who live with rare diseases should be supported and incentivized while keeping the cost of these medications affordable for rare disease patients.
  • Patients have a right to know if they are unable to receive comprehensive health care for their concern because either their health practitioner or facility is subject to faith-based restrictions.
  • Housing is health care. Washington residents struggling to survive unsheltered or living in unstable or unsafe housing also struggle to access comprehensive health care and adequate treatment for mental health or substance use disorder and recovery. We support continued expansion of Housing First model housing, permanent supportive housing, and expansion of supportive housing funded by Medicaid at the state and federal levels.
  • Healthcare Insurance companies will stop predatory and unaffordably-high deductible use.
  • Adequate funding for eldercare in rural towns/areas
  • Consumers have the right to obtain, at a reasonable price, the tools, parts, and schematics necessary to repair home health care products so that they can continue to be used rather than sent to landfills.

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Economic & Housing Justice, Jobs and Tax Fairness

We Believe:

  • Housing is a basic necessity and a human right.
  • Rent stabilization is an essential tool in ensuring that Washingtonians have predictable and affordable housing.
  • Placing appropriate equitable property taxes on secondary homes, to be distributed as affordable housing subsidies.
  • It is the proper role of the government to provide stable housing to people experiencing housing insecurity and those who are under-housed, to expand the stock of supportive, low income, accessible, and affordable housing, and to use all tools available to control the astronomic explosion of the cost of housing
  • New housing developments should be required to incorporate energy saving technologies to reduce energy consumption and increase affordability.
  • In requiring developers to pay impact fees to mitigate increased capital needs for schools, safe pedestrian infrastructure, roads, parks, sewers, water, fire safety, and other effects of development
  • Preempting and excluding rent control or stabilization at the local level inhibits cities and counties from handling the housing affordability crisis in ways that best fit their communities.
  • In respecting the rights of all adults, including seniors and persons with disabilities, to direct their own lives in housing, education, medical, financial, and all other life choices, as appropriate
  • Ban the accumulation and purchase of housing and residential properties by Private Equity, also mandating the sale of any currently held properties by Private Equity Organizations/Companies.
  • The severe shortage of permanently affordable rental housing in our state constitutes a public emergency
  • All jurisdictions should be encouraged to develop public properties to create long term, sustainably built, union-constructed, low-income housing
  • The available supply of housing has not kept up with demand and the Washington State Legislature should increase funding for assistance and construction of affordable and accessible low-income housing.
  • In eliminating discriminatory land use policies, reducing arbitrary regulatory barriers to housing construction, and amplifying best practices to increase housing supply in communities.
  • In trade agreements that protect American manufacturing jobs and do enforce, international human, economic, and environmental rights
  • Using deficit fearmongering to drive budgetary decisions is wrong, divisive and destructive
  • Reducing SNAP benefits and forcing families into a one-size-fits-all option that removes consumer choice is harmful and perpetuates food insecurity
  • SNAP benefits should be adjusted for cost of living.
  • Importing or exporting commodities below their true production and transportation costs, i.e. dumping, can destroy local industries and should not be indiscriminately practiced.
  • Predatory home loan practices such as discounting foreclosures, deceptive, coercive or exploitative loan terms, as well as balloon loans, perpetuate harm, are discriminatory, and should be banned
  • Policies and practices that dehumanize and criminalize neighbors experiencing homelessness, including sweeps, are inhumane and should be illegal
  • Low-income/shelter/transitional/permanent supportive housing should exist in all areas where other residential housing exists, not be concentrated by environmental racism and classism.
  • Developers should be required to pay impact fees to mitigate increased capital needs for schools, safe pedestrian infrastructure, roads, parks, sewers, water, fire safety, and other effects of development
  • Renters’ tax credit
  • Employers are required to pay federal holidays and a minimum of 30 days of leave per year.
  • Our regressive tax system should be more equitable and balanced
  • The criminalizing and forcible removal of people experiencing homelessness from public lands when they do not have access to stable, affordable, and accessible housing appropriate to their circumstances is immoral, inhumane, and unacceptable. Dehumanizing terms, such as “sweeps”, “clean-ups”, or “cleans”, referring to forced removal, are harmful and deny the humanity of those impacted.
  • Promulgating laws and regulations that prevent foreign entities from purchasing existing housing stocks and tracks of land for profit driven development that reduces housing availability to Americans, drives sprawl growth, destroys open space, and raises property taxes on Washington residents.
  • The Washington State Legislature should support all efforts to increase funding for the construction of new affordable housing, and access to existing affordable low-income housing.
  • All levels of government should use creative solutions and progressive revenue sources to ensure all people have permanent, sanitary, stable, secure, safe, and livable housing and to assist homeowners at risk of foreclosure
  • In funding services within shelters and permanent supportive housing to support individuals to achieve lifelong stability, and services for residents experiencing homelessness who need help to prepare for a stable lifestyle in-line with Housing First principles
  • The strict regulation at the federal, state, and local levels of Single Family Residential (SFR) real estate investors to stop their activities from driving up the prices of and access to housing. Single Family Residential (SFR) real estate investors, such as real estate investment trusts (REITs), private equity groups, hedge funds, short term housing rentals, and foreign investors in single family homes, townhouses, and condos contribute to the housing crisis in Washington State and the United States through higher rents, home prices and fewer available units
  • In including underrepresented communities of color and marginalized community members in meaningful dialogue and involvement around developmental growth and gentrification.
  • Placing appropriate equitable property taxes on secondary homes, to be distributed as affordable housing subsidies.
  • In altering or eliminating restrictive “single family” zoning laws that contribute to food deserts, urban sprawl, and the inflated cost of housing
  • In promoting the mixed-use developments that encourage healthy and walkable communities

On Economic Justice

  • Tax policy should be used to prevent and break up concentrations of extreme wealth, through higher marginal rates, restrictions on loopholes and deductions, and inheritance taxes.
  • Extreme wealth and poverty both harm our society’s health; current levels of income inequality are toxic to our democracy.
  • The gender and racial pay gap should be closed.
  • In facilitating equality of opportunity. This would include publicly funded Universal Family Care, steady funding for all public schools, legislation to end the digital divide and protecting public assets.
  • In bringing banking systems closer to the people. A state bank of WA system should be considered to facilitate infrastructure projects; credit unions should be invested in rather than large banks; banking services should be available to all, potentially through restored USPS services.
  • Funding the expansion of broadband internet to all Americans, especially in rural areas, is critical to those areas’ success
  • Support programs which get the endpoint handhelds and tablets into the hands of low-income persons.
  • Every person in the US should receive enough income to support life, therefore, we believe in a guaranteed basic income

On Tax Fairness

  • We advocate for a tax system that is fair and equitable, facilitating inter-generational wealth transfer from lower- and middle-income taxpayers, empowering younger generations to own homes, provide for their children, and save for retirement.
  • A progressive wealth tax is critical for a fair contribution of tax dollars that support all our communities.
  • Protecting our capital gains tax
  • In reducing financial speculation through tax policy
  • Ensuring a strong, progressive taxation system in Washington through reducing the sales taxes that burden the most vulnerable and lowest income earners
  • Washington should improve financing for local governments by establishing a state bank.
  • Improving access to financial services for citizens who lack bank accounts would extend equality to underserved communities.

