SCHIFF 2 SEN
ESTB 2 25
SEE CITIZENS OVER CORP AMEND 9 25
https://scorecard.lcv.org/moc/adam-b-schiff
100 2021 98% life
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After a series of suspiciously timed, highly lucrative bets, federal prosecutors have begun exploring whether insider trading laws are being broken via prediction markets. A handful of users have been making big money off the apps Polymarket and Kashi, and a growing number of critics warn that they must have received insider information pertaining to TV show finales, elections and President Donald Trump’s decisions regarding the war on Iran.
Prediction markets have exploded in popularity in recent years, allowing users to gamble on a vast range of yes-or-no questions. Sometimes the bets are on low-stakes matters like the outcome of a television series, but lately, a number of high payout bets tied to major geopolitical events have been in the news, such as a $400,000 win off a bet made just hours before Trump’s surprise raid and arrest of ex-Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, or several waves of bets linked to Trump’s statements regarding the war on Iran.
The timing of these bets has investigators looking into whether insider trading occurred, and whether such laws are applicable to prediction markets in the first place. Currently, it is largely up to prediction apps to police themselves — which different companies have done to different degrees with varying success — but some federal prosecutors are now saying these regulations should be formalized.
Democrats agree. Last week, over 40 House and Senate Democrats signed a letter to Trump Administration officials urging action on such insider trading.
“Given the exponential growth in prediction market trading, rising evidence suggesting possible governmental insider trading in prediction markets, and potential confusion surrounding existing law in this area,” the Democratic letter asked relevant agencies to “issue guidance reminding federal employees of their existing legal obligation to refrain from using their insider governmental information to profit from prediction market trades.”
So far, attempts to ban election-related betting have failed, which has led to an explosion of such gambling over the past two years. Now when it comes to addressing insider trading, some experts are skeptical that action will be taken.
“I think it will be difficult. You can’t criminally prosecute someone if the law is vague,” said Aitan Goelman, a criminal defense lawyer who previously served as the director of enforcement at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which theoretically oversees prediction markets. “Prosecutors would have to show not only that someone was trading in possession of material nonpublic information, but they were doing it in violation of some kind of fiduciary duty or duty of trust. But all this is untested.”
Then there is also the question of the Trump family’s involvement in prediction markets and their regulation. President Trump’s administration is notoriously anti-regulation and has already expressed a desire to expand prediction market access. At the same time, Donald Trump Jr. is on the advisory board at Polymarket, and the wider Trump organization has leaned into investing and profiting off such platforms.
This, warn critics, sets up a dynamic in which neither the fairness of prediction markets nor those tasked with regulating them can be trusted.
“It’s not fair for anyone, especially federal officials, to use inside information when betting on prediction markets,” said Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). “Donald Trump’s CFTC shouldn’t let public officials get away with rigging prediction markets against working people.”
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September 17, 2025
NEWS: Sen. Schiff, Reps. Neguse, McGovern, and Lee Introduce Constitutional Amendment to Overturn Citizens United
On Constitution Day, lawmakers resume push to ensure Congress and states can set reasonable limitations on political spending and influence by corporations on U.S. elections
Washington, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and U.S. Representatives Joe Neguse (D-Colo.-02), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.-02), and Summer Lee (D-Pa.-12) introduced the Citizens Over Corporations Amendment, a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would overturn Citizens United v. FECand limit corporate influence and spending in American politics.
“The Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United opened the door for corporations to pour billions of dollars of dark money into elections. This anonymous and unrestricted spending cripples transparency in the political process and weakens our democracy. Our amendment will keep big money out of politics and restore power where it should belong — with the American people,” said Senator Schiff.
“The time to confront political corruption and clean up government is now,” said Congressman Neguse.“The Citizens Over Corporations Amendment works to renew people’s faith in our democracy by ensuring transparency through campaign finance reform and preventing unrestrained spending and dark money in elections.”
“Elon Musk poured millions into electing Donald Trump and then used the influence he bought to fire federal workers, dismantle USAID, and strip health care from millions,” said Congressman McGovern. “Citizens United gives billionaires like Musk even more power to rig the system for the well-off and well-connected. That’s not a democracy—it’s an auction. I’m proud to support the Citizens Over Corporations Amendment, which will overturn Citizens United, get big money out of politics, and put power back where it belongs—in the hands of the people.”
“Some say the beginning of the collapse of our democracy was when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Citizens United, giving the green light to corporations and billionaires to pour hundreds of millions into our elections and drown out the voices of everyday people. At the root of why we cannot make progress on so many urgent policies is a system where money speaks louder than people. The Citizens Over Corporations Amendment is about changing that. It is about putting power back where it belongs, with the people, so we can build a government that works for all of us, not just the wealthy few and their corporate interests,”said Congresswoman Lee.
Senator Schiff has introduced his constitutional amendment in the U.S. House of Representatives to overturn Citizens Unitedsince 2013 and has been a strong proponent of fixing America’s broken campaign finance system since he was first elected in 2000, after a race that was at the time the most expensive in the history of the House of Representatives. The first bill he cosponsored in Congress was the bipartisan McCain-Feingold Act to regulate the financing of political campaigns, which was later passed and signed into law.
The proposed Constitutional amendment will:
- Make clear the Constitution does not restrict the ability of Congress or states to set reasonable, viewpoint-neutral limitations on the raising and spending of money by candidates and others to influence elections
- Distinguishes between natural persons, corporations, or other artificial entities, including by allowing Congress or the State to prohibit such entities from spending money to influence elections
- Allow public financing of campaigns when states choose to enact such laws, which can restrict the influence of corporate or private wealth = public fund election
- Take further steps to protect the freedom of the press in the case of future campaign finance-related legislation
Earlier today, Senator Schiff and lawmakers rallied for Constitution Day to underscore the need to protect our democracy and curb influence by special interests on American politics. At the rally, Schiff highlighted his proposed amendment reversing the 2010 Supreme Court ruling that ended restrictions on corporate campaign spending, eliminating decades of legal precedent.
:{The Senator’s full remarks at the rally can be
VID DAN GOLDMAN?
viewed
.Schiff’s remarks can be downloaded here.}:
The bill is co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H), Angus King (I-Maine), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Andy Kim (D-N.J.), and Cory Booker (D-N.J.).
The bill is endorsed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Democracy Defenders Action, Public Citizen, End Citizens United, People for the American Way, Common Cause, and Free Speech For People.
“Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v FEC 15 years ago, unlimited and untraceable money has flowed from the pockets of corporations and the ultra-wealthy into political campaigns”,said Stuart McPhail, Director of Campaign Finance Litigation, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW). “In the 2024 federal election cycle alone, over $2.7 billion was funneled through super PACs to various political campaigns. This dark money corrodes our democracy by allowing corporations and billionaires to hide their identities while greatly influencing elections and policy. CREW is proud to endorse the constitutional amendment introduced by Senator Schiff and Representatives Neguse, McGovern, and Lee to overturn Citizens United and ensure that the voices of average citizens are not drowned out by moneyed interests.”
“Democracy Defenders Action wholeheartedly endorses Sen. Adam Schiff and Reps. Joe Neguse, Jim McGovern, and Summer Lee’s constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United,” said Virginia Canter, Ethics and Anticorruption Chief Counsel and Director, Democracy Defenders Action. “This crucial step will ensure that all Americans, not just the super-rich and corporations, have an equal voice in our elections–and true representation in our democracy.”
