Category: Dean Phillips

With cameras off, Trump meets with bipartisan House group, including Dean Phillips, to discuss shutdown

Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips on the floor of the U.S. House on Jan. 3, 2019. Credit: Glen Stubbe, Star Tribune file

Cameras were off as Trump met members of Problem Solvers Caucus.

WASHINGTON – Rep. Dean Phillips joined fellow members of Congress on Wednesday in urging President Donald Trump to reopen the entire federal government, using a private meeting to push for an end to the nearly monthlong shutdown.

Phillips, a newly elected Minnesota Democrat, said he was one of 12 House members — six Democrats and six Republicans — summoned to the lunch hour meeting in the White House Situation Room as the shutdown hit its 26th day. All are members of the Problem Solvers Caucus, a bipartisan group of moderates that Phillips joined upon taking office.

“The president explained his position and afforded every one of us the chance to explain ours,” Phillips said. “We went there to express the fact that hundreds of thousands of federal employees are suffering, working without pay, that millions more contractors and people who rely on government services are increasingly being impacted.”

View the complete January 16 article by Patrick Condon on The Star Tribune website here.

Rep. Phillips cosponsors universal background checks bill

WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Rep. Dean Phillips is cosponsoring a bill that would require universal background checks for nearly all firearm purchases.

Phillips, who is in his first term representing Minnesota’s 3rd District, announced on Jan. 8 that he is cosponsoring the universal background checks bill, H.R. 8.

“This is not a partisan issue,” Phillips said in a statement. “In fact, the vast majority of Democrats, independents and Republicans support universal background checks on gun sales. Passing H.R. 8 won’t end our gun violence crisis, but it is an important first step, and I urge my colleagues in the Senate to join us in advancing this long overdue legislation.”

View the complete January 15 article by Melissa Turtinen on The Lakeshore Weekly News website here.

Should tackling political corruption be House Democrats’ first priority?

Rep. Dean Phillips: “I’m disappointed it hasn’t received more fanfare, given its importance. Credit: Brian Snyder, Rueters

Far from being drained, the Washington Swamp at the beginning of 2019 seems swampier than ever: In the last year, Cabinet secretaries have resigned under clouds of corruption, sitting members of Congress have been indicted, and outgoing lawmakers waited mere hours after leaving office to ink lucrative lobbying contracts.

That’s why the new Democratic majority in the U.S. House has introduced, as its first order of business, a bill that proposes a sweeping range of reforms to the political system, from curbing campaign spending to banning lawmakers from serving on corporate boards. Entitled the For the People Act — or simply called “H.R. 1” in legislative-ese to denote its primacy in the majority’s agenda — the bill is being branded as nothing less than the cure for a broken democracy.

You’d think that in the current climate, an ambitious anti-corruption campaign on Capitol Hill would break through the noise and earn a warm reception from an American public that, per a 2015 Gallup poll, overwhelmingly believes that Congress is corrupt, out of touch, and beholden to special interests.

View the complete article by Sam Brodey on the MinnPost website here.

Phillips cosponsors campaign finance reform bill

Credit: Phillips campaign

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Newly sworn-in Rep. Dean Phillips has cosponsored a bill that would reform voter protection and campaign finance laws, known as The For the People Act of 2019, said the Phillips team in a press release on Jan. 4. Phillips introduced the bill with Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. John Sarbanes, the chief author and chair of the Democracy Reform Task Force.

The bill would expand voter protection through automatic voter registration and increased access to early voting and vote-by-mail, and strengthen ethics laws. The legislation also seeks to expand campaign disclosure requirements, establish a public-matching system of individual campaign contributions and expand the campaign finance oversight powers of the Federal Elections Commission.

“The partisanship and gridlock that plagues our government is a symptom of a larger disease,” said Phillips in the release. “That disease is the corrupting influence of special interest money in our politics. In November, communities across our nation came together to demand a disruption of politics as usual. The For the People Act will begin the important work of elevating common interests over special interests, and I am proud that it is the first bill I have the honor of cosponsoring in service to the people of Minnesota’s third district.”

View the January 8 article by Eden Teller on The Eden Prairie News website here.

Several Minnesota delegation members to donate shutdown pay

MINNEAPOLIS — Several members of Minnesota’s congressional delegation said they will donate their pay to charity during the partial federal government shutdown.

Reps. Pete Stauber, a Republican, and Angie Craig, a Democrat, said Monday they would donate their salaries during the shutdown .