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Labor

We Believe:

  • The right of working people to unionize without harassment is a fundamental civil right
    • Organized labor has played a historic role in our country to give workers a voice in their workplace, a measure of security with living wage jobs and safer working conditions, and dismantled institutional barriers that have restricted equal access to job opportunities and equal pay for equal work
  • “The rights of workers to organize and bargain collectively to determine their pay, benefits and working conditions must be strengthened, protected and enforced, while actions to suppress, prevent or otherwise interfere with union organizing efforts must be condemned and penalized.
  • America’s economy depends on jobs that provide a fair and living wage, fair benefits, and safe working conditions for ALL workers
  • Equal work should receive equal pay, and such that there are no minimum wage exemptions
  • All workers should have the right to unionize, especially those historically excluded from labor protections, e.g., migrant and domestic workers, formerly incarcerated people, and any other underrepresented, misrepresented, or disadvantaged people, and that this right is protected at the Federal level. As such, we believe union hiring, organizing, and affirmative action in apprenticeships and subsequent hiring processes should be protected; protections for whistle-blowers and workplace organizers should be enforced, as should reasonable accommodations in hiring.
  • All workers have the right to respect in the workplace and not be subjected to syntax games to categorize them outside employee protections. Employees should be provided a healthy and harassment free workplace, predictable scheduling, and guaranteed leave. And the institutions of government should endeavor to protect the interests and safety of laborers above the interests of capital.
  • In a livable minimum wage that is tied to the median market housing rate
  • In a significant expansion of worker training and apprenticeship programs in partnership with labor unions, technical and community colleges, and K-12 schools, with dedicated programs for green industrial and construction job creation, training, and placement linked to public investments in clean energy infrastructure to build a new economy based on clean energy. This would also include a just transition for workers in industries impacted by societal change and efforts to reverse climate change, including access to guaranteed income, union public sector jobs, and dignified retirement with robust pensions
  • We should support injured and ill workers, and strengthen workforce retraining programs for these workers.
  • In safe staffing legislation that protects essential workers, such as nurses who are working without breaks in order to provide the legal standards of care are necessary
  • In a modern Works Progress Administration to renew public investment in education, technology, essential health care infrastructure, and transportation infrastructure and sustainability
    • Invest in reopening hospitals and clinics in rural and underserved areas
    • Modernize public buildings such as schools, post offices, and libraries, especially in underserved areas, and co-locate affordable housing on these public lands
    • Prioritize funding for public research institutions
    • Create a federal jobs guarantee to ensure living wage jobs for all who want to work.
  • We support requirements to buy local, regional, US, union-made, products in all government contracts
    • Legislate incentives to buy local goods and services
    • Labor, environmental, and human rights standards of the US are required and binding in all such agreements
    • Increase opportunities for small family- operated farms, US manufacturing, and small businesses in government contracting over large corporations by capping firm size in bidding through the use of anti-trust to break up large monopolies and create an agricultural sector that serves the nations health and security
    • Remove the exemption of agricultural workers from overtime pay requirements
  • In enacting protections for workers and union members participating in wildcat strikes
  • The anti-union Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 should be repealed and replaced with legislation affirming worker’s rights
  • Firefighters are exposed to carcinogenic substances in numerous facets of their work, with published and emerging science showing links between firefighting and many cancers. Since cancer can be difficult to pinpoint in origin, all firefighter cancers should be considered presumptive occupational disease, refutable by evidentiary standards
  • A workforce should reflect local demographics
  • All non-compete clauses included in employment contracts, along with provisions for redundancies, should be narrowly tailored in both scope and duration.
  • In disincentivizing outsourcing or offshoring in all trade deals and government contracts, at every level – fair and/or direct trade, not free trade
    • Labor, environmental, emissions, and human rights standards of the US or better are required and binding in all such agreements
    • A 32-hour work week should be considered standard full-time employment.
  • No employer or educational institution may discriminate against an employee or student on the basis of a medical decision
  • The elimination of “at-will employment” as the default standard for a worker’s job and replacing it with a “for cause dismissal” with a “covenant of good faith and fair dealing” standard
  • The institutions of government should endeavor to protect the interest and safety laborers above the interests of capital.

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Social Justice

We Believe:

  • All humans have rights, regardless of immigration status, including: access to safe food, air, water, and shelter, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, economic opportunity, personal safety, health care, education, employment, legal aid, and equitable due process
  • All levels of government must enact policies that strengthen our country by affirming the value of all individuals, and by eliminating the systemic conditions that perpetuate inequality, oppression, and inequitable access to opportunities
  • The Diversity of society should be honored. Efforts to reflect that diversity in our Party are of utmost importance, and special attention must be paid to the rights of currently and historically marginalized communities, including individuals with disabilities, immigrants, peoples of color, indigenous people, the very poor, religious minorities, and atheists. Those who face discrimination should be afforded the legal means and economic opportunities to overcome such injustices
  • Reparations must be studied as an avenue to address the systemic racism that persists throughout our institutions today
  • As Democrats, we are, and will remain, at the forefront of the struggle to extend and ensure social, political, economic, legal, and cultural rights to all persons
  • The Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice must enforce civil rights laws and receive appropriate funding for civil rights investigations, as required by the legal mandate of that agency
  • All levels of government should fully enforce the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act
  • Black lives matter
  • The Law Must be applied and enforced in a transparent and equitable manner
  • The Disproportionate surveillance of and enforcement against people of color has led to unnecessary death, loss of respect and public trust, and damage to the community
  • Those Who Benefit from unearned privilege must actively listen to marginalized communities and step back to provide space for members of such communities to be heard by society at large
  • Free and open voting is a civil right and expresses the will and consent of the people
  • A Commitment to Free Speech carries an obligation to speak out in defense of the values of democracy and inclusivity against the evil forces of racism and other hate speech
  • The right to peacefully protest and demonstrate are constitutionally protected rights
  • Privacy is a fundamental right; our private lives and personal information must be protected from intrusion by government, corporations, and others
  • Each person has the right to sovereignty over their own body
  • People have a right to make reproductive decisions, including contraception, abortion, and sterilization, without restriction or interference from government, corporations, or religious entities, and they must have safe, legal, protected, affordable and accessible universal health care that allows them freedom of choice
  • Techniques with the practical effect of restricting a person’s right to reproductive freedom should be reversed and prohibited. These techniques include:
    • Defunding Planned Parenthood
    • Requiring complete hospital surgical facilities for abortion
    • The legal doctrine of “fetal personhood”
    • Hyde Amendment restrictions on federal funding of abortions
    • Allowing a church-owned hospital, religiously affiliated employer, or insurance plan use religious freedom as the basis for denying access to an abortion or other reproductive care
  • Involuntary sterilization of all human beings, including persons with disabilities, should be banned
  • Disabled people have the right to fully access all facets of society and to live with dignity and independence
  • Laws such as the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Students with Disabilities Act, and the Rehabilitation Act, should be monitored and enforced. Disability integration laws should be enacted at the state, as well as the federal, level.
  • Access To gender-affirming health care, services, and surgery must be preserved
  • Marriage, as a legal union of consenting adults, with all rights and obligations that entails, must continue to be recognized by the government without regard to the sexual orientation or gender-identity of the spouses
  • Data Should be collected about anti-trans violence and the factors that drive it
  • Government policies should protect a person’s access to public restrooms that correspond with their gender identity.
  • LGBTQIA+ people must be treated equitably including, but not limited to, their parental rights. Federal protections should be enacted to ensure this. Everyone should be referred to by their preferred pronouns
  • “Conversion therapy,” a pseudoscientific practice intended to change sexual orientation, gender identity, and/or gender expression, should be banned
  • The Right of an individual to practice their religion does not extend to the denial of the constitutional rights of others
  • In The separation of church and state, and that no entity has the right to impose its religious doctrine on others
  • Organized prayer has no place in taxpayer-funded institutions, and government funds should never be used for religious purposes
  • Equal Work deserves equal pay
  • The Equal Rights Amendment has been ratified and should be certified by Congress
  • All levels of government should enact legislation and policies that will end human trafficking for the sex trade, labor trade, and all other forms of involuntary servitude, while protecting the rights of sex workers
  • Child and slave labor must end worldwide
  • In strong legislation, treatment programs and education designed to reduce harassment, intimidation, domestic or sexual violence, gun violence, and bullying
  • It is our responsibility to protect the rights and welfare of all people within our borders
  • It is dehumanizing to use the term “illegal” in reference to any human being.
  • Demand For immediate presentation of documents regarding one’s status in the United States should never be required
  • For-profit prisons or detention centers used by Immigration, Customs and Enforcements (ICE) for the detention of immigrants should be shut down
  • Asylum seekers should be allowed to remain in the US while awaiting the processing of their cases
  • U.S.-affiliated and at-risk Afghans should be welcomed into the United States and be able to attain permanent legal status
  • Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) immigrants, as well as non-citizen farmworkers, should be encouraged to participate in local party politics (committees, e-boards, etc.), as a means of having a voice in developing policies that affect them
  • The Federal Government should ratify agreements from UN conventions that support human rights, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women, and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
  • Federal monetary policy tools should be used to help local municipalities invest in housing, schools and infrastructure.
  • The High number of missing and murdered Indigenous women and people is a human health and welfare crisis that requires immediate and aggressive action to eliminate further harm to Native families and communities
  • In Support for injured workers. Firefighters are exposed to carcinogenic substances in numerous facets of their work, with published and emerging science showing links between firefighting and many cancers. Since cancer can be difficult to pinpoint in origin, all Firefighter cancers will be presumed workplace illness rebuttable by evidentiary standards

