Jag Davies 🌹

NJ’s homeless numbers show big increase | NJ Spotlight News The homeless population in NJ is the largest in more than a decade, according to the latest annual point-in-time count.

A new report shows a sharp increase in homelessness in NJ.

With federal cuts looming, state & local leaders must urgently prioritize building more affordable homes, strengthening tenant protections, and addressing the root causes of housing instability. www.njspotlightnews.org/2025/07/nj-h...

Appreciate this discussion. Drives home how zoning reform is *necessary but not sufficient* to fix the housing crisis. Even if Abundance types use it as a Trojan horse for a billionaire-friendly agenda, it's still needed—just insufficient w/out stronger tenant protections & public sector investment.

There might be an abundance of abundance discussions but this one is really special. It brings together expertise on the housing policy with the bigger question of a post-neoliberal agenda. Listen in!

Zohran Mamdani Must Confront the NYPD. Here's What He Can Do. No single issue will be more challenging for a Mayor Mamdani than policing. But there are concrete steps he can take to reform the NYPD and curb its culture of impunity.

A good piece, not just on Mamdani and NYPD, but for anyone thinking about how to reduce policing/ arrest and not just funding more training. by @alexvitale.bsky.social
www.thenation.com/article/poli...

Q: When it comes to immigration policy, which of the following Democratic candidates would you be more likely to vote for? 75% of Dem voters and 43% of independents selected "A Democratic candidate who fights for our freedoms by pushing back against family separation, mass raids, and forced detention without trial." 16% of Dem voters and 35% of independents selected "A Democratic candidate who prioritizes bipartisan compromise with Republicans to secure the border and deport undocumented immigrants." The remainder said either that a candidate's approach to immigration policy wouldn't influence or they'd never vote (12% among independents) for a Dem.

Since we are in new round (it never ends) of what Dems ought to do while fascists power grab, a view from voters in our latest Research Collaborative/Data for Progress national survey (N=1199, July 18-20)
TLDR: Dems and independents want Dem candidate who fights for immigrant rights.

How New York’s Tenants Won | Tara Raghuveer The night before the New York City municipal primary, the air was sticky with heat and Ferdousi Begum was too tense to sleep. For the past six months,

To understand how @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social won the mayoral primary by a full 12 points last month, it helps to understand how tenants like Ferdousi Begum and Parveg Hasan decided to go on the offensive against real estate.

My first for @nybooks.com, learned tons! www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Appreciate @inquest.bsky.social publishing this excerpt from my book Carceral Apartheid: How Lies and White Supremacists Run Our Prisons. @uncpress.bsky.social

Advocates say New Jersey budget falls short of affordable housing needs • New Jersey Monitor Advocates are sounding the alarm over the new state budget they say undercuts funding for the Affordable Housing Trust Fund.

New Jersey's senseless cuts to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund are penny-wise but pound-foolish. This is often the only source of funding for smaller, shovel-ready developments.

We're calling on Gov. Murphy & legislative leaders to restore the full funding. newjerseymonitor.com/2025/07/03/a...

The data is clear: fines and fees don’t deliver justice — they impose instability. ⛔

For decades, our state & local governments have relied on #FinesAndFees to fill budget gaps – extracting money from people drawn into our criminal, juvenile, traffic, and municipal courts. 🧵

Welcome to the Age of Disappearance America's new era of secret police.

When the Homeland Security funding from the new budget bill kicks in we are going to enter a fundamentally new era of unaccountable secret police that will change American politics and society for a long time.
www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/welcome-to...

If the GOP reconciliation bill passes, ICE gets through FY2029:

- $45 billion for detention, on top of the current annual budget of $3.4 billion
- $14.4 billion for transportation and removal, on top of the current annual budget of $750 million
- $8 billion for hiring/retention
- Billions more.

The Zohran Coalition Mamdani's Mandate & The Dawn of a New Day

NEW: Zohran Mamdani's multi-racial coalition toppled Andrew Cuomo on Tuesday. He won three of five boroughs, the renter class, & "middle income" residents; doing best overall with younger & less frequent voters.

My take on Mamdani's Mandate:
www.michaellange.nyc/p/the-zohran...

The job of a good message isn't to say what is popular. The job of a good message is to make popular what we need said.

Zohran Mamdani’s Mandate Is A Democratic Earthquake There will now be a high-stakes battle to define the meaning of the New York mayoral candidate’s historic win.

The battle for the future started last night.

The Democratic Party political/media elite are going to try to tell you the election didn’t matter, and the victory was only about charisma, rather than a mandate for policy change.

The fight only just starting. Buckle up — it’s gonna be a wild ride.

The Subway Is Not Scary Fear of the subway is a mark of low moral character.

Fear of the New York City subway is a mark of low moral character.
www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/the-subway...

