Amanda Litman

Opinion | Forget Trump’s IVF promises. The GOP’s record shows contempt for fertility care. As always, pay more attention to what politicians do than to what they say.

He was lying about this from the get-go, which was obvious if you looked at literally anything he had done in his first term related to fertility care.
Pay more attention to what politicians do than to what they say. css.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

My Democratic colleagues and I just left the state of Texas to break quorum and stop Trump’s redistricting power grab.

Trump is trying to rig the midterm elections right before our eyes. But first he’ll have to come through us.

It’s time to fight back.

Let's build sustainable power! Run for Something elects young diverse progressives to local office to help Democrats build permanent power for the long haul — no matter who’s in the White House.

You will notice - @runforsomething.net doesn’t do this! We ask for money regularly, yeah, but never in a hair on fire bullshit urgency you’re a monster if you don’t give kind of way. If you want to support that kind of intentionality, chip in: runforsomething.net/donate

We can’t treat our supporters like shit. No amount of money is worth the hit to the relationship.

Texas Democrats are showing what fighting looks like. Get ‘em.

I really appreciate the ideas in this and also this:

“Too many people are trying to win the last election instead of trying to win the next ten.”

Forcing us to look beyond the right now I think helps us think about the structures we need to build to get back to…some sort of democracy.

One simple trick to fix the Democratic Party ...does not exist!

How can we give people IRL experiences (both explicitly political ones but also just good-vibes ones) that change how they feel about the party and about each other?

amandalitman.substack.com/p/one-simple...

If you did not see Magic Mike XXL in a crowded theater full of women, you missed out on a genuinely religious experience.

That’s a good dog!!!

I just finished reading "When We're in Charge" by Amanda Litman, and I’ve never highlighted a nonfiction book this much in my life. (I find most business books either too meta, too tactical, or too male-centered). "When We're in Charge" is a refreshingly helpful guide for Millennial + Gen Z leaders navigating a world where we’re expected to “be ourselves” and somehow also be perfect, composed, strategic, and vulnerable...but not too much (cool cool cool). Three ideas that stuck with me: 🧠 Navigating the divide between your “work self” and “home self” has never been trickier. This struggle is REAL, especially for leaders who are perpetually on social media. How does one walk the line between authenticity and oversharing? It requires *constant* dialing up or dialing down how much of yourself you present. Litman writes, “My goal is not to be 100 percent myself all the time; my goal is to regularly be the leader version of myself when it's required and to do so in a way that's sustainable for my mental health.” TLDR; You can lead with authenticity and still have boundaries. You can be warm without being everyone’s best friend. You can share strategically without handing over your whole self.

😠 No matter how much good you try to do, someone will be disappointed or furious. “Your goal as leader is not to provide for every possible want or need. Your goal is to create psychological and emotional safety, within reason, in order to serve the organization's goals and give people their dignity. That safety comes not from the mission or the work itself, but from the culture you create and the ways you assure expectations and reality are aligned.” Preach, Litman. 💡 Transparency is insight, not necessarily input. There are a number of models for decision-making that you can adopt, define for your team, and then reference as appropriate. Sharing context is key, but that doesn’t mean every decision needs to be (or should be) a group vote. Clear roles and decision-making models prevent chaos and burnout. Anywayyyyy, I highly recommend this book for anyone shaping what leadership looks like in 2025 and beyond (and who is a bit confused/overwhelmed by the whole thing...aka me).

Another edition of unironically obsessed with how people post about my book on LinkedIn.

Get your copy!

Bookshop: bookshop.org/a/100021/978...

Amazon: www.amazon.com/When-Were-Ch...

Book recs for the final stretch of summer Rabbit rabbit!

21 book recs for summer reading - more recs always welcome! open.substack.com/pub/amandali...

I didn’t see that, just yours. 🤷‍♀️

I wasn’t referring to higher office - you all assumed that. I run an organization that exclusively helps people for state and local offices for the first time.

Shoulda tagged you!! Sorry!!

Thank you! 🥹

“we should be rigid in our values, but flexible in how those values show up as policies” is the best way I’ve ever heard this expressed

for all the people who are like “a Mamdani would never fly in Kansas” - right because the policy needs would be different there. the values can be the same!

This is how @runforsomething.net has always operated! It’s what has enabled us to work with candidates in all 50 states and at varying levels of office.