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Human Services

We Believe:

  • Our county, state, and federal governments must be prepared for pandemics, which includes providing adequate annual support, funding of our public health institutions, and a stockpile of medical supplies for use when a rapid response is required
  • Social services must be integrated, culturally competent, linguistically, financially & physically accessible, free of faith-based requirements, and based on the needs of the individual
  • Human services are an essential component of community safety strategies and must be funded accordingly
  • That support for families should be enhanced with resources and education on mental health in order to foster supportive health environments
  • Measures to ensure the long-term sustainability of our earned benefit safety-net programs – Social Security and Medicare – are urgently needed now
  • Our elders have a basic right to health, comfort, dignity, respect, and a vibrant life
  • Our children have a basic right to health, safety, comfort, dignity, respect, and adequate opportunities for education and play
  • People who suffer from substance abuse deserve safe consumption sites, funding for social workers on-site, and first responders who are trained and equipped for overdose response
  • In dedicating state resources to building more long-term addiction recovery housing programs for the homeless and programs that would provide for 18 months to prevent relapse
  • More government subsidized housing with surplus funds for seniors and people with physical or mental disabilities
  • Children of low-income families, need adequate public assistance including but not limited to:
    • The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)
    • The Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP)
    • Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC)
    • Earned income tax credit
    • Child tax credit
    • Housing, including funding emergency assistance for low-income renters facing temporary financial difficulties, limiting move-in fees, rental application costs and late fees, and increasing the Washington statutory notice period for rent increases from 60 to 75 days
  • All people should have equal access to healthy, affordable, and culturally appropriate foods.
  • Social Security benefits should be improved by:
    • Expanding these earned benefits to immigrant populations
    • Providing Social Security benefits that address inequities for low-income families, women, people with disabilities, public sector workers, and people of color
    • Crediting individuals serving as caregivers of dependent relatives with deemed wages
    • Ensuring that the annual cost of living adjustments keep pace with the actual costs that seniors and people with disabilities face – especially those related to health care and basic needs
    • Removing the cap on Social Security payroll taxes
    • Increase Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) to meet or exceed the federal poverty level-to address the poverty our disabled citizens face in society
    • Allow the disabled on SSI, and those that are in transition stages between their full time job, semi-retirement and full retirement, to work part time to supplement the low-income they are forced to live on without deductions for work that results in income below the federal poverty level
    • Remove the marriage penalty for the disabled on SSI—allowing them to retain their financial supplements and medical insurance.
  •  In-home caregivers deserve training and adequate compensation with a pay differential to reward caregivers willing to care for individuals with more complex or extensive needs and those willing to work evenings, nights, and weekends
  • Adequate funding is needed to provide preventative services, early intervention, and crisis care for behavioral and mental health issues including ongoing counseling, residential programs, and community reintegration services.
  • Medicaid benefits should adequately cover home, private adult family homes, and community-based and facility-based care services without impoverishing working families
  • Childcare requires public and/or employer financing so that parents do not have to choose between their jobs and childcare
  • That childcare is fundamental to the early learning and development of children in Washington state, especially those who are under-resourced and marginalized
  • Rural areas have an immediate crisis because of “childcare deserts,” areas where there is no available childcare.
  • All parents should have parental leave benefits.
  • Specialized training should be available to all first responders, including social workers, police officers and fire department personnel to respond to mental health crises. Mental health crisis teams, including social workers, should be a part of every jurisdiction’s first responder services.
  • The state must provide robust care for all foster children and resources and assistance to foster parents and caregivers in order to retain and recruit high quality individuals.
  • Repeal the Windfall Elimination Provision to remove veteran disability payments from being included as income for low-income assistance programs.
  • It is imperative that the state furnish high quality, and best practices of care and essential resources for the well-being of foster children within the system. Furthermore, we must ensure that these services are extended to individuals aging out of the foster care system until they reach the age of 26.
  • Medicaid provider services must be accessible across state lines, especially for those who live near state borders, require highly specialized lifesaving care only available out of state, or while traveling domestically.

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Transportation

We Believe:

