"We're On Fire" and "We Will Rise"
From: Lynne Revo-Cohen
Hi Friends,
I want to share 2 new music videos to help us turn out the progressive vote in 2020. Please share and encourage your friends and family to do the same. “We’re On Fire” is my new music video and I’ve updated “We Will Rise” first published after the Women’s March in 2017. Fingers crossed for safe and early voting for everyone!!!
All the Best,
Lynne
“WE’RE ON FIRE”
Lynne Revo-Cohen 2020
“We Will Rise”
Lynne Revo-Cohen 2020
Tonya Saunders, WPG Principal, Featured Panelist in CQ Roll Call/Fiscal Note Webinar [Recap]
WPG Principal, Tonya Saunders, Panelist for CQ Webinar: On-Demand: Regulations 2021 - What an Administration Change May Bring
Did you know: regulations are the number one concern for more than 50 percent of public affairs workers, according to FiscalNote’s most recent State of Public Affairs Survey.
The regulatory comment period can make or break an organization’s success in the public policy arena. But with the regulatory environment fluctuating from president to president, in tandem with a possible administration change this November, it’s essential you prepare for every possible regulatory outcome.
Join FiscalNote and CQ Roll in our recorded webinar, where we discuss what changes may be ahead for the regulatory environment and what you can do to prepare now.
Panelists:
Dimitri Karakitsos, Partner, Holland & Knight
Joshua Habursky, Head of Government Affairs, Premium Cigar Association
Tonya Saunders, Principal, Washington Premier Group
K Street backrooms morph into ‘the Zoom where it happens’
Featuring WPG Principal, Tonya Saunders
Article published in Roll Call
By Kate Ackley
Posted June 15, 2020 at 10:30am
ANALYSIS — K Street may never look the same.
The upheaval of the coronavirus pandemic along with the wave of protests for racial justice and equality will leave a lasting imprint on the lobbying sector — on the strategies for influencing lawmakers and on the policy agenda. This moment also has expedited the long-running, but slow-to-change conversations about spurring diversity on K Street and in its pipeline for personnel, Capitol Hill.
And if you didn’t notice already, the lobbying corridor’s infamous backrooms have moved over to video chats.
Sure, some of the permanent transformations, like more Zoom conferences and fewer in-person meetings even after the pandemic ends, may appear minor, subtle adaptations around the edges. For an industry, like politics itself, built around face-to-face relationships with conversations sparked at high-dollar fundraising events, even some of the seemingly little shifts may galvanize a larger metamorphosis in the long run.
Lobbyists seem to agree.
More than 70 percent of them believe that even after the COVID-19 threat ebbs, it will still be much more difficult to meet with federal policymakers in person, according to a recent survey by the Public Affairs Council. More than 60 percent of those respondents expect the pandemic will usher in a decline in traditional lobbying trips to the Hill and will bring about an even faster rise in digital advocacy and grassroots campaigns than what was already underway. And 83 percent said videoconferences increasingly will fill that role.
“I was actually very surprised that such a strong majority said they strongly agreed,” says Doug Pinkham, who heads the council. “That doesn’t mean there’s not a great value in showing up. But we’ve heard from a number of members of Congress and their staff that they love the Zoom meetings. You can get more done in an hour.”
Fundraisers, too, have moved into cyberspace, though the return of holding those events in person is almost certain. Some lawmakers have already scheduled such activities for this summer.
Still, K Street has come to the conclusion that “what they call shoe-leather lobbying will be more difficult in the future,” Pinkham adds. That’ll affect Beltway insiders and the associations and groups that arrange fly-in visits from around the country.
The worldwide protests offer a real-time example of what that might mean for influencing the legislative agenda. While it may not be possible to sit down with members of Congress in their offices now, if you need proof that showing up in person can make a powerful statement in pushing for policy change just look to the racial justice demonstrations, sparked by the killing of George Floyd, a black man, by Minnesota police in late May.
Those demonstrations have pushed House Democrats — and even the GOP-led Senate — to craft policing overhauls and have dramatically shifted the attention of the congressional agenda to systemic inequities in the nation’s housing and jobs markets, schools and other areas that stretch beyond law enforcement.
The Black Lives Matter movement “is going to have a lot of impact on legislation going forward,” says lobbyist Tonya Saunders. “It is actually highlighting a number of areas of inequality, as COVID did as well.”
That reckoning has touched K Street, which wasn’t all that long ago mostly an ol’ boys network of predominantly white men.