Stauber says he believes it isn’t right for members of Congress to be paid “while parts of the federal government remain shut down and thousands of federal worker are furloughed.” He plans to donate his pay to the Domestic Abuse Intervention Programs in Duluth. Craig says she’ll donate her salary to the Eagan Open Door Pantry and Wabasha Food Shelf .

View the complete January 8 article from the Associated Press was posted on The News Tribune website here.

Dean Phillips Talks Trump, His Agenda and Balancing Business Values Within Government

Incoming Congressman Dean Phillips Credit: Jake Armour

The Third District’s new congressman reflects on challenges and priorities as his government-repair mission prepares to enter action mode.

Dean Phillips has a sense for the marketplace. He led Phillips Distilling as it recast itself from a maker of commodity spirits before the artisanal booze craze hit. He co-created Talenti Gelato before there was a gelato outpost in every upscale neighborhood, and his Penny’s Coffee offers a template for third-wave coffee shops as community centers. The adopted son of a legendarily philanthropic Minneapolis family, Phillips, 49—exhausted by the tenor of American politics and the tenure of Republican Rep. Erik Paulsen—decided to challenge Paulsen for his congressional seat, with an inclusive campaign geared to the district’s moderate, pragmatic leanings. We met him during Thanksgiving week at his soon-to-be ex-campaign HQ in a bungalow in downtown Excelsior.

An ugly campaign

Q  Were you surprised to see your corporate ties and board history used against you by Republican interests? It seemed extraordinarily cynical.

A  I thought it was ironic, disappointing, and very much a symptom of this disease [of money in politics]. I’m so grateful to the voters of the district that supported a campaign that took the high road.

View the complete January 2 article by Adam Platt on The Twin Cities Business website here.

Rep.-elect Phillips Announces Senior Leadership Team

Excelsior, MN — Today, Rep.-elect Dean Phillips announced his Congressional office leadership team, which will commence once he is sworn in on January 3, 2019.

Phillips is adopting a dual Chief of Staff organizational structure, with one based in Minnesota’s 3rd District and the other in Washington, D.C.

Filling the Chief of Staff position in Minnesota will be Zach Rodvold, Phillips’s Campaign Manager, who previously worked in the state office of U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone and served as U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar’s State Director from 2007-2009. Rodvold also worked for former House Speaker Paul Thissen and the House DFL Caucus from 2011-2017. Continue reading “Rep.-elect Phillips Announces Senior Leadership Team”

Rep.-Elect Dean Phillips Announces “Representation Begins with Listening” Town Hall

Phillips makes good on campaign promise with first free, open-to-the-public town hall meeting as a Congressman-elect for Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional District

EXCELSIOR, MN — Rep.-Elect Dean Phillips today announced that he will hold his first public town hall meeting since being elected on Monday, December 17th at Oak Grove Elementary School in Bloomington, Minnesota.

Phillips’s campaign for Congress was based on the idea that representation begins with listening, and in addition to appearing at well over 120 public events over the course of his campaign — including dozens of town-hall style events — he committed to holding free, open-to-the-public town hall meetings at least quarterly while in office.

In his remarks on election night, Phillips promised to hold his first town hall before even being sworn into office, which elicited cheers and applause from the crowd. Here are the details:

WHAT:  “Representation Begins With Listening” Town Hall Meeting
WHO:  Free and open to the public
WHEN:  Monday, December 17, 2018,  6:30 PM
WHERE:  Oak Grove Middle School, 1301 West 104th Street, Bloomington, MN

Will the Congressional Progressive Caucus become the Freedom Caucus of the left?

The new, 235-member strong Democratic majority set to take power in the U.S. House of Representatives in January will be, on average, the most progressive Democratic ruling faction on Capitol Hill in decades — or ever.

The party’s left flank is further to the left than ever: Democrats’ most celebrated freshmen, upstarts like Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, are vowing to push for single-payer health care and other left-wing policies. Meanwhile, the Democrats to their right, like Rep.-elect Dean Phillips, unabashedly defend the Affordable Care Act, gun control, and other liberal priorities. The pro-gun, sometimes pro-life conservative “Blue Dog” Democrats who populated Democrats’ last House majority from 2007 to 2011 are all but extinct.

Progressives finally have a fresh chance to govern in D.C., and the Congressional Progressive Caucus is aiming to make it as successful as possible. The decades-old faction of the most left-leaning Democrats — most recently co-chaired by outgoing Rep. Keith Ellison — was, over the last eight years of Republican control of the House, a group of a few dozen liberals that slowly increased its clout in Congress as Democrats languished in the minority.

View the complete December 4 article by Sam Brodey on the MinnPost.com website here.