Posted on 10/07/2024 6:03:56 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Imagine hearing a knock on your door and opening it to find actor Jane Fonda campaigning for a local election candidate.
That's how the 86-year-old actor and activist is spending her time this election season. She's campaigning around the country for local candidates who support action on climate change, building on her years of climate-related protests.
Fonda told CBS News that the campaigning work felt so necessary that she told her agent she wouldn't be taking any acting jobs this year, to make sure she had time to canvass.
"This year I said to my agent 'I'm sorry, I can't work.' When the election is happening that's going to determine the future, I couldn't do it," Fonda, a two-time Academy Award winner, explained. "I couldn't do it. Next year I'll do it."
Fonda has hand-picked over 130 lower-level candidates who will stand up to the fossil fuel industry using her political action committee, JanePAC.
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"This is the last election that can have a major effect on climate," Fonda said.
1005-satmo-fondaclimate-schecter-3244332-640x360.jpg Jane Fonda (L) with California State Assembly District 26 candidate Tara Sreekrishnan (R) and campaign staff. CBS Saturday Morning Supporting "climate champions"
Many of the candidates Fonda is supporting are running for under-the-radar offices like Portland City Council or a school board seat in Virginia. She's already raised $4 million to help those candidates get elected.
"That low-level candidate could, first of all, could rise up and become governor of the state. You want to groom them to rise into leadership positions as climate champions," Fonda said. "If we have the right people elected to office, we can do it."
It's far from the first time Fonda has stepped into the world of activism. In 1972, she made a controversial visit to Vietnam opposing the war, and in the 1990s, she marched to support women's reproductive rights.
In 2019, she launched her Fire Drill Fridays, a protest series inspired by Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg, to draw attention to global warming. She was arrested five times during those protests, even spending her 82nd birthday behind bars.
"It was aimed not at the government. It was aimed at the great unasked," Fonda said of that protest series. "There's like 70% of Americans that are really concerned about the climate crisis, and when they're asked why they don't take action, they say, 'Well, nobody asked.'"
"You need people in the halls of power"
Now, Fonda has made the move from protest to politics. 62% of Americans think that politicians should do more to fight climate change, according to the Pew Research Center, many politicians on both sides of the aisle vote against legislative solutions. Her hope is that helping elect people who think differently will make a difference.
"Nonviolent civil disobedience and protests historically have changed history, but you need people in the halls of power with ears and a heart to hear the protests, to hear the demands," Fonda said.
Going door-to-door and working to raise money for the local candidates she supports has been "so fun," she said.
"It's a lot of work. Oh, it's so much fun. Ever since I'm doing 100% of what I'm capable (of) in confronting the climate crisis, I don't get depressed anymore," Fonda said. "I get angry, but I'm not depressed. Hope is a muscle. It's like the heart. It's a muscle, and you have to activate it to feel it."
Fonda said that the work of campaigning has helped her feel hopeful and fulfilled.
"I wouldn't be doing it if I wasn't hopeful," Fonda said. "Everybody needs meaning in their life. I'm old, so I think a lot about being on my deathbed and I know that when you're on your deathbed, you want to feel that it's been worthwhile."
Imagine hearing a knock on your door and opening it to find actor Jane Fonda campaigning for a local election candidate.
I would have to remember which piece is in the front hall.
Imagine hearing a knock on your door and opening it to find actor Jane Fonda campaigning for a local election candidate.
I would have to remember which piece is in the front hall.
Send the dogs out!
Doesn’t look like she’s had a heartbreaking death in her late years. I have.
CBS: Fonda is an ACTRESS, not an ACTOR. There is a difference.
5,000 personal sexual favors in exchange for votes will take some time.
Hanoi Jane deserves all she can swallow.
Maybe Tampon Tim has some tips?
You and me both; I would be arrested about two weeks later for kidnapping-torture and murder!
It would take the two weeks because I know a lot of places in the middle of nowhere and nobody cares.
Hanoi-ing Jane needs to shut her big, stupid yap.
She’s only going to be knocking on doors in gated communities.
NOT FONDA JANE
She’s had some work done. For a moment I thought the candidate was a Republican since she was R in the picture. That is MSM level psychology. They always say Rep. next to whatever democrat crook congressman that gets in trouble.
By association ... anything this traitorous hag is affiliated with is degraded and toxic
They dug up that old fossil for this?
Indeed communists always helping other communists it’s a party rule.
F Jane and the horse she rode in on
She
Hillary Clinton
Barack Obama
Jimmy Carter
John McCain
...round out my top five.
I’m trying to forgive and forget, but it sure isn’t easy.
Individually, in a group setting, they may be okay to be
around. I just don’t care for what they have done, and
in some instances still are doing.
At this point, Carter is probably the least offensive due
to his health.
I don’t actually wish harm to them, but I do wish they
could stop meddling in our nation’s business.
I just wouldn’t want to see her on my doorstep. I’d have
to fumigate the place.
Oops, I guess McCain would be the least offensive at this
point. Carter’s coming in a close second from what I
understand at this point.
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