Letter: “How MA Must Respond to Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill”

Heather Ford, “LETTER TO THE EDITOR: How MA Must Respond to Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill”,” Westwood Minute, July 31, 2025.

To the Editor:

A month ago, Trump and Congressional Republicans passed the Big Beautiful Bill. But this bill is ugly: containing one of the biggest rollbacks of health care access in US history, cuts to food assistance and public education, and escalated funding for ICE.

Through this bill, the Trump administration wants states like Massachusetts to do their dirty work for them. Bay Staters need to be clear that we won’t.

Massachusetts needs to better protect our essential services from federal cuts. The extreme cuts to health care access, food assistance, education, and other vital programs will hit state budgets hard. Indeed, we are already seeing the impact of the unilateral cuts that Trump made earlier this year.

Rather than making cuts that will fall on the backs of the most vulnerable, we should be making sure that the most profitable corporations in our commonwealth are paying their fair share. That’s why we need to pass the Corporate Fair Share bill (H.3110 / S.2033), which would ensure that large multinational corporations like Amazon and Walmart pay more in taxes using a federal formula called Global Intangible Low-Taxed Income (GILTI).

Fun Fact: if Massachusetts started charging these corporations fifty percent of their GILTI, it would be the same percentage of their GILTI that Maine, Vermont, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire already do.

Beacon Hill also needs to tap into the state’s $8 billion rainy day fund. The looming cuts that Bay Staters face under the “Big Beautiful Bill” are why the rainy day fund was created.

Second, Massachusetts needs to better protect our immigrant communities by not being complicit with Trump’s mass deportation agenda. Trump’s $45 billion increase in ICE funds means that the administration will be looking for more people to work as immigration agents. Scaling up means that they will want states to offer existing personnel to do their dirty work. We must be clear that we won’t. Bills like the Safe Communities Act (H.2580 / S.1681) and the Dignity Not Deportations Bill (H.1588 / S.1122) would ensure that our state and local law enforcement are not being deputized as ICE agents.

Our legislators on Beacon Hill speak of doing the best for their constituency. Bay Staters should push for them to pass these three bills to help them do their best and reject the President’s agenda.

Heather T. Ford
Westwood, MA

Thanks to Heather Ford, Westwood resident, for sharing these comments and opinions with Westwood Minute. 

Letter: “It’s Time for Beacon Hill to Lead, Not Linger”

Jason Brown, “It’s Time for Beacon Hill to Lead, Not Linger,” West Roxbury/Roslindale Bulletin, July 30, 2025.


To the Editor:
Seven months into President Trump’s second term, the harm has been swift: rollbacks of civil rights, environmental protections, and safety net programs. ICE raids are tearing families apart, and Congress has aided these efforts. Meanwhile, Massachusetts has been slow to respond. There has been some progress, like immigrant legal defense funding and laws pro-
tecting abortion and gender-affirming care, but we can and must do more.

We need to better protect immigrants. Trump’s $45 billion expansion of ICE means federal agents will pressure states for help. Massachusetts must draw a clear line by passing the Safe Communities Act (H.2580/S.1681) and the Dignity Not Deportations Bill (H.1588/S.1122), which would ensure that local law enforcement is not deputized as ICE agents.

We also need to shield essential services from deep federal cuts to health care, education, and food assistance. Massachusetts can lead with fair and direct revenue policy. The Corporate Fair Share bill (H.3110/S.2033)
would close offshore tax loopholes, ensuring that large multinational corporations like Amazon and Walmart pay their fair share. This would be an overdue fix with meaningful impact.

And let’s not forget our $8 billion rainy day fund. These federal assaults on our communities are precisely the “rainy days” it was designed for.

Massachusetts has the wealth, the tools, and the moral imperative to act. When the Legislature returns from recess, we need them to meet the urgency of the moment—not just with words, but with action. Constituents must demand bold leadership.
Jason Brown
West Roxbury

MA Passed a Budget on Time. What’s in It?

Let’s start out with the ugly, and then the good and the bad.

The UGLY: Yesterday, the US Senate passed a horror show of a budget to take away health care access and food assistance in order to fund tax cuts for the mega-rich and large corporations, and to create a police state in the US by increasing ICE’s budget several times over. If passed, it will be a disaster for the country and for Massachusetts. If you have friends in other states who have Republican Senators or Representatives, ask them to make a phone call in opposition to the Big Ugly Bill.