“Citizens United has turned our democracy into a government that serves the ultra-wealthy. Political spending by billionaires has surged an astonishing 160-fold since the 2010 Supreme Court decision, and working families are paying the price like never before as self-enriching politicians bankroll tax breaks for their biggest donors. Senator Schiff’s amendment is a bold and commonsense step to reclaim government for the people. We applaud his leadership to challenge the billionaire class, fight corruption in Washington, and get Big Money out of politics,” said Tiffany Muller, President, End Citizens United.
“Citizens United destroyed our nation’s safeguards against the undue influence of money in politics. For 15 years now, dark money has flowed freely, allowing the rich and powerful even more influence over our elections. This amendment is essential to preventing that continuing assault on the integrity of our elections. People For the American Way is proud to support this amendment as we work toward building a democracy truly of, by, and for the people,” said Svante Myrick, President, People For the American Way.
“The vast majority of Americans want the real voices of real people to matter more than the money that corporations and the super-rich funnel into our political system. The devastating Citizens United decision 15 years ago dramatically altered the landscape of our politics—unleashing a flood of cash and deepening the outrage that regular people feel at the inequities baked into our democracy. We must overturn this decision. Senator Schiff, and Reps. Joe Neguse, Jim McGovern, and Summer Lee have remained focused and continue pushing for a constitutional amendment to do just that. Public Citizen strongly supports their efforts,” said Lisa Gilbert, Co-President, Public Citizen.
A fact sheet on the legislation can be foundhere.
...representatives Joe Neguse, Jim McGovern, and Summer Lee
The Citizens Over Corporations Amendment would overturn the Supreme Court's ill-considered opinion in Citizens United v. FEC, as well as other precedents which have made it impossible to regulate billions in campaign spending. We do not recommend this step lightly, but numerous irresponsible court decisions pose such a threat to the health of our democracy that we must act.
This Amendment would address a flawed legal theory going back to the Supreme Court's 1976 decision in Buckley v. Valeo which established an artificial distinction between campaign contributions and expenditures – permitting some regulation of
the former and precluding any meaningful regulation of the latter.
THE CITIZENS OVER CORPORATIONS AMENDMENT WOULD:
Ensure the ability of Congress or the States to propose reasonable viewpoint- neutral limitations on the raising and spending of money by candidates and others to influence elections
Distinguish between natural persons and corporations or other artificial entities created by law, including by allowing Congress or the State to prohibit such entities from spending money to influence elections
Allow — but not require — public financing of campaigns when states choose to enact such laws
Take further steps to protect the freedom of the press
We have all witnessed the pernicious impact of unrestrained spending on campaigns. The tidal wave of independent expenditures creates an unmistakable appearance of corruption and impropriety.
Americans will assume, perhaps with good reason, that the levers of our
government can be bought by the wealthiest members or incorporated entities of
our society. This impression will ultimately demean and weaken our democracy
Full text of the bill is availablehere.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
Mr. SCHIFF (for himself, Mrs. SHAHEEN, Mr. KING, Mr. WELCH, Mr. WHITEHOUSE, Mr. KIM, and Mr. BOOKER) introduced the following joint resolution; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on
JOINT RESOLUTION
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United
States relating to the authority of Congress and the
States to regulate contributions and expenditures intended to affect elections and to enact public financing
systems for political campaigns.
1 Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives
2 of the United States of America in Congress assembled
3 (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all
6 intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when
1 ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several
2 States within seven years after the date of its submission
3 for ratification:
4 ‘‘ARTICLE —‘SECTION 1. Congress and the States may regulate
6 and impose reasonable viewpoint-neutral limitations on the
7 raising and spending of money by candidates and others
8 to influence elections.
9 ‘‘SECTION 2. Congress and the States may regulate
10 and enact systems of public campaign financing, including
11 those designed to restrict the influence of private wealth
12 by offsetting the raising and spending of money by candidates and others to influence elections with increased
14 public funding.
15 ‘‘SECTION 3. Congress and the States shall have
16 power to implement and enforce this article by appropriate
17 legislation, and may distinguish between natural persons
18 and corporations or other artificial entities created by law,
19 including by prohibiting such entities from spending
20 money to influence elections.
21 ‘‘SECTION 4. Nothing in this article shall be construed to grant Congress or the States the power to
23 abridge the freedom of the press.’’.
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VID
0:01
Robert, thank you very much and thank
you to all the in incredible
0:05
organizations that have come together
0:07
today and are such great champions of
0:09
our democracy. Uh it is a delight to be
0:12
with you. Uh thank you for standing with
0:15
us because you believe as I do that
0:18
democracy at its core is an act of
0:20
faith. Faith in the improbable
0:22
experiment in self-governance that we
0:24
call America. faith that our people
0:27
possess sufficient wisdom and virtue
0:30
that we can govern ourselves and that we
0:32
don't need to be ruled by a desperate. A
0:35
belief that elections should belong to
0:36
the people and not to the highest
0:39
bidder. The conviction that government
0:41
should serve all of us, not just the
0:43
most powerful, not just the most
0:46
well-connected.
0:47
This year, indeed, this last decade,
0:50
that trust, that belief, that faith has
0:52
been battered. battered by corruption,
0:55
battered by the dominant influence of
0:57
mega corporations, battered by a
1:00
president who treats the rule of law as
1:02
an inconvenience and self enrichment as
1:06
an animating purpose. But battered does
1:09
not mean broken. And today we take a
1:12
step towards rebuilding faith in the
1:14
resiliency of our democracy brick by
1:16
brick, one safeguard after another.
1:18
Today I'm introducing the Protecting Our
1:21
Democracy Act. This initiative first
1:24
undertaken by Speaker Pelosi who brought
1:26
together a group of us in the first
1:28
years of the first term of the president
1:30
to draft our own set of post-watergate
1:33
like reforms. This legislation if passed
1:36
will enshrine into law the guard rails
1:39
that Donald Trump has so gleefully torn
1:41
down and establish new ones to prevent
1:44
future abuses of power. safeguards to
1:47
help ensure that no president can exist
1:49
above the law. That whistleblowers are
1:51
protected, not punished. That no
1:53
government employee is so special that
1:56
they are immune from conflict of
1:57
interest laws when they promote their
1:59
own economic interests over those of
2:02
competitors or the country. That
2:04
Congress's power of the purse cannot be
2:06
hijacked by a wannabe king or man named
2:10
vote who got no votes. that the public's
2:13
trust cannot be sold to the highest
2:15
bidder. But we can't stop there because
2:18
even before Donald Trump, there was
2:20
another rot eating away at the faith in
2:22
our system. The flood of dark money
2:25
unleashed by Citizens United. That
2:28
decision told Americans their voices
2:30
could be drowned out by a billionaire's
2:32
checkbook. It turned elections into
2:35
auctions.
2:36
Today, it told everyday citizens they
2:39
were competing with corporations.
2:41
masquerading as people. So, I'm joining
2:44
my colleagues to reintroduce my constit
2:46
constitutional amendment to overturn
2:47
Citizens United as I have for many years
2:50
to once again affirm what should be
2:53
obvious that our democracy is not for
2:55
sale that the power of an idea should
2:57
never be measured by the size of a bank
2:59
account. These are not partisan
3:01
measures. These are, in my view,
3:04
patriotic ones. And I'm determined, all
3:06
of us are determined to rebuild the bull
3:08
work of our democracy so that future
3:11
generations inherit a republic stronger,
3:13
fairer, and more just than the one we
3:15
have now. Lincoln called this nation the
3:18
last best hope for mankind. If we are to
3:20
ensure that remains true, we must make
3:23
his cause our cause, to repair what's
3:26
broken, to restore what's been lost, and
3:29
to remind the American people why
3:30
democracy is worth believing in. Again,
3:34
thank you again for being here. I will
3:36
now turn the microphone over to my
3:38
friend and the strongest champion of
3:41
democracy we have seen uh in these
3:44
trying times and that is House Speaker
3:47
EMERITA Nancy Pelosi.
