29 weeks to Midterm Elections
The AoC Checklist features clear, well-researched actions for Americans who value democracy, equality, voting, and decency. We are a big tent for all people who want a kinder, flourishing nation.
If you only have 10 minutes, take our top three suggested actions:
- Tell bank CEOs to stop funding fossil fuel and deforestation.
- Thank Republican senators who voted to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court.
- Urge clemency for a man unfairly sentenced to death.
In this edition of the AoC Checklist:
- Senate actions: What we’re contacting our senators about.
- House actions: What we’re contacting our House reps about.
- Action 1: Get 18-year-olds registered to vote.
- Action 2: Distribute voter guides to marginalized voters.
- Action 3: Oppose state legislation that threatens election workers.
- Action 4: Urge clemency for a man unfairly sentenced to death.
- Action 5: Tell bank CEOs to stop funding fossil fuel and deforestation.
- Action 6: Share your story on the value of reproductive freedom.
- Action 7: Oppose a state’s unconstitutional immigration enforcement program.
- Say Thanks: Acts of Gratitude
- Check out Good News from around the nation
- How you can support and share the AoC Checklist
Contact your senators
Check the box if you made contact–whether for one issue or all–so we can count your action.
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
Your script: Hi, I’m from [ZIP] calling/writing about several issues. I’d like Sen. [NAME] to:
- Work to ensure that people of African and Middle Eastern descent (including those fleeing Ukraine) receive the same humanitarian asylum priority as caucasian Ukrainian refugees. [Sources: Human Rights First, AILA]
- Support the immediate end of discriminatory Title 42 and vote no on the Public Health and Border Security Act of 2022. [Source: Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project]
- Support extending the expanded Earned Income Tax Credit that supports people working in critical, low-paying jobs, even if they aren’t raising kids. [Source: Center On Budget]
- Support the President’s proposed budget increase for homelessness and housing assistance. [Source: National Alliance to End Homelessness]
- Pass the Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act (S. 3285) to ensure meat and poultry workers have essential protections. [Source: Public Justice Food Project]
Contact your House representative
Check the box if you made contact–whether for one issue or all–so we can count your action.
Look up your House representative here.
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
Your script: Hi, I’m from [ZIP] calling/writing about several issues. I’d like Rep. [NAME] to:
- Support extending the same welcome Ukrainian refugees receive to African, Hispanic, and Asian people fleeing similar violence in their home countries. [Sources: Human Rights First, AILA]
- Extend the expanded Earned Income Tax Credit to that supports people working in critical, low-paying jobs, even if they aren’t raising kids. [Source: Center On Budget]
- Support the President’s proposed budget increase for homelessness and housing assistance, and add their name to Rep. Gwen Moore’s “Dear Colleague” letter. [Source: National Alliance to End Homelessness]
- Pass the Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act (H.R. 6250) to ensure meat and poultry workers have essential protections. [Source: Public Justice Food Project]
I value democracy
With respect and collaboration, we work to create a nation that welcomes all people, expands freedoms, and upholds the Constitution. Each citizen must be able to freely and fairly elect those who represent their values.
Action 1: Get 18-year-olds registered to vote.
Source: The Civics Center
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
Of all U.S. 18-year-olds, just 20% are registered to vote. Without intervention, millions will be unable to vote this November. Our partner, The Civics Center, is launching the Class of 2022 Ready to Vote Challenge which empowers high school seniors to register to vote before graduation (or to pledge or preregister to vote if not yet eligible). Volunteers are needed for virtual help.
Sign up: For The Civic Center Volunteer workshop to learn how volunteers can get involved in this nonpartisan campaign on Tuesday, April 19, at 4:30pm PT/7:30pm ET.
Action 2: Distribute voter guides to marginalized voters.
Source: Spread the Vote
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
In addition to working to get IDs into the hands of 21 million eligible American voters, our partner Spread The Vote is launching a campaign to produce and distribute non-partisan voter guides. You can help empower voters to plan their vote and get to the polls for primaries and midterms.