I think this is really important. local progressive candidates focusing on local issues and mobilizing action even on a small grassroots level are doing a lot more good than everyone just going on talk shows to pontificate about Trump without trying to meaningfully check his power

🦇🦇🦇

I picked up a second job while running for office currently. Is my time management skills evolving? You better believe it lol

Am I still the evolving into best candidate despite the extra work? Absolutely, we have to play the hand we are dealt and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

In the tiny print: 10k people signed up to run for something in 2 weeks after Mamdani primary victory — biggest surge in 8 years.

The #1 grumpy comment I get in response to WHEN WE'RE IN CHARGE (whenwereincharge.com !!), in which I describe how boomers are about to pass the baton to millennials & gen Z, is a variation "what about gen X!??! When do we get to take over??

Sorry yall. Blame the boomers!

When it comes to the C-suite, Gen X might be doomed to live up to its “forgotten generation” moniker. More baby boomers are working past traditional retirement ages. By the time they are ready to pass the torch, millennials will be reaching for it. This is already happening at more companies. In the Russell 3000, 41.5% of chief executives are at least 60 years old, up from 35.1% in 2017. Over the same period, the share of CEOs in their 30s and 40s has grown to 15.1% from 13.8%, according to research by the Conference Board and ESGAUGE. That leaves Gen Xers, typically defined as those born between 1965 and 1980, with fewer chances to lead. People in their 50s held 51.1% of CEO seats eight years ago. Now they occupy 43.4%.

The Gen Xers Who Waited Their Turn to Be CEO Are Getting Passed Over More companies are holding on to older leaders or passing over a generation in search of the next ones

Per usual, the boomers holding on to power far past their time are the real villains in this story. www.wsj.com/lifestyle/ca...

That’s still true! We collect data a little differently now but Trump is almost never mentioned in early convos.

can confirm (w/ @meredithconroy.bsky.social and Ciera Hammond): at around this time during Trump 1, people giving local reasons why they signed up with Run for Something were more likely to actually run than people who gave Trump reasons
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Exciting news: lots of young people across the country are entering politics, and among them, "the most common specific issue we're hearing candidates talk about is housing" 🏠🏠🏠📢

And: Having deep local ties is an important part of our endorsement criteria.

Good edit, I will clarify: We're usually the only national organization! Most have deep ties locally.

No matter the outcome, the Democratic Party will be different after the 2026 election. Change is coming. I see it happening in real-time with the hundreds of Run for Something candidates we’re working with already on the ballot and the thousands more who will be running next year and beyond. Whether these individuals win or lose (and for what it’s worth, I expect many of them will win!), it will be a different party after the midterms. While the national conversation is stuck in a circular firing squad, arguing in abstract about which of many competing visions of the party will take us forward, the truth is that the operative and pundit class don’t get to decide. Voters do. And their decisions will be shaped by the candidates and potential candidates who step up to lead, listen to what their communities care about, and build new coalitions around broadly shared values.

Looking back, 2018 was a major transformational year for Democrats, with a new wave of leaders winning both nationally and locally that began to set in motion the generational shift. The Biden presidency of 2021-2024 was the status quo’s final hold on power -- while not in the way he promised, he did function as a "bridge to a new generation of leaders." And after 2026, we’ll be on the other side.

Win or lose, the Democratic Party will look different after 2026. Couldn’t happen soon enough!

They are not controlled by the party (or by anyone else) I say this with all due respect: Most of the people debating and pundit-ing about where the Democrats should go from here have little say in the matter. For many of the leaders Run for Something is engaging with -- which, again, is the largest pipeline of its kind -- we are the only organization they’re in touch with. We are regularly the first endorser for our candidates and often the only one, as few groups go as local or as broad in scope. More broadly, few candidates are in touch with official party entities. They’re not hearing from the think tanks putting out policy papers, the pollsters with data decks, and few have the funds to pay for the consultants so many online seem to abhor. They are removed from that world, and they’re better off for it.

Some are explicitly running against the party brand if that makes sense for where they are. Others are running in primaries against Democratic incumbents who’ve been out of touch with where the community is, and haven’t had to earn their seat in years or ever. They’re showing up and putting their names on the ballot even as the gatekeepers inside stale institutions have told them to get in the back of the line, or that it’s not worth trying because they’ll never win. They don’t care. The stakes are too high and the problems are too urgent not to give it their all.

(5) They are not controlled by the party (or by anyone else.)