---
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mma
Kalshi is aggressively advertising on TikTok, seemingly targeting young people while promising a “money hack”
Leading expert on gambling behavior tells Media Matters: “The younger you are when you start and the more frequent you do these activities, that’s where the likelihood of addiction and harm go up”
Written by Olivia Little
Updated 03/30/26
Update (3/30/26): Following publication of this article, Kalshi spokesperson Elisabeth Diana notified Media Matters that the company no longer works with any of the influencers in the advertisements featured below. Diana added: “We don't 'skirt regulation' — we're federally regulated by the CFTC. On Kalshi, unlike with sportsbooks and casinos, there is no 'house,' which means our revenue doesn't come from incentivizing people to lose. It's fairer and less predatory than gambling.”*
Kalshi has been flooding TikTok with advertisements seemingly targeting young people. The ads, which often promote using the platform regularly as a type of “side hustle,” set off alarm bells for a leading expert, who tells Media Matters that they could increase the likelihood of gambling addiction.
Kalshi is a prediction market platform that allows users to buy positions on the outcome of nearly any “economically relevant event.” Like Polymarket, the other major player in prediction markets, Kalshi is regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission as a derivatives exchange listing futures contracts, which were traditionally reserved for major commodities, stock indexes, or interest rates. On Kalshi, prediction options range from the innocuous — who will win Survivor 50 — to more politically charged and morally dubious subjects — like how many deportations will occur this year.
Prediction markets have entered a “hypergrowth phase,” generating nearly $64 billion in trading volume last year — an increase of more than 400% from 2024. Sporting event contracts accounted for more than 80% of prediction market activity in 2025, though Kalshi fervently denies that trading on sports is the same as gambling.
Sports gambling is primarily regulated at the state level, and in most states the minimum legal age to gamble is 21. However, prediction market platforms have skirted these regulations by offering sports event contract trading to any user 18 years or older, even in states where sports gambling is illegal.
Dr. Timothy Fong, a clinical professor of psychiatry and co-director of the UCLA Gambling Studies Program who has worked in the field for more than 20 years, told Media Matters that there is functionally very little difference between Kalshi and traditional gambling — and sometimes no difference at all.
“So I know when I download Kalshi and I want to put money on the Super Bowl — Kalshi gives me the option, I put my own real money on an event of uncertain outcome in the hopes of winning a larger reward at the expense of potentially losing my initial expense — that’s gambling,” said Fong. “It feels like gambling, it smells like gambling, and I think for some of the contract events it is identical.”
Now, TikTok users are being bombarded with ads suggesting Kalshi is a “money hack” that will enable them to make hundreds or even thousands of dollars from their phone.
Kalshi is flooding TikTok with ads that seem to target young people
Media Matters manually retrieved and documented Kalshi advertisements on TikTok because, unlike in the EU where TikTok is required to provide advertising repositories, the United States has no transparency mandates. It is impossible to know the full extent of Kalshi’s TikTok campaign, but our research helps piece together a glimpse into its advertising strategies. (This particular research focuses on TikTok, although Kalshi’s advertising wave has also hit other major social media platforms such as Instagram, Reddit, and YouTube.)
First, it is significant to note that Kalshi’s advertisements appear to predominantly feature and target young people. “We made a pact in this world where we said gambling is a 21-and-over activity, and yet these [ads] are clearly geared toward under-21 or right at that 21 level,” said Fong.
Nearly every advertisement we found features a young man or woman hyping up Kalshi’s platform and services. Often young men are featured in videos promoting sports trading and young women are featured in videos promoting Kalshi’s culture market.
:{Video
According to Fong, normalizing frequent engagement at a young age is a key contributor to future addiction. “When you borrow from the other lanes of addiction, the whole idea that this isn’t really harmful is what leads to early engagement and frequent engagement. And why that matters is that the younger you are when you start and the more frequent you do these activities, that’s where the likelihood of addiction and harm go up.”
Cait Huble, director of public affairs at the National Council on Problem Gambling, reviewed Kalshi advertisements documented by Media Matters and expressed concern about their framing. “In terms of some of the language that they’re using — if this was a regulated gambling operator, this would never pass a regulator’s test,” explained Huble. “The way they are positioning the expectation that you’re going to win, that there’s no clear explanation of the odds, things like what kind of skill it is.”
“This is functionally gambling,” Huble said.
One advertisement described Kalshi as a “money hack” and seemed to be trying to drive young people to its service by exploiting a sense of FOMO, or fear of missing out. “I don’t know why more people aren’t doing this, like, I literally made $761 and 7 cents last night,” a woman claimed. “I woke up this morning and it paid out. Why aren’t you guys doing this? It felt stupidly easy.”
:{Video
“The implication is that if you don’t bet on these things, you are missing out,” said Fong. “If you don't bet on this thing, you’re slow to uptake, you’re not cool. There’s kind of a Joe Camel kind of thing, with the smoking, where by association if you don’t do it you’re being left off the train.”
Another advertisement framed making weather predictions on Kalshi as a “side hustle” users can participate in from the comfort of their own home. The video shows a young woman on a couch lounging under a blanket, with on-screen text claiming to have “made $270 this week from my bed.”
:{Video
Of course, trading on Kalshi is fundamentally different from actual employment. “The side gig and the hustle [are] obviously very concerning — this is not a job,” said Fong. “That’s false advertising. The idea that, oh, there’s all this magic and partying and spectacular financial success, that this is a roadmap for you to have freedom financially is completely false.”
That doesn’t stop Kalshi’s advertisements from promising an easy way to earn money. “Trying to explain to myself how i just made $170 this week doing literally nothing but checking if it would rain (2026 is different),” read one, adding that the platform is “legal in all 50 states.”
But Kalshi is facing mounting legal challenges, particularly around allegations of sports betting. Arizona’s attorney general recently filed criminal charges against the platform over “illegal gambling,” a Massachusetts judge last month banned Kalshi from offering sports contracts without a state gaming license, and Nevada won a temporary restraining order on March 20 preventing Kalshi from offering event contracts related to sports, elections, and entertainment.
On March 23, Sens. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and John Curtis (R-UT) introduced a bipartisan bill that would ban prediction markets from accepting or listing sports events and casino-style games. “Sports prediction contracts are sports bets — just with a different name,” said Schiff. “These contracts are currently offered in all fifty states in clear violation of state and federal law.”
And the industry’s controversies don’t end with sports gambling. Prediction market users placing suspicious bets on the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and the start of the war in Iran have heightened scrutiny about the possibility of insider trading, leading the company to announce new efforts to crack down on market manipulation.
Meanwhile, Kalshi has a partnership “to incorporate real-time prediction data into CNBC’s editorial coverage,” a data integration agreement with CNN featuring “a new Kalshi-powered real-time news ticker that will run during segments that feature Kalshi data,” and a deal with The Associated Press ahead of this year’s midterms to “help campaigns and everyday citizens track market expectations for election outcomes.”
