PROVIDENCE – In September of 2016, ConvergenceRI sat down with Rep. Aaron Regunberg, one of the youngest members of the R.I. General Assembly, to talk about his legislative priorities in the next session.

A photograph of Regunberg pointing to the sign of Hope Street accompanied the story, an iconic image that captured the young legislator’s optimism. [See link to ConvergenceRI story below.]

As ConvergenceRI reported: “Regunberg first gained prominence three years ago when he was working with the Providence Student Union, championing the cause of high school students who had to walk more than two miles to school each way.

At the State House, Regunberg has become an outspoken voice for progressive politics: he led the effort to create a new legislative commission to study the practice of solitary confinement in Rhode Island; he has championed legislation to create a policy of earned sick leave in the state; and he has also been involved in organizing efforts around opposition to the proposed gas-fired power plant in Burrillville and the proposed LNG facility in Providence.”

When asked in that interview what motivated him, Regunberg answered: “What drives me is that there are an incredible number of Rhode Islanders who need some real change. There are thousands and thousands of working families that are struggling to make ends meet, that are working hard and still not able to get ahead. That are not able to get a day off from work when they are sick to recover, because they are living so close to the edge.”

The job of our government, Regunberg continued, is to address those issues.

Advocating for a Fair Shot
Now, almost a year later, with some five weeks left in the 2017 legislative session, Regunberg has emerged as a leading voice of a new coalition of more than 25 progressive legislators, championing the “Fair Shot” agenda, which includes bills to create paid sick leave and increase the minimum wage toward a living wage.

Regunberg has also emerged as a vocal leader of organizing activities known as “Resist Hate,” focused on locally based initiatives to promote resistance to the Trump administration agenda and to stiffen the back of the Congressional delegation.

Regunberg has also championed new renewable energy polices, introducing legislation to create a carbon tax, in response to the threat from climate change.

Regunberg met last week with ConvergenceRI at the innovation hub that is Olga’s Cup + Saucer on Point Street, where a number of customers engaged in “convergence” stopped by to say hello: Hope Hopkins from CommerceRI; Joanna Detz, publisher of ecoRI News, Carol Malysz from MedMates, and Betsy Stubblefield Loucks from the Rhode Island Alliance for Healthy Homes, among others. [What struck ConvergenceRI was how many folks within Rhode Island’s innovation ecosystem did not seem to know or had not yet met Regunberg in person.]

A political earthquake
With the election of President Donald Trump on Nov. 8, 2016, the world shifted dramatically, according to Regunburg. Suddenly, a much more urgent response was required.

“I think what happened on Nov. 8 [with the election of President Donald Trump was a transformational moment for a whole lot of people in this country,” Regunberg said. “It has certainly helped to shape my priorities and where I’m putting my time and energy.”

People are realizing, Regunberg continued, “that we have to stand up and fight if we are going to have a shot at maintaining human civilization.”

That’s no small thing, saving human civilization, ConvergenceRI responded. How are you measuring the success of things so far – what has happened, and where do we need to go?

“There are a few different ways to look at that,” Regunberg began. “Organizing which is happening here in Rhode Island has had a lot of success. On the federal level, Rhode Islanders have played a role in building a narrative within the Democratic party that we need to have leaders to stand strong and fight.”

There is certainly a difference inside the State House between last year and this year, Regunberg continued. “When 7,000 people gather for a women’s march, that has led to conversations I’ve had with some of my colleagues, who don’t normally think about these issues, who said: “Man, it feels like there are lot of women who are really upset, that we need to do something.”

Which, he added, was a change in “consciousness” for them, even if it did not portray a “nuanced understanding” of what’s going on.

Further, there has been an abundance of new faces testifying at committee hearings, beyond the usual same few lobbyists, something that has been noticed by legislators, according to Regunberg.

“All these new people are coming out [to testify] at hearings,” Regunberg said, has made a big difference at the State House, opening up “more space for progressive policy wins, I believe.”

The new activism, Regunberg said, “has created a bit more, but not enough, of a sense of democratic accountability among our Democrats. That there are folks, who believe in and represent the values that the party is supposed to represent – working families, autonomy for women, standing up for immigrants. And, that there are people watching us, to see if we actually represent that or not.”

Having said that, Regunberg added, “We have a long way to go.”