How America Failed the Unhoused Brian Goldstone’s There Is No Place For Us is an enraging book about the intertwined calamities of homelessness and wage labor.

i reviewed @brian-goldstone.bsky.social's stunning book There Is No Place For Us. the book will make you very sad and angry but it is a vital and inarguable rebuttal to the american fantasy that the only thing between you and a good life is hard work www.thenation.com/article/soci...

The Tyranny of Public Opinion The battle over trans rights shows that Democrats have forgotten the fundamentals of politics

"A wealth of research shows that voters don’t come to their policy preferences organically — they follow the cues of political figures they identify with. It’s not that politicians see where voters stand and try to move toward them, it’s the other way around." stringinamaze.net/p/the-tyrann...

You can’t cut property taxes while opposing affordable housing Thoughtfully designed affordable housing stabilizes and strengthens our neighborhoods.

A critically important OpEd from @fairsharehousing.bsky.social:

"Affordable housing isn’t charity. It’s infrastructure."

www.nj.com/mosaic/2025/...

The Tyranny of Public Opinion The battle over trans rights shows that Democrats have forgotten the fundamentals of politics

"If all Democrats do is attempt to match public opinion, they’ll be forever operating within a Republican frame, stuck watching the polls while Republicans move them." stringinamaze.net/p/the-tyrann...

There Is No Place For Us w/ Brian Goldstone (05/19/25) | The Death Panel Get more from The Death Panel on Patreon

In our latest, @reallandsend.bsky.social and @city.bsky.social speak with ‪Brian Goldstone about how we systematically, and intentionally, undercount the homeless, and Brian’s new book There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America

www.patreon.com/posts/129388...

You can’t cut property taxes while opposing affordable housing Thoughtfully designed affordable housing stabilizes and strengthens our neighborhoods.

Affordable housing grows the tax base, ensures strong public services, and improves the cost of living & quality of life for *everyone*.

In this new op-ed for @nj.com, Rev. Eric Dobson spells out why affordable housing is the foundation for thriving communities:

Graph titled: Multiple chronic medical conditions are increasingly common in state & federal prisons

Incarcerated people have more chronic medical conditions than ever

Yet healthcare behind bars is blocked by expensive copays, limited resources, & understaffing – creating a situation in which each year spent in prison takes *2 years* off an individual’s life expectancy

“The housing crisis is not just a crisis of supply and demand. It is a crisis of justice.”
Enhanced housing production that fails to combat exclusion is just continued segregation but on a larger scale. Would repeat the tragic wrong of the 1950’s-1960’s.

Under ‘Crime-Free Housing’ Laws, Families May Be Evicted for Minor Offenses

You can be evicted for: calling 911 too many times; being wrongly accused of shoplifting; having a son with a disability who needs help; being a victim of domestic violence.

This is "crime-free housing" in America.

A searing, crucial investigation by Sidnee King Pineda:

NJ cannot afford to ignore our housing crisis. Every town must do its part. | Opinion New Jersey is in an affordable housing crisis. When municipalities embrace affordable housing, they are investing in their future.

Affordable housing isn’t charity — it’s a strategic investment that benefits *everyone*.

🔥 Read this powerful new op-ed by the New Jersey NAACP's Jeff Carter on why "a state that turns its back on the unhoused is a state turning its back on itself." 🔥 www.northjersey.com/story/opinio...

As a longtime constituent of @repespaillat.bsky.social, I'm extremely disappointed by this endorsement of Cuomo — someone with a loooong track record of corruption, sexual predation, and undermining the interests of working-class New Yorkers.

We need a better mayor — and a better Congressmember!

NY proposal against wearing a mask during crimes stigmatizes masking and won’t stop antisemitism, advocates say The 2026 fiscal year budget includes increased penalties for wearing a mask while committing certain crimes

My latest, on the New York state budget and the governor's stymied push for a mask ban. @prismreports.org
As @jabaribrisport.bsky.social put it: “Restricting voluntary masking in public is truly unconscionable.... it’s clearly not about public safety."
prismreports.org/2025/05/05/n...

Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: A Fair Chance at Housing: Policies in Practice . After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar. From New Jersey to Flint, Michigan, states and cities across the country are considering and implementing fair chance housing policies that make housing more inclusive for people with conviction/arres...

Tomorrow at 3 p.m. ET: Join Vera and partners for a discussion on how Fair Chance Housing policies are helping open doors to housing for people impacted by the criminal legal system.

📅 RSVP here: verainstitute.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

This is why it makes NO SENSE to talk about "the country" voted for x, y, or z.

What is a ‘criminal’ immigrant? The word is an American rhetorical trap | Jonathan Ben-Menachem Labels like ‘gang members’ and ‘terrorist supporters’ are an easy way to make humans disposable

It shouldn't matter if Trump’s victims have criminal records. If we only defend the “innocent,” the fascists will argue that their victim “was no angel.” An anti-fascist rhetoric that carves out exceptions for imperfect victims is a gift to our opponents.

New from me for @us.theguardian.com: