A productive meeting and resistance updates!

Posted by Sally Erdle
May 23, 2025

DA Caribbean Islands, Director of Communications

Much was accomplished at the Democrats Abroad Caribbean Islands Executive Committee on April 29th, 2025, to which all members were invited.

Here is a quick summary:

Organizing now

The Chair, Kristin Deason, noted that the meeting was held on Trump’s 100th day in office, recognized that the first 100 days have been worse than many expected, and noted that this is why many of us are volunteering and working with Democrats Abroad to resist the current administration and prepare for future elections, She emphasized the importance of organizing now to engage volunteers and voters to beat Republicans at the in 2026 midterms and before, in other special elections.

Strengthening our structure
The appointment at this meeting of a new Vice Chair, Douglass Lea; a new Treasurer, Claudia Reshetiloff; and two Regional Island Captains Christine Burstein for the Southern Islands and Claudia Reshetiloff for the Northern Islands; continued to strengthen our Caribbean Islands committee structure.

We currently seek volunteers for the following positions:

Secretary

Program and Events Coordinator

Resistance Lead

GOTV (Get Out the Vote) Lead

Someone to take the Webex (virtual meeting platform) training

Island Representatives where we don’t have them (we currently have Reps for Grenada, St Vincent & the Grenadines, St Lucia, Barbados, Antigua & Barbuda, St Maarten, the Cayman Islands, the BVI and Bermuda).

Or assist the existing Rep in your island!

If you are interested in any of these roles, contact Kristin at info-CaribbeanIslands@democratsabroad.org

We’ve recently updated our DA Caribbean Islands website. Check out the new Welcome page, Leaders page and News at https://www.democratsabroad.org/t1

Update on Resistance Actions

🔴 Make sure you are registered to vote in any available elections this year and have requested your ballot at votefromabroad.org

🔴 The SAVE act, which jeopardizes voting from abroad by demanding in-person registration and voting in your county of record, has passed the House and could come up in the Senate any time. Call or write to your Senators and tell them to vote NO on this bill (and see “resistance” on the Democrats Abroad website for messaging, or use tools such as the 5 calls app, etc.)!

🔴 The “Big Bad Bill” that takes from the poor and gives to the rich just passed (by one vote!) in the House and now goes to the Senate where the real fight will take place. Senate rules are different and stricter and Senators have longer terms. As long as the Senate changes the bill then they will need to reconcile it with a new House version. We can keep the pressure up for the biggest changes possible, ie, preserve lots more Medicaid or SNAP funding. Thune is talking about a July 4 deadline. There is a real chance to drag this out, expose the GOP for what they are doing, and maybe, just maybe, even help kill this bill.

Call or write to your Senators and tell them to do all they can to make the biggest changes possible in the Big Bad Bill. Letters to the editors of hometown papers are a good idea too!

🔴 Sign up for the DA resistance newsletter here (https://www.democratsabroad.org/take_action) to learn about additional resistance actions you can take.

The date of the next DA Caribbean Islands meeting will be announced. Hope to see you there!

A productive meeting and resistance updates!

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