Here is the ConvergenceRI interview with Rep. Aaron Regunberg, an ascending voice in progressive Democratic politics in Rhode Island, a vocal advocate of resistance in the age of Trump, who often takes his time before responding to questions, avoiding easy answers.

ConvergenceRI: It has been almost a year since we last sat down for an interview, in September of 2016.
REGUNBERG: Wow, a lot has changed since then.

ConvergenceRI: One of the priorities you set out to accomplish in 2017 was passage of legislation to create paid sick leave for all Rhode Island workers, which seems as if it is likely to happen.
REGUNBERG: There has been an incredible amount of work from a whole different bunch of organizations and legislators on this issue. I think we’ve moved it forward, in a really powerful way.

There are probably five weeks, six weeks left of this session – hopefully not six weeks. Anything can happen; I don’t want to make any firm predictions.

I’m feeling pretty good. We have a significant path to getting a strong bill passed, and we have an even wider path to getting a fine bill passed. And, we have a definite path where things fall apart; we always have to make that clear.

ConvergenceRI: Can you explain what you mean? What’s the difference between a fine path and a significant path?
REGUNBERG: For me, it comes down to coverage, pushing for different carve outs.

Some industries can have legitimate cases about unique burdens that they may have, but everyone gets sick, and everyone needs earned sick time.

A strong bill is one that covers as many people as possible, and covers the [longest] length of time.

We introduced legislation that would give up to 7 days of paid sick time for every Rhode Islander. That is more generous than some other jurisdictions that have passed this; our neighbors in Massachusetts and Connecticut are at 40 hours and five days of paid sick time.

I believe strongly that we cannot and should not be going below five days.

There are also different things, such as the definition of family, about whom you can take sick time off to care for.

There are interest groups that want a narrow definition. I’ve been fighting for a more inclusive definition – I wouldn’t describe it as overly broad – that takes into account that we don’t have “Leave It To Beaver” ideal, nuclear families anymore.

ConvergenceRI: Is there horse-trading going on, in negotiations?
REGUNBERG: There are definitely conversations and negotiations going on, ever since this process started. It’s picked up within the last few weeks.

I’ve been working hard to sit down with as many members and leaders of the business community to really try and drill down on their concerns.

From my perspective, some of the concerns [voiced] over this bill are not particularly rooted in reality; there’s been some misinformation.

Some concerns are very rooted in reality, because business owners have a set of responsibilities and burdens.

There is a genuine effort to figure out what the issues are how can we address them to find the right balance between employers and workers.

ConvergenceRI: The Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce has been very active in opposing this legislation. Do they represent the viewpoint of most businesses?

REGUNBERG: We received a letter from the Chamber that had listed a number of businesses signed on [opposing the legislation].

The meeting I was having the other day at Olga’s was with one of [the executives] of those businesses. He did not know that his company had signed on [opposing the paid sick leave legislation]. Apparently, one of the other managing partners had signed on.

He was like, yes, this doesn’t seem like a problem; yes, we already do this. I don’t see what the issue is.

When we had out hearing with the House Labor Committee, there were literally, from my memory, as many business leaders and owners there in support of the legislation as against it.

There is a pattern, in pretty much every state or jurisdiction that’s passed this [legislation], where business lobby groups fight us tooth and nail, but it passes.

And then, a year after it is implemented, everyone pretty agrees, it’s been fine and it hasn’t let to any of the nightmare scenarios.

I’m very confident that if we can get this over the finish line, when we come back a year later, and we have conversations with some of these businesses, they’re going to say: this has been fine, good even.

ConvergenceRI: How does it feel for you to be at the center of all this, to have taken up the mantle of leadership as a champion of the Fair Shot agenda? You’ve been outspoken and articulate.
REGUNBERG: I appreciate the kind words. In terms of earned sick time, I do want to make it clear that if it were just me [alone] talking, we wouldn’t be in a position to move this right now. There is a whole group of legislators that came out for the Fair Shot agenda.

ConvergenceRI: How many legislators have signed onto the Fair Shot agenda?
REGUNBERG: I think there are 25 or 26. People have seen that it is a way we can make a concrete difference in a whole lot of Rhode Islanders’ lives.

ConvergenceRI: How comfortable are you in this role? What have you learned about yourself in the process? And, in terms of strategy, what needs to be done?
REGUNBERG: [a long pause]

ConvergenceRI: Did you think I was just going to ask easy questions?
REGUNBERG: No, those are great questions. And, I’m sorry if they take me a bit of time to think through.