  • Efficient, well-planned, and frequent public transportation choices promote healthy communities, economy, and environment.
  • In maintaining adequate public funding for our transportation infrastructure
  • In progressive funding of transit such as fair and equitable car tabs and fares
  • In massively increased annual federal investment in public transit systems, including new funding and rebalancing between federal highways and transit spending, to incentivize expansion of transit networks throughout America, give Americans cleaner transportation choices, and reduce vehicle miles traveled. These investments themselves will support millions of construction and operations jobs
  • In expanding and enhancing accessible, safe, affordable and efficient public transportation, including bus, rapid transit, ferries, high speed rail, light rail, commuter rail, conventional rail, regional and long-distance rail, and on-demand “last mile”
  • In prioritizing high occupancy public transportation over highways for low occupancy vehicles
  • In encouraging business to transport goods by lower-carbon methods including electric cargo vehicle or electric cargo bicycle, especially for last mile scenarios.
  • In requiring public transit agencies including state-operated rail service and the Washington State Ferries to join a common statewide payment-card system, expansion of the Regional Reduced Fare Permit to all transit agencies throughout the State, and implementation of a reduced fare program to facilitate transfers between such agencies
  • In requiring cities, counties, and regional authorities to implement equitable transit-oriented development and smart growth practices in their land use planning to decrease the need to drive
  • In determining the carbon pollution and social costs of carbon associated with all transportation projects
  • In regularly increasing Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards to levels that challenge automakers to improve fuel efficiency.
  • In reducing contaminants from vehicles, such as copper, lead, 6PPD in brakes, tires, and other parts
  • In requiring transportation and transit agencies to use sustainability rating tools, such as INVEST, Envision, Greenroads, or LEED, to evaluate all of their programs, policies, and projects, and to aid them in reducing their environmental footprint, social impacts, and financial costs
  • In setting and implementing aviation CO2 emissions standards at a national level that surpass the International Civil Aviation Organization’s (ICAO) standards
  • In implementation of smart, aggressive purchasing of non-fossil-fuel transportation vehicles for all local, state and federal agencies including the USPS and prohibit purchase of fossil fuel-based transportation vehicles when sustainable fuel-based vehicles are viable based on life cycle costs
  • Because the Environmental Protection Agency has made an Endangerment Finding that leaded aviation fuel emissions from piston aircraft contribute to pollution which endangers the public’s health and welfare, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) should, to the extent possible, continue to regulate and enforce a sensible phase-out of leaded aviation fuel and facilitate the licensing and distribution of lead-free fuel
  • In reducing urban sprawl and increasing complete streets where people can walk or roll to everything they need within 15 minutes, helping to create a community that is safer and sustainable while lowering greenhouse gas emissions
  • In investing in continued local access to needed transportation infrastructure, including rural road and highway maintenance and improvement, to ensure consideration of cities and counties outside the I-5 and I-90 corridors, while shifting transportation resources away from highway expansion which has been proven to not reduce congestion but instead increases greenhouse gas emissions and particulate matter
  • In building an integrated American rail system, electrifying passenger and freight rail throughout the country, expanding existing rail lines, and requesting federal investments to further develop an efficient high-speed rail service where appropriate
  • In expanding Amtrak Cascades service to Eastern Washington
  • In fully funding and proceeding with the I-5 Portland to Vancouver Bridge project, to benefit each of those communities and encourage efficient transit between them by road, public transit, and bicycle. In enacting policies and expanding government support for making travel as safe as possible for pedestrians, bicycles, other non-motorized transportation, environmentally sensitive areas, and wildlife, in addition to motorized vehicles.
  • In providing incentives for local authorities to prioritize the inclusion of safe sidewalks, and bicycle access, especially near amenities such as schools, senior facilities, medical facilities, and libraries
  • Local Public Transport should be made fare free. Public transport is disproportionately used by disadvantaged communities. The savings from no longer needed fare enforcement and additional corporate/vehicle taxes should offset the loss of revenue.
  • Transportation is the highest GHG emitting sector in the U.S. and in WA state and highways emit the greatest percent; all state greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced by about half by 2030
  • Electric Vehicles (EVs) must be widely available, and subsidized for lower income buyers; EVs should be utilized for business and public transportation purposes, including on-demand transit services
  • In researching and choosing technologies that minimize mining for battery and other components of energy products
  • Railroad infrastructure must be operated in the public interest rather than for maximized profit
  • In researching, developing, and investing in more efficient battery storage systems

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Criminal Justice

We Believe:

  • Disqualify law enforcement officers from employment if they are on the Brady List
  • The criminal legal system must prioritize change within its ranks with emphasis on racial and gender equity in reforms and on addressing the domestic violence crisis among law enforcement officers (to ensure inclusion of incarceration facilities staff), including the explicit prohibition and disqualification from service or employment within law enforcement of those with a history of domestic violence or violent bigotry.
  • In ending mass incarceration and dismantling the prison industrial complex
  • Reinstate the Parole Board to take a look at lengthy/excessive sentences to address our mass incarceration
  • All people, regardless of race, sexual orientation and gender identity, ability and class have the right to be secure in their persons, bodies, houses, papers, personal data, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures
  • In full funding of the Violence Against Women Act, services to crime victims, expeditious testing of rape kits and programs to prevent sexual violence. To combat this, we advocate for closing loopholes that enable dangerous individuals to access firearms, along with reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, will help mitigate these dangers. The CDC should be authorized and funded to investigate and compile data on gun violence including and highlighting the statistics and demographics of perpetrators of violence and not just victims.
  • A person’s wealth, gender, sexual orientation, or race should not determine how the rule of law is applied to them and should not affect law enforcement’s decision to capture, prosecute, and convict the perpetrator of a crime committed against them.
  • All victims of crimes have a right to justice.
  • A person’s ability to serve on a jury should not be diminished due to their race, gender, sexual orientation, wealth, or prior contact with law enforcement.
  • The strikingly disproportional negative impact of our civil and criminal justice system on people based on race, sexual orientation and gender identity, ability and class demands our attention and cries out for justice too long denied.
  • The culture of the entire criminal justice system must change for equitable justice for all.
  • Incarcerated individuals should be given access to phone, email and other digital communication with their families at no cost to them or their families, as this encourages family unity and furthers the incarcerated person’s rehabilitation.
  • Educational programs, in many forms, should be fully funded and readily available to incarcerated individuals who desire it, whether to improve opportunities post-incarceration or to gain an understanding of particular issues. Incarcerated individuals are generally less violent when they are scholars, and recidivism is reduced after prison. They provide access to communication tools, strengthen family ties and support rehabilitation
  • Adequate, accessible medical care should be provided for incarcerated persons
  • Solitary confinement is cruel and inhuman and should be abolished
  • In increasing public safety by reducing the root causes of crime such as poverty, wealth inequality, lack of affordable housing, under employment, mental illness, drug addiction and supporting the restorative and corrective services to return people to living productive lives should replace the punishment and incarceration focus within the criminal justice system
  • In using therapeutic, mental health, and drug courts, at all court levels, to reduce the overrepresentation of people with mental illnesses, drug addiction, and “crimes” of poverty and homelessness in the carceral system.
  • In immediate and comprehensive action to end racial profiling and the disproportionately high imprisonment of people of color, and to reduce the U.S.’s overall incarceration rate, which is the highest in the world. Reducing mass incarceration benefits communities and begins to dismantle the prison industrial complex.
  • Providing all formerly incarcerated people with the opportunity to re-enter and be productive members of society, starting with an assistance plan for transitional food, clothing, housing, transportation and employment when they are released from a local, state, or federal institution.
  • No one should profit from imprisonment; prisons should be public, rehabilitative institutions. In addition, the school-to-prison pipeline must be dismantled.
  • Fully funding therapeutic and mental health courts at every level is crucial to effectively supporting individuals dealing with mental health conditions, substance abuse issues, and offenses linked to poverty. Addiction treatment and restorative justice are preferred over incarceration, and homelessness should not be criminalized.
  • Law enforcement is obligated to remain impartial and unbiased when apprehending, prosecuting, and convicting those responsible for crimes, and all employees and subcontractors operating within the justice system must meet high ethical standards.
  • Basic human rights must be respected for individuals in confinement, including those in jails, prisons, mental health facilities, protective custody, or memory care facilities.
  • Community service work is an important element of restorative justice and should be considered as a substitute for incarceration when public safety isn’t an issue.
  • In supporting men and boys in undoing unhealthy beliefs, behaviors, and social pressure to be aggressive, violent and entitled to violence against marginalized people. A healthy and safe community is a place where boys and men work towards undoing socialized beliefs about domination and control over others.
  • Individuals with a criminal conviction should retain their right to vote and should be encouraged to register and vote in their home precinct.
  • Investing in alternative emergency response programs can establish safer channels for individuals to seek assistance promptly. Strengthening community-police relations involves implementing civilian oversight, review, and engagement in formulating ethical law enforcement strategies.
  • Investing in housing, nonviolent conflict resolution, education, youth programs, healthcare, social services, rehabilitation, and providing living wage jobs can effectively decrease crime and violence in communities.
  • In supporting survivors through honoring, respecting, and conducting credible investigations into their stories while thoroughly examining their claims.
  • Sex workers should not be charged or prosecuted for sex crimes when they report crimes.
  • Sex work should be decriminalized
  • Incarceration is not an effective solution for marginalized and traumatized women. The underlying causes of criminal behaviors indicate that community-based treatment programs offer more advantages than punitive measures within the justice system.
  • In judicial discretion in the sentencing of individuals.
  • End Qualified Immunity, permitting citizens to sue public officials, including law enforcement, to hold them accountable and increase public trust in our government institutions and law enforcement.
  • The criminal legal system is rooted in racism.
  • Cash bail criminalizes poverty. No one should be held in jail due to their inability to post bail.
  • Right to timely, appropriate, quality dental and healthcare for incarcerated individuals.
  • Remove high fees for sending money to fund basic communication and minor comfort items, as these place burdens on families and disproportionately impacts people living in poverty.
  • That the justice system should first serve justice through rehabilitation, restoration and transformation rather than through retribution and punishment.
  • In eliminating the use of solitary confinement in jails and prisons except as the last resort and for an appropriate period of time in an emergency or medical event. Basic rights for individuals in solitary confinement should include at least 4 hours outside of the cell per day and access to communication, educational materials, and personal hygiene.
  • In mandatory ongoing anti-racism, anti-bias and diversity training for all employees in the criminal legal system.
  • In demilitarizing the police and ending all No-Knock Raids
  • In ending the practice of charging youth as adults.
  • We believe in ending solitary confinement as a form of punishment.
  • Support the creation of a coalition of law enforcement, community advocates for police accountability, and legislators to start ongoing dialogue to change the culture of policing that will save lives of both law enforcement and community members.

