IMV Summer Potuck Picnic: Join Us!
IMV's Annual Potluck Picnic: Candidates, Food
IMV's Annual Summer Potluck Picnic
Tuesday, July 29th, 5-8 pm,
Sherrill Brook Park (Route 12 in New Hartford). Big Pavilion to the right when you enter the park.
Here's the registration link so you can let us know you're coming: https://www.mobilize.us/indivisible/event/818310/
Bring a dish to share if you can and a blanket or lawn chair. We will have some paper plates and plastic ware but as always we encourage people to bring their reusable items, and that includes water bottles. IMV will provide some cupcakes.
Get an overview of where we are and where we're headed with pro-democracy activism at this time.
Meet and greet local Democratic candidates for 2025 elections and some of your Democratic elected representatives..
All are welcome at this event! Bring friends and family!
IMV Community Circles
IMV Community Circles allow us to come together and meet each other, talk about political actions we can, take, and build a strong community movement to protect democracy and stand up to MAGA. Thanks to everyone who has hosted or attended a community circle so far. We have loved receiving the many creative ideas you have generated and the teams you are developing to make political activism local, bite-size, and fun. If you want to host, you'll have the support of IMV Steering Committee in organizing and publicizing it. Email us to get started: IMV@Indivisiblemv.org.
ROME
Wednesday, August 27 (Please note this is a new date because of the conflict with Rome Democratic Candidate Meet & Greet on Aug. 13)
6:00 PM -7:30 PM
Rome Art and Community Center
308 W. Bloomfield Street, Rome
Register here to let us know you're coming.
HERKIMER COUNTY
Tuesday, August 12 and August 26
6:00 -7:30 pm
German Flatts Community Center
555 Rt 5-S, Mohawk
There is ample parking--meet at the outdoor pavilion.
One Million Rising Training: Session 2 on Wednesday
Did you attend the first One Million Rising session (July 16) along with 100,000 other people across the country? Let's keep it going and growing! Session 2 is coming up next week:
If you want to know more about the current strategy to grow our numbers and prepare ourselves for mass mobilizations and non-cooperation actions to come (think general strikes, sit ins, boycotts, etc.) then join a Thursday "What's the Plan?" call. If you can't make a 3 pm call, sign up anyway. You'll get the recording and watch when you have time.
Effective Messaging Follow Ups
We hope many of you got a chance to hear from Anat Shenker-Osorio, our messaging guru, on the Zoom earlier this week! Whether you're talking to friends and acquaintances or writing a letter to the editor, it’s not just what you say but HOW you say it. In this session, we learned about the power of words and how we can frame our messages to tell our stories and communicate across differences. Messaging for solidarity means crafting language that doesn’t just reflect our values but also invites others in. This type of messaging resists division, lifts shared struggles, and helps us build the collective will needed to confront systems of oppression and authoritarian threats.
Below are the resources shared on the call:
Solidarity in Action Training Series Overview
Connect with the Campaign using our online form to receive updates
Check out the Advancing Our Values website
One session alone isn’t going to turn us into messaging experts. There's a follow-up Learning Lab next Monday at 7pm on "Messaging for Solidarity.
REGISTER FOR THE LEARNING LAB HERE
Disappeared in America Updates
Many of you remain deeply concerned and worried about the snatching and disappearing of people from American streets, stores, schools, and job sites. That concern is exacerbated by reports of ICE in our local communities and the recent agreements between local law enforcement offices and ICE (such as Madison County Sheriff and the Camden police). Local leaders of the June 26 Disappeared in America event in Utica are following up by meeting with the Oneida County Sheriff, Robert Maciol. We are thrilled that a public demonstration and press conference is turning into sustained political pressure.
Note: The-disappeared.com is a helpful website with resources you can use to continue to educate yourself and engage in advocacy and activism on this issue.
Sum Up and Inspiration
Good Trouble Lives On events were held all over the state and the country. At our Utica rally, we had great energy and speakers. People did not want to leave; they stayed talking and holding signs in the beautiful sunny evening weather, Here's some local coverage in case you missed it:
Phoenix Radio (excellent interviews presented by Ron Klopfanstein)
Need a Rally?
Join us on Thursdays in Utica at 4 pm at 10 Broad Street. If you need a rally this Saturday, we encourage you to head nothwest to Bridgeport for the "Families First" popl up rally on Saturday morning. This is a protest against the Trump-Republican budget cuts to Medicaid, food, education, and housing. Register on Mobilize to get the specific location:https://www.mobilize.us/familiesfirst/event/816924/
What Else Can I Do?
The calendar is full of opportunities to learn on virtual webinars and to connect with IMV or meet and support local candidates. We also encourage you to continue to support Blake Gendebien ,the amazing farmer candidate running for Congress in NY21 and NY22 Rep. John Mannion.
Our Democratic reps in Congress have very little power right now. What they do have because of their office is a platform.
Rep. Mannion is using his on an almost daily basis to call out the Trump MAGA assault on democracy and the theft of the taxes of workers in America and the programs that make their lives better just to line the pockets of billionaires. That's everything from public education to public broadcasting, Medicaid to food assistance.
When elected officials do the wrong thing we call them out. When they are doing the right things, we need to be just as vocal.
Find ways that you can encourage and support Rep. Mannion's efforts. Then do the same for companies, institutions, and organizations that are standing up to Trump, the ones who refuse to comply in advance, who refuse to get on their knees.
Let's start plotting our actions for the months ahead--both the resistance to Trump and the active steps to defeat MAGA and win elections at every level of government. More info to come at the annual summer potluck picnic on Tuesday. We can't wait to see you there!
Democracy is not a spectator sport.
Website: indivisiblemv.org
Follow us on Bluesky: @Indivisiblemv.bsky.social, on Instagram's Threads.net/@indivisiblemohawkvalley, on X (Twitter) using @indivisiblemv and of course on our Facebook page and IMV Activism Group.
