People’s Action, the lobbying arm of the left-wing People’s Action Institute, was created when USAction, Community Organizations in Action, National People’s Action Campaign, and Campaign for America’s Future merged in 2016. ¹

The organization, promoted by the left-of-center fundraising network Democracy Alliance (DA), promotes left-of-center policy on issues including environmentalism, opposition to the use of zero carbon nuclear energy, housing, government-controlled healthcare, and government-funded college tuition for all. People’s Action advertises on a mailing list called the “Joyous Rebellion” and on its “Our Future” blog, which includes a daily newsletter called “Progressive Breakfast.” ^{2 3 4  5}

People’s Action receives most of its income from contributions and grants, including grants from private foundations including George Soros’s Foundation to Promote Open Society (FPOS), ideologically motivated communications provider CREDO Mobile, and actor Mark Ruffalo’s Solutions Project. ^{6 7 8}

Background

People’s Action is the political advocacy and lobbying arm of People’s Action Institute, one of the most aggressive left-wing advocacy organizations in the United States. Both People’s Action and People’s Action Institute were formed when National People’s Action, the Alliance for a Just Society, and the USAction Education Fund merged in 2016. Other legacy organizations of People’s Action and the People’s Action Institute include the Center for Health, Environment, and Justice; the Institute for America’s Future; the Campaign for America’s Future; Community Organizations in Action; the National People’s Action Campaign; and USAction. ⁹

The left-of-center Democracy Alliance (DA) promotes People’s Action and People’s Action Institute on its website. DA is a collective of left-of-center donors that has been active in orchestrating “the activities of a permanent ‘left infrastructure’” since 2004. In its promotion of People’s Action, DA has claimed that the organization develops projects to “fight to reclaim a democracy that works for all and advance racial and economic justice.” People’s Action also states that it uses “race, gender, and class as strategic forces” to pass its long-term agenda of building a “progressive infrastructure.” ¹⁰¹¹

Political Goals

People’s Action focuses on left-of-center environmentalist issues, left-wing housing policy, government-controlled healthcare, and government-funded college tuition. The organization advertises its “Joyous Rebellion” mailing list, which sends updates on “opportunities to take action,” and its blog “Our Future.” Which includes a daily newsletter called “Progressive Breakfast.” ¹²¹³

Government-Controlled Health Care

People’s Action calls for an expanded version of Medicare-for-All, (often styled “Medicare for All” or “Medicare for all”), a proposed policy to create a government-controlled, socialized health care system in the United States by expanding the existing Medicare program to cover all citizens and abolishing private health insurance providers. ¹⁴

People’s Action claims to be “fighting to take back control of our health care from corporations and CEOs,” adding that under its proposed government-controlled, taxpayer-funded healthcare system, health care would be “provided to all people at zero cost to patients.” The organization also claims that it is imperative to “directly counter the racialized villainization of public health programs,” such as Medicaid, and to block the repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (commonly known as the ACA, Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare). ¹⁵

Taxpayer-Funded Tuition

People’s Action, through its affiliate Student Action, calls for “free college for all.” The organization classifies education as a “human right” and demands that college be made available through taxpayer funding to everyone, including illegal immigrants and former criminals. The organization also calls for colleges to divest resources “from police and [Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)] presence on campuses.” ¹⁶

Student Action also claims to take part in a “youth resistance,” which consists of fighting “colonialism, imperialism, and racial capitalism.” Student Action has supported other far-left positions, claiming that to be inspired by “the people of Puerto Rico who continue to resist US imperialism” and those in the “Global South” that have “built and led cultural revolutions.” ¹⁷

Opposition to Nuclear Energy

In May of 2021, People’s Action was one of 715 groups and businesses listed as a co-signer on a letter to the leadership of the U.S. House and Senate that referred to nuclear energy as a “dirty” form of energy production and a “significant” source of pollution. The letter asked federal lawmakers to reduce carbon emissions by creating a “renewable electricity standard” that promoted production of weather dependent power sources such as wind turbines and solar panels, but did not promote low carbon natural gas and zero carbon nuclear energy. ¹⁸

