- Double pay for working overtime.
- Child Care for $10 a day.
- Two weeks paid vacation.
- Federally produced and cheaper prescription drugs.
- $20,000 in downpayment assistance for new homebuyers.
- Cracking down on grocery stores and AI price gougers.
- Taxing big oil and giving that money to consumers.
- Abolish Super PACs.
These are the proposals contained in the Progressive Caucus's New Affordability Agenda, unveiled yesterday to show the American People that Democrats have proposals designed to make their lives better while also combatting corporate and MAGA Republican greed and the top one percent first policies.
Speaking at the Wednesday unveiling of this new affordability agenda, which will take the form of ten separate legislative bills, Arizona Congressional District Three Yassamin Ansari, fresh off helping to pressure Congressional Republicans to get Pam Bondi to appear before them, and proposing legislation, along with fellow Arizona Representatives Adelita Grijalva and Greg Stanton, designed to restore the 12-hour maximum holding process for detainees, said:
"As we all well know, while Donald Trump is using or trying to use taxpayer dollars to build his ridiculous 400 million dollar ballroom and abuses his office every single day to enrich himself and his family to the tune of billions of dollars, the people in my district and across the country are suffering, forced to decide between paying for groceries or their rent. As the Congressional Progressive Caucus's Lowering Costs Task Force Chair, I am having conversations about costs with real Americans in communities all across the country. And what I am hearing is exactly what the polling that we released today shows.
On our Affordability Across America tour, I'm hearing from people on all sides of the political spectrum and across zip codes about the actual policy changes that they want to see that would lower prices. And what we have heard so far that I really want to emphasize is that people want to see bold, decisive, and quick action, not endless deliberation or perfection. They see that the Trump administration has worked on overdrive to make their lives worse.
We as Democrats, and especially as progressives, need to be just as quick but to improve lives for every single American, not wait for the broadest possible consensus or for legislative perfection. On the first stop of the tour, Congressman Horsford and I heard from service workers in Las Vegas about how ever-rising prices are changing their lives from the inside out and the shame that they associate with no longer being able to afford their basic necessities. But this is a crisis of Donald Trump's making, not a personal failure.
It is he who should be ashamed. The people that we spoke to have worked for decades and often forced to work multiple jobs only to be unable to make rent, pay their car insurance, or God forbid, afford quality health care. People of all backgrounds and ages.
One man said that he saw his rent go up from $900 a month to $1,400 a month. That should never happen. And as the youngest woman in Congress, I know that young people are feeling the affordability crisis in a distinctly hopeless way, wondering if they will ever be able to afford a home, let alone how they will be able to pay for health care or future child care or ever be out from under the thumb of student debt.
We want Americans to thrive, not just to survive. Besides being able to literally make ends meet, when was the last time you or your family could afford to take a real vacation, to celebrate at a dinner or to buy new clothes or spend on anything that wasn't an absolute necessity? This year is America's 250th anniversary, and I know that there is a knee-jerk association that is not necessarily overtly positive during these especially difficult times. But we should want to renew patriotism in this country, to rebuild systems for people that work for people who are not billionaires or the ultra wealthy or massive corporations, to live in an America where your enjoyment of life is not only tied to your income, an America that my parents sought out when they immigrated here to build a better life for me and my brother.
This new affordability agenda includes the bills that we know can build broad support to pass as soon as Democrats take the majority in Congress. This Lowering Cost Task Force is working on a bold suite of bills to put money back in Americans' wallets. We heard this from folks on this tour as well.
We have multiple stops to go, but people are asking us to be specific. They want caps on rent. They want opportunities for home ownership.
They want Medicare for all. They want public free transportation, free child care, and an economy that works for all of us. And as progressives, we need to be the ones to not just think big, but act big.
Not sit around for endless vetting. We know what the solutions are. Change is needed, and we are the ones leading it."
There is a lot to like about the New Affordability Agenda.
Vice President Kamala Harris, for those who were not paying attention during the 2024 campaign, proposed aspects of this agenda along with other items like newborn financial assistance and paid apprenticeship programs.
While some, like Jim Kessler's Third Way, may rightly quibble that the proposals do not address other items like getting rid of the Trump tariffs or regulation reform to make the home-buying process quicker and more affordable while others may wonder why the agenda did not include proposals to raise the national minimum wage, provide paid family and medical leave, making the tax cuts on tips and overtime permanent, and restore clean energy and electric vehicle tax credits, this agenda is a good starting place to provide much needed relief to working and middle class Americans and should attract needd voters in 2026 and 2028.
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