THE GOOD: On Monday, the Massachusetts State House did something it hasn’t done since 2016: it passed a budget before the end of the fiscal year.

There are some major victories in this budget to celebrate:

  • Banning tenant-paid broker’s fees
  • $2.5 million in continued funding for an access to counsel program, which provides legal representation to low-income tenants facing eviction
  • $5 million for an immigrant legal defense fund
  • Permanently fare-free regional transit authorities
  • Increased funding for our public schools

THE BAD: But there were also disappointments in the budget:

  • Only $1 million in dedicated funding for No Cost Calls implementation
  • Less funding for local aid
  • Insufficient funding for housing safety net programs
  • Insufficient funds for SNAP case workers

Read more about the state budget here, here, and here.

Write to your legislator to express your support for the budget wins and your disappointment with what was left out.

Email Your Legislators

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.”

Another Budget Takeaway: Fair Share Delivers

One major budget takeaway: The Fair Share Amendment has been delivering even more than expected, and it has proven essential. The Fair Share Amendment has been producing even more revenue than projected, and it has made possible critical new investments in education and transportation. Learn more about its $6 billion in positive impact so far at https://www.fairsharema.com/.

Massachusetts SHOWED UP to Rallies This Weekend. What Can You Do Next?

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.

Can you write to your state rep and state senator in support of these key bills?

EMAIL YOUR STATE LEGISLATORS

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.

Can you write to your state rep and state senator in support of these key bills?

In solidarity,

Letter to AG Campbell to Protect Immigrant Taxpayers

Progressive Mass was proud to sign on to the letter below, organized by Greater Boston Legal Services.

June 5, 2025

Honorable Andrea Joy Campbell

Massachusetts Attorney General

One Ashburton Place

Boston, MA  02118

Re: A petition to challenge the impending use of confidential IRS data for immigration enforcement

Dear Attorney General Campbell,

On behalf of the many immigrant families living in Massachusetts, the undersigned urge you and other Attorneys General to consider bringing a lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The goal of the suit is to prevent the agency from implementing a recent Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which would allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for the first time to use confidential taxpayer information as immigrant locator tools.

Unlike individual plaintiffs who would put themselves at risk of deportation, Attorneys General have standing to bring their own challenges based on the lost revenue resulting from vulnerable immigrants dropping out of the tax system.

Background

DHS wants access to immigrant tax data in order to expedite the mass deportation mandate under Executive Order 14161 from the President. The broad scope of the data sought is apparent from the first paragraph of the MOU which references the EO:

WHEREAS by Executive Order (EO) No. 14161, Protecting the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats, 90 Fed. Reg. 8451 (Jan. 20, 2025), the President directed the Secretary of State, in coordination with the Attorney General, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Director of National Intelligence, to take immediate steps to identify, exclude, or remove aliens illegally present in the United States;

The administration believes that DHS access to the personal data of immigrant taxpayers is permissible under an exception to the tax-privacy statute that allows for the investigation and trial-preparation of federal criminal statutes. 26 U.S.C. § 6103(i)(2). There is no exception for civil immigration enforcement. There do not appear to be safeguards to ensure that the information shared would only be used for actual criminal investigations. While most information-sharing requires judicial oversight, the (i)(2) exception allows access to a subset of IRS data without going to a court. It is feared that the information extracted from IRS records will inevitably be utilized for civil immigration enforcement, a clear violation of taxpayer privacy rules. These strict privacy protections were enacted in response to Nixonian abuses and the present contemplated mass transfer of taxpayer information is utterly unprecedented. High level IRS officials including an acting Commissioner have resigned over concerns that the MOU violates taxpayer privacy rules.

A lawsuit by the Attorney(s) General would challenge the administration’s efforts to break down one of the strongest firewalls for government data: the privacy afforded to tax information. See 26 U.S.C. § 6103 (tax-privacy statute). Starting with people who have final orders of removal and subject to criminal investigations, the administration seeks to build information pipelines from tax-related agencies—such as IRS and SSA—to ICE. A pending lawsuit[1] in the D.C. Circuit has an uncertain future and we are looking to your office to take up the baton before it is too late.

