Progressive Salem

09/02/2026

Thank you so much to Councilor Mai Vang for joining us for our September First Tuesday social! We loved hearing about your achievements and your write-in campaign.

Join us for our next First Tuesday on October 6 with Councilor Micki Varney.

08/18/2026

✨ Go Mai! ✨

Our momentum is real. 🔥

People keep asking how they can help me reach East Salem voters. Two ways make the biggest difference:

1. Chip in $20+ today. This campaign runs on small donations from neighbors like you, and every dollar helps spread the word about why East Salem should write in MAI VANG for Ward 6 City Councilor.

Contribute today: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/elect-mai-vang

2. Knock doors with me. Our volunteer crew is growing fast, the voter lists are easy to use, and this is hands-down the highest-impact way to help.

Write-in campaigns are won one conversation at a time. Let's do this! 💪

08/16/2026

Progressive Salem supports Mai Vang, who last February introduced a motion to explore legal methods of renter protection that passed Salem City Council unanimously.

After an investigation into where Betsy Vega resided during her campaign, an interesting comment was left on Mai Vang's write-in announcement video.

When asked about renter protections at the March 31 Salem Reporter forum, Betsy Vega opposed rental protections and said that landlords are already overregulated. Because of this, it's reasonable to believe Betsy Vega will take positions on city issues at her campaign funders' behest instead of genuine positions.

We support Mai Vang's write-in campaign so that she can continue her good work for Salem's working people. This fall, write in Mai Vang for Ward 6 City Councilor.

08/16/2026

The question Chris is answering in this video was about municipal tree code. Chris Cummings heard it, nodded, and drove the entire thing straight into Wallace Marine Park.

Within seconds we are no longer talking about trees. We're talking about drugs. Specifically, drugs seeping down into the soil and annihilating the trees: a sentence that should come with a peer-reviewed citation and instead just got said out loud, with full confidence, by a man asking for your vote. That is not how trees work. It is not how soil works. It is not how anything works. But it is the most Chris thing imaginable, because to Chris there is only one issue, and every other issue is just a hallway that leads back to it.

You could ask this man about the noise ordinance. Homelessness. Ask him about the water bill. Homelessness. Ask him about crosswalk timing on Edgewater and he'll find the encampment angle before the light turns green. The tree code walked in perfectly healthy and left in a body bag.

And then he posted about it again tonight. In case West Salem had briefly forgotten that Chris Cummings has exactly one note, and it looks like he intends to play it until the piano gives out.

Here's the actual point under the joke: homelessness is a real, serious issue, and it deserves a candidate who can hold more than one thought at a time. This is the opposite of that. This is a man handed a softball about trees who turned it into a crime scene where, somehow, the victims are the trees. West Salem is surely smarter than this.

08/10/2026

Since 2018, there have been numerous elections decided by very narrow margins. 629 elections across the United States were determined by 10 votes or fewer. Of these, 372 were decided by fewer than five votes, and 91 elections were won by a single vote. YOUR VOTE MATTERS!

08/08/2026

It's pushing 90° in Salem today, and the trees over your street are the difference between a livable block and a heat trap. Salem's tree code protects the canopy we already have for a reason: shade is heat resilience.

The League of Women Voters asked the candidates in Ward 6 and Ward 8 a simple question about our trees. The answers weren't close.

🌳 WARD 8 - WEST SALEM
Micki Varney, a scientist, talked parks, natural resources, and how the canopy actually functions. Chris Cummings led with his grandpa being a logger and "you can get free trees from the City."

🌳 WARD 6 - EAST SALEM
Mai Vang recognized the importance of expanding the canopy in East Salem, where residents have the fewest trees and the most exposure to exactly the heat we're feeling right now. Betsy Vega talked about "tree condensation."

On a day like today, preparation isn't a bonus. It's the job. Watch, then decide who's actually ready.

This fall, vote Micki Varney, Salem City Council Ward 8 and write-in Mai Vang Salem City Councilor Ward 6!

08/05/2026

Salem is in the fight of the decade: a $5.1 billion California data center wants 75 acres, our water, and our power, and it spent 16 months hidden behind a nondisclosure agreement before the public got let in on the secret.

Everybody in this town has an opinion. The neighbors packing council chambers have an opinion. Your barista has an opinion. And Ward 6's councilor-elect, Betsy Vega?

Crickets.

Here's what the silence tells you: Betsy doesn't have a position on Oakline because nobody's handed her one yet. She's waiting for the script. Waiting for her slate to circle up and tell her what she thinks. When the marching orders come down, she'll know exactly what to say. But not one second sooner.

Salem's water crisis and the biggest development decision this city has faced in a generation. And the person elected to represent East Salem just two miles away is standing in the corner, waiting to be told what her own opinion is.

If Betsy can't find her voice on the biggest issue in town before she's even sworn in, what happens on every hard vote after?

The chambers are full, Betsy. The mic is on. We're waiting, but nobody's holding their breath.

This November, WRITE IN MAI VANG!

08/04/2026

Watch closely. This is the Marion County Board of Commissioners on August 27, 2025. The people at the podium are from SEDCOR, the economic development agency that Marion County pays $160,000 a year. SEDCOR President Erik Andersson is briefing commissioners on "Project Gridline," a data center that had already optioned roughly 80 acres at Mill Creek and held a pre-application meeting.

Salem's city councilors weren't told about this project until July 13, 2026, almost a year later. By the time it reached Salem City Council, a tax abatement for this project came from the Marion County Assessor, approved just days before Oregon's new law would have blocked it.

08/04/2026

Go Mai! 👊💥