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Law and Justice

We Believe:

On Gun Safety and Reform

  • Support the creation of a coalition of law enforcement, community advocates for police accountability, and legislators to start ongoing dialogue to change the culture of policing that will save lives of both law enforcement and community members.
  • The right of people, including students, to peacefully protest is a fundamental right protected by the First Amendment and by the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and that right must be protected; suppression of protests, including on school campuses, is anti-democratic and must not be tolerated.
  • Gun violence is a public health crisis causing trauma, injury, and death
  • Firearms are used by abusers to intimidate and harm women, especially those in marginalized communities. To combat this, we advocate for fair pay to empower survivors to break free from abusive situations and support their families. The CDC should be authorized and funded to investigate and compile data on gun violence
  • In implementing common sense gun safety measures including, but not limited to
    • Background checks
    • Banning assault weapons
    • Limiting the number and type of weapons owned
    • Requiring
      • Training
      • Licensing
      • Safe storage
      • Age limits for ownership and discharge of firearms
  • We must protect survivors of domestic violence by requiring police to confiscate weapons of those subject to protection orders that include surrender of firearms, for the duration of the order
  • In government facilitated gun buy-back programs.

On Human Rights and Civil Rights

  • In the responsibility of all local jurisdictions to fully implement statewide legislation around gun safety, including (but not limited to) extreme-risk protection orders and penalties for brandishing a weapon.
  • In allowing local jurisdictions to pass additional restrictions to prevent gun violence and intimidation.
  • In honoring the rich diversity of society with efforts to reflect that diversity in our Party, including advocating for and supporting marginalized communities.
  • In the bodily autonomy of every human being
  • Childcare is a public responsibility.
  • In impartial application and equitable enforcement of law
  • In justice for all of us, regardless of race, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, disability, or class
  • In building an inclusive society that ensures social, political, economic, legal, and cultural rights to all persons
  • In the freedom of speech and right to protest. The government should protect those that are engaged in peaceful protest. The assault of people engaged in non-violent protest (whether from police or other citizens) should be investigated and appropriate consequences should be enforced.
  • That people must have the right to full access to all facets of society, and to live with dignity and independence
  • In free and open voting as a civil right that expresses the will and consent of the people including the passage of the John R Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, the For the People Act, and the Freedom to Vote Act.
  • That privacy is a fundamental right; our private lives and personal information must be protected from intrusion by government, corporations, or others
  • In the separation of church and state, and that no entity or individual has the right to impose religious doctrine on others
  • That the United States Congress must certify ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment
  • In ending child and involuntary labor
  • The U.S. should prevent use of rape as a tool of war, and take action to stop rapes occurring
  • The United States should ratify the United Nations Conventions on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women and on the Rights of the Child
  • The United States should ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
  • The United States should sign and ratify the United Nations agreement creating the International Criminal Courts
  • LGBTQ people, including LGBTQ youth, have the right to dignity, respect, and privacy regarding their identity. Workplaces and public institutions, such as schools, should not serve as spaces to strip those rights away from LGBTQ people and youth. 
  • The United States should support programs for voluntary forms of evidence-based, safe, and effective family planning worldwide
  • The right of people, including students, to protest is a fundamental right protected by the First Amendment and by the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and that right must be protected; suppression of peaceful protests, including on school and college campuses, is anti-democratic and must not be tolerated.

On Animal Welfare

  • In the protection of domestic, agricultural, and wild animal welfare by adequately funding programs that benefit animals, enforce animal welfare laws, and restrict or prohibit the use of animals in experimentation.
  • In seeing animals and all species as having complex emotional and physical lives and they should be treated with dignity.
  • Prohibit egregious methods of killing animals
  • Eliminate sport/trophy hunting, derbies, and killing contests where prizes are given to most animals killed.
  • In restricting the use of lead in ammunition and fishing gear and educating hunters and fishers in the dangers of gear to birds, whales, and other non-targeted species.
  • Prohibit or limit availability of rodenticides that bioaccumulate in animals up the food chain.
  • In Prohibiting the use of wild animals in circuses, exotic animal shows, and petting zoos
  • Enacting comprehensive legislation to protect animals from cruelty, abuse and exploitation, including laws against animal cruelty, regulations for animal testing and bans on cruel practices
  • Allocating resources for the establishment and support of animal shelters, rescue organizations and wildlife rehabilitation centers
  • Developing strategies to protect endangered species, preserve habitats and combat illegal wildlife trafficking 

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Governance

We Believe:

