Hi valued readers of Rachel’s Notebook,
I have two stories to share tonight -
One I co-wrote with my Intercept editor Ryan Grim about a new progressive challenger in an Ohio congressional district gerrymandered for Democrats. 36-year-old Morgan Harper, a Columbus native who spent her first nine months in foster care and wound up working as a senior official for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has mounted a bid against Rep. Joyce Beatty, who has represented her district in D.C since 2013. There’s a lot of tension these days over Democrats primarying other Democrats in safe blue districts, and Ryan and I explore those elements in the story.
If you’ve seen the news recently about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi taking swipes at Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, and/or if you saw headlines about veteran lawmakers in the Congressional Black Caucus speaking out against Justice Democrats—the national organization that helped elect AOC and supports primarying Democrats—you’ll probably get a lot out of this piece. (And if none of that has crossed your radar, no worries, we’ll catch up you in the story!)
Read it here: How Morgan Harper’s Ohio Primary Challenge Explains the House Democratic Meltdown
The second piece is a look at how the 2020 Democratic candidates for president are talking about charter schools on the campaign trail. Some candidates have come out behind policies to limit charter schools, some are voicing more critical rhetoric about charters, and others are offering notably muted defenses. As someone who has followed charter school politics for a while, I can tell you it’s a significant shift from years past, and reflects what I see as three main trends: a competitive effort by candidates to court teacher unions (which have long opposed charters), an effort by candidates to distance themselves from the unpopular Trump administration and Betsy DeVos, and a substantial recent drop in support for charters among white voters. The charter movement’s loss of clout within the Democratic party is one of the more surprising developments this election cycle.
You can read it The American Prospect here.
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