Justice Democrats


Justice Democrats is an American progressive political action committee founded on January 23, 2017, by Kyle Kulinski of Secular Talk, Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks, Saikat Chakrabarti, and Zack Exley, former leaders from the 2016 Bernie Sanders presidential campaign. Kulinski and Uygur are no longer affiliated with the group but remain active supporters. Alexandra Rojas became executive director of the organization in May 2018. The organization formed as a result of the 2016 United States presidential election and aspires "to elect a new type of Democratic majority in Congress" that would "create a thriving economy and democracy that works for the people, not big money interests".
Members of the Justice Democrats espouse that all campaigns need donations and that candidates who hold policies viewed as unfavorable by corporate interests and wealthy individuals will be denied funding by corporations. The organization advocates reducing the role of money in politics and only endorses candidates who pledge to refuse donations from corporate PACs and lobbyists.
The organization was noted for issuing a much smaller set of endorsements in 2020 than it did in 2018. Communications Director Waleed Shahid has justified this as an effort to focus the group's resources on the most promising candidates.

History

After the 2016 presidential election resulted in a victory for Donald Trump, many progressives pointed to the perceived loyalty of politicians to large donors as a major contributing factor to Hillary Clinton's loss to Trump. These critics contend that a campaign finance model more similar to that of Bernie Sanders, whose 2016 presidential campaign was funded by small individual donations, will increase public trust in politicians and accountability to constituents.
On January 23, 2017, Cenk Uygur and Kyle Kulinski, founded Justice Democrats with ten others, including former staffers from the Sanders campaign such as its Director of Organizing Technology, Saikat Chakrabarti, and MoveOn.org fundraiser Zack Exley. According to the organization, they seek to create a left-wing populist movement to support alternative Democratic candidates beginning with the 2018 mid-term elections, in order to either defeat the incumbent Democrats or cause them to become accountable to their constituents. They require their candidates to take a pledge to refuse financial contributions from billionaires and corporations. In addition, they hope to rebuild the Democratic Party on a national level and to defeat President Trump in his 2020 run for re-election.
On March 20, 2017, Justice Democrats reported that they had received 8,300 nominations and raised $1 million. Justice Democrats announced in March 2017 they had teamed up with Brand New Congress, a PAC established by former Sanders campaign supporters, to further their goals. By November 1, 2017, they had merged with fellow progressive group AllOfUs.
Representative Ro Khanna of California's 17th congressional district announced on May 9, 2017, that he had become a Justice Democrat, and the first sitting member of Congress to join the organization. Over the following year, Raúl Grijalva of Arizona's 3rd congressional district and Pramila Jayapal of Washington's 7th congressional district also joined bringing the number of sitting representatives in Justice Democrats to three. Khanna and Jayapal had first won elections to the House of Representatives in 2016 while Grijalva had been an incumbent since 2002.
During the 2018 elections, Justice Democrats ran 79 progressive candidates against Democrats, Republicans and Independents in all three levels of US government. 26 of them advanced past the primary stage. All Justice Democrat candidates running for office were endorsed by The Young Turks who provided them with a media platform on their interview show Rebel HQ. The seven Justice Democrats candidates who won their electoral congressional races in 2018 consisted of Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the three sitting members. All seven won districts already held by Democrats.
In 2020, Justice Democrat Marie Newman defeated incumbent Representative Dan Lipinski in the 2020 primary for Illinois's 3rd congressional district.

Uygur's resignation

On December 22, 2017, it was announced that Uygur had resigned from his position at the organization, following the revelation of previously deleted but archived controversial blog posts he had written. The following day, Kulinski announced that he had stepped down from the organization as he disagreed with the opinions of the Justice Democrats staff members that pressed for Uygur's dismissal over the blog posts. He said his decision came as a result of a personal dilemma as he saw the posts in question upon re-reading them as being satirical due to them dealing with Uygur complaining about his inability to attract women. Kulinski noted that the decision to ask for Uygur's resignation came from Justice Democrat staff, not the candidates, and as such he asked his supporters to continue backing the organization's candidates.
In mid-November 2019, Uygur filed to run for Congress in California's 25th district, a seat recently vacated by the resignation of Katie Hill, an office also being pursued by former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos. Uygur stated he would not run as a member of the Justice Democrats.

Ideology and political issues

According to Justice Democrats, their highest priority is to effectively eliminate the role of money and conflicts of interests in politics. As such, any candidate running with Justice Democrats must pledge to refuse any donations from corporate PACs and lobbyists. Declining money from corporate PACs and supporting Medicare For All have both been described as litmus tests for the organization. Justice Democrats support the idea of publicly funded elections, banning Super PACs as well as banning private donations to politicians and campaigns. In addition, they advocate for the reinstatement of provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and a ban on gerrymandering for partisan gain. Several members have voiced support for a constitutional amendment aimed at removing money from American politics.
To accompany its launch, Kulinski and Uygur published the following set of progressive founding principles for the coalition. Adjustments have been made since 2017, resulting in a slightly different platform appearing on the Justice Democrats webpage at a given time.

2018

There were 79 candidates officially endorsed by Justice Democrats in the 2018 election cycle.

Governor

Lieutenant Governor

U.S. Senate

U.S. House

2020

Currently, there are 17 candidates endorsed by the Justice Democrats in the 2020 election cycle.

U.S. President

U.S. Senate

U.S. House

Summer for Progress

Several progressive organizations, including Our Revolution, Democratic Socialists of America, National Nurses United, Working Families Party, and Brand New Congress, announced in July 2017 a push to encourage House Democrats to sign on to a #PeoplesPlatform, which consists of supporting "eight bills currently in the House of Representatives that will address the concerns of everyday Americans." These eight bills and the topics they address are:
  1. Medicare for All: H.R. 676, the Medicare For All Act
  2. Free College Tuition: H.R. 1880, the College for All Act of 2017
  3. Worker Rights: H.R. 15, the Raise the Wage Act
  4. Women’s Rights: H.R. 771, the Equal Access to Abortion Coverage in Health Insurance Act of 2017
  5. Voting Rights: H.R. 2840, the Automatic Voter Registration Act
  6. Environmental Justice: H.R. 4114, the Environmental Justice Act of 2017
  7. Criminal Justice and Immigrant Rights: H.R. 3227, the Justice Is Not for Sale Act of 2017
  8. Taxing Wall Street: H.R. 1144, the Inclusive Prosperity Act

    Congressional members