One thing I have been thinking about a lot, particularly since Nov. 8, is the need [to recognize] that if we’re going to win, we need power, and to have power, we need mass mobilizations, we need a lot of people.

I feel like there have been tendencies on the left…
BETSY STUBBLEFIELD LOUCKS: [interrupting as she leaves Olga’s, saying hello and offering, unsolicited] I want you to know that you’re supported. You’re doing awesome work.

REGUNBERG: [continuing the conversation] …We on the left, we need to start winning, and we need to think about winning in terms of strategy and building power – and building enough numbers to have the power to win.

We can’t keep being like, in some sort of fetish around losing, “We lost because we’ve got the truth, and everyone is too stupid if they don’t see it. It’s not our job to educate the people and bring them in.”

No, it is our job. We have values that a majority of people share, and we can’t keep trying to be the most radical cool kid on the block in ways that drive out people who need to be in the fight with us.

Within our progressive community, within the center-left to left, we need to reorient ourselves to build an [inclusive] movement that can actually take power.

ConvergenceRI: What does it look like to win? To have a strong enough voice to change the conversation at the State House? How are you defining success?
REGUNBERG: It ultimately comes down to an ability to pass policies that make a difference in people’s lives in positive ways.

In order to do that, we need to have a chamber where there is enough support of those policies to get them through. We need to have an outside infrastructure where people are as worried about everyday actual Rhode Islanders as the organizations that they represent.

It is about the changing the narrative of the conversation, it’s about owning the discourse.

ConvergenceRI: There is recent research findings by sociologist Shannon Monnat, mining the data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, analyzing what she calls the diseases of despair, that found that in Rhode Island, between the years 2010 and 2014, some 59.8 percent of all deaths for the demographic of white adults, male and female, between the ages of 25 to 34 were from alcohol, death and suicide.
REGUNBERG: Those numbers are shocking and, at the same time, they’re not that shocking, because of the absurdities of our capitalist system right now, where the inequality of wealth is so unbelievable right now.

Because, in my generation, that’s who you’re talking about, there’s existential dread on so many levels. It is a shout out to all my [fellow] millennials who are trying to figure out what to do with their lives, knowing that [there appears to be] no future.

In so many ways, economically, planet wise, we’re getting to a point where the fundamental paradoxes of our system are hitting a critical mass.

It’s very frustrating [at times] for me to be in the General Assembly during this time, where there does not seem to be any sort of urgency to understand the crisis that so many people are in, and how to respond.

Now we’re dealing with more than a $100 million deficit for the budget. And the conversation is, you’re lining up programs that impact our most vulnerable communities, and it’s which of these programs are we going to slice.

We can’t talk about revenue. Progressive revenue isn’t even on the table for how we’re going to resolve these things.

I’ve introduced legislation for progressive tax reform, to close the tax loopholes, to tax corporations that have absurd ratios of CEO to employee payscales.

But we can’t talk about [creating] progressive revenue; we just have to talk about which things we are going to cut. There’s such a mismatch.

ConvergenceRI: What gives you hope, what sustains you, what nourishes your ability to keep moving forward?
REGUNBERG: I have hope from the mass mobilizations that we’ve been seeing, hope from the fact that the organizing is still going on. The heights of the flames have died down a bit, but we’ve gotten to this slow burn, it’s a continuous burn, that’s what we need as a sustainable way to light this movement forward.

I have hope because of some of the unbelievable resilience of our communities. And the fact that there are so many Rhode Islanders that found that we are connected, and who are willing to stand up.

One thing that has been lovely to watch is the way that opposition organizing around the Burrillville power plant has grown. At the beginning, the focus of the organizing seemed to be pretty narrow.

Now, it has grown, to include a number of groups, with a better understanding of how all the energy and climate change issues connect.

On Wednesday, there was a hearing about energy facilities siting legislation as well my carbon tax bill, and numerous folks who were testified about energy facilities added: while I’m up here, let me say that we’ve got to support this carbon pricing bill, too.

We’re seeing the potential for organizing to bring people together around not only their own issues and interests, but a better understanding of the larger areas of concerns, and becoming voices for all of us as citizens, converging, that has been my hope.