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404 the-making-of-a-judge-perspectives-from-federal-judges-and-the-senate-judiciary-committee
LI Olivia Oo · 3rdThird degree connection
Policy Advisor, Senator Adam Schiff at United States Senate](https://www.linkedin.com/in/olivia-oo-04723735?miniProfileUrn=urn%3Ali%3Afs_miniProfile%3AACoAAAdUyncBpTsZzfRRY919TGSHhimu1dysiII)
storm
all staff Sen_Adam_Schiff
- Email, work:
*****@judiciary-dem.senate.gov
- University of California, Los Angeles School of Law - JD, critical race studies (2015-2018)
*Activities and notes: Masin Family Academic Excellence Gold Award for Highest Grade in Critical Race Theory; National Black Law Journal, co-editor-in-chief; Black Law Students Association, co-president; NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Earl Warren fellow
- Hampton University - BA, broadcast journalism, political science, summa cum laude (2011-2015)
Activities and notes: Student Government Association, vice president
Greek Organizations:
Employment History
- Senate Judiciary Committee (Jan. 2025-)
Counsel
- Senate Judiciary Committee (Nov. 2023-Dec. 2024)
Sen. Laphonza Butler (**D**-CA)
Counsel to Sen. Butler
- Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (April 2022-Nov. 2023)
Policy Counsel
- Campaign Legal Center Inc. (March 2020-March 2022)
Legal Counsel, Voting Rights
Associated Organizations
Bar membership:
- District of Columbia Bar (Dec. 2019-)
- New York State Bar (June 2019-)
Caleb Jackson, Counsel to Senator Adam Schiff
Caleb,
Thank you again for meeting with us. We thought it might be helpful to summarize our discussion. Meeting notes by John.
After introductions and an appreciation for the Senator’s work we requested that you ask the Senator to co-sponsor the We the People Amendment (HJR 54 in the House) when it is introduced in the Senate. We also identified these specific areas where we believe the WTPA is stronger and more effective than the existing language in the Senator’s amendment addressing the Citizens’ United decision:
- WTPA explicitly states money is not speech and forbids the Judiciary from so construing the First Amendment.
There is no equivalent provision (NEP) in the Schiff amendment.
- WTPA explicitly states that Constitutional rights are only for Natural persons.
Schiff amendment-NEP.
- WTPA explicitly states that corporations have no Constitutional rights.
Schiff amendment-NEP.
- WTPA requires disclosure of campaign contributions and spending.
Schiff-NEP.
- WTPA-Contains statement of intent to limit how the Supreme Court can interpret the amendment.
Schiff amendment-NEP.
- WTPA contains mandatory language (see 1-4 above)
Schiff contains only permissive (“may”) language re: campaign finance regulation, distinguishing between natural persons and corporations/artificial entities, and prohibiting such entities from spending money to influence elections
- Schiff amendment allows “reasonable” limits on campaign contributions/spending.
What’s reasonable would ultimately end up before SCOTUS, which is hostile to such regulation. It could simply find all such regulation unreasonable and strike it down, with no effective recourse.
- The Schiff amendment is substantially similar to the amendment the Senator proposed in 2019 when he was in the House. The current crisis remands that democracy proponents act boldly and permissive language simply isn’t strong enough to meet the moment.
You asked how Rep. Jayapal got support for HJR 54 in the House, and what the internal dynamics were there regarding WTPA. We replied that she used the sign-on letter procedure. After our meeting we checked with MTA National staff for further information and were told that HJR 54 received support as a result of Rep. Jayapal's original and updated mid-year "Dear Colleague" letters and lobbying from constituent volunteers and MTA staff via calls, emails and virtual meetings with legislative aides both in-state and in Washington. MTA staff identified no internal dynamics particular to the bill.
We asked you why the Senator introduced his amendment when Senator Shaheen had already introduced one that was very similar. You indicated he wanted to continue pursuing this issue because he had done so in the House and it was important to him.
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2016 16 co-sponsors
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rebecca Schatz
Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) (Dec. 2024-), Legislative Director
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10 25
Staff Assistant
Daniela Alvarado
Legislative Assistant
Caitlin Balagula
Scheduler
Madeleine C. Barry
Legislative Aide
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Chief Counsel; National Security Advisor
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Digital Director; Press Aide
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Policy Advisor
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Constituent Outreach Representative
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Eddie Mendoza
CAMPAIGN MODE
FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — SCHIFF STAFF:Rep. Adam Schiffis announcing top aides for his U.S. Senate campaign. Brad Elkinswill serve as campaign manager, Larry Grisolanoas media consultant, Lis Smith as senior adviser for communications, Amy Levinas pollster, Parke Skelton as general consultant, Mike Nellis and Patrick Boland as senior advisers, Terri New and Elizabeth Tauro Mitchell as senior advisers and national finance consultants, Marisol Samayoaas comms director, Alex Wilcoxas research director and Eddie Mendozaas constituency director.
Legislative Fellow
Eric Merron
Deputy State Director
Colleen Oinuma
Policy Advisor
Olivia Oo
State Director
Ann Peifer
Counsel
ManoLasya Perepa
Field Representative
Camille Pon
State Press Secretary
Ruby Robles
Communications Director
Marisol Samayoa
Director of Scheduling
Erin Sandlin
Legislative Director 2015- butler
Rebecca S. Schatz rebecca-schatz-16866447
Northern California Regional Director
Edwin Sevilla
Legislative Assistant
Jamie Thompson
Senior Advisor
Lucy Xiao
Press Assistant
Tanya Yarian
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7 25 noem poland?
Jul 29, 2025
Long before Project 2025 – there was a different playbook for turning a democracy into an autocracy. Let's talk about Viktor Orbán and Hungary.
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RWW
09/15/2025
by
- David Badash @ The New Civil Rights Movement: Vance Hosts Stephen Miller on Kirk’s Show to Preach ‘Real Unity’ — While Blaming the Left
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller was Vice President JD Vance’s guest on Monday’s edition of “The Charlie Kirk Show,” just days after the right-wing political commentator was assassinated. The suspected gunman’s motives and political beliefs remain unclear, but the vice president pinned the blame for Kirk’s murder on “left-wing extremism.”
- Jennifer Bowers Bahney @ Mediaite: Trump Declares He’s ‘Already Investigating’ People On The Left Who Share Blame for Charlie Kirk’s Murder
President Donald Trump reiterated his claim that radical leftists and Democratic supporters were responsible for the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, while taking questions from reporters on the tarmac at Morristown Airport in Morris County, New Jersey, on Sunday evening.
- Cameron Adams @ The Daily Beast: MAGA Star Uses Prayer Vigil to Launch Charlie Kirk Killer Conspiracy
The adviser actually pleads for parents to pull their kids out of university.
- Anna Merlan @ Mother Jones: The Full Weight of the Federal Government Is Being Used to Memorialize Charlie Kirk
After the shocking murder of MAGA influencer Charlie Kirk on Wednesday afternoon, tributes and expressions of grief poured in from conservative politicians and activists, along with expressions of sympathy and denunciations of political violence from both sides of the aisle. Now, however, numerous government and elected officials are taking their protection of Kirk’s legacy a step further, indicating they’ll use the power of their offices to discourage, punish, or, in some cases, fire anyone who speaks ill of him.
- Moira Donegan @ The Guardian: Charlie Kirk’s killing was a tragedy. But we must not rewrite his life
In the wake of horror, honest accountings of his life have not only become rare – they have also become dangerous.
- Paige Skinner @ HuffPost: 'Fox And Friends' Host Apologizes For 'Callous' Remark About Homeless People
Brian Kilmeade has a history of saying insulting things while on the air.
