This Thursday, the Massachusetts Senate will vote on comprehensive privacy legislation known as the Massachusetts Data Privacy Act (S.2608). Strong data privacy legislation must ban the sale of our sensitive data, limit how companies handle our data, and provide a strong enforcement mechanism.
The Massachusetts Data Privacy Act, as written, achieves many of these goals, including a complete ban on the sale of sensitive data. But there are critical protections missing from the bill, and Big Tech lobbyists will be hard at work this week trying to keep them out and to weaken the bill.
Your legislators will be hearing from the Big Tech lobbyists who have spent the whole year cozying up to Donald Trump. They need to be hearing even louder from you.
Here are the key amendments that civil liberties advocates are rallying behind and that your senator needs to hear from you about:
#52 (Rausch) – Closing Loophole to Prevent All Sales of Sensitive Data, which eliminates broad carveouts for industries that are regulated (but in a much more general way) on the federal level
#25 (Friedman) and #4 (Creem) – Preventing Location Tracking for People Traveling to Massachusetts,which ensure that people who come to our state for reproductive and gender affirming care have all the protections we can offer
#55 and #56 (Rausch) – Strong Enforcement, which ensure that people are able to seek redress in court when their rights are violated. To put it simply, a law without a strong enforcement mechanism is just a recommendation.
Tomorrow is National Voter Registration Day, the country’s largest single-day voter registration drive.
It also happens to be the date for a State House hearing on various voting rights bills, including Same Day Registration.
Our democracy is strongest when everyone can participate, but MA still puts up unnecessary barriers to participation. Given that the average American moves more than 11 times over the course of their lives, moving near Election Day could lead to disenfranchisement with our ten-day registration cutoff. Likewise, given the stress of school, work, family, and myriad other commitments, many voters may first start to learn about an election after the registration window has passed.
Even worse, if clerical errors exist on the voter rolls, voters can fill out a provisional ballot, but voters leave unsure if their vote will be counted. No one should ever lose basic rights due to clerical errors.
Same Day Registration can fix all of that, and MA should join our neighboring states in passing it.
ICE officials have announced an increase in activity in Massachusetts, and it has been seen on the ground already. ICE has been kidnapping people off the streets, harassing bystanders, and terrorizing communities–making everyone less safe.
The LUCE hotline has been doing amazing work to keep people alert and to document what’s happening. Bookmark https://www.lucemass.org/if you haven’t already.
Although we can’t stop everything ICE is doing in Massachusetts, we should not be making their work easier. We need our state legislators to pass legislation to limit the scope of ICE in Massachusetts and to better support our immigrant communities.
That’s why it’s essential for your state legislators to co-sponsor and advocate for critical legislation this session in support of immigrants’ rights:
Safe Communities Act (H.2580 / S.1681), which would end the voluntary involvement of our public safety officials in civil immigration matters
Dignity Not Deportations Act (H.1588 / S.1122), which would prohibit sheriffs from voluntarily renting beds to ICE and ban agreements to deputize state and local law enforcement to ICE
Immigrant Legal Defense Act (H.1954 / S.1127), which would ensure that immigrants navigating our complex immigration courts have legal representation and make permanent a recent budgetary appropriation
EMAIL YOUR LEGISLATORS In solidarity, Jonathan Cohn Policy Director Progressive Massachusetts
Say Hi at the Mass Dems Convention This Weekend!
If you’ll be in Springfield this Saturday for the Massachusetts Democratic Party Convention, swing by the PM table to say hi! (Don’t see us at first? That’s because we’re all the way in a corner.) We’ll have actions for you to take at the table — and to bring back to your Senate district seating area.
CONVENTION ALERT:In 2017 and 2021, we collaborated with allies like Our Revolution MA to help strengthen the Massachusetts Democratic Party platform. The 2025 platform committee erased the gains from 2017 and 2021 as well as decades-old commitments to policies like single payer health care.
The 2025 platform is a major step back on health care, labor, climate, racial justice, democracy reforms, LGBTQ+ rights, disability rights, immigrants’ rights, and more.
Click here to learn about the effort to fight this rollback.
LEARN MORE
Protect Our Care with Corporate Fair Share Town Halls
It’s time to Protect Our Care with Corporate Fair Share. The Trump administration is taking away healthcare from working families and seniors so they can put more money into the pockets of billionaires and big corporations. Here in Massachusetts, we could lose as much as $3.5 billion in federal aid that pays for health care, education, and food access for hundreds of thousands of people. We simply can’t afford the harm that will cause.