Support: Spread the Vote by donating $5/month. Here’s how.
Action 3: Oppose state legislation that threatens election workers.
Source: Voting Rights Lab
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
In response to the myth that Biden stole the 2020 election, many extreme leaders have introduced undemocratic state bills that interfere with elections, including threatening election workers with criminal penalties.
If you live in AL, AZ, GA, IL, KS, KY, MI, MO, MS, NC, NE, NH, OH, OK, PA, VA, WA, WI, WV: Contact both your state legislators to share that you do not support current bills that threaten election workers for doing their jobs (look up).
If you live in the other 31 states: Lawyers are needed to defend election workers. Share, sign up, or donate to the Election Official Legal Defense Network: https://eoldn.org
I value equality
Support the dignity of your rainbow of neighbors from every religion, race, ethnicity, culture, gender, sexual orientation, economic status, age, and ability.
Action 4: Urge clemency for a man unfairly sentenced to death.
Source: MADP
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty are urging Missouri Governor Mike Parson to grant clemency to Carman Deck and commute his sentence to life without parole. Let’s raise our voices with them.
Action 5: Tell bank CEOs to stop funding fossil fuel and deforestation.
Source: Indigenous Environmental Network
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
Since the 2015 adoption of the Paris Agreement, the world’s 60 largest banks have invested $4.6 trillion in fossil fuels—contrary to their long-term climate pledges. This spring, shareholders in six of the largest U.S. banks will vote on resolutions calling for policies that honor banks’ long-term climate commitments.
Sign: The open letter to big bank CEOs.
Bonus: Add your name to ask bank shareholders to insist on an end to fossil fuel expansion in time for April shareholder meetings.
For each of the above petitions, click “Edit subscription preferences” under the “Sign my name!” button to opt out of emails.
Action 6: Share your story on the value of reproductive freedom.
Source: Grandmothers for Reproductive Rights
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
In anticipation of a Supreme Court decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, Grandmothers for Reproductive Rights has launched a program to amplify the stories of those who had abortions years ago, and what those decisions made possible in their lives.
Consider sharing your story: With Grandmothers for Reproductive Rights if you had an abortion before Roe v. Wade.
Action 7: Oppose a state’s unconstitutional immigration enforcement program.
Source: Mijente
Join the 0 Americans of Conscience who have completed this action by checking the tally box!
Contact: The Department of Justice (DOJ)
(202) 353-1555, contact form, or by mail.
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001
Script: Hello, I’m contacting you from [STATE] to express my concern about Operation Lone Star, an unconstitutional Texas program that violates civil rights of people through racial profiling and biased policing. This program has incurred over 2,000 charges of sexual assault, stalking, and other crimes. I value respect and join more than 100 organizations urging the DOJ to initiate a formal Title VI investigation. Funding must be terminated immediately to Texas agencies and counties engaged in these discriminatory and unlawful acts.
Acts of Gratitude
Signatures to the forms below will be printed with a letter of thanks from Americans of Conscience, and mailed to the recipient 2 weeks after the Checklist publication date. Your information will not be stored after that date.
Thank Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D–MI) for filing a lawsuit to uphold the right to abortion in Michigan.
If you’d like to mail your own personal expression of gratitude, use this address: P.O. Box 30013, Lansing, MI 48909
Thank Sens. Susan Collins (R–ME), Lisa Murkowski (R–AK), and Mitt Romney (R–UT) for voting to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court.
If you’d like to mail your own personal expression of gratitude, use these addresses:
SC: 413 Dirksen SOB, Washington, DC 20510
LM: 522 Hart SOB, Washington, DC 20510
MR: 354 Russell SOB, Washington, DC 20510
Bonus: Thank your Democratic senators (find addresses here) for voting to confirm Judge Jackson to SCOTUS.