- Aaron Parnas @ MediaTouch Network: How the Trump Administration is Breaking the Law and Wasting Taxpayer Dollars with Giant Banners of Donald Trump
An exclusive report from Senator Adam Schiff exposes a coordinated misuse of federal funds for political propaganda.
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UNIV NUMB 1 ON SCHIFF LIST 7 25
WATCH: Sen. Schiff Outlines 10 Ways Trump is Wrecking the Country, Redefining the Idea of America
July 10, 2025
D.C. — U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) spoke on the Senate Floor to recount President Donald Trump’s most unlawful, unconstitutional, and disastrous actions since taking office, emphasizing the deliberate chaos and complete disregard of the rule of law.
In his speech, Schiff laid out the top 10 ways that President Trump has hurt Americans’ lives and livelihoods: Trump’s inhumane immigration policy and indiscriminate ICE raids across the country, undermining the rule of law, cuts to health care, impact of tariff policy on American people and businesses, sweeping and indiscriminate DOGE cuts, ending our advances in health and science, destroying renewable energy, weakening our alliances around the world, cuts to food assistance, and attacking research and science.
Watch his full remarks HERE. Download remarks HERE.
Read the transcript of his remarks as delivered below:
Over the last 250 years, this country has grown from a handful of rebellious colonies, to an economic, scientific, military, cultural, technological, and agricultural behemoth. And, crucially, through it all, we have remained a democracy, devoted to the hard work our Founders envisioned of making our nation a more perfect union. Progress has not always been straightforward, but it has been consistent over time, and nothing short of extraordinary.
Which is why it is all the more heartbreaking to see so much damage, so much self-inflicted harm, imposed on our country by this administration over the last 170 days. Indeed, if you were to design a presidency and policies to diminish our scientific and technological prowess from within, it would look a lot like this administration. If you were determined to kill our clean energy future, and retreat from any hope of addressing climate change, it would look a lot like this. If you wanted to undermine our standing around the world, befriend dictatorships and betray our fellow democracies, it would look a lot like this. If you wanted to deliberately tear at the social fabric and cohesion of our country, set state against state, and people against people, to the point of conflict in the streets, it would look a lot like this administration.
The president and his Cabinet have been tearing down so much of what makes this country special, and so quickly, that it has been hard to see the big picture, hard to separate the biggest harms from merely the most sensational, or the most proximate. One hundred days was not enough time to evaluate the harms this administration had already inflicted on our country and its people, but 170 days just might be sufficient.
So today, I want to go through the top ten ways this administration has been wrecking the country. From the thoughtless and the irresponsible, to the illegal and the unconstitutional, to the deliberately cruel and malicious, I want to tell you what the actions of this presidency have really meant for the country, and for our future.
So here they are. The top 10 ways the administration is wrecking the country. Number 10:
Donald Trump is waging an all-out war on America’s research universities.
America’s universities have been the envy of the world for much of the last century, powering scientific achievement and economic growth. Dramatic breakthroughs in medicine, significant achievement in the arts, technological innovation, and all of the attendant economic benefits have been driven by a decades’ old partnership between universities and the federal government.
As part of this grand bargain, the federal government invests in research conducted at top universities and the country enjoys the benefits. From brilliant scientists in academia the military gets new technologies and capabilities, including innovations in fusion energy, laser technology, electronic jamming capabilities and so much more. Our health care is improved, and our life spans are increased by university-led research into new medicines, medical implants and devices. Food science helps us grow healthier crops and produce more food with less water and less pesticides. You would be hard-pressed to find a field of scientific endeavor in which university research has failed to deliver.
Now, that is all on the chopping block. The administration has cancelled tens of billions of dollars in university research funding. It is stopping some of the best and brightest from coming to the U.S. to study, by banning international students from attending. Already, some of the world’s most promising students are choosing to go elsewhere, to China, or the UK, or Sweden, or Canada. The reason we want the very best students is so we can remain the global leader in every field of endeavor. That is what makes us great. But this? This is a one-way brain drain in the wrong direction.
The administration is also raising taxes on research universities and threatening the removal of accreditation from universities which fail to bow to the president’s ideological and political whims.
And it is using real concerns about antisemitism on campus as a pretext, or the policies of athletic departments that it disfavors, to justify attacks on universities that will do nothing but set the country and our economy back. Their real agenda is to change the agenda at schools, to eliminate academic independence, and to indoctrinate students in an ideology that is more to their liking, turning administration bureaucrats into a kind of thought police.
Coming in at number nine of the top 10 ways the administration is wrecking the country: taking away food from hungry kids in America.
Donald Trump promised to “Make America Healthy Again,” but he is not. Instead, he has settled for making America hungry again. The budget, just realized through their Big Ugly Bill, makes a multi-hundred-billion dollar cut to the SNAP program. That’s supplemental nutrition and food assistance. Basically, food for hungry kids and families.
This isn’t a cut that can be explained away with a vague, multipurpose phrase or platitude like “waste, fraud, and abuse.” Or by engaging in funny math. Feeding hungry families is not wasteful, providing fresh food at schools for kids that can’t otherwise afford to eat is not a fraud, and helping seniors living on the edge of poverty afford a meal is not an abuse. But taking this food away to fund tax cuts for wealthy people and corporations — that is a fraud, that is a waste, and that is an abuse.
These cuts will mean more kids who are unable to get a school lunch. More seniors literally sitting and starving in their homes. An America that is more hungry than before. An America, that though it is the richest nation on earth, and the most productive agricultural nation on earth — has chosen to adopt more hunger as its policy. Moving on to number eight.
Coming in at number eight of the top 10 ways the administration is wrecking the country: Donald Trump is destroying our alliances with democratic nations around the world and aligning our country with dictators.
Across administrations and decades, America has been a symbol of stability for the globe. A trusted partner. A champion of freedom and democracy. We have stood up to evil empires and championed the cause of liberty. And though we have made more than our share of mistakes in trying to rebuild other nations in our image, we have strived to achieve a foreign policy consistent with our values.
Now, in just the first few months, so much of that legacy has been betrayed, so many of our alliances have been degraded, so much of our standing in the world has been made small, so many of our friends have become estranged, our treaty partners unsure of whether they can count on us in a pinch.
Donald Trump likes to talk about “peace through strength.” He likes to think that bullying our friends, or extorting a price for our security guarantees, is what makes us strong. But he is wrong. He trashes our relationships with our friends. He belittles the Canadians and the British, who fought and died alongside American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. He denigrates Ukrainians, and their brave president, who fight nobly in defense of their democracy and sovereignty, and he insists on Ukraine paying tribute — in the form of mineral rights — to secure his support. He flatters and fawns over the Kremlin dictator, at least he did, until even Trump could see that he was being made to play the fool by a mass murderer who did not want peace, only further mayhem. And who can say how long Trump’s new resolve against Putin will last before it is overtaken by caprice or self-interest.
The only true constant of Trump’s foreign policy has been that the United States will be there for you if and only if it is pleasing to the president. If you flatter him, if you bow and scrape before him, or if there is something in it for him. Personally. Like a $400 million aircraft, or a multi-billion-dollar crypto deal for his family. He has made it plain that American foreign policy is part protection racket, and part just racket.
All of this means that America is less safe and secure, with fewer friends we can rely upon, out of any sense of shared sacrifice or values. The mutual defense clause of Article 5 of NATO has only been invoked only once, and that was on our behalf after we were viciously attacked by terrorists on September 11th. Our friends and allies rushed to our defense, and not just out of a sense of treaty obligation, but because of a shared sense of purpose and our common humanity. The problem with turning every relationship into a transitional or transactional one— is that everyone will want something in return — and no one will be there when you really need them. Moving on.
