Progress Texas Certified Progressives 2024: Progressive Values Questionnaire

Progress Texas has built the largest online community of progressives from across the state — Texans who share and stand up for bold progressive values. Together, we are building a statewide movement to fight for the future of our state. Electing progressives to office at every level of government across Texas is critical in helping us get there.

We want to ensure that candidates who share our progressive values get elected in May and November — particularly in the most competitive districts. So, we created a questionnaire for candidates to support, to build a cohesive movement on the issues that matter most.

Progressive Values:

Reproductive Rights:

All Texans – regardless of age, race, income, ZIP code, gender identity, immigration status, or whether they are incarcerated or detained – should have access to the full range of reproductive health care, from birth control and sex education, to post- and prenatal care and abortion. We must proactively fight back against laws that restrict access to abortion, put women’s health at risk, and create devastating barriers to care, particularly for low income women and women of color. Trusting and equipping women to control their own reproductive lives is fundamental to achieving gender, racial, and economic equality.

An Environmentally Sustainable Texas:

Texas should be at the front of the clean energy economy, leading the energy transition by increasing production of renewable energy, investing in sustainable solutions, and reducing the use of fossil fuels. Every Texan has the right to live in a healthy community with clean water and air, safe from the high and long-term costs of fossil fuel operations and liquefied natural gas (LNG) infrastructure on our health, local economies, and of course, climate. We must hold corporations who break the law accountable, as well as mandate public disclosure of dangerous chemicals stored near neighborhoods and schools. I support policies that take action to save our planet and the future of the state, like supporting 100% clean energy and decarbonizing the economy.

Voting Rights and Democracy: 

Our election system needs to focus on expanding voting, rather than restricting it, by increasing access through online or automatic voter registration, and expanding vote-by-mail to all eligible voters. While courts have ruled that voter ID requirements may stand, it is imperative that Texas broaden voter ID requirements to include as many types of ID as possible, such as student IDs. In order to ensure equal voting power and a truly representative democracy, we must also eliminate the influence of corporate money in our campaign finance system, institute campaign finance limits at the state level, and end the partisan gerrymandering of electoral maps.

Economic Opportunity and Workers Rights: 

Our economy is powered by hardworking Texans. All Texas workers deserve a living wage and should have access to paid sick days, family leave, and safe work environments. It’s beyond time we increase the minimum wage and ensure equal pay for equal work. All workers must have the right to organize and fight for their economic security, including public pensions and retirement security. 

Health Care for All:

Health care is a right and all Texans deserve access to affordable health care. The State of Texas should expand Medicaid, which will save lives and bring home billions of our own federal tax dollars, and it is imperative that Congress protect the Affordable Care Act. 

Quality Public Education and Affordable College:

A strong public education system should offer every student the guarantee to high quality pre-K through 12th grade public schooling. Every Texan should have access to a safe, inclusive learning environment, free from book bans and school voucher scams that steal taxpayer money for private schools which discriminate against marginalized and low income communities. We need an adequate, equitable, and sustainable source of funding to ensure competitive pay and livable income for retirement for teachers that keeps up with rising inflation costs. After graduating, every Texan should have the opportunity for affordable college, regardless of their family’s income, and we must curb the accumulation of crippling student debt by cutting student loan rates and refinancing existing student loans.

LGBTQIA+ Equality:

We need protections for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and intersex Texans in all forms. Our elected leaders at the federal, state, and local level should work to provide equal rights and protection under the law for all LGBTQIA+ people like housing, employee, and medical protections, not push laws that chip away at equality under the false guise of “religious liberty” and endanger already vulnerable populations.

Immigrant Rights:

We must create an immigration system that protects immigrants and vulnerable communities. Immigrant families and workers living and working in our communities must be treated with the same respect and dignity as everyone else. We must end the practice of family separation, and begin repairing institutional damage by repealing discriminatory policies, and divesting funds from militarizing the border via border wall or any other form of militarization.

Criminal and Racial Justice:

All Texans deserve to be protected and treated equitably by a fair criminal justice system. We must institute comprehensive reforms to ensure accountability and justice in cases of police violence, to combat racial disparities throughout the system, and to end the mass incarceration of communities of color. Charges such as possession of small amounts of marijuana (two ounces or less) disproportionately impact communities of color and should be decriminalized and, at a minimum, changed from a felony to a ticketable offense. Elected officials should champion the policy solutions set forth by Campaign Zero – including ending racial profiling, for-profit policing, increasing training, community oversight and representation, and limiting use of force – in addition to reforming sentencing, bail, prosecution, prisons, parole, and reentry.

Ending Gun Violence:

Inexcusable, senseless violence has been brought upon innocent victims and their families. Policies that address the devastating epidemic of gun violence and protect responsible gun ownership are not mutually exclusive. We must stand up to the dangerous influence of the gun lobby and implement lifesaving, evidence-based reforms, including universal background checks, passing ‘red flag’ laws, repeal of open and campus carry, stop straw purchases, and stop the sale of assault weapons.

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