In Support Of Mid-Michigan’s LGBTQ Community

Owosso City Council has seen controversy this month over the upcoming Owosso Pride Festival, which will be happening on May 30 at Curwood Castle Park. A group of area residents, some of whom have protested Pride in previous years, urged the council last night to reject a permit for the festival, while other residents spoke in defense of Pride and the LGBTQ community. I was glad to wake up this morning to the news that the council upheld the permit, and Owosso Pride will continue as scheduled.

At a time when life is unaffordable and war is on the march, I find it maddening that anybody would spend their precious time working to prevent a celebration of joy and selfhood by LGBTQ people. Talk about missing the point.

This is the politics of scapegoating, and it’s a very old story. In times of adversity, bullies find it easy to blame marginalized and outsider groups for the challenges of society. Powerful people inflame these tensions with propaganda. Trump and his allies are masters of this. They want us fighting against each other – straight against queer, white against brown against black, men against women, native-born against immigrants, and every faith against each other. As long as working people are fighting each other along these lines, we’re not uniting to fight the billionaires who are squeezing us with every rent check and insurance premium.

I will always reject divide-and-conquer politics by affirming the fundamental human rights of all people. I’ve never liked bullies, as long as I can remember. Standing up to bullies means standing alongside people who are different from me. I have, and I will.

I am proud to count many LGBTQ people among my dear friends. I’ll see you at Owosso Pride, and other pride events throughout the 7th district in late May and June.

Votes of Note In DC

Your weekly record of Tom Barrett’s doings in DC.

Funding the VA, but pushing privatization. The House passed its annual appropriations bill for the Veterans Administration. There are many, many important and necessary provisions contained within. However, I am concerned about an ongoing trend towards privatization of veterans’ care, which this bill continues. While in-house care at the VA gets only a 2.8% increase, below the rate of inflation, privatized care receives a 17% increase. VA officials have described the move towards privatized care, at a time when in-house providers are facing cuts and forced resignations, as an existential threat to the VA system. As your Congressman, I will work to reverse this trend in budget negotiations. (Source: Veterans Healthcare Policy Institute)

Feeling the heat on Iran War. After voting three times to allow Trump’s Iran War to continue, Barrett finally broke ranks with his party and voted on Thursday to stop it. The vote still failed, by one vote. One can’t help but notice how these votes always fail by a narrow margin, because party leaders release just as many members to buck their party for good PR as won’t impact the outcome. Nevertheless, credit where it is due: to the voters of the district for letting Barrett know we won’t accept his support for this disastrous war. (Source: CBS News)

District Notes

Lansing camp sweeps cost lives. Two encampments were swept by Lansing Police Department last week. The city has admitted that sweeps won’t solve homelessness, but they keep doing them anyway. When well-established encampments are swept, it results in dispersal around the city, and more hurdles to services and treatment. Within the last two weeks, the unhoused community and allies grieved the overdose death of a community member who was previously evicted from Dietrich Park. The cycle of displacement and death will never stop until we have more resources for treatment and affordable housing. Why does the city insist on making the problem harder to manage in the meantime? (Source: Fox 47)

Fishy business at MSU. In an unscheduled Sunday night meeting, MSU trustees took votes to double the President’s salary, and limit public expressions of dissent by Board members. While I lack the information to fully judge these measures, the whole situation is fishy. If any readers have insight into MSU Board politics, I would sincerely love to hear it, as I have been often befuddled by its actions over the past several years. Spartans deserve more stability and transparency than we have gotten from university leaders. (Source: WILX)

Howell Township extends data center moratorium. The moratorium will last an additional 6 months, giving the township more time to draft regulations to protect the public interest amidst the nationwide data center offensive by Big Tech. As your Congressman, I will work for a 12-month federal moratorium on new data centers, as well as the establishment of a House Committee on A.I. Oversight. We need strong guardrails in place to ensure that data centers, and the artificial intelligence they power, will be used for the common good, not the whims of a few billionaires in Silicon Valley. (Source: Livingston Daily)