The administration has stated its intent to seek information for as many as seven million people using this pipeline, alongside its articulated desire to create a “mega API” for IRS data. While DHS argues that it primarily targets those with final deportation orders (which have rarely resulted in criminal prosecutions) it is unlikely that ICE will truly undertake the time and expense to pursue criminal proceedings for so many people. Furthermore, those of us who have represented immigrant taxpayers before the IRS do not believe the agency has the competency to verify another agency’s criminal investigations particularly given the high volume of investigations that DHS would have to undertake.

The reported agreement has caused panic and confusion in the immigrant community among the many taxpayers who have relied on the IRS to keep their tax data private. The IRS encourages all taxpayers to comply with their tax filing obligations regardless of their immigration status, issues Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITINs) to those ineligible for social security numbers to facilitate compliance and has assured taxpayers –up to now- that their information is protected. ITINs were never intended to be tools for immigration enforcement. Indeed, immigrant ITIN filers pay more than their share of income taxes in Massachusetts and undocumented workers contribute payroll taxes even though they may never be able to access the Social Security or Medicare benefits they pay for with each paycheck.

Immigrant families have been traumatized. They are afraid to attend immigration hearings, go to work, send their kids to school, or even attend community gatherings such as church services. Now will they be putting themselves and/or family members at risk by filing their tax returns? A recent study from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) found that undocumented immigrants in Massachusetts contribute $650 million in state and local taxes. Immigrant workers are critical to our state economy and this breach in taxpayer privacy threatens to disrupt our taxpaying workforce. If the agreement is executed, immigrants will go further underground and we will see “downstream consequences” to our state revenues. Our tax system is built on voluntary compliance. ITEP has raised the alarm that tax revenues will decrease if the IRS is weaponized against immigrants and their tax information is used against them. We all lose when taxpayer privacy is weakened and inevitably results in the erosion of trust in the tax system.

We know you are already doing a great deal to alert and educate the residents of Massachusetts including immigrants, but a legal suit on behalf of vulnerable immigrant taxpayers seems necessary to prevent this imminent abuse of the law.

We look forward to discussing any questions you may have. Thank you for reading this and for all that the AG’s Office is doing during these very uncertain times. 

Sincerely,

Agencia ALPHA

Asian American Civic Association

Asian Taskforce Against Domestic Violence (ATASK)

The Boston Foundation

Boston Immigration Justice Accompaniment Network (BIJAN)

Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston (BMA TenPoint)

Boston Tax Help Coalition, Office of Workforce Development, City of Boston

Brazilian Workers Center

Brazilian Women’s Group

Brockton Workers Alliance

Cambridge Economic Opportunity Committee (CEOC)

Center for New Americans

Centro Presente

Children’s Health Watch  

Chinese Progressive Association

Coalition for Social Justice Action

Community Action Agency of Somerville (CAAS)

Community Economic Development Center- New Bedford (CEDC)

Community Labor United

Dominican Development Center

English for New Bostonians

Greater Boston Labor Council 

Greater Boston Legal Services

Haitian Community Partners Foundation

Health Law Advocates

Healthy Families Tax Credit Coalition

Horizons for Homeless Children

Immigrant Family Services Institute (IFSI) 

Immigrant Service Providers Group/Health, Somerville

International Institute of New England

Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action (JALSA)

Jewish Vocational Services (JVS)

Justice at Work

Justice Center of Southeast Massachusetts

Kids in Need of Defense (KIND)

La Colaborativa

Lawrence Community Works

Legal Key Partnership for Health and Justice

Lynn Rapid Response Network

Lynn Worker’s Center

Massachusetts Advocates for Children

Massachusetts AFL-CIO

Massachusetts Association for Community Action (MASSCAP)

Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations

Massachusetts Coalition of Domestic Workers

Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center (MassBudget)

Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition (MIRA)

Massachusetts Immigrant Collaborative (MIC)

Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI)  

Massachusetts Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health (MassCOSH)

