Ok. First, I want to thank TrumpResistance for raising the issue of WHO is behind Swingleft.org. I actually left this message on their Facebook page a day or so ago:
I, too, had been to the website and at that time, there was no information about who was behind it in the “About” section. Since TrumpResistance’s diary, however, they have updated with information about who they are. The three key players I see are these:
- Ethan Todras-Whitehill
- Joshua Krafchin
- Miriam Stone
(Note: Krafchin and Stone are married)
Now — some here know that I do animal rescue. Part of that involves me vetting potential adopters for urgent, special needs cats. As a result, I have subscribed to a simple background checking service that aggregates publicly available information on individuals provided I have a first and last name, and state of residence. So today, I used that on these three people
High level, they all appear to be mid-thirties in age. The background checker gives me their known public profiles — Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn and other lesser sites. So here’s what I learned about each, and you can check for yourself and decide accordingly.
Joshua Krafchin (Married to Miriam Stone)
Facebook profile. It appears his posts are public, and a quick scrolling of his history back to early November shows that he was a Clinton supporter who was undone by the election. A few embeds:
LinkedIn Profile
Miriam Stone (Married to Joshua Krafchin)
Facebook profile
LinkedIn profile
(Couldn’t find much more on her)
Ethan Todras-Whitehill
Facebook profile (Facebook informs me that, like me, he is a member of the Pantsuit Nation Facebook group — I can’t determine when he joined)
He is a freelance writer, who at one time posted on Huffington Post. (note — the dates at the link are a website glitch. Clicking on and accessing the individual articles show the real date of publication). He also had an article published in The New York Times.
LinkedIn profile
YMMV, but for my part, I found these to be young, motivated folks. The public information I can find points at at least Democratic values, if not progressive ones. Again — all props to TrumpResistance for asking valid questions, questions all of us should ask when these types of sites pop up.
And as to the swing districts on their site, they did acknowledge that there was a “glitch”, but they’ve fixed it. I know that when I put my zipcode in, it definitely pulled back my closest swing district — VA-10, Barbara Comstock (R), right across the road from me (I’m in VA-11).
Finally, the reason why many are finding swing districts far from their own location seems to be because they are targeting a small number. From their website:
Why the House?
The 2018 House elections are the next best chance for progressives to regain power in our government.
- There are 52 Swing Districts—places where the last election was won by 15% of the vote or less. We need to win 80% of all Swing Districts to take back the House.
- If we win all 17 Democratic-held Swing Districts, we need to flip 24 of the remaining Republican ones. We’ll keep the Swing Left community up to date as these numbers shift.
- The 2018 Senate map heavily favors Republicans, making the House a more viable place to focus our efforts.
- House races receive less attention, so your dollars, hours, and talents count more.
- We’re starting early to unify progressives who promote tolerance, equality, unity and fairness. To out-organize Republicans, we can’t wait.
So again — you be the judge. I just wanted to put all of this out there.