Number seven of the top 10 ways the administration is wrecking what is best about this country — is their pointless, economically suicidal and self-destructive attack on the development of renewable energy.
Renewable energy can lead the world away from a climate catastrophe. It can be an economic slingshot, catapulting us into an abundant energy future that is American made. It can truly make us energy independent, instead of simply more dependent on the fossil fuel industry.
But Trump has attacked clean energy with a vengeance, repealing incentives passed during the Biden administration. And why? Because they were passed during the Biden administration, and because Donald Trump made a promise to oil companies in exchange for campaign cash — lots of it. More than a billion of it. The Big Ugly Bill phases out tax credits meant to spur development of solar and wind power and replaces them with tax credits for coal. If you are wondering whether you heard that right – you did.
Tax credits for coal mining. In the year 2025. At a time when we’ve harnessed the capacity of the sun and the wind to power entire communities, we are disinvesting in a renewable energy future in order to fund an industry from the 1800s.
It’s the policy equivalent of investing in Black Lung. And it will choke our energy supply over time and kneecap our economic potential. China knows this. In May, China installed 93 gigawatts of solar capacity. That’s enough to power almost 70 million homes. And they did it in a single month.
China is installing almost 100 solar panels every second. And that’s not because the Chinese Communist Party is populated by a bunch of crazy environmentalists. It’s because they know this is the industry of future. They want to dominate the global market in clean energy, and thanks to Donald Trump, they will.
So how will Trump’s energy policies impact you at home? It means your energy bills are going to go up – way up. By hundreds of dollars a month. Renewable sources of energy are the vast majority of the new energy coming online in America. Take that away, and we are reliant on the same old capacity, your same old utility, less competition, and higher prices. Costing you more to heat your home in the winter, or cool it down during the hot, hot summer. It means more families will make the impossible choice between paying their utility bills and putting food on the table.
Now earlier, I talked about this administration’s cuts to our research universities. Which brings me to number six, the broader attack on health and science. The administration is slashing the National Institutes of Health – the nation’s premier medical research agency.
They have cut NIH by almost half. Almost half. Now, I’m no scientist. But I took enough science classes in college to know my way around a lab. And I’m certainly no economist. But I can do basic math. And I can tell you with certainty – as anyone can who looks at this — that cutting NIH in half, massively gutting research grants and positions, will lead to the cancellation of clinical trials and new treatments, and to Americans needlessly suffering from any number of illnesses.
It will mean scaling back research efforts on everything from cancer, to Alzheimer’s, to HIV/AIDS. Destroying years or decades of research in any number of fields, that might have been weeks or months from a breakthrough.
That hurts everyone. There isn’t a Senator in this body who hasn’t been visited by families with sick children, or sick parents, or constituents who are ill themselves, constituents who have pleaded that we increase funding for NIH, who have put a human face on the hope that they or their loved ones might be saved, saved if only we invest in NIH.
And now, we turn our back on them. And for what? For what?
At number five, of the top 10 ways the administration is wrecking the country, we have the massive DOGE cuts to the federal workforce and federal agencies everywhere.
Elon Musk and his lot of unqualified, unvetted, unrestrained tech bros have taken a chainsaw to any number of federal grants, federal contracts, federal departments, and federal jobs without the slightest understanding of the human consequences. Musk may have held himself harmless during these massive cuts — he managed to use his position of influence to expand his billions in government contracts at Starlink — but everyone else was made to suffer. Now he is gone, but the wrecking crew continues its work.
DOGE accidentally cut our nuclear safety staff, then had to rush to rehire them. They cut specialists in bird flu and then had to rush and rehire them. Remember those coal tax credits I mentioned earlier? Well, they’re cutting mine safety efforts – making dangerous work, even more so.
They DOGE-d USAID and diminished our soft power around the world. They are dismantling the Department of Education, and selling off our children’s education, piece by piece.
And they would cut NASA in half. There is no more high-profile example of America’s scientific and technological prowess than our space program. And sadly, there is no better example of its deliberate forfeiture.
In my lifetime alone, our space program was the first to plant a flag on the moon. We launched the first solar probe. We took the first photos and landed the first rover on Mars. We are sending more humans into orbit than ever, and on track to land the first human on Mars. We did those things not because they were easy.
No, we did those things, as President Kennedy said – because they were hard.
Because space exploration can teach us things about our life on earth that propel innovation here at home, innovation that allows us to travel faster, live longer, and live better. And because exploring space can provide the most profound thoughts of our place in the universe, and whether amidst all of that we are alone.
This agency that has brought us such hope and excitement – and pride – will be brought low. It may be one small step for DOGE, but it represents one giant leap backward for mankind.
The Trump administration has also paused the hiring of critical seasonal firefighting staff, and laid off probationary employees, just as we begin another devastating fire season. They cut staff and programs at NOAA and the National Weather Service – hurting early earthquake warning, early warning of all disasters, warning that is pivotal when disasters strike, like it did in Texas this week, in North Carolina months ago, or in Los Angeles in January.
They cut staff who run the phones at Social Security while closing regional offices, making it harder for seniors to get the benefits they paid into their entire life. Because that was the goal. That was the goal.
And for all the pain that DOGE has inflicted and continues to inflict, the only thing that bastard agency has really served to accomplish is making government less effective, less efficient, and less trustworthy. Because more than anything else, the DOGE bloodletting has killed the trust of countless Americans.
Trust that the federal jobs and programs they relied upon would continue. Trust that they might be paid less than private sector workers to do the work they love, to unravel new mysteries in space, in the oceans, in our bodies and in ourselves, but that they could rely upon the government as an employer, that they would be insulated from political and partisan considerations, that they would not become some ideological arm of a president or his party, or its collateral damage. Now, that trust is now gone.
And the loss of that talent and that trust, just might be the most expensive loss of all.
At number four, of the top 10 ways in which the administration is wrecking our country and our economy: tariffs. The on-again, off-again, on-again, off-again, on-again, off-again, on-again tariffs. The ill-considered, ill-executed, unpredictable, unproductive, costly, indiscriminate and self-destructive, tariffs.
For a president who ran on lowering costs, his most significant economic action has been a colossal backfire. Prices for your 4th of July barbecue last week were the highest they’ve ever been. Like the costs of burgers or beer. Phones are now more expensive. Cars are more expensive. Prices at Walmart, Target, Costco, up, up, up. And on Amazon, they were going to add a specific line item for the cost of the Trump tariffs besides each affected product, until the Trump administration begged its owner, Jeff Bezos, not to be so transparent with their own customers because it made the president look bad. This didn’t stop Amazon from adding the Trump tax to the price of the goods you buy on Amazon— it just stopped them from showing you just how much more you were paying.
And while you get poorer because of these tariffs, America is not getting any stronger. While your pocketbook is getting hit, so too is our standing around the globe. After all, these chaotic tariffs give our trading partners the all too accurate impression that we are unpredictable. That we’re unstable. That America, with all its power, is unreliable. So those trading partners flock elsewhere. They go to China, or India, or elsewhere. The fact is we have so alienated even our closest friends and allies, that some, like Canada, have gone beyond reciprocal tariffs to a downright boycott of American goods. Devastating American farmers, small businesses, and consumers alike.
The Art of the Deal indeed.
Which takes us to number three, and this administration’s attack on our health care.