That’s why the Raise Up Mass coalition is holding a series of regional Protect Our Care Town Halls across the state to tell our legislators: it’s time to make big corporations pay their fair share in taxes—and stop the cuts. Chances are we’re holding one near you! Can you join us?
Find a Town hall near you
Here’s what’s at stake. Up to 350,000 people in MA could lose their health care and/or food assistance because of cuts to Medicaid and SNAP. More than one million students could be hurt by cuts to PreK-12, colleges, and child care. The money from these cuts to state funding is flowing directly to big corporations and billionaires, while our communities are stuck with the cost of hospital closures, hungry students, and long ER lines.
Help Get Rent Control on the Ballot
Homes for All Massachusetts is launching the process to place rent control on the ballot in 2026 with a kickoff event this Saturday, September 13, at 11 am in Town Field (1565 Dorchester Ave) in Dorchester–the first of many events.
The Trump administration and Republicans in Congress have been rolling back critical funding for climate initiatives at the state and local level. But the fact that they deny the realities of climate change to appease their billionaire backers doesn’t make the climate crisis any less severe.
With such federal retrenchment and sabotage, we need states to step up. Here’s one way: make sure the major polluters who caused the climate crisis start paying up to fund the solutions.
The very companies who lied to the public for decades about climate change are benefiting while all of us, especially the most vulnerable, bear the cost.
The Make Polluters Pay bill (H.1014 / S.588), which just had a hearing on Tuesday, would require these major polluters to pay a one-time fee based on their historic emissions to fund climate-resilient infrastructure upgrades.
That means more money for restoring coastal wetlands; upgrading roads, bridges, subways, and transit systems; preparing for extreme weather; energy efficiency upgrades and retrofits; supporting the creation of self-sufficient clean energy microgrids; and addressing urban heat island effects through green spaces and urban forestry.
New York and Vermont have already passed such a bill. Let’s make MA next.
Protect Our Care with Corporate Fair Share Town Halls
It’s time to Protect Our Care with Corporate Fair Share. The Trump administration is taking away healthcare from working families and seniors so they can put more money into the pockets of billionaires and big corporations. Here in Massachusetts, we could lose as much as $3.5 billion in federal aid that pays for health care, education, and food access for hundreds of thousands of people. We simply can’t afford the harm that will cause.
That’s why the Raise Up Mass coalition is holding a series of regional Protect Our Care Town Halls across the state to tell our legislators: it’s time to make big corporations pay their fair share in taxes—and stop the cuts. Chances are we’re holding one near you! Can you join us?
Here’s what’s at stake. Up to 350,000 people in MA could lose their health care and/or food assistance because of cuts to Medicaid and SNAP. More than one million students could be hurt by cuts to PreK-12, colleges, and child care. The money from these cuts to state funding is flowing directly to big corporations and billionaires, while our communities are stuck with the cost of hospital closures, hungry students, and long ER lines.
As the Trump administration rolls back progress on climate action, we need states like Massachusetts to be bolder. And that means not entrenching polluting fossil fuel infrastructure.
Eversource Gas is holding an Open House and Listening Session on August 7th at 6pm to take a concrete step towards getting their permits and building a toxic and dangerous pipeline expansion project from Longmeadow to Springfield.
Springfield Climate Justice Coalition is once again calling on organizations in Western Mass and beyond to stand with them as they send a powerful message to the Healey administration, elected officials and Eversource Gas: “We do not want Eversource to build a polluting pipeline that would run through environmental justice residential neighborhoods, and dangerously close to schools and community hubs in Springfield!”.
The Springfield Climate Justice Coalition is organizing a dynamic outdoor event before the Open House, calling public attention to the dangers of this project and Eversource’s deceitful and self-serving intent in building it. We will gather at 5:15 pm sharp in Stearns Square (one block north on Bridge St) for a street theater performance and call to action, followed by a mini-march to the Eversource Open House at the UMass Center at Tower Square, 1500 Main St.
The Open House (6 to 8 pm) will consist of a short presentation by Eversource, followed by Q & A. Eversource will be providing food and child care, as well as language interpretation in Spanish and Russian. We need the place packed with opponents of this dangerous project, raising all the questions Eversource wants avoided. Wear red!