  • All Americans must have equitable access to the political process, regardless of health, place of residence, economic status, race, religion, disability, criminal status, legal financial obligation repayment status, or gender. All attempts to intimidate voters or interfere with voting, recording, storing, and tallying votes should be criminalized and litigated.
  • That Ranked Choice Voting should be used for Presidential Primary elections
  • Voter participation is crucial to the health and future of our democracy. All elections should be fair, secure, and easy to vote in. Washington must remain a national leader on voting rights and electoral justice. Attempts to eliminate Washington’s vote-at-home system or institute schemes to suppress the vote and confuse voters must be defeated.
  • Voting and petitioning should be done on paper to ensure that participation in our democratic process is auditable, secure, and protected from bad actors and foreign interference.
  • Ballot measures should be described in plain language that allows the voter to understand what the measure would do. Short, arbitrary word limits for statewide ballot measure descriptions should be increased.
  • In requiring, funding, and supporting automatic voter registration nationally. 
  • That all State and Federal elections be declared a non-working holiday in the state of Washington.
  • Corporations are not people, money is not speech, all elections should be publicly funded, and Citizens United is not consistent with the Constitution and should be overturned.
  • Every eligible American should have a say in deciding which people and policies will determine our future.  Many eligible voters are wrongly denied their right to vote.  We strongly support measures at the state and national levels to increase voting of all eligible voters, including voting by mail.
  • Legislative clarity and vigorous enforcement of the Emoluments Clause of the U.S. Constitution covers the President, federal elected and appointees. When judges, federal, or state employees receive current, or promises of future, financial, business, or media favors, that can create a conflict of interest in the execution of their duties.  None may use the power or perks of their office to favor any private person or entity for personal, business, or political gain.
  • Evaluating public policies through a human rights lens, promoting intercultural dialogue, and respecting the democratic values of the Constitution, empowers our communities to work toward meeting the needs of all residents while upholding fundamental rights, principles, and internationally accepted standards of justice and fairness.
  • In the importance of governmental intervention in areas where individual action or private sector provision is insufficient or ineffective.  The method involves comparing existing or proposed policies and regulations for alignment with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and governing constitutions, evaluating whether the proposed or existing public policies impact all rights holders equally, to ensure everyone is included in society’s mainstream.
  • Mainstreaming is a globally accepted strategy for promoting gender equality. Mainstreaming is not an end in itself but a means to achieve the goal of gender equality.  Mainstreaming involves ensuring that gender perspectives and attention to the goal of gender equality are central to all activities – policy development, research, advocacy/dialogue, legislation, resource allocation, planning, and implementation and monitoring of programs and projects.

On Media Reform

  • Democracy relies on an informed citizenry. Therefore, public airwaves, broadband and internet access which is affordable and high quality must be provided to everyone as a utility, especially in rural and underserved areas.
  • In order to provide information to the public, journalists must be legally protected from governmental interference or prosecution, retaliation, and from being compelled to reveal their sources, especially whistleblowers.
  • Reinstating the Federal Communications Commission’s Fairness Doctrine and enshrining it in law is critical for the integrity of public airways, cable and social media platforms.  Cable and social media must be regulated for factual honesty and integrity across the board, applying the same principles required in journalism.
  • In order to sustain a vibrant, open exchange of information that represents many interests, aggressive application of antitrust laws is necessary to prevent the formation of media monopolies.  That also requires limiting the number of news outlets that any media conglomerate may own and operate.

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Federal Government

We Believe:

  • That USPS should be adequately funded to serve the public-at-large, from secure processing and timely delivery of mail (including election mail-in ballots) to provision of money-orders and postal banking services, and that such funding be secured with the same financial assistance to USPS of annual Congressional appropriations covering both retirement and health care benefits that is provided ALL other federal governmental agencies
  • That the United States Postal Service (USPS) is vital to a functioning democracy, that the services it now provides and could provide are an integral and a critical infrastructure base to the operations and survival of our collective community — local to national, urban to rural — and are of especial necessity to underserved urban and geographically dispersed rural populations
  • The USPS must not be privatized

On Foreign Policy

  • Removing the requirement to fully fund the 40 pension of new and current hires that was meant to cripple and bankrupt the Postal Service 
  • The United States must provide assistance and work cooperatively with other nations to build a more peaceful, sustainable, and stable world by addressing root causes of conflict, including poverty, inequitable access to natural resources, economic injustice, and environmental degradation
  • The United States should formalize a trading alliance of modern democracies, open to growth as more nations modernize, to consistently promote human rights, the rule of law, and genuine democracy inside its member-nations and across the world. This is an effective way to proactively promote accountability, stability, peace, and prosperity for all in our ever-more interconnected world.  
  • In using foreign aid to offset or forgive the onerous debt of countries forced to choose between debt repayment and essential services
  • The United States must work closely and persistently with other countries to prevent or stop genocide wherever it occurs
  • We must recognize failures to stop prior genocides and therefore must act to prevent war crimes and human rights violations before they are officially recognized as genocide.
  • The United States should provide full support and funding of our State Department as the primary foreign policy arm of the U.S. Government
  • Promotion of global security must include greater access to education, both basic and continuing education
  • The United States should adopt international fair trade agreements that strengthen human rights, respect the rights of indigenous peoples, raise global standards for labor rights, and promote environmental strategies, as part of a sustainable global economy and contain meaningful enforcement mechanisms to protect people and the planet
  • In exhausting diplomatic efforts before resorting to military action or war
  • The Geneva Conventions should be enforced through all levels of command, within both US and supported foreign military, in the protection of civilians and the treatment of all prisoners of war enemy, combatants, and detainees, regardless of the location of their incarceration
  • The Geneva Conventions should be enforced through all levels of command, in the treatment of all prisoners of war, enemy combatants, non-combatants, and detainees, regardless of the location of their incarceration or their nationality or lack thereof
  • The United States should sign and ratify the United Nations Convention on Cluster Munitions, and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty
  • The U.S. must not preemptively use any nuclear weapons
  • The U.S. should promote peace through multilateral peacekeeping missions and helping to restore the infrastructure and economies of countries impacted by U.S. military conflicts
  • We must protect our nation from external threats without suppressing human rights at home and abroad we must reject torture, extraordinary rendition, abduction and detention in secret prisons, supporting foreign military or police forces
  • The rights, laws, and interests of governments and workers should be prioritized over the interests of private corporations
  • The U.S. should not impose forced austerity measures, including privatization of government services, as a condition of U.S. aid and U.S. support for loans through the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank
  • The United States must honor and ratify international treaties that protect civilian populations, refugees, and human rights, and address climate change and prevent genocide
  • The United States must pursue serious, full, constructive, and persistent engagement to promote negotiations and other actions that will lead to a peaceful, sustainable resolution of conflicts in the middle east, Ukraine/NATO, Taiwan/China Sea, Korea, Africa, Latin America, Caribbean (Haiti)
  • Palestinians, like all other peoples, have the right to self-determination, to life, liberty, security, freedom from torture, cruelty, degrading treatment, arbitrary arrest, detention, or exile, and every other right established by the 1948 UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)
  • The United States must apply the Leahy Law universally, granting no special status to any country.
  • The United States must pursue serious, full, constructive, and persistent United States engagement to promote negotiations and other actions that will lead to a peaceful, sustainable resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, based on mutual recognition and ensuring security, economic growth, and quality of life for the peoples of the sovereign state of Palestine and the sovereign state of Israel
  • The US should not provide military aid, weapons, military service members, or other support to governments that are indiscriminately killing civilians in violation of international law regardless of if enemy combatants are intermixed with civilians.
  • The US shall not provide military aid (financial and otherwise) to governments that target aid workers or the press. If the press is not safe to report on the military operations of a government, then the US shall not provide aid.
  • The United States should acknowledge and support the Global Indigenous Council in their mission to support and preserve Indigenous cultures around the globe.

