August 12th, 2008 at 10:19 am | posted by Virginia Simmons
Yesterday, John McCain was campaigning in Sparks Nevada and as always ONE was there to great him.
On the rope line as Senator McCain entered the town hall he spotted my ONE shirt and pointed it out to his wife. Having just returned from Rwanda with ONE it was a familiar sight. I was able to thank Cindy for traveling with ONE and asked her how the trip went. “Amazing,” she said, “it was fantastic.”
Well it must have stayed on her mind. Prior to introducing her husband, Cindy spoke to the packed high school auditorium about the ONE Campaign and her “incredible journey through Rwanda.” She went on to offer her support for the efforts by ONE to make fighting extreme poverty and disease a foreign policy priority during this election season, and for the many organizations on the ground in Africa “offering hope to mothers and children through selfless aid work and service.”
Mrs. McCain went on to comment about the strength of African families and noted that the key to fighting these dreaded diseases will be to empower African women and mothers.
August 11th, 2008 at 2:43 pm | posted by Virginia Simmons
Listen to this NRP piece from Thursday about McCain and Obama’s interest in boosting foreign aid. The beginning of the piece is transcribed below, but the full clip is just over 4 minutes and worth the listen.
The economy may be in trouble and the budget deficit growing, but supporters of U.S. foreign aid see some promising times ahead. That’s because both leading candidates for president have talked about the need to continue to help poor nations develop.
Every so often at town hall meetings on the campaign trail, Republican John McCain calls on people from a grassroots organization known as the ONE campaign. They ask him what he’ll do to help poor nations fight HIV/AIDS, malaria and illiteracy. McCain has said he sees foreign assistance as a key factor in securing America.
“It really needs to eliminate many of the breeding grounds for extremism, which is poverty, which is HIV/AIDS, which is all of these terrible conditions that make people totally dissatisfied and then look to extremism, particularly Islamic extremism,” he told a town hall meeting in New Hampshire last month.
At a speech in Washington this summer, Democrat Barack Obama also spoke about development aid as a strategic imperative for the U.S. in today’s world.
“I know development assistance is not the most popular of programs, but as president, I will make the case to the American people that it can be our best investment in increasing the common security of the entire world and increasing our own security,” he said. “That’s why I will double our foreign assistance to $50 billion by 2012 and use it to support a stable future in failing states and sustainable growth in Africa, to halve global poverty and to roll back disease.”
McCain has not been that specific about how much money he would spend, but he has set a goal of trying to eradicate malaria in Africa and fight corruption.
Steve Radelet of the Center for Global Development sees a total change in Washington’s attitude about development aid, and he’s hoping this will translate into some real reform….
July 24th, 2008 at 12:12 pm | posted by Matthew Bartlett, ONE Regional Organizer
Sen. McCain held a town hall meeting in Rochester, NH, yesterday to campaign for President. And just like we did for all the candidates from both parties during the NH Primary, and just we did in Unity, NH, last month - ONE was there to help advocate for the world’s poorest people.
As you can see from earlier posts, Sen. McCain recognized ONE at the start of the town hall and even briefly mentioned how Cindy McCain was joining ONE on a bi-partisan trip to Rwanda.
Later during the town hall meeting, ONE’s Marine, Michael Castaldo raised his hand and spoke with Sen. McCain about US efforts to fight AIDS and poverty in Africa and how it relates to Def. Sec. Gates’ recent call for more funding for humanitarian aid to help win hearts and minds around the world.
Programs like PEPFAR and the Millennium Challenge Corporation, are helping to save millions of lives around the world and lift millions more out of extreme poverty. But it also helps to create a safer and more secure future for those in need, and for us at home.
“And could I also recognize another organization that is very, very popular and a very important one, not only here in New Hampshire but across the country, and that’s an organization called ONE.
This is an organization inspired by a lot of people including Bono and they have over 2 million volunteers in this nation, and they go all over the world, especially Africa, to help cure malaria, AIDS, cholera, and help people. This is one the great examples of what America is all about.
I’m proud that Cindy, and a group, a number of other people, are in Africa as we speak, with the organization called ONE trying to do what we can to help those people and that organization and publicize their great work.
Thank you to the group from ONE, will you guys stand? Thank you very much. Thank you.”
Last Thursday ONE Members in Portsmouth Ohio attended a Town Hall Meeting for John McCain. The Senator reiterated his commitment to the ONE Campaign and its issues - and our volunteers were all anxious to have an opportunity to show the Senator their support for fighting extreme poverty around the world.
ONE’s presence at presidential campaign events is nothing new to the campaign trail and we work to have our members and volunteers attend events for both Senator’s Obama and McCain. It wasn’t long after we arrived that we were given an incredibly warm welcome by the McCain staff, thanking us for our continued presence at events.