MetroWest Worker Center/Centro del Trabajador  

Neighbor to Neighbor Massachusetts

Northeast Justice Center 

Northshore Community Development Coalition

Office of State Representative Russell Holmes

Office of State Senator Liz Miranda

Open Door Immigration Services

Pathway for Immigrant Workers

Progressive Massachusetts

Project Citizenship

RESULTS-Massachusetts

Rosie’s Place

Safety Net Project, Wilmer Hale Legal Services Center, Harvard Law School

SEIU Local 509

Strategies for Children

The House of the Seven Gables Settlement Association

The Neighbourhood Developers (TND)

Unitarian Universalist Massachusetts Action Network (UUMassAction)

United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 2322

The Welcome Project 

Watertown Citizens for Peace, Justice and the Environment

Women’s Bar Association of Massachusetts

Women’s Institute for Leadership Development (WILD)

[1] Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, et al. v. Bessent, et al., 1:25-cv-00677 (D.D.C.)This case was filed by Public Citizen before the Treasury-DHS Memorandum of Understanding, based on reporting of imminent disclosure of the information of tax filers using Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITINs). As part of the litigation, the MOU, partially redacted, was made public confirming that a much wider target group of taxpayers is at risk. On May 12 the Court denied the Plaintiff’s request for preliminary injunction.

Progressive Groups Call Out Beacon Hill Inaction in Trump’s First 100 Days

The Honorable Speaker Ron Mariano

24 Beacon St.

Room 356

Boston, MA, 02133

The HonorableSenate President Karen Spilka

24 Beacon St.

Room 332

Boston, MA, 02133

Wednesday, May 14, 2025 

Hon. Speaker Ron Mariano and Hon. President Karen Spilka,

Two weeks ago marked the 100th day of Donald Trump’s second presidential term. These hundred days have been marked by an incessant barrage of chaos, cruelty, and corruption. We have seen consistent threats to Massachusetts—to essential social programs; to efforts to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion; to our ability to keep our residents safe; to our efforts to tackle the climate crisis; to the scientific research that powers our regional economy; to people’s constitutional rights of free speech, including abductions of MA residents. We have seen an undermining of the basic rule of law that has pushed us into a constitutional crisis as well as a global trade war that will cause economic harm to our Commonwealth. We have seen the exacerbation of racism, misogyny, xenophobia, homophobia, transphobia, Islamophobia, and antisemitism–the list goes on–in rhetoric and policy. We need not recount every such harmful action taken and its impact on Massachusetts because you know them too well. 

But what is less known is how you will choose to respond. Indeed, 100 days into Trump’s presidency and 17 weeks into the 194th session of the General Court, only two bills had been signed into law: (1) a supplemental budget that included harmful restrictions on the access to emergency shelter for families with children and (2) another temporary extension of the ability of state and local bodies to hold hybrid and virtual meetings. That has not grown in the subsequent weeks. 

Although grappling with the full scale of present and future crisis from the federal administration is daunting, it is incumbent upon you to respond and to meet the moment as best you can. 

While you focus on planning for what’s to come, there are steps that we can take now, steps that have already been vetted in hearings in past legislative sessions:  

  • Guarantee that Massachusetts resources are used for state priorities, not federal immigration enforcement, by ending the state Department of Corrections’ 287(g) agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), banning future 287(g) agreements, and ending intergovernmental service agreements
  • Protect access to courts by prohibiting police and court officials from initiating contact with ICE about a person’s pending release from police or court custody
  • Embrace the best practices already in place in cities and towns by ensuring that state and local police will not inquire about immigration status will not inquire about immigration status or engage in civil immigration enforcement related activities
  • Ensure the safety and well-being of the residents of the Commonwealth and those traveling from other states for reproductive care by shoring up privacy rights and banning the purchase and sale of personal cell phone location data
  • Strengthen our state’s shield law for reproductive and gender–affirming care

All of these are bills you can, and must, pass now. We must be proactive in our policymaking, not wait until the crisis reaches its apex before responding. 

Moreover, as we have already faced lost federal funding and face even more later this year, with expected harm to our public schools, our health care, our safety net programs, our infrastructure, and so much more, we urge you to present a plan for the public for how you will protect our essential services. Now is not the time for cuts. We can and must raise revenue to fund our needs, and there are many such options available, most notably by closing tax loopholes that allow billionaire global corporations to dodge taxes by hiding their profits in tax havens abroad. We must also not be afraid to tap into the state’s rainy day fund when the torrential downpour comes. 

