voting rights

A reform agenda for voting rights

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Despite all the horror stories about “red state” voter suppression efforts in this election, there was also some good news for voting rights in the states as well. The New York Times reports, Before the Fights Over Recounts: An Election Day Vote on Voting:

In Tuesday’s elections [there was] a wave of actions aimed at making voting easier and fairer that is an often-overlooked strain in the nation’s voting wars.

Floridians extended voting rights to 1.4 million convicted felons. Maryland, Nevada and Michigan were among states that made it easier to register and vote.

From the Brennan Center for Justice:

Automatic Voter Registration (AVR) is gaining momentum across the country. Currently fifteen states and D.C. have approved the policy, meaning that over a third of Americans live in a jurisdiction that has either passed or implemented AVR. A brief history of AVR’s legislative victories and each state’s AVR implementation date can be found here. This year alone, twenty states have introduced legislation to implement or expand automatic registration, and an additional eight states had bills carry over from the 2017 legislative session. A full breakdown of these bills, as well as those introduced in 2015, 2016, and 2017, is available here.

Where AVR Has Passed 11-8-18

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The GOP’s ‘voter fraud’ fraud is illegal voter intimidation

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Voter intimidation is a crime. 18 U.S. Code § 594 – Intimidation of voters.

And yet President Donald Trump and his soon-to-be former Confederate Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III are openly engaging in the crime of voter intimidation, for the first time ever in American history. Without evidence, Trump and Sessions warn of voter fraud in Tuesday’s elections:

President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Monday issued strong warnings about the threat of voter fraud in Tuesday’s elections, echoing the president’s baseless claims that massive voter fraud marred his 2016 election and prompting accusations that his administration is trying to intimidate voters.

In a tweet early Monday, Trump said that law enforcement has been “strongly notified” to watch for “ILLEGAL VOTING.” He promised that anyone caught voting improperly would be subjected to “Maximum Criminal Penalties.”

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Sessions, in a statement laying out the Justice Department’s plans to monitor ballot access on Election Day, said “fraud in the voting process will not be tolerated. Fraud also corrupts the integrity of the ballot.”

In remarks to reporters on his way to a campaign rally in Cleveland, Trump also falsely claimed that voter fraud is commonplace.

“Just take a look,” he said. “All you have to do is go around, take a look at what’s happened over the years, and you’