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Write to Biden/DNC to urge messaging shift on economy - use my template below if u agree [1]

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Date: 2023-11-21  

I just sent this to the general comment inbox of the DNC. Feel free to modify as you wish and send to any and all Dems who might be able to get the message through. I’m especially looking for ways to email Julie Chavez Rodriguez, Biden’s campaign manager. If readers know how to contact her or her staff, please share that info in comments. Here’s what I wrote to the DNC:

Hi fellow Dems,

I'm a proud Dem in PA. I'm worried about how Biden and his team are messaging re the economy. They seem eager to tout all the good news (and there has been much), but they seem unable to acknowledge that the daily experience of millions of working people is that too many essentials are still too expensive (especially groceries). There's a grumpy vibe I feel from the Biden team when it expresses resentment that the media or the general public can't seem to acknowledge all the data showing that the economy is doing well. We can fume about the media, but wewould be better off if we accepted that their ongoing narrative is negative, and if we adapted to make the concerns that that narrative reflects work for our team.

We need to be saying “the economy is still suffering from the pandemic, and as a result too many basic items are still too expensive. We’ve made good progress healing the economy and we can see that in terms of job growth, strong unions, and growing wages, but we know there’s still a lot of people stretching to pay the bills, and we won’t stop fighting for working people until we get more and more of those high prices to come back down.” I fear that the message Biden’s folks are putting out too often tries to tell people how good the economy is when that clashes with their lived experience at the supermarket.

I hope Biden's team will pivot, and start naming loud and clear that too many things are still too expensive for working folks, and that this is because there's more work to do to heal the damage COVID did to the economy. Lead with empathy about that. Then tell us how team Biden is working to bring those prices down and to point to where their economic work has started to succeed in the form of lower prices (gas prices, lots of other retail goods besides groceries, etc.) And then tell us the diff btw how they will keep fighting for all of us vs what Trump and the GOP would do (cut taxes for zillionaires, let big companies wreck our environment, and basically not have a plan). I am worried about Biden creating a disconnect with working people that Trump will exploit.

I am hopeful that his team will shift, and go with the kind of messaging I suggest above when they start campaigning hard. They can still brag about the things that are going great — the big data about inflation easing, the massive job growth, the rise in wages, the UAW stories — but the narrative should be that those wins are reasons why the people should believe in their ability to tackle the remaining problems, and to keep telling people that they know many of them are struggling and they care and are on their side. Biden is so good at connecting with people with his natural empathy that he's an ideal candidate for this kind of message.

Thanks for listening.

Rabbi Maurice Harris

PS — I wrote to the DNC at democrats.org/...

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