When the Senate passed Trump’s Big Ugly Bill last week, 50 of our colleagues put their stamp on a budget that will devastate Medicaid, that will mean hospitals and clinics close, and that millions of Americans will lose access to life saving care. That will mean people get their care denied. That will mean the long hard fight against opioids will be set back, by cuts to substance abuse treatment. After promising that Medicaid would not be touched, that our health care would not be harmed, they cut it by one trillion dollars, trillion with a T. To fund tax cuts for wealthy people, by the trillions.
And when your hospital closes because it loses millions of Medicaid dollars, it won’t matter whether you personally were on Medicaid — your hospital will be gone. You, and everyone else, will have to drive farther to find an emergency room, to have a baby, to get dialysis, or to be treated for a stroke. The quality of your care will decline. Your access to care will diminish. Especially reproductive care, but every kind of care. Most of us will pay more, a lot more, for the care we receive. But some will go without care altogether.
In the richest nation on earth, we will move farther away from universal quality care, to a period of even greater scarcity, even shorter life spans, even lesser quality of life. And again — for what? More tax cuts for wealthy people who don’t need them, and who already have all the care that they need.
Now we have reached number two, of the top 10 most destructive acts of the administration — Trump’s undermining of the rule of law.
The assault on the rule of law began almost immediately, with the pardon of 1,550 people who committed one of the most serious offenses in the nation’s history — attacking the U.S. Capitol to stop the peaceful transfer of power. In granting pardons to hundreds of offenders who used violence that day against police officers, Donald Trump sent a powerful message to his followers: that they may use violence on his behalf and he would have their back, that he would insulate them from the law and from accountability. And more than that, that he would promote them, advocate for them, appoint them to high positions in a new justice department, a department oriented not towards justice, not devoted to a rule of law, but devoted only to him.
In Trump’s justice department, we are no longer a nation of laws, but a nation of men, to be rewarded or punished according to the president’s whims. A mayor of New York charged with corruption has his case dismissed, not because of any prosecutorial misconduct or lack of evidence, but because he is useful to the president on an unrelated policy matter.
In Trump’s justice department, the absence of evidence or lawful predication is no bar to initiating a criminal investigation, when a political pretext will do. He is using the department as both sword and shield — a sword to pursue his enemies and a shield to protect his friends, and to protect no one more than himself.
A president given immunity by Supreme Court justices he appointed — acting like a convicted felon because he is a convicted felon — now engaging in the most blatant graft and corruption, accepting gifts and gratuities, airplanes and commissions, in the hundreds of millions, in the billions, and without any fear of investigation, let alone prosecution. The inspector generals are gone. The watchdogs are gone. Only the dogs are left, to feed on the carrion that was the rule of law.
When courts try to restrain the Trump administration’s illegality, his departments ignore their orders. We saw it with the Alien Enemies Act. We see it with the unlawful impoundment of FEMA funds. With the lawless withholding of state funding. With attacks on foreign assistance appropriated by Congress. With racial profiling, and illegal renditions to foreign prisons without due process, or frankly any kind of process.
Which takes me to the number one way in which Donald Trump and this administration are wrecking this country, and that is, by destroying the very idea of America.
Our nation was formed as an improbable experiment, an experiment based on the unproven idea that people possessed sufficient virtue to be self-governing, that we did not need to be ruled by a tyrant. From that humble and daring beginning, the idea grew, that a country so constituted, so organized, could not only rule itself, but could attract the best and brightest, the most industrious of souls from all over the earth and make them Americans. That there would be no caste system in America, that here, anyone with the drive, the talent and the intellect could prosper. That there were no limits to what we could achieve. That idea — that became America — was our most powerful appeal, our calling card, at home and around the world.
It has driven people to our shores. It has inspired people in dark prison cells in Iran, in labor camps in China, in gulags in Russia, and in impoverished places everywhere to dream of America, what it stands for, and what it might mean to them, if only they were so lucky, so very lucky, to one day move to this great place called America.
And Donald Trump’s destruction of that idea, the idea of America, as the last best hope of mankind, is the worst offense of this administration.
During Ronald Reagan’s final speech as president, he spoke of a man who wrote to him of the uniqueness of America: ‘You can go to live in France,’ the man wrote, ‘but you cannot become a Frenchman. You can go to live in Germany or Turkey or Japan, but you cannot become a German, a Turk, or a Japanese. But anyone, from any corner of the Earth, can come to live in America and become an American.’”
“Other countries,” Reagan said, “may seek to compete with us; but in one vital area, as a beacon of freedom and opportunity that draws the people of the world, no country on Earth comes close.
“This,” he said, “is one of the most important sources of America’s greatness. We lead the world because, unique among nations, we draw our people — our strength — from every country and every corner in the world. And by doing so we continuously renew and enrich our nation. While other countries cling to the stale past, here in America we breathe life into dreams. We create the future, and the world follows us into tomorrow. Thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity, we’re a nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge, always leading the world to the next frontier. This quality is vital to our future as a nation. If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.”
That was Ronald Reagan. But now we have Donald Trump, a president who, more than any other in our history, “clings to a stale past.”
I can forgive the president for his reckless tariff policies, for his sycophantic hires, or his foolish tax giveaways to the rich. But I will never forgive him for the damage he has done, and for the damage he continues to do, to the very idea of America, for how the rest of the world now views this country, and more critically, more catastrophically, how we have come to view ourselves.
Tackling immigrants to the ground, people who are landscapers, or farm workers, or restaurant workers or garment workers, let alone beating them while they lay there, as agents did the father of three U.S. Marines, is not how Americans treat the hardworking people who come here in search of a better life. Using the military against our own citizens, sowing chaos and division in our cities, is not consistent with the idea of America. That is not an America confident of its future and of its place in the world, able to inspire people around the world, able to see the best in ourselves.
On a day that Benjamin Franklin watched our nation being formed, on a day he witnessed George Washington preside over the constitutional convention, seated in a chair with an image of the sun embossed on the top, Franklin pulled some colleagues aside, and remarked about how artists often have a difficult time distinguishing between a rising and a setting sun in their art.
“I have often,” Franklin said, “and often, in the course of the session… looked at that [emblem] behind the President, without being able to tell whether it was rising or setting. But now at length, I have the happiness to know, that it is a rising and not a setting sun.”
Today, I know, a great many Americans fear that our sun is setting, but I do not believe that. I have more faith in America than that. We have overcome far greater challenges in our history than our present difficulties. And those who would bet against this country would be wise not to, those who have, are far more likely to be proven the losers than the winners of that bet.
The sun is not setting on our republic, but eclipse-like, it is obscured, and the actions of this administration have cast a kind of shadowy darkness over the land.
Though our sun is not setting, neither is it rising, nor will it rise of its own accord. In this respect, Franklin’s celestial metaphor falls short. We have no control over the sun. Our orbit has been predetermined by forces well beyond our time and understanding. We are powerless to change its trajectory. But we are not powerless to change our own. We are not powerless to save our country, to remember who we are, to once again capture the imagination, the hopes, and aspirations of a weary mankind.
Our sun, America’s sun, will rise again and shine brightly unto ourselves and to all nations. But it will take all of us, working together and well into the future, to make it so. Until then, we must press on, doing all we can to mitigate the harms of the current administration until we can end them, until we can bind up our nation’s wounds as Lincoln said, and begin again the sacred work of restoring the very best of America.
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WATCH: Sen. Schiff Outlines 10 Ways Trump is Wrecking the Country, Redefining the Idea of America
*“I will never forgive him for the damage he has done, and for the damage he continues to do, to the very idea of America, for how the rest of the world now views this country, and more critically, more catastrophically, how we have come to view ourselves.”