To ensure the efficient and responsive legislative process that this work requires, we urge you to prioritize coming to an agreement on the Joint Rules for the legislative session. Both chambers proposed valuable reforms to make the legislature more open, accountable, and timely. Clarity on rules is essential for the work ahead: inertia thrives under uncertainty. 

We appreciate the words you have spoken in the past months to criticize the harm being done by the federal administration. What the Commonwealth needs now is your actions. 

Sincerely, 

350 Mass 

Act on Mass 

Asian American Resource Workshop 

Asian Pacific Islanders Civic Action Network – Massachusetts

Chinese Progressive Association 

Clean Water Action 

Community Action Agency of Somerville, Inc.

Families for Justice as Healing  

Homes for All Massachusetts 

Indivisible Mass Coalition 

Lynn United for Change 

Massachusetts Peace Action 

New England Community Project

Our Revolution Massachusetts 

Progressive Democrats of Massachusetts

Progressive Massachusetts

Springfield No One Leaves 

Unitarian Universalist Mass Action

“We are the safest major city in the nation because we are safe for everyone.”

Earlier today, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, in her opening remarks defending Boston’s Trust Act to the US House Oversight Committee, explained, “We are the safest major city in the nation because we are safe for everyone.”

During the hearing, Mayor Wu and three other mayors had to withstand the racist, intellectually dishonest attacks from House Republicans but made clear that protecting the rights of our immigrant communities makes us safer.

Cities like Boston and countless others across the Commonwealth have passed ordinances to make clear that local law enforcement do not work for ICE and should not do the work of federal immigration enforcement. But we need to enshrine local best practice into state law and strengthen the protections for our immigrant communities against the threats from the Trump administration.

That’s why it’s essential for your state legislators to co-sponsor critical legislation this session in support of immigrants’ rights:

  • Safe Communities Act, which would end the voluntary involvement of our public safety officials in civil immigration matters
  • Dignity Not Deportations Act, 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, which would ensure that immigrants navigating our complex immigration courts have legal representation

Can you write to your state representative and state senator in support of these key bills?

Maura Healey to Struggling Families: There’s No Room at the Inn

Forty-one years ago, Massachusetts enacted the first-in-the-nation “right-to-shelter” law, guaranteeing all homeless families with children and pregnant women access to temporary housing and other emergency services.

However, over the past year, Governor Maura Healey and our State Legislature have been chipping away at this critical guarantee. Just last month, the MA Governor’s Office announced policy changes that further dismantle the state’s emergency shelter system for all families by creating a two-track system, with some families being sent to barracks-style respite centers capped at 30 days and other families being capped at six months.

Let’s be clear: with our rapidly growing rents, weak tenant protections, and exclusionary zoning policies across the state, affordable housing opportunities do not magically appear after six monthsjust because the state wants to wash its hands of any responsibility to care for our residents. Kicking families out of shelter during the coldest months of the year is especially obscene.

Write to Governor Healey and your state legislators about why we need to end these cruel new shelter policies and uphold our status as a right to shelter state.

Recently, a group of local elected officials from across the Commonwealth sent a sign-on letter to Governor Healey urging her to end these harmful restrictions. Can you also ask any local elected officials you know (your City Councilor, your Select Board Member, your School Committee Members, etc.) to join them? In solidarity,

PM in the News: Progressives Push for Preemptive Action on Trump 2.0

Kelly Garrity, “Progressives push for preemptive action on Trump 2.0,” POLITICO, December 11, 2024.

NOW NOT LATER — With just over a month until Donald Trump returns to the White House, more than a dozen progressive and grassroots groups are urging the state’s Democratic leaders not to wait to strengthen state laws for rights they say are likely to come under fire in the next administration.

In letters sent to Gov. Maura Healey and top legislative leaders, the coalition calls on Beacon Hill’s Big Three to get the ball rolling now, before the current legislative session ends on Dec. 31.

“States like Massachusetts have a responsibility to lead and push back: we must refuse to comply everywhere we can, we must shore up protections for marginalized communities in the Commonwealth, and we must chart a clear course for what accountable progressive governance looks like and how it delivers for us all,” the letter to Senate President Karen Spilka and House Speaker Ron Mariano reads.

