How? You may ask. The answer is simple – ballot measures – but the execution takes careful planning, hard work and financing.
According to Wikipedia: The Fairness Project is a United States 501(c)(4) charitable organization created in October 2015. They promote general economic and social justice throughout the US by the use of ballot measures to circumvent deadlocks in law changes by the legislative and executive branches of government. They act as a national body by supporting state organizations and campaigns with targeted funding rather than by direct campaigning. They support the gathering of signatures to meet the variable requirements to trigger ballots in states and then aid the campaigns with early financial backing, strategic advice, and various campaign tools.
The Project seeks to raise state minimum wages, both through stepped annual increases and through elimination of the tip credit exemption. It has expanded Medicaid coverage and provided funding in the most expensive ballot campaigns ever fought. Usually alongside their other campaigns, the Fairness Project has supported improving paid sick leave coverage. Following Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the Project has also supported legalizing abortion via statewide ballot initiatives. The Project has supported 17 proposals in total, of which 16 have passed. Concerns have arisen about the lack of transparency of non-state organizations like the Fairness Project influencing local decisions.
The following is the March 6, 2023, media release from The Fairness Project, proudly explaining who they are and what they do.
Fairness Project Featured on NPR’s ‘All Things Considered’
Washington, DC — On Friday, the Fairness Project was featured on NPR’s flagship news show, All Things Considered, which highlighted the nonpartisan nonprofit’s record of winning ballot measure campaigns on progressive issues in red and purple states. Since its founding in 2016, the Fairness Project has won over 30 ballot measure campaigns to advance economic and social justice in 17 states, including passing Medicaid expansion in seven states and raising the minimum wage in nine.
LISTEN: This group gets left-leaning policies passed in red states. How? Ballot measures
“The Fairness Project is the brainchild of a large health care workers’ union in California. It helps fund ballot measures for traditionally left-of-center issues and it provides extensive research into what messages will sway the largest number of voters. [Executive Director Kelly] Hall says, for example, to make a Trump voter feel good about expanding Medicaid coverage: ‘Folks who can separate this issue from their partisan identity are the people who get us over the finish line in these conservative states.’
“And they’ve won a lot. With the Fairness Project’s support, campaigns to raise the minimum wage and expand Medicaid have won not just in Missouri, but in nine red or purple states. Now they’re taking on abortion rights .The group also worked on a ballot measure in Michigan last year which codified access to reproductive health care, including abortion. They’re exploring more of these measures for 2024.”
Last year, the Fairness Project won eight ballot measure campaigns: defending reproductive rights in Michigan and Vermont; raising the minimum wage to $15 in Nebraska; expanding Medicaid to 40,000 low-income South Dakotans; reining in predatory medical debt collectors in Arizona; increasing civilian oversight of the Los Angeles County Sheriff; and defending direct democracy in Arkansas and South Dakota. Since 2016 the Fairness Project has won a total of 31 campaigns in 17 states across the country.
Continue reading and listening on NPR here.
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