MOST CORRUPT ACTS 6 25
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mta lauren greene water bd pfas met him 5 25 swalwell?
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#WethePeopleAmendment has two new cosponsors--Rep Nikema Williams (GA-5) and Rep Adam Schiff (CA-28). We are now at 93 cosponsors, our most yet!
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email form: Contact - Senator Schiff
ltr: 112 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington D.C. 20510
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- U.S. Senator from California
- Email: https://www.schiff.senate.gov/contact/
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OTHER STAFF PHONE
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Patrick Boland - Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) (Dec. 2024-) ... LegiStorm
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Contact Information ; Address: SD-B40B Dirksen Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510 ; Phone: 202-224-3841 ...
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Staff
Chief of Staff Patrick Boland eshoo
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Education Issues Danielle Fulfs
I serve as Policy Director for Senator Adam Schiff. I was previously his Deputy Chief of Staff & Legislative Director in the House of Representatives. My past experience includes roles in Whip Katherine Clark's office, as well as Representative Pramila Jayapal's office. Prior to coming to Washington, DC, I worked in the advocacy space with a focus on criminal justice reform. I received an M.A. from the Committee on International Relations at the University of Chicago and a B.A. in Political Science and International Studies from Loyola University Chicago.
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Texan. Press and comms stuff. Texan. Press and comms stuff.
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Matt Hennessey
Matt Hennessey
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief of Staff | U.S. Senator Elissa SlotkinChief of Staff | U.S. Senator Elissa Slotkin
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Dahvi Cohen profile picture
Dahvi Cohen
Dahvi Cohen
· 3rdThird degree connection
Legislative Assistant at U.S. SenateLegislative Assistant at U.S. Senate
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Carlos Sanchez profile picture
Carlos Sanchez
Carlos Sanchez
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief of Staff, Senator Ben Ray LujanChief of Staff, Senator Ben Ray Lujan
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Noelle Rosellini profile picture
Noelle Rosellini
Noelle Rosellini
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief of StaffChief of Staff
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Clayton Armentrout profile picture
Clayton Armentrout
Clayton Armentrout
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief of Staff at United States SenateChief of Staff at United States Senate
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Joel Kelsey profile picture
Joel Kelsey
Joel Kelsey
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief Of Staff, United States Senator Richard BlumenthalChief Of Staff, United States Senator Richard Blumenthal
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Tim Hysom
Administrative Director at U.S. Senator Adam B. SchiffAdministrative Director at U.S. Senator Adam B. Schiff
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Jennifer MacLellan profile picture
Jennifer MacLellan
Jennifer MacLellan
· 3rdThird degree connection
Deputy Chief of Staff at United States SenateDeputy Chief of Staff at United States Senate
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Danielle Fulfs profile picture
Danielle Fulfs
Danielle Fulfs
· 3rdThird degree connection
Policy Director in the United States SenatePolicy Director in the United States Senate
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Daniel Zawitoski profile picture
Daniel Zawitoski
Daniel Zawitoski
· 3rdThird degree connection
Experienced Government Affairs StrategistExperienced Government Affairs Strategist
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Wesley Fink profile picture
Wesley Fink
Wesley Fink
· 3rdThird degree connection
Staff Assistant at United States SenateStaff Assistant at United States Senate
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Jackson Boaz
Digital + Press @ Sen. Adam SchiffDigital + Press @ Sen. Adam Schiff
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Ken R. profile picture
Ken R.
Ken R.
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief Of Staff for Senator Tammy BaldwinChief Of Staff for Senator Tammy Baldwin
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Krysta Juris profile picture
Krysta Juris
Krysta Juris
· 3rdThird degree connection
Chief of Staff | United States SenateChief of Staff | United States Senate
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Adam D. Schiff profile picture
Adam D. Schiff
Adam D. Schiff
· 3rdThird degree connection
Agriculture Legislative Assistant at Office of U.S. Senator Tina SmithAgriculture Legislative Assistant at Office of U.S. Senator Tina Smith
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Dahvi Cohen
Legislative Assistant at U.S. SenateLegislative Assistant at U.S. Senate
Heidy Melchor
Public Policy | UCLA Alumna | CHCI AlumnaPublic Policy | UCLA Alumna | CHCI Alumna
Leighton Huch
Policy Director at New Democrat CoalitionPolicy Director at New Democrat Coalition
Ngoc Nguyen
Deputy Chief of StaffDeputy Chief of Staff
Noelle Rosellini
Chief of StaffChief of Staff
Steven Park
Foreign Affairs SpecialistForeign Affairs Specialist
Jackson Boaz
Digital + Press @ Sen. Adam SchiffDigital + Press @ Sen. Adam Schiff
Zach Grossman
Deputy Chief of Staff/Legislative Director at U.S. House of RepresentativesDeputy Chief of Staff/Legislative Director at U.S. House of Representatives
Jamie M. Thompson
Senior Legislative Assistant at U.S. House of RepresentativesSenior Legislative Assistant at U.S. House of Representatives
Kyle Abrams
Director of Scheduling/Policy Advisor, U.S. House of RepresentativesDirector of Scheduling/Policy Advisor, U.S. House of Representatives
Ryan Flanagan
Digital Organizing Director - California Democratic PartyDigital Organizing Director - California Democratic Party
Kaitlyn Kelly
Senior Policy Advisor at U.S. House of RepresentativesSenior Policy Advisor at U.S. House of Representatives
Tim Hysom
Administrative Director at U.S. Senator Adam B. SchiffAdministrative Director at U.S. Senator Adam B. Schiff
Madeleine Barry
Special Projects Director at Schiff for SenateSpecial Projects Director at Schiff for Senate
Rebecca Schatz
Legislative Director at U.S. SenateLegislative Director at U.S. Senate
Katie A.
Deputy Political Director, Adam Schiff for U.S. SenateDeputy Political Director, Adam Schiff for U.S. Senate
Marisol Samayoa
Communications DirectorCommunications Director
Faith Florez
Staff Assistant Staff Assistant
Christina B.
Legislative Aide - Senator Adam SchiffLegislative Aide - Senator Adam Schiff
Barrett Ahn
International Politics Student at Georgetown UniversityInternational Politics Student at Georgetown University
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1 25
California’s newest U.S. Senator, Adam Schiff, who formerly represented portions of Pasadena as a Congressman, announced Thursday he had been assigned to four committees, including the Senate Judiciary Committee, as he embarks on a full term replacing the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein.
According to Schiff’s office, he will serve on the Senate committees on the Judiciary; Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry; Environment and Public Works; and Small Business and Entrepreneurship.
“I am grateful for the opportunity to serve on four committees of keen interest to all Californians,” Schiff said in a statement. “These assignments will allow me to work directly on the high cost of housing and other inflation issues, to support our critical agriculture industry, to address crime and public safety concerns, to support our small businesses, to attack fentanyl, to reform our broken immigration system, to preserve and protect our environment, to deliver vital water and transportation infrastructure, to protect our democracy, rights and our freedoms, and so much more. I’m committed to working across the aisle to deliver for Californians in the U.S. Senate and eager to get started.”
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VOUGHT FILIBUSTER 2/5/25
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Trump's Attorney General nominee Pam Bondi faced intense questioning during her confirmation hearing. Senators Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla challenged Bondi on her independence and past statements. The session led to Bondi verbally clashing with Schiff and Padilla.
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