The organizations backing the push: Signatories include groups like Indivisible Massachusetts Coalition, Progressive Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Immigrant & Refugee Advocacy Coalition, Act On Mass and Our Revolution Massachusetts.

What they want: The groups are asking Healey to call the Legislature back for a formal session “as soon as possible.”

They’re also calling on the governor to create a “legal defense fund” that would support civil rights litigation, and are urging Healey to join Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and Colorado Gov. Jared Polis’ “Governors Safeguarding Democracy” group.

And they want to see the Legislature pass bills that would ensure no state resources are used in assisting federal immigration enforcement and end ICE detention in the state.

Advocacy Organizations Call on Massachusetts House and Senate to Reconvene Before End of Session to Pass Critical Legislation that Addresses Threats of Trump Administration

Tuesday, December 10, 2024 

Speaker Ron Mariano 

24 Beacon St.

Room 356

Boston, MA, 02133

Senate President Karen Spilka 

24 Beacon St.

Room 332

Boston, MA, 02133

Speaker Mariano and Senate President Spilka, 

Residents across Massachusetts have responded to the recent presidential election with fear and anxiety about what will come from a second Trump administration. We know the damage caused from the first one: the harms done to civil rights, labor rights, environmental protections, immigrant communities, communities of color, LGBTQ rights, reproductive rights, health care access, public health infrastructure, and so much more. 

Trump and the coming Republican Congress have been clear that they plan to continue these assaults. They and their allies have outlined it in Project 2025, which proposes a radical right-wing restructuring of the federal government and an attack on basic rights and freedoms that we in Massachusetts cherish. 

States like Massachusetts have a responsibility to lead and push back: we must refuse to comply everywhere we can, we must shore up protections for marginalized communities in the Commonwealth, and we must chart a clear course for what accountable progressive governance looks like and how it delivers for us all. 

This work ahead will follow different timelines, but what is clear now is we cannot wait until next January to get started. We ask you to be proactive, and not merely be reactive to the threats of the Trump administration. This extraordinary moment requires extraordinary action. Other states, such as California, have responded by coming back into session to pass additional protections. We urge you to come back into session as soon as possible this month to do the same. 

Knowing that assaults on our immigrant communities will be immediate actions from the next Trump administration, we urge you to take up legislation this December to protect our state’s immigrant communities, including but not limited to provisions found in bills S.1510/H.2288 and S.997/H.1401: 

  • Guarantee that Massachusetts resources are used for state priorities, not federal immigration enforcement, by ending the state Department of Corrections’ 287(g) agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and ensuring that state and local police will not inquire about immigration status 
  • End ICE detention in Massachusetts and prohibit the deputization of local officials to act as ICE agents 
  • Protect access to courts by prohibiting police and court officials from initiating contact with ICE about a person’s pending release from police or court custody, except at the end of a sentence of incarceration 
  • Ensure the safety and well-being of the residents of the Commonwealth and those traveling from other states for reproductive care by shoring up privacy rights and banning the purchase and sale of personal cell phone location data. 

If old patterns hold, then the Legislature will reconvene in January, committees will be assigned in February, hearings will continue for the next year, and little if any legislation will be passed and signed into law in the first half of 2025. We saw the damage of the first Trump administration, and we cannot afford that wait. 

We appreciate past efforts to  proactively respond to right-wing federal action. After the Supreme Court’s shameful Dobbs decision in late June of 2022, you took quick action to provide legal protections to abortion providers, out-of-state patients, and insurers; expand access to contraceptives; and help ensure that women who face grave circumstances get the care they need. 

We ask that you once again step up. We look forward to working with you in December and also in the coming years to counter the threats posed by the Trump administration. Our Commonwealth must take action at this moment and respond, and we must be flexible now, which means proactively passing legislation in December before this session ends. 

Sincerely,

Indivisible Mass Coalition

Progressive Mass

Massachusetts Immigrant & Refugee Advocacy Coalition

Act On Mass

American Federation of Teachers – MA

Asian American Resource Workshop 

Asian Pacific Islanders Civic Action Network – MA

CARE Action, Inc

Clean Water Action

MassEquality

Mass Peace Action

Our Revolution Massachusetts

Progressive Democrats of Massachusetts

Indivisible Acton Area

IndivisibleLAB

Valley Action