FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 3, 2025
CONTACT: Unai Montes, press@peoplesaction.org, 202-660-0605 (bilingual)
Community Organizations Across the U.S. Denounce Vote to Take Away Health Care, Food, and Irreplaceable Services From Millions To Give Tax Cuts to Billionaires and CEOs
Washington, D.C. – In a joint statement, Down Home North Carolina co-executive directors, Dreama Caldwell and Todd Zimmer, Maine People’s Alliance co-executive directors, Jesse Graham and Amy Halsted, West Virginia Citizen Action Group co-executive directors, Dani Parent and Gary Zuckett, Citizen Action Wisconsin executive director, Dr. Robert Kraig, Missouri Jobs With Justice executive director, Caitlyn Adams, Center for Health Progress co-executive directors, Joe Sammen, Theresa Trujillo, and Dana Kennedy, Citizen Action of New York, co-executive directors, Carolyn Martinez-Class and Rebecca Garrard, and VOCAL-NY co-executive directors, Alyssa Aguilera and Jeremy Saunders, Community Voices Heard Power executive director Juanita Lewis, join People’s Action executive director, Sulma Arias – signing on behalf of one of the largest network of grassroots, power building organizations representing working class members in the country – in denouncing the passage of the MAGA murder bill:
“A budget is a statement of values. The callous bill advanced by Republicans in Congress through the federal budget reconciliation process does not reflect ours.”
“The federal budget reconciliation package, that just advanced out of the U.S. House of Representatives and is expected to be signed into law by President Donald Trump, is both cruel and irresponsible. It takes medicine from the sick, food from the hungry, and money from the pockets of the working class, in order to transfer over a trillion of our public dollars to billionaires, multinational corporations, and already-wealthy CEOs. This, when working class communities struggle to meet their basic needs, live paycheck-to-paycheck, and pray that they will make it from one day to the next knowing they don’t have enough to keep both a roof over their heads and the lights on.”
“We value hard work and humanity; family and fairness; opportunity and community. We do not value political corruption or corporate greed. But that is what the White House and MAGA House and Senate have forced upon all 340 million of us.”
“The GOP Congress just passed a federal budget that:
- Takes away health care from 16 million by slashing Medicaid, Medicare, and the ACA
- Eliminates the emergency food and nutritional assistance that 40 million count on
- Rips away over $1 trillion of our public dollars to fund a tax scam giveaway to billionaires
- Triples funding for terrorizing citizens and non-citizens through detention and deportation
- Guts vital services for vets, seniors, families and kids and adds $4 trillion to the deficit”
“This is not who we are. But it is what happens when the billionaire-backed bullies of the MAGA regime run the show.”
“We will organize community by community across the country to hold the members of the U.S. Senate and House accountable for their votes.”
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About Down Home North Carolina:
North Carolina’s small towns and rural communities matter. We work here, we live here, and we are raising our families here. That’s why we, poor and working people, are building power across race to make sure that our elected officials work for us.
About Maine People’s Alliance:
The mission of Maine People’s Alliance is to create a world where everyone has what they need, contributes what they can, and no one is left behind.
With more than 32,000 members across Maine, MPA is the state’s largest community action organization.
Over the past three decades, MPA has worked to build a powerful statewide grassroots movement for progressive social change, serving as a leader in state campaigns for expanded health care access, toxics use reduction, affordable housing, universal home care, clean elections reform, racial justice, immigrant rights, a higher minimum wage and tax fairness, among others.
MPA is dedicated to providing Maine people with the tools, knowledge, skills and opportunity to become involved in the decision-making processes that affect their lives.
About West Virginia Citizen Action Group:
Since 1974, West Virginia Citizen Action Group (WV CAG) has advocated for better public policy, rights of individuals, a clean environment, and a stronger democratic process.
The philosophy of WV CAG is that full-time citizen participation in the decision-making processes of our state is absolutely essential. Our staff and members work to increase the voice of the average citizen in public affairs through research, education, lobbying, organizing and coalition building – speaking out on behalf of the consumer, speaking out in defense of a cleaner environment, and speaking out in favor of a government that is honest, open, and accountable to the needs of all its citizens. We work to empower individuals by providing them with resources to be effective advocates on issues that affect/impact their lives.
About Citizen Action of Wisconsin:
Citizen Action of Wisconsin is dedicated to economic, racial, and environmental justice, and achieving a Wisconsin and an America where every human being has an equal opportunity to live a meaningful and fulfilling life. We believe that organizing across the urban-rural divide is the only pathway to unlocking the true potential of democracy to fundamentally transform our society in the human interest and overcome structural racism, sexism, xenophobia, corporate domination, and other forms of oppression.
About Missouri Jobs With Justice:
We envision a Missouri where:
- The economy and public infrastructure are strong and good jobs are plentiful
- The right of all workers to organize and collectively bargain is protected
- Opportunity exists for all regardless of race, identity, or immigration status
- All are assured economic security and a safe, healthy life from the cradle to the grave
- White supremacy is understood, challenged, and dismantled
Together we win tangible victories for all working people: Black, Brown, and white. We work to build power through action and strong relationships that are rooted in justice, equity, and solidarity. We don’t do the work as performance. We perform the work to build real power and real wins for all of us.
About Center for Health Progress:
We are a people-powered, multi-racial, member-led organization in Colorado. We want our communities–not greedy corporations and executives–to have power over the decisions that impact our lives.
About Citizen Action of New York:
Citizen Action of New York is a grassroots membership organization taking on big issues that are at the center of transforming society by:
- Ensuring our children have a quality public education no matter their zip code
- Ending our current system of mass incarceration and establishing a new system of justice
- Ensuring quality affordable housing for all
- Fighting for guaranteed quality, affordable health care
- Taking big money out of politics by creating a fair elections system
- Aiming to dismantle the historic racist system by promoting racial justice
- Striving for a more progressive tax system to begin to end the runaway inequality in our state
We look for opportunities to accomplish big changes – not small, incremental reforms. We work to elect progressive candidates to office who are committed to these issues. Our power comes from the grassroots: people coming together to push the edge of the possible. Every new member helps bring New York and America closer to a society that works for all of us!
About Community Voices Heard Power:
Community Voices Heard Power! is a multiracial member-led organization that builds power through grassroots political organizing. We work to change systems and shape policies to ensure racial, social, and economic justice for all New Yorkers.
About VOCAL-NY:
Voices Of Community Activists & Leaders (VOCAL-NY) is a statewide grassroots membership organization that builds power among low-income people affected by HIV/AIDS, the drug war, mass incarceration, and homelessness in order to create healthy and just communities. We accomplish this through community organizing, leadership development, advocacy, direct services, participatory research and direct action.
About People’s Action:
People’s Action is a proud national network of 38 member-based, power-building organizations
in 29 states with more than a million members and tens of thousands of national volunteers. We
are from every background, speak many languages, and live in small towns, cities and rural
areas. We are all of us!