Michael Williams, another longtime lobbyist, called the pandemic and the video footage of Floyd’s killing a “double whammy.” COVID-19 exposed a racial divide of its own by hitting black and Latino Americans disproportionately.
“COVID showed it to you, then George Floyd just really magnified it and brought into clear view what’s undeniable: There are things that are fundamentally wrong,” Williams says. Because of the lockdowns aimed at curbing the pandemic, he adds, “people were home and not otherwise doing their other things that they do during the day, so you have a microfocus on this. … I don’t think you can come back from that.”
K Street isn’t immune from that microfocus either, as corporate clients work to link their own brands and public policy agendas to the racial justice movement and as firms seek out more diversity among their lobbyists and digital advocates. It will cross into many policy issues too.
“From a lobbying perspective,” Williams says, “all of the questions coming next, whether it’s on appropriations, transportation, infrastructure, whatever issue you’re lobbying on, it’s going to come with the overarching question: How does this fit in with the overall question of economic equality or social justice? I get that from Republicans and Democrats.”
Williams and Saunders, both of whom are black, say they hope that even as lawmakers and staff may continue to push K Street into more virtual encounters after the pandemic, the lobbying industry will make a push to increase diversity among its ranks.
“There have been some strides made, so you’re not the only one in the room,” Saunders says.
Or perhaps in the new parlance and with the pressure from the protest movement, there will be more black and brown people in the Zoom.
Rest in Power RBG
In Memory of John Lewis
Shutdowns are hitting minority-owned businesses particularly hard
Millions of small businesses aren't expected to survive the coronavirus pandemic, and those owned by women and people of color are disproportionately feeling the pain of the economic shutdowns.
Why it matters: Minority-owned small businesses employ over 9 million people (about 15% of small business jobs) and generate more than $1 trillion in annual economic output.
Businesses helmed by owners of color tend to be smaller than nonminority-owned counterparts with less of a financial cushion to weather prolonged closures, per a new McKinsey study.
They also are more likely to be in industries highly disrupted during the pandemic, including food services, retail and personal care.
The big picture: Minority-owned businesses "are disproportionally operating in low-income communities and some of these underbanked areas where, per capita, they just don't have the same level of bank branches and bank infrastructure," said Margaret Anadu, head of Goldman Sachs Urban Investment Group, at an Axios digital event Wednesday.
She noted that African American business owners have not been able to apply for the Paycheck Protection Program loans at the same rate as other companies.
Still, these business owners are showing creativity when it comes to taking care of their employees and supporting their communities during the crisis.
In a McKinsey survey of more than 1,000 small businesses, 40% of minority-owned businesses have added services like free delivery and adjusted hours for elderly customers, compared with 27% of the overall small business owners surveyed.
Between the lines: In a striking paradox, minority-owned businesses are nearly 10 percentage points more optimistic than their nonminority counterparts about the overall economy's recovery.
But they were 10 percentage points more pessimistic than their nonminority counterparts about their own businesses' sustainability.
What's next: Immediate relief for small businesses can take a number of forms: grants, low-interest loans, assistance dealing with negotiations, advertising credits and deferred rent payments, said McKinsey partner Deepa Mahajan.
All small businesses are having to reinvent themselves with contactless payments, digital offerings and new services that appeal to homebound customers.
"The old business models won't necessarily work, and there's only so much that relief gets us," Mahajan said.
Thank you for joining us last week for our AACC Webinar!
I want to extend a special thank you to everyone who signed up for our Webinar last Friday, Will Opportunities Begin to Shrink in the Federal Market for Small Business?. I appreciate the Asian American Chamber of Commerce (AACC) and Proposal Helper for providing a platform to discuss timely changes to SBA rules and policy issues impacting small business growth.
A live copy of the webinar will soon be uploaded online for your reference and the slides are now available for download.
Contractors should consider joining the organization Mid-Tier Advocacy, Inc. to promote federal procurement policies that support healthy competition and long-term growth. Learn more.
If you have any specific issues that involve individual lobbying needs, please feel free to contact me for a "free" private consultation: tsaunders@washingtonpremiergroup.net.
Sincerely,
Tonya Saunders
Principal, Washington Premier Group
WPG Principal to Join Asian American Chamber of Commerce (AACC) Webinar This March
Washington Premier Group Principal Tonya Saunders will join a Webinar for the Asian American Chamber of Commerce (AACC) this month to discuss small business opportunities and how best to engage with policy developments affecting your business.
The webinar is hosted by Proposal Helper and will broadcast online on
March 20th, 2020 at 8:30 AM to 9 AM.
