Despite being elected to move away from Trump policies of the past, despite a clear reckoning on our priorities in the wake of COVID, and despite the fact that budgets are moral documents, President Biden is likely to propose a $740 BILLION budget that would keep Pentagon spending at Trump-era levels. Disappointed doesn’t begin to cut it. We’re furious. A growing chorus in Congress is too. But while Congress, not the White House, is ultimately in control of the purse strings, progressive champions can’t stop this budget on their own. That’s why we need to turn the pressure up even higher, and remind everyone in Congress and the White House: We want our priorities put back in order and that means cutting the Pentagon budget.

Right now, concrete is being dumped into sacred lands of the Okinawan people for the construction of a new U.S. military base. With over 800 military bases around the world already, the construction of another base is not only harming the Okinawan people but ramping up the threat of war. 2021 has to be the year we finally close the new base in Okinawa and begin a pathway towards peace in the Pacific — and we do that by closing down our foreign military bases and building up diplomacy. We’re in a unique, but narrow opportunity with President Biden in office to raise the alarms on this, and other, disastrous bases. That means we’ve got to jump into action and urge Defense Secretary Austin to stop the construction NOW — and we need your help in getting LOUD.

The media and many irresponsible politicians are completely failing to meet this moment in history by focusing on a symptom of a global economic and health crisis -- families and unaccompanied minors at the U.S./Mexico border -- rather than its root causes. Recently asked by President Biden to lead "the administration’s efforts to deter migration to the southwestern border by working to improve conditions in Central America," Vice President Kamala Harris can help turn things around by -- among other things -- prioritizing COVID-19 vaccine access for Central America and other countries immigrants are currently fleeing from in this time of a global health and economic crisis. No matter how many oversimplified anecdotes journalists collect, or public officials that say it, pretending that people risk their lives and leave everything they know just because a President in a different country is a "nice guy" has to be one of the most ridiculous stories our pandemic has produced yet. To suggest that either talking tough, more enforcement, or the further criminalization of immigrants is a solution to this crisis is not just irresponsible (we now have decades of data that prove the opposite) -- it is also dangerous. This is dangerous not just for immigrants and their countries of origin, who bear the brunt of this harmful thinking, but really for all of us in the U.S. and around the world when our best shot at a better future right now is directing every spare resource we have towards stamping out COVID-19. With VP Kamala Harris leading these latest efforts, she has a real opportunity to help send this message, to save lives, and to economically assist Central America and the world by prioritizing vaccine access for all. If enough of us sign-on and share this, we'll help give her the support she needs to do so. With dueling health, economic, and climate crises -- vaccine access isn't the only thing Central America and immigrants need right now -- but it could be the beginning of the spark needed to start moving towards a world where people migrate out of want, and not out of need. That's our only chance at ever stopping the negative effects associated with immigration. Until then, we need to take this moment in history as another reminder that we can't wall off our problems. Viruses know no borders. We either liberate ourselves together or not at all. Any journalist or public official that thinks otherwise is failing all of us.

President Biden is being applauded by Jared Kushner — the very person who was catastrophic to U.S. foreign policy. When Kushner followed his father-in-law into the White House, we had successful, working nuclear agreement between Iran, the United States, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Russia, and China. But they decided it would be better to walk away from that successful deal to make childish threats, launch new military misadventures, and put us right back on the path to war with Iran. President Biden should listen to US — not Jared Kushner! During the Trump years, we repeatedly came close to all out war with Iran. If the United States doesn’t move toward for diplomacy now, we’ll be right back on the brink of war. Jared Kushner supporting Biden’s approach to Iran is a bad sign. Now’s the time to choose peace and diplomacy, and it’s up to us to make it happen. Can you add your name to our note urging President Biden to join the Iran deal and walk away from Trump’s catastrophic policies?

While President Biden has made the right promises, actions speak louder than words. The airstrikes against targets in Syria that he authorized undermine those promises and risk escalating tensions in the Middle East. Last year Congress passed a War Powers Resolution in response to an unconstitutional airstrike and Trump refused to sign it. We need a War Powers Resolution that sends a clear message that only Congress, not the president, can approve military strikes like the one President Biden launched in Syria. We need fewer wars, and less military tension. We need Congress to act.

The Biden Administration has just released a U.S. intelligence report that clearly states that "Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman approved an operation in Istanbul, Turkey to capture or kill Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi." (1) But while the U.S. government has placed sanctions on many of the assassins involved, the Biden Administration has not placed sanctions on the man who ordered the assassination -- Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman. (2) Under the U.S. law the Global Magnitsky Act, the U.S. government can place property sanctions and a U.S. travel ban on human rights violators. (3) By not placing sanctions on Saudi Arabia's brutal ruler, the Biden Administration is sending the terrible signal that the U.S. will maintain its relationship with Saudi Arabia's dictatorship instead of standing up for human rights. President Biden should immediately place a travel ban and sanctions on Mohammed bin Salman. It is time for the U.S. to end its alliance with the Saudi monarchy. (1) https://freedomforward.org/2021/02/26/u-s-intelligence-report-on-saudi-monarchys-murder-of-jamal-khashoggi-pdf/ (2) https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/26/jamal-khashoggi-mohammed-bin-salman-us-report (3) https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/09/13/us-global-magnitsky-act