Shortly after McCain delivered his remarks, he singled out the ONE Vote ‘08 members, asking them to stand and briefly discuss the ONE Campaign and our mission. Before calling on ONE members, McCain stated that we were some of the best citizens of our generation, in that we are working for a cause bigger than ourselves. When asked what his administration would do to combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria and TB, McCain responded by stating that he would increase funding for vaccines and to the World Health Organization.
After McCain’s remarks, ONE members greeted McCain and wife, Cindy, handing them both ONE wristbands. Cindy quickly put her wristband on, telling the ONE members how excited she was to travel to Rwanda with the bi-partisan ONE delegation later this week.
As we were leaving one of the town hall attendees shouted through the crowd, “thanks, and you guys are doing incredible, incredible work.”
June 19th, 2008 at 1:04 pm | posted by Virginia Simmons
I just got this email from our legislative director Tom Hart!
“Friends, we have some good news. McCain confirmed he will add his name as a cosponsor of the Biden-Lugar bill, perhaps as early as today. This should help “unstick” the bill. Great collective effort, particularly from Porter Delaney here in DC and Matthew Bartlett in NH.
So just this week, we have both Obama and McCain added as cosponsors.
June 13th, 2008 at 10:40 am | posted by Matthew Bartlett, ONE Regional Organizer
Sen. McCain held a town hall meeting back here in the Granite State yesterday. And just like we did for every candidate from both parties during the NH Primary, ONE was there to help represent for the poorest people on Earth.
As soon as Sen. McCain came to the stage, he spotted our ONE group in the crowd and recognized ONE and had us stand up in front of everyone. Later on during the town hall meeting, I raised my hand to ask Sen. McCain to support the new global AIDS bill, called PEPFAR, that is currently being considered in the Senate. NH’s own Sen. Sununu was there too, who is helping to pass this critical and life saving US response to the global AIDS pandemic.
Good people from both sides of the political aisle are taking brave and bold steps to help pass the new PEPFAR bill in the Senate before the G8 summit meeting. But it will take all the efforts of ONE members everywhere to make sure that our leaders know that it is not only possible to prevent and treat the spread of HIV/AIDS…it is also a priority!
You can go here to encourage your senators to officially co-sponsor PEPFAR, and you go here to sign a petition to Senators Reid and McConnell urging them to use their leadership to unstick the legislation and move it to the Senate floor.
May 28th, 2008 at 4:25 pm | posted by Josh Chernila, ONE Online Communities Coordinator
Yesterday, I attended John McCain’s speech at the University of Denver. I was accompanied by two other ONE members, Matthew McAllister and Lydia Van Vleet. Before the speech, we spread the word about ONE with those sitting around us. It was great to share information about an organization that we are so passionate about and it was awesome to see the people we talked to show their support and thank us for what we were doing.
An hour and half later, after speaking with several campaign organizers and state senators about ONE, it was time for the speech. Senator McCain walked out and immediately recognized us in our ONE shirts. He stopped to thank us for coming as he shook our hands. Before he started his speech, he took a moment to recognize us as he said: “As I always do, I’d like to recognize our young people from the organization called ONE […] the epitome of what young America is all about.” (Link to clip on CNN.) On his way out, McCain stopped to thank us for coming. Overall, it was a great experience and I was proud to represent the ONE Campaign.
-Allie Mills, ONE CU-Boulder and Denver ONE
P.S.: This morning we were pleasantly surprised to see the picture above on the front page of the Denver Post. Apparently the Associated Press passed the picture around and a number of papers including the Denver Post and the Washington Post picked it up.
Yesterday afternoon Sen. John McCain came back to Iowa for a townhall in Des Moines; it was his first time in the state since he’s clinched the Republican Party nomination.
I attended the 500+ person event with follow ONE volunteers to make sure that Sen. McCain remembered ONE and the fight to end extreme poverty during the general campaign. Shortly after taking the stage Sen. McCain recognized the many people in the crowd wearing ONE T-shirts, and asked me to stand up. I was already seated on the stage behind him, so I was facing the crowd. Sen. McCain spoke about the ONE Campaign and why he supports what we do. He then handed the microphone over and asked me to speak a little about ONE.
First, I thanked Sen. McCain for his sharing his plans for fighting malaria last week. (All the candidates released statements) and I explained ONE’s non-partisan efforts to educate and raise awareness about extreme poverty around the globe to the hundreds of Iowans at the event.
The ONE Blog is a daily log of the anti-poverty movement. The site is operated by ONE staff, volunteers, members and coalition partners.
The content of each post and each comment represent the views of that author and does not necessarily reflect the views of the ONE Campaign or ONE Action. ONE does not support or oppose any candidate for elected office, and any posts expressing support or opposition for a candidate is not endorsed by ONE.