Nuclear power plants produce no carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gas emissions, and as of 2021 accounted for 19 percent of American electricity production—the largest source of zero carbon electricity in the United States. ¹⁹ An October 2018 proposal from The Nature Conservancy noted that zero-carbon nuclear plants produced 7.8 percent of total world energy output and recommended reducing carbon emissions by increasing nuclear capacity to 33 percent of total world energy output. ²⁰

Funding

People’s Action receives most of its income from contributions and grants, including grants from private foundations. The organization had total revenue of $1.6 million in 2016, approximately $3.2 million in 2017, just over $2.5 million in 2018, and around $2.6 million in 2019. People’s Action received 87.8% of its total revenue from contributions and grants in 2016, 99% of its total revenue from contributions and grants in 2017, 97.5% in 2018, and 97.7% in 2019. ²¹

People’s Action had $1.4 million in total functional expenses in 2016, $2.3 million in 2017, $3.1 million in 2018, and $1.8 million in 2019. The organization spent $339,594 on salaries and wages in 2016, $594,108 in 2017, $980,438 in 2018, and $381,300 in 2019. ²²

People’s Action received a recommendation for a two-year grant worth $1,927,640 in 2017 from the Open Philanthropy Project, a center-left funding nonprofit founded in 2016 by Cari Tuna and Dustin Moskovitz affiliated with the Open Philanthropy Action Fund. According to the Open Philanthropy Project, the grant recommendation was accepted by “a 501(c)(4) social welfare organization,” although the name of the organization was not given. ²³

The Open Society Foundations (OSF), a private grantmaking foundation created and funded by billionaire financier and liberal philanthropist George Soros, referred a grant of $400,000 to National People’s Action, one of the legacy organizations of People’s Action. The grant had a term of four months and was paid by the Foundation to Promote Open Society (FPOS), another major grantmaking foundation funded by Soros. The grant was made in 2016, the same year that National People’s Action merged with the Alliance for a Just Society and USAction Education Fund to create People’s Action. ²⁴

People’s Action also received a $41,715 grant from CREDO Mobile (formerly Working Assets), a cell-phone company that explicitly uses its profits to support left-wing causes and ensures its customers that their participation in its cell phone programs “fund[s] progressive causes and power social activism.” People’s Action used the grant from CREDO to “oppose the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.” ²⁵²⁶

People’s Action also received a $30,000 grant in 2020 from the Hidden Leaf Foundation, a left-of-center private foundation that gives grants to left-of-center organizations focusing on social issues.

Solutions Project, an environmentalist advocacy group that began by promoting a full transition away from conventional energy to environmentalist energy sources but has since repositioned its focus to promoting diversity and female leadership in the environmentalist movement, lists People’s Action on its grantee map but does not disclose how much money it has provided the organization. ²⁷

People’s Action is also listed on the 2020 grantee list of the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation, a donor-advised fund that provides grants for several left-progressive advocacy organizations. People’s Action was also listed as a member of the Green New Deal Network,  a coalition of far-left special interest and agitation groups aligned to support so-called Green New Deal legislation. According to the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation, members of the Green New Deal Network Coordinating Team include People’s Action, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), MoveOn Civic Action, Greenpeace, and the Sierra Club, among others. ²⁸

Political Activities

Protesting Disney CEO Bob Iger on Business Advisory Council

In 2017, People’s Action, alongside several left-of-center organizations including MoveOn and CREDO, protested Disney locations across the United States as the organizations called for Walt Disney Company CEO Bob Iger to step down from his position on former President Donald Trump’s Business Advisory Council. ²⁹