Recent U.S. airstrikes in Syria on alleged Iranian-backed militias are a stark reminder of the choice we face: continue the same failed “maximum pressure” campaign towards Iran with its countless deaths and unrest OR take the proven path of peace by returning to diplomacy. Missile strikes, retaliatory bombings, and the ever-present danger of all out war aren’t inevitable. The good news is, there’s an offramp toward diplomacy available right now. President Biden has to take it by rejoining the Iran deal (the JCPOA if we’re being fancy) — quickly. Rejoining the Iran deal is the ONLY way off Trump’s path to war with Iran. And it’s up to us to show the Biden administration that there is a MASSIVE movement of people who want a world built on peace and justice, not senseless war.

A just-declassified intelligence report directly implicates Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) in Jamal Khashoggi’s murder and dismemberment at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018. The U.S. government must act immediately to hold MBS accountable. The Saudi regime has expertly lobbied, donated, and flattered U.S. decisionmakers from both parties for years, and Biden’s team is not automatically immune from this corruption and influence. With the declassification of the ODNI intelligence report, we have a chance to shine a light on this corruption — and we’ve got to seize this moment to provide justice for Jamal Khashoggi. Add your name to urge President Biden to use his authority under the Global Magnitsky Act to sanction Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

A nonprofit organization, COVAX, will help with distribution of more than 800,000 of the Astra Zeneca Covid vaccines to the Guatemalan government. These 800,000 vaccines will give priority to vaccinating healthcare workers. However, these 800,000 doses will only be enough to vaccinate approximately 2% of the Guatemalan population, given that two doses are required. Moreover, the efficacy of this vaccine after the 2nd dose is only 70%, which is a much lower efficacy than those vaccines being given in the U.S. Most of the population of Guatemala cannot expect to receive vaccines until at least the end of 2022.

Early in February, President Biden formally issued a proclamation to end the fake “national emergency” Trump declared on the U.S.-Mexico border. But as of right now, 3,600 active duty troops are staying put. People seeking safety and asylum should be met with humanitarian aid and open arms. Instead, the U.S.-Mexico border is a place of chemical weapons, detention centers, barbed wire, walls, and active duty troops. While Biden is making positive moves, unless the U.S. southern border — and U.S. immigration policy — is fully demilitarized, there’s no way they’ll ever be enough to truly get us away from where we’ve been. We’ve got to start moving toward where our professed values push us to be. And we’ve got to do it fast. The militarization of the border has got to end. It will, but only if we show the Biden administration that there’s massive public support for them to do it.

Millions of people around the world may not get COVID-19 vaccines until as late as 2024--unless President Biden reverses the Trump administration’s deadly Big Pharma boondoggle at the World Trade Organization (WTO).

In a world full of walls, social media is a powerful tool to help us share our stories and support one another and our common humanity — no matter our religion, race or nationality. We know Facebook is considering its responsibility to implement guardrails to keep the platform safe and accessible for us to connect across space and difference. But we are deeply concerned about Facebook's proposed revision of its hate speech policy to consider "Zionist" as a proxy for "Jew" or "Jewish." The proposed policy would too easily mischaracterize conversations about Zionists — and by extension, Zionism — as inherently antisemitic, harming Facebook users and undermining efforts to dismantle real antisemitism and all forms of racism, extremism and oppression. We cannot dismantle antisemitism if we are blocked from voicing our opinions and sharing our experiences with each other. We can discuss, debate and even disagree, as long as we share the belief that all of us deserve safety, freedom, and dignity. We ask Facebook to not erect barriers impeding users from connecting with each other as we engage in this work. This is the wrong solution to a real and important problem: those who fuel antisemitism online will continue doing so, with or without the word “Zionist.” In fact, many antisemites, especially among white supremacists and evangelical Christian Zionists, explicitly support Zionism and Israel, while engaging in speech and actions that dehumanize, insult, and isolate Jewish people. Importantly, this move will prohibit Palestinians from sharing their daily experiences and histories with the world, be it a photo of the keys to their grandparent’s house lost when attacked by Zionist militias in 1948, or a livestream of Zionist settlers attacking their olive trees in 2021. And it would prevent Jewish users from discussing their relationships to Zionist political ideology. Facebook scrutinizing specific words won’t keep any of us safe, but it will prevent us from connecting on the political issues important to all of us and block us from holding people and governments accountable for their policies and actions. The current Israeli government, and some of its supporters, have demanded that Facebook add “Zionist” to its hate speech policy. This would shut down conversations about accountability for policies and actions that harm Palestinians. Facebook should refuse to cooperate with those who seek to build more walls to keep us apart. We call on Facebook to not add “Zionist” as a protected category in its hate speech policy.