On Military and Veterans’ Affairs

  • Military leaders should follow rules and regulations ensuring service on ensuring members rights and protections
  • Military service members are entitled to adequate and ongoing education about their rights under the U.S. Constitution and UCMJ
  • Military service members should be free to exercise their own religious beliefs, while respecting the beliefs of others
  • We believe the United States should support the nation of Ukraine in defense against military aggression, restoration of all occupied land, and obtaining full restitution for war damages.
  • Our military service members are entitled to serve with a clear mission and adequate resources and protections, including:
    • Military leaders should follow the basic training program rules on respect for the common dignity and civil rights of human beings
    • Military personnel should be protected from reprisals for refusing to follow illegal orders
    • Palestinians have the right to self-determination, to establish and govern their own sovereign state.
    • Military personnel and all others who rely on Tricare and military medical facilities have the right to make their own reproductive decisions, with the same rights accorded to civilians regardless of gender
    • The United National Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) is vital to provide humanitarian aid and should be funded by the United States.
    • Funding should be increased for investigative units under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) for full prosecution of all sexual assaults, and of harassment based on gender, religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, by military personnel
    • In cases of alleged sexual assault between members of the US military, the direct chain should be removed from jurisdiction over either the complainant or the accused
    • Discrimination within the United States Armed Forces based on gender, gender identity, or sexual orientation must be prevented
    • Troops must be accorded mandatory breaks between combat-related tours
  • Veterans must be given adequate support, including:
    • Training and education in how to appropriately function in a civil society prior to release
    • Active outreach to provide access to housing and services for homeless veterans, and to enable homeless veteran communities to be established through alternative shelter opportunities
    • Adequate funding for physical and mental rehabilitation and long-term care and treatment of veterans, including treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury
    • Veterans’ preference in hiring, and requiring employers with government contracts to have a veteran’s set-aside in hiring to fulfill those contracts
    • Dedicated education, job training and apprenticeship programs for veterans and family members, that will partner with labor and industry to provide an immediate transition into guaranteed employment
    • Modernizing the VA hiring process in particular, and USA Jobs in general, to match private-sector practices for applicant processing and hiring completion while maintaining equal employment opportunity, nondiscrimination, and veteran’s preferences currently in place
    • Providing all veterans with full, timely, and no-cost treatment at local military or VA medical facilities, or emergency rooms and urgent care throughout the state, especially in rural areas, regardless of the nature/character of their discharge, and providing retraining for those who are disabled
    • Veterans’ services should be provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs, except where essential to provide care in rural clinics and other situations covered under the Veterans Choice Act
    • Combat should be conducted only by uniformed military personnel
    • Government contracts should be awarded based on fair and competitive bidding, with preference given to U.S. companies and veteran-, minority-, women-owned small businesses

On Immigration

  • The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency should be reformed to insure humane treatment
  • The United States Congress should pass comprehensive reform of United States immigration policy that includes a path to citizenship for all undocumented immigrants, streamlines our immigration process, removes cost barriers to immigrants, increases the number of people who are permitted to enter the United States, and provides more funding for immigration services

On Foreign Policy Impact on Immigration

  • Diplomacy and sustainable development should be used to improve the social, economic and environmental conditions that contribute to undocumented immigration into the United States
  • The U.S. should not pursue destabilizing foreign policies, such as the drug war, which force so many immigrants to flee their homelands

On Border Protection

  • Border Patrol checkpoints should be used only at the border
  • Congress shall repeal the law that allows warrantless search of any vehicle within a ‘reasonable distance’ of the border, interpreted by CBP to mean within 100 miles of all land and maritime borders.
  • Border Patrol should not have any role in ordinary law enforcement activities, including providing routine translation services for other agencies
  • Border Patrol should not disrupt other civic duties like attending court hearings, inhibiting the right to due process
  • State or local agencies should have no involvement in the enforcement of federal immigration laws, including providing information, access, and/or assistance to ICE

On Access to Entry

  • The U.S. should not adopt unjust and arbitrary quotas, limits, and other immigration rules that have the primary purpose of preventing new immigration
  • The U.S. should abandon the “Remain in Mexico” policy, which has led to thousands of kidnappings of asylum seekers
  • The U.S. should codify that domestic violence and other forms of gender-based violence are recognized reasons for asylum status
  • The merits of asylum seekers should not be judged on U.S. geopolitical and/or economic interests
  • Asylum-seekers should not be automatically detained or deported
  • No one should be deported or detained without due process of law
  • Streamlined and expedited procedures for granting asylum should be provided to persons fleeing from areas of war, genocide, and political oppression, drug and human trafficking, fleeing religious and ethnic oppression, civil strife and violence
  • Streamlined and expedited procedures for granting work visas should be provided to asylum seekers and migrants seeking employment.
  • No one should be subjected to any “public charge” rules that disproportionately limit or prohibit immigration of people with disabilities

On Treatment at Borders

  • It is our responsibility to protect the rights and welfare of all people within our borders regardless of citizenship or immigration status
  • All people, regardless of their country of origin or their immigration status, deserve to be treated fairly, respectfully, and with dignity, and that all people have a right to equitable treatment under the law
  • State and local governments should adopt policies that prevent their law enforcement agencies from being involved in immigration enforcement
  • All levels of government should recognize the basic human rights of immigrants and protect them with transparent due process in all proceedings and an opportunity for a clear and equitable pathway to documented status and citizenship
  • All detainees should have the right of habeas corpus, to humane treatment, safe facilities, adequate medical care, nutrition, clothing, shelter, freedom of religious practices, disability access, family unity, legal defense, a living wage for their work, and access to basic education services, interpretive services, and an accounting of their location
  • Immediately begin the re-unification of the over 3,000 families that have been separated at the border.
  • Families of undocumented immigrants and people seeking asylum must not be separated
  • No child should be caged
  • Qualified foster care services should be provided for undocumented, unaccompanied minors
  • Counsel should be provided in all immigration related legal proceedings, regardless of immigration status
  • Government-funded interpreters and translation services should be provided in all immigration related legal proceedings
  • Detainees should not be forced into labor
  • The Federal Government should dramatically increase the number of qualified immigration judges to clear the immigration backlog and avoid lengthy detentions for adults and children

On Paths to Citizenship

  • The Federal Government should allow undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children who have attained the age of majority to apply for U.S. citizenship without first being required to return to their country of origin
  • The United States Congress should pass a comprehensive “Dream Act” for young adults that provides a streamlined path to citizenship

On Access to Services

  • All levels of government should enact policies that fully integrate and support immigrants as equal members of our communities, including programs offering instruction in English, interpretative and translation services of governmental documents and services, and preparation for citizenship
  • Immigrants should be issued identification documents and driver’s licenses regardless of status
  • Immigrants should not be excluded or demeaned based on religion or country of origin
  • All people, regardless of their immigration status, are entitled to K-12 and post-secondary education to provide them the knowledge and skills to be productive members of society
  • Access to healthcare and human services should be provided without regard to immigration status; withholding those services is discriminatory and inhumane
  • The Federal Government should enact policies that allow foreign students to remain in the United States and give them opportunity to earn permanent residency