If you join online:
Tune in at 5 pm to the livestream of the Springfield Climate Justice Coalition’s dynamic outdoor event before the Open House. Then take action together, writing to our elected officials to pass S.2290 / H.3547 “An Act preventing gas expansion to protect climate, community health and safety”. Eversource will begin their powerpoint at 6:30pm, which we will encourage folks to log into. This is open to everyone who cares about our climate future!
Healey Wants to Spend $360 Million on a New Prison. Tell Her No Way.
For years, our friends at Families for Justice as Healing have been organizing against a proposed $50 million new women’s prison to replace MCI-Framingham.
How has Governor Maura Healey responded? By proposing a $360 million new women’s prison.
Incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women and girls have been clear: what we need is not a new prison, but greater programming for those currently incarcerated, better reentry programs for people when they return to community, and greater community investments in housing, health care, education, and economic security and opportunity.
Think of how much that $360 million could do if it went instead to keeping communities safe and ending cycles of incarceration and harm.
Join FJaH in telling Governor Healey to stop the $360 million new women’s prison with the action toolkit at bit.ly/FreeHerMA.
Call daily between 9am and 5pm only – (617) 725-4005
“Hello, my name is _________________ and I am your constituent. I oppose your plan to build a $360 million women’s prison. Spending hundreds of millions of dollars on prison construction is not investing in people’s wellbeing and will not make our communities safer. Our communities need this money for housing, healing, healthcare, treatment and more. We could actually make Massachusetts a model for the rest of the country by releasing many more women and implementing alternatives to incarceration rather than building yet another prison.”
Massachusetts has a housing crisis, and we need every tool in the toolbox.
Too many working-class individuals and families are being priced out of their communities and the Commonwealth entirely due to ever-growing rents. But Beacon Hill can take action.
Join Homes for All Massachusetts tomorrow for a rally in the State House (Grand Staircase) the State House at 11:30 am before the 1 pm hearing on rent control at 1 pm in Gardner Auditorium.
Healey Wants to Spend $360 Million on a New Prison. Tell Her No Way. For years, our friends at Families for Justice as Healing have been organizing against a proposed $50 million new women’s prison to replace MCI-Framingham. How has Governor Maura Healey responded? By proposing a $360 million new women’s prison. Incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women and girls have been clear: what we need is not a new prison, but greater programming for those currently incarcerated, better reentry programs for people when they return to community, and greater community investments in housing, health care, education, and economic security and opportunity. Think of how much that $360 million could do if it went instead to keeping communities safe and ending cycles of incarceration and harm. Join FJaH in telling Governor Healey to stop the $360 million new women’s prison with the action toolkit at bit.ly/FreeHerMA. Call daily between 9am and 5pm only – (617) 725-4005 Email any time using this form: https://www.mass.gov/info-details/email-the-governors-office Sample Email/Script: “Hello, my name is _________________ and I am your constituent. I oppose your plan to build a $360 million women’s prison. Spending hundreds of millions of dollars on prison construction is not investing in people’s wellbeing and will not make our communities safer. Our communities need this money for housing, healing, healthcare, treatment and more. We could actually make Massachusetts a model for the rest of the country by releasing many more women and implementing alternatives to incarceration rather than building yet another prison.” Share Your Fair Share Story On November 8, 2022, Massachusetts voters passed Question 1: the Fair Share Amendment. We chose a fairer tax system, guaranteeing that the richest one percent will pay more to fund our public schools, colleges, roads, bridges, and public transit. Now, Fair Share is at work, already funding more than $6 billion in transportation and public education investments—with more to come. See a list of Fair Share investments to date at fairsharema.com. How is the Fair Share Amendment positively impacting your life, family or work? Are your children receiving free school meals, or learning in a newly-renovated school building? Are you riding a regional transit authority bus for free, or paying a reduced fare on the MBTA? Are you attending tuition-community college, or receiving state financial aid to make public college more affordable? Are you driving on newly paved roads, or riding on subway trains that are faster? Are you receiving child care financial assistance, or sending your child to a child care program that’s benefitted from new grants to child care providers? Is your city or town receiving more money for local roads and schools? (hint: if you live in Massachusetts, the answer is YES!) Raise Up Massachusetts is collecting stories about the many ways the Fair Share Amendment is making a difference in the lives of Massachusetts residents. If you have a story about how Fair Share is positively impacting your life, family or work, please share it with us here. SHARE YOUR STORY Progressive Mass’s New “Power Lunch” Series What comes after calling your state rep and state senator? Getting others to do so as well. Join Progressive Mass for our “Power Lunch” phone bank series (Thursdays at noon), where we will be building our collective power in service of a better Commonwealth for all.
