Statement by Deborah Weinstein, Executive Director, Coalition on Human Needs 

Here’s something you already know: the power of money is strong. 

Big money scored a “win” today, now that the House has voted for One Big Brutal Bill and it will be signed into law. The implacable impetus for this legislation has always been to extend and expand the trillions of dollars in tax breaks that overwhelmingly favor corporations and the rich. Working in tandem with members of Congress who not only want to give the richest more but insist on giving the poor less, we now face perhaps the greatest transfer of resources from low to high incomes in our nation’s history. 

We must be clear-eyed about the threats most of us face. This legislation, if implemented as written, will shrink federal resources for health care, food, education, and investments to meet our energy needs. That will be combined with the autocratic power grab by the Trump administration to seize funds Congress has appropriated, denying still more resources. We will see continued thuggish seizures of immigrants, at grievous cost to families, communities, our economy, and the principles of law. And there will be more upcoming fights, threatening affordable housing, child care, education, public health and environmental protections. 

This is not about words on a page – this is about real hardship, real sickness, real needless death to be inflicted recklessly by a slim majority of our leaders. That human needs advocates could not prevent this is bitterly painful. 

Still – the power of big money is not unlimited. Many thousands of us struggled and succeeded in getting the Affordable Care Act enacted, and have seen its expansion, providing health insurance and significantly better coverage for millions. Entrenched power was disrupted by the civil rights victories of the last century. Those struggles made people’s lives and our nation better. 

Today’s action by Congress, and the tyrannous behavior of the Trump administration, are painful demonstrations that this struggle is not over.   

The community of human needs advocates is determined to continue that struggle. We in the Coalition on Human Needs are a grateful part of that community, joining with civil rights, faith, environmental, labor, disability, gender, and anti-poverty advocates. We will ramp up our joint capacity to show the harm that these policies will inflict, so that people across the nation, and our local, state, and federal officials, will know the impact. We will show the expected harms as clearly as we can, knowing that some of the damage can be forestalled by further governmental decisions. We will lift up every story we can of people whose lives have been changed for good or ill – from benefits that helped and that soon will be denied, or who have lost help through earlier restrictions. When cuts begin to be inflicted, we will do all in our power to show that harm, and to show how it can be prevented. We will do all this with an unceasing determination to build the public will to stop the harm, to build anew the supports that our people require, and to restore and protect our lawful rights. 

Human needs advocates depend upon the moral certitude of Dr. King’s “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” This is a bitter day in which that arc is hard to see. It is worth remembering that the source of this determination to hope is from the 19th century abolitionist, Theodore Parker. His words are especially meaningful today, because they do acknowledge that our road is not just long; it is uncertain and perilous. 

“I do not pretend to understand the moral universe. The arc is a long one. My eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by experience of sight. I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.” 

Our eyes tell us that big money is taking a win today. We cannot see clearly how long it will take to overturn this victory of greed over need. So we are guided – we are impelled – by the clarity of conscience. Our conscience is muscular – it finds actions to take every day. That arc? It doesn’t just “bend” – we help to bend it towards something better, as best we can.