On Access to Employment

  • The Federal Government should sign and ratify the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their families
  • All levels of government should enact policies that prevent discrimination in wages and working conditions for immigrant workers, including access to safe and adequate housing, medical care and educational opportunities
  • All levels of government should enforce all existing laws which penalize employers who knowingly employ undocumented immigrants
  • In securing workplace safety irrespective of immigration status or national origin
  • Undocumented workers should be given the same rights as other citizens to unionize and assert grievances about labor conditions
  • Employers should be provided with legal access to an immigrant workforce, such as a guest worker program

On the Rights of Legal Residents and Their Families

  • Legal permanent residents should have the same rights as American citizens concerning waiting time for their legal spouses to join them in the U.S.
  • There should be no deportation or detention of family members of U.S. citizens
  • The Federal Government should increase family unification, including families of domestic partners and bi-national couples, by granting legal status with the same standards as spouses of citizens

Other

  • English should not be established as the sole official language of the United States

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Tribal Relations and Sovereignty

We Believe:

  • Treaties, Executive Orders, and Agreements between the U.S. and Tribal Nations are crucial, establishing a government-to-government relationship and affirming sovereignty. These treaties set boundaries, peace, and trade agreements, addressing land, resources, and sovereignty issues. However, many were negotiated under duress or deceit, leading to broken promises and violations by the U.S. government, impacting the rights and prosperity of Tribal Nations. By honoring treaties and bolstering tribal sovereignty, we advance towards achieving equity and justice for all Indigenous peoples. Advocating for the rights and sovereignty of Tribal Nations necessitates acknowledging and respecting the diverse voices and experiences within Indigenous communities, including those of tribes still seeking federal recognition.
  • In upholding the Treaties, Executive Orders and Agreements made between Tribal Nations and the Federal Government, secured specific rights and privileges to sustain the future of Tribal Nations
  • Not all treaties were signed in good faith or have been upheld by the United States
  • In fully supporting tribal treaties, tribal natural and cultural resources, and the general welfare of the tribes.
  • Respecting every Native citizen’s inherent rights in alignment with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People and committing to recognizing the languages, histories, and cultures of Tribal Nations as core to our national identity, health, and heritage. This includes honoring natural law and preserving the dignity of all Native citizens, including those in urban areas and Urban Indians from Federally Recognized Tribes across the U.S.
  • In acknowledging that Tribal Nations’ languages, histories and cultures are an integral part of our national identity, wellness and heritage
  • Advocating for the voting rights of sovereign Tribal Nations and assert that reservations, as geographically contiguous entities, should be safeguarded against redistricting tactics that weaken the political influence of Tribes. Moreover, it is imperative to abolish policies and practices that impede the protection of Native voting rights.
  • Advocating for environmental and sustainability policies by consulting with Tribal Governments and securing free, prior, and informed consent before permitting construction or fossil fuel development on tribal lands. We also oppose any actions by the U.S. government that threaten Tribal rights to their lands or resources. Our support extends to Tribal sovereignty in managing the environment and natural resources, preserving salmon and fish, protecting shellfish, and upholding traditional rights to hunt, fish, and gather.
  • In respecting the natural law and human dignity of all Indigenous citizens
  • In creating a Reparations, and a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to address the multi-generational economic effects and cultural oppression of Native Tribes and communities set forth by the colonization of their lands and upheld by the US government through the genocide and stolen land of the Indigenous Peoples of this country
  • Advancing health, safety, and well-being in Tribal communities, focusing on initiatives that support Native American livelihoods, including healthcare, meeting the federal Indian trust responsibility, addressing the crisis of opioids, fentanyl, and emerging drugs, tackling social, economic, and behavioral health challenges, recognizing systemic disenfranchisement, preserving Tribal culture, and investing in infrastructure improvements like roads, water systems, housing, and broadband access on reservations.
  • Supporting Indigenous education and self-determination across all educational levels, emphasizing lifelong learning and the significant role of Native families in educational decisions, including providing resources for Native Elders to teach youth about their Tribal identity and culture, improving access to and quality of schools, providing housing for Native youth, tackling high dropout rates among Native students, expanding access to Tribal Colleges, and promoting Indian Studies programs and the development of materials for the John McCoy (luliaš) Since Time Immemorial curriculum. Additionally, we advocate for better access to employment and training opportunities for tribal members, improving Tribal Compact Schools, and enhancing educational opportunities through continuing education to address educational disparities and create an environment where Native students can flourish, rooted in their cultural heritage.
  • Advancing the self-governance, economic independence, and sustainability of Tribal communities by eliminating economic hurdles such as state taxation, improving access to capital development funds, and distributing property tax revenues collected from Tribal lands back to the Tribes
  • In elevating the Governor’s Office of Indian Affairs to a Cabinet level agency with adequate funding in respect of the inherent sovereignty of Tribal Nations. This includes fulfilling the implementation of meaningful tribal consultation of all issues at all levels
  • In increasing efforts to appoint tribal citizens to Tribal liaison positions, boards and commissions at all levels of government to provide equitable and distinct representation in policies and decisions impacting Tribal Nations
    • In expanding the rights of Tribal Nations to exercise criminal jurisdiction over non-tribal and non-Native citizens committing acts of domestic violence, dating violence, homicide, or protection order violations on Tribal lands consistent with the Violence Against Women Act and other congressional legislation. This includes maintaining and authorizing the Violence Against Women Act to fund and expand the specific Tribal Nations’ provisions, such as judicial training.
    • Upholding the rights of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and People and their families, acknowledging these rights are often violated due to their Native identity, recognizing law enforcement’s failures in protecting Indigenous peoples, and addressing stereotypes and biases that fuel the disproportionate rate of missing and murdered Indigenous women in the U.S.
  • The high number of missing and murdered Indigenous women, men, and two-spirit is a human health and welfare crisis that requires immediate and aggressive action to eliminate further harm to Indigenous families and communities
  • Washington State should provide full funding for the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and People (MMIW/P) Task Force to assess systemic causes behind the high rate of disappearances and murders of Indigenous women and people
  • In improving state-federal-tribal relations to avoid bias and discriminatory community policing through law enforcement training and cross-cultural education with Tribal Nations, and in providing judicial training on the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 and the Washington Indian Child Welfare Act of 2013 to eliminate the loss of Native children’s ties and identities to their families, cultures and homelands
  • In the essential role of Indigenous families and parent committees in the decision-making process of their children’s education, health and well-being as defined by the Indian education legislation, including supporting Indigenous elders with resources to train and educate Indigenous youth in their Tribal identity, history and cultural resiliency, and continuing the development and improvement of schools
  • In funding the American Indian Health Commission for Washington State and its work with state agencies and the Health Benefit Exchange. This includes:
    • Implementing the state law licensing mid-level dental professionals, such as dental health aide therapists, to address the lack of access to dental care
    • Supporting the construction of tribal specialty care facilities to address the lack of access to medical specialists and shifting the costs from the state to the federal government in fulfillment of its trust responsibility
    • Continuing funding of programs that combat social, economic and behavioral health problems such as homelessness, food insecurities and substance abuse
    • Increasing and expanding community health centers and behavioral and mental health services for Native youth within Tribal communities and school systems
    • Maintaining funding of Urban Indian health organizations to enable them to address the health needs of Native Americans who may not have access to Tribal health facilities
  • As a form of reparations for the genocide committed against Native Americans provide funds to tribal nations for housing, health, education and economic development.

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