In solidarity, Jonathan Cohn Policy Director Progressive Massachusetts
Trump’s pro-oligarchy, anti-democracy pals who wrote Project 2025 were clear: they want to destroy the National Labor Relations Act, which is the foundational law passed during the New Deal to protect private sector workers’ rights to unionize.
Trump and his cabinet officials are hard at work at implementing their promised rollback of labor laws, leaving working people poorer and less safe.
Here in Massachusetts, we can make sure that—no matter what happens at the federal level— workers are protected in Massachusetts. That’s why we’re supporting legislation from the Massachusetts AFL-CIO, known as the Protect Labor Act, that would ensure that these labor protections exist in MA no matter what.
Although the Legislative session here in Massachusetts has been off to a slow start, I was delighted that one of the earliest hearings was for the Prison Moratorium bill.
This bill would put a five-year pause on new prison and jail construction, a recognition that we should be investing in jobs and education and not in incarceration.
The first step is getting the bill out of committee, and the Joint Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight needs to hear from people like your state senator and your state representative. The House is operating on a 60-day timeline for reporting bills out of committee, and that deadline is fast approaching.
The Legislature voted for the Prison Moratorium back in 2022, but Republican Governor Charlie Baker vetoed it. It advanced out of committee last session but never made it to the floor for a vote. Let’s get this unfinished business done early.
It was inspiring to see all the photos of Massachusetts out in force this weekend: whether at Boston’s Pride for the People or the “No Kings” rallies from communities small and large, across every corner of the Commonwealth. I love seeing the creativity in people’s signs and the collective power on display of people showing up.
And we will need those numbers, that energy, and that creativity if we want to pass important policies to fight back. Good policy is possible, but it doesn’t happen unless your state representative and state senator hear from you—and often.
With Massachusetts being targeted by ICE raids that terrorize communities and make us all less safe, we need our State Legislature to take action in support of disentangling state and local law enforcement from ICE.
With a federal government attempting to criminalize dissent, we need to shore up privacy rights and combat new aggressive and invasive forms of surveillance.
That’s why we need Beacon Hill to pass the Safe Communities Act, the Dignity Not Deportations Act, and the Location Shield Act.
The Safe Communities Act (H.2580 / S.1681) would end the voluntary involvement of our public safety officials in civil immigration matters.
The Dignity Not Deportations Act (H.1588 / S.1122) would prohibit sheriffs from voluntarily renting beds to ICE and ban agreements to deputize state and local law enforcement to ICE.
The Location Shield Act (H.86 / S.197) would prohibit companies from selling, leasing, trading, or renting location data. Your privacy should not be for sale, and your location is your business.
Right now, the Massachusetts House and Senate are negotiating a final budget for the next fiscal year. We know that a budget is a statement of values, and we need to be sure that the FY 2026 budget is reflecting our values of a more just and equitable Commonwealth.
Here’s what to ask from your legislators:
Immigrant Legal Defense Fund: Please advocate for House language dedicating $5 million for a new legal defense program to provide immigration legal services to eligible low-income immigrants and refugees without access to legal representation (House line item 4003-0124).
Banning Broker’s Fees: Please advocate for Senate language to require that residential rental broker’s fees be paid by the contracting agent (typically, the landlord), ensuring that renters are not burdened with unexpected and extraordinary costs.
Access to Counsel: Please advocate for House language allocating $3 million to ensure that tenants facing eviction have access to counsel (House line item 0321-1800).
Emergency Assistance for Families: Please advocate for the Senate’s larger appropriation of $225 million for Residential Assistance for Families in Transition (RAFT), which prevents displacement by providing short-term emergency assistance to keep families stably housed.
Massachusetts Rental Voucher Program: Please advocate for the House’s larger appropriation of $258,111,840 for the MRVP, which provides long-term rental subsidies to approximately 10,000 low-income households for use in the private housing market.
No Cost Calls: Please advocate for House language allocating $10 million for the Communications Access Trust Fund for no cost communication in prisons and jails (House line item 1595-6153).
Universal School Meals: Please advocate for the House’s larger appropriation of $190M allocation for School Meals for All.
Fully Funding Our K-12 Public Schools: Please advocate for the Massachusetts Education Justice Alliance priorities of closing the Chapter 70 inflation gap of $465 million, fixing the charter school reimbursements with the House funding level of $199 million, increasing funding for school building program, and preserving the House inclusion of a grant program for community schools.
