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Gabrielle Gurley

Gabrielle Gurley is The American Prospect’s deputy editor. Her Twitter is @gurleygg, and her email is ggurley@prospect.org.

Recent Articles

Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

Gabrielle GurleyOct 18, 2018
(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty, File)
(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty, File) Mary Mayhew on May 5, 2018, in Augusta, Maine T here’s no better way to drive a stake through the heart of anti-poverty programs than to appoint a new administrator with documented success in heaving low-income adults and children off of social welfare systems. America, meet Mary Mayhew, aka “Mary Mayhem,” as she is sometimes known in her home state of Maine. The former secretary of Maine’s Department of Health and Health Human Services (DHHS) is now the number two at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and director of Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program. Could Mayhew be any worse than any other official appointed by President Trump to strangle an agency from within? Yes, she could. The announcement of her appointment prompted a collective gasp from the Pine Tree State. It should take very little time for Mary Mayhew to become know as the “Scott Pruitt” of #Medicaid . #p2 #resist #UniteBlue #mepolitics https://t.co/...

What Happens When You Can’t Catch a Ride to the Polls?

Voter-suppression tactics can create transportation challenges, especially for young people and minorities.

Gabrielle GurleyOct 15, 2018
(AP Photo/Steve Karnowski)
(AP Photo/Steve Karnowski) Voting booths stand ready in downtown Minneapolis on September 20, 2018, for Friday's opening of early voting in Minnesota. mobility_icon.png G etting a ride with Uber or Lyft doesn’t spring immediately to mind as an example of democracy in action, but on Election Day, the companies plan to offer discounted rides and free trips to voters facing transportation challenges in partnership with groups like #VoteTogether and DemocracyWorks (Uber) and the National Federation of the Blind, Voto Latino, and the National Urban League (Lyft). There’s more to this than good corporate citizenship, as the firms anticipate profiting from their discounted fares and from broadening their rider base, though they also are working with voting-rights groups to raise awareness of voter-registration tools and other election information. Forward-thinking transit systems in some cities and smaller locales also offer free rides on Election Day. But most people fend for themselves...

Florida Wrestles with Election Cybersecurity

This purple state remains a plum target for hackers foreign and domestic, and its history of suppressive voting measures complicates efforts at reform. 

Gabrielle GurleyOct 09, 2018
AP Photo/John Raoux Last May, Florida's Secretary of State Ken Dentzer declined a $20 million share of federal cybersecurity money, until Governor Rick Scott, pictured here speaking with Supporters in Orlando, forced him to accept it. This article appears in the Fall 2018 issue of The American Prospect magazine. Subscribe here . E ver since the infamous election of 2000, Florida has been ground zero in the struggle to improve the technology and security of voting. Unfortunately, those critical issues have been conflated with deliberate political efforts to suppress voting and undermine confidence in voting systems, and 2018 is no exception. The reforms instituted since the 2000 debacle, such as early voting, served to make voting more convenient and restored confidence that all votes would be counted accurately. Even Republican Governor Rick Scott, no fan of convenience or expanding the franchise, finally went along with online voter registration last year. Thanks to the work of...

The Collins Conundrum

Maine’s court of public opinion considers the case of Brett Kavanaugh—and of Susan Collins, too.

Gabrielle GurleyOct 04, 2018
(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
(AP Photo/Alex Brandon) Senator Susan Collins on Capitol Hill on October 3, 2018 S hortly after Brett Kavanaugh unleashed his apoplectic plea for a Supreme Court seat, a small group of women, some dressed in judges’ robes, arrived to protest in front of Senator Susan Collins’s house in Bangor, Maine. Had she been at home, she would have seen the women carrying signs urging her to vote no when Kavanaugh’s confirmation comes up for a vote in the Senate. Contrast that episode with Mainers’ reaction to seeing Collins at Bangor International Airport last summer. Deplaning from a Washington flight, Collins walked through the arrivals area into a round of applause from the assembled travelers after she’d help defeat her Senate colleagues’ attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act. After more than 20 years in the Senate, she savored the once-in-a-career moment. Today, Collins is once again a pivotal vote on the nation’s future—and her own. After President Trump’s latest diatribe against the...

California Gears Up for a Gas Tax Clash

The Golden State is often a harbinger of trends to come, such as recently passed fuel taxes and vehicle fees to finance long-overdue local and state transportation projects. But these are now imperiled by an anti-tax ballot initiative. 

Gabrielle GurleySep 21, 2018
AP Photo/Richard Vogel Gasoline prices are displayed at a gas station near downtown Los Angeles screen_shot_2017-07-19_at_4.28.52_pm.png “ Your gas tax dollars at work/Rebuilding California, SB 1” signs have sprung up on transportation infrastructure repair and maintenance projects from the Mexican border to the Oregon line. Having $5 billion each year to fill potholes, shore up bridges, and pave roads is a pipe dream for most states. In 2017, California finally stopped imagining the “what-ifs” of transportation fixes and got to grips with its state-of-good-repair backlog. Governor Jerry Brown signed a new transportation revenue program into law in last April and the state officially hiked fuel taxes and vehicle fees last November. With little real money expected from a dysfunctional Washington, the onus for new revenues has shifted to states to figure out the best way to keep decay at bay. In California, the Democratic-controlled Legislature came up with a slate of investment...

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