Three Wins Today: Dec 10, 2025
Anti AI, ICE and Corruption? What are these wins you speak?
Congress does a lot of things, but this week I learned the most important are the least flashy and most likely to get my comment section filled with “who cares, that’s not fighting.”
I know, I know, I say that a lot, but this is different.
I got to attend Rep
’s State of the District. And you know what? Most of what the district cares about is events, ribbon cuttings and federal funding. You know, all those things you make fun of me for posting about.Don’t get me wrong, they also want Rep Kamlager-Dove to work on the ACA, and impeaching Trump and calling out the illegalities, and doing everything she can to fight back, but, this was a celebration of the work for district. The stuff that will never get you invited as a guest to MSNOW.
It started with federal funding. Sherri Francois is the founder of the SoLa Foundation. SoLa stands for South LA, and it’s a new community center that will allow kids to learn about tech, film, videography and more. These are not kids who have had access to these disciplines before. It will literally change thousands of lives.
Rep Kamlager-Dove was able to secure the funding to make it a reality and it’s opening next month. As a party, as people on social media, we downplay these wins. But hearing from Francois herself, you cannot downplay that.
She also said “Equity, economic mobility and community is at the heart of everything Sydney does.” And sure, that’s about bills, but it’s about this too.
Then the outreach team took the stage to share several Menti polls. These are polls in real time, of the people in the room. It started with what issues matter most to you out of the 10 options. Everyone in the room gets to see what matters to everyone else.
And then they asked “what do you want to see from Rep Kamlager-Dove in 2026?” She and her team promised they will read through every single response and build a plan out of it. For the record, this is a great reminder of why all calls to action are only for YOUR Rep, and calling someone else’s doesn’t help so much.
The casework team was next.
We’ve all seen them, the end of the year graphics from each Dem announcing how much money they returned to the district. And we all roll our eyes because, who cares? That would be happening even if Trump wasn’t in office. But it matters. It matters so much. The ability to get people back the money they’re owed, to work with the IRS and get the response you want? That’s not easy, and we absolutely take it for granted.
They are also the team responsible for getting people back from ICE. Rep Kamlager-Dove’s constituents, Enrique was taken by ICE in July. His niece was on the phone with Rep Kamlager-Dove’s case worker team daily, sometimes multiple times a day. In front of the camera we saw her do a few press conferences, but behind the camera, her team was working every single second to bring him home.
Finally Rep Kamlager-Dove took the stage herself. And she immediately started with talking about healthcare. Apparently, CA-37 is the district with the 4th largest percentage of people on the Medicaid in the entire country.
She talked with pride about how casework has increased and the time it takes them to handle an issue has been cut in half.
She celebrated the two bills she has gotten passed through committee, because, when you’re in a minority, that’s worthy of a celebration.
She shouted out the HUNDREDS of events she and her team attended in district (you know the ones you HATE when I talk about them.)
And then she announced a new addition to this State of the District, the awards. These awards are entered into congressional record, and for the first award, that was more important than ever.
The Public Service Honor Award went to: Eugene Ogasawara and Chans Chiv. They work at the LA Passport Agency. They are federal employees. And yes there were two other awards, but I was just in awe of this one. These specific employees at the passport office made it possible for her casework team to do their work and speed up that work, and then she recognized them for it.
I left at this point, I hadn’t eaten or drank enough and my head was swimming (yay chronic illness), but I got the point.
Congress is about so much more than the bills passed or stopped, the press conferences given, the protests attended, even the short form content made.
It’s about the constituents, and doing right by them. And no matter how much I say that in every post and every video, I didn’t fully get it till right then.
Every time our Dems show that their constituents matter the most? That’s when they’re fighting the hardest, and that’s how it always should be.
And maybe now, you’ll understand that too.
National
Wed, Nov 26 - iHeart Radio chief program officer, Tom Poleman send an internal memo explaining that iHeart is changing their tagline to be “We’re Guaranteed Human.”:
A few weeks ago, I shared that iHeart is one of the last truly human entertainment sources and our listeners come to us for companionship, connection, and authenticity — something AI can’t replicate. We’re Guaranteed Human. We don’t use AI-generated personalities. We don’t play AI music that features synthetic vocalists pretending to be human. And the podcasts we publish are also Guaranteed Human.
He goes on to say that it’s okay to use AI for menial tasks, but not for anything creative:
To be clear, we do encourage the use of AI powered productivity and distribution tools that help scale our business operations – such as scheduling, audience insights, data analysis, workflow automation, show prep, editing and organization. Those tools help us reach more people efficiently, while preserving the human creativity and authenticity that define our brand.
I know a lot of people are making fun of this, and I get it. “We’re Guaranteed Human” is an objectively funny phrase, but in this day and age, it’s an important one.
In a world of Sora 2 and Tilly Norwood, this is a really massive deal that is worthy of praise.
AI is not all negative. I think it has some incredible promise in the fields of science and medicine, but it shouldn’t be anywhere near the creative fields and I’m really glad a company with as much power and name recognition as iHeart feels the same way.
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Thu, Dec 4 - Police Chief Brian O’Hara has made it abundantly clear, in two separate interviews, that the police department will not be working with ICE to help them with deportations.
He told KSTP:
I respect that federal law enforcement has a role to play, and that’s their lane, that’s fine. What’s troubling to me as a human being is interacting with Americans, the people in our community that are being terrorized the way some of this stuff is being handled.
And he went even further when he spoke to MSNOW saying:
If unlawful force is being used by any law enforcement officer against any person in this city and one of our officers is there, absolutely, I expect them to intervene, or they’ll be fired.
Basically, if anyone in the MPD sees ICE using excessive force and doesn’t try to stop it, they’re fired. That sounds very cut and dry to me. Which is great to hear.
Now, we get to see if he actually follows through. I really hope he does.
New Jersey
Fri, Dec 5 - It’s a great day when a Democrat does something wrong and we fully hold them accountable, because it’s a really important reminder that we’re not a cult.
Attorney General Matthew Platkin issued a disqualification order to former Senator, Bob Menendez to let him know that he can never run for public office in New Jersey again.
He said:
Critical to preserving the public’s faith and trust in government institutions is ensuring that elected officials who commit crimes involving their offices don’t find new opportunities to regain positions of power. Too many people in New Jersey have a cynical viewpoint that corruption is a routine, widespread feature of our politics. We hope the court’s decision sends a message that it is not acceptable and it will carry consequences.
Corruption is a hard thing to get rid of, but it’s amazing when we see Dems doing what they can.
Good riddance Bob Menendez. Glad your children didn’t follow in your footsteps.
So I hope these wins help you fight harder!
Our voices are our superpower, but only when we use them!
Hi Ariella, where are these rejecting trolling objections you speak of? I don't ever see them here on substack! Maybe on X ??