The coalition of organizations, headed by the left-of-center Center for Popular Democracy (CPD), collected approximately 390,000 petitions to Disney calling for Iger to step down. Jennifer Epps-Addison, network president and co-executive director for the Center for Popular Democracy said, “Disney has the power to take a stand against Trump and support a happy ending for all families,” adding that the Trump administration was an “authoritarian, hateful, anti-immigrant regime.” ³⁰

2020 Elections

In September 2020, People’s Action released a report titled, “HOW TO DEFEAT TRUMP AND HEAL AMERICA:
Deep Canvassing and Political Persuasion in the 2020 Presidential Election,” which detailed a “deep canvassing political persuasion experiment,” conducted by the organization that same month to test ways on how to decrease Trump’s voter margin in the 2020 presidential election. ³¹ According to People’s Action, deep canvassing involved, “candid, two-way conversations where canvassers ask voters to share their relevant, emotionally significant experiences and reflect on them aloud.” ³² The report claimed that the deep canvassing experiment had resulted in a “3.1% overall decrease in Trump’s voter margin,”³³ and was estimated to be, “102 times more effective per person than the average presidential persuasion program,” ³⁴ according to documented, “academic research.” ³⁵

Following President Biden’s victory in the November 2020 elections, the executive director of People’s Action and People’s Action Institute at the time, George Goehl, issued a statement on Biden and Harris’ win, commenting:

To be clear, grassroots organizations powered these victories. People’s Action mobilized its multigenerational, multracial working class members to call and text more than 47.1 million undecided and conflicted voters in battleground states critical to Biden’s victory—having more than 280,000 deep canvass conversations this cycle. This is the largest deep canvass political program in the history of American politics.  ³⁶

Letter Calling for U.S. to “Cooperate” with China

On July 7, 2021, Peoples’ Action along with 47 other organizations signed a letter to President Biden and the U.S. Congress, accusing the United States of approaching China with “an antagonistic posture.” ³⁷ The letter claims that “escalating, bipartisan anti-China rhetoric […] bolsters racist, right-wing movements in the United States,” and that the “U.S. demonization of China has always been a major barrier to progress in global climate talks.” ³⁸ The letter urges the United States to cooperate with the Chinese government, despite its record of humans rights abuses, to “address the existential threat that is the climate crises.” The letter also cites statistics on U.S. and Chinese greenhouse gas emissions and criticizes the U.S. for being “the biggest carbon polluter in history.” ³⁹

Calling for State of Emergency on Housing

In August 2022, Homes Guarantee, a left-of-center policy project of People’s Action, called for the Biden Administration to declare a state of emergency on housing as well as increase government intervention towards reducing rental costs. ^{40 41} In addition, the Homes Guarantee coalition asked for the Biden Administration to create a cabinet-level task force that would seek to reduce and regulate rental pricing as well as provide legal assistance for those facing eviction. The group also called for the Treasury Department to pass measures that would prevent landlords from raising the rent of tenants beyond a certain point. ⁴² According to Tara Raghuveer, the campaign director of Homes Guarantee campaign director with People’s Action, “If the president intends to take meaningful action to curb inflation, he must be serious about using every available authority to regulate the rent.” ⁴³

2024 Elections

On July 25, 2024, People’s Action announced they had endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for her 2024 presidential campaign following President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the nomination and his reelection campaign. People’s Action’s endorsement occurred alongside the Working Families Party (WEP) and the Center for Popular Democracy Action Fund endorsing Vice President Harris. On the same day, the organization announced it was starting an independent expenditure program to assist Vice President Harris’ campaign through volunteers engaging in “deep canvassing” or having, “deeper conversations with the people they speak to, focusing on underlying fears and values to shift hearts and minds in a lasting way.” ⁴⁴ People’s Action announced it was planning to launch its program in August 2024 while trying to grow it into a nation-wide program by September 14, 2024. Maria Popadiak, the Movement Governing Director for the organization, claimed, “We know what kind of future Trump has in store for us…our program is designed to block his path to power and protect our families, our freedoms, and our future.” ⁴⁵

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