Good News
As Americans of Conscience, we celebrate!
Progress on actions previously featured in the AoC Checklist
- Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson is confirmed by the Senate to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, becoming the first Black woman in the nation’s history to receive a SCOTUS confirmation.
- Congress passes and the president signs the Postal Service Reform Act, which will uphold USPS efficiency and funding.
- A Montana district court temporarily blocks four election administration laws that would have impacted Native voters, elderly and disabled voters, and other groups’ access to the ballot.
- New York voters with certain disabilities will be able to cast their votes via a new electronic method that will allow them to print out ballots online and mail them back.
- The Biden Administration will end discriminatory Title 42 effective May 23.
Tribal
- The Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation regains rightful control of their rights to the minerals under the Missouri River.
- The Rappahannock Tribe regains rightful control of 465 acres of their land.
National
- Due to the ongoing pandemic, President Biden extends the pause on federal student loan payments through August 31.
- The Bureau of Land Management pauses all oil and gas activities in the Chaco Canyon region until a final decision is made regarding the lawfulness of fracking on 45,000 acres in the area.
- CDC.gov adds a wastewater surveillance tracker to monitor early indicators of COVID-19 spread in communities.
- Passport applicants can now select the gender neutral “X” marker on their forms.
State
- CO enshrines the right to abortion without government interference into law.
- CO: Federal court dismisses a lawsuit that would have ended the state’s open primary system.
- FL: Federal court rules that multiple provisions of a state voting law are unconstitutional and that the legislature must first get court approval before passing future voting legislation.
- MD legislature overrides the governor’s veto and expands access to abortion.
- RI: LGBTQ students and community allies protest and testify against a proposed discriminatory education bill.
Local
- West High students in Salt Lake City walk out to protest a discriminatory anti-trans athletics bill.
- Palm Springs, CA City Council approves funding for a pilot program that will provide transgender and nonbinary residents with no-strings-attached universal basic income.
- Cincinnati invests in electric vehicle charging stations and electric police vehicles.
- Tens of thousands of books have been returned to NYC libraries since late fees were eliminated.
Corporate and organizations
- Yelp will cover expenses for employees and their spouses who must travel out of state for abortion care.
- Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to be represented by the independent Amazon Labor Union (ALU).
- 25 scientists glue themselves to the UK Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy to highlight the climate science the government is ignoring.
- Engineers at Stanford invent a solar panel that generates electricity at night.
News with heart
- Child protective service workers in Texas resign rather than comply with a discriminatory order to unnecessarily and invasively investigate trans youths’ families.
- Janice Pettyjohn is hired as Howard University’s assistant director of football operations, becoming the first woman to ever be hired for a full-time football position at the university.
- Organizations refurbish medical equipment to help meet people’s needs in the midst of supply chain shortages.
To Support the Checklist
The AoC Checklist helps you speak up to create a better democracy for all and is always ad-free and no-cost. Our volunteer team vets hundreds of organizations’ calls-to-action and writes them up succinctly and without partisan language so that it’s easy for you to speak up. It takes hundreds of hours and has real costs to operate, becoming a patron would support the continuity of our work.
Thank you so much for doing this work. I often feel so overwhelmed by the mountain of crushing bureaucratic oppression and doom and gloom with the climate and horribleness that I do nothing and revert to escapism to cope with my own feelings of powerlessness. The work you so makes it so accessible to do SOMETHING to make a difference. I appreciate you so much. Thank you, thank you, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
You are so welcome. It’s an honor for us to serve our nation this way. And to be completely honest, most of our team feels similarly too. It’s a normal human reaction to want to escape when faced with the limits of our individual power. Remembering that it’s our collective effort over time that leads to change makes it (for me) a little easier to persevere. Just know you’re in good company. 🙂
Thank you for still being here. I came back and I’m so glad I did.
Sometimes you need a break, but you can always pick back up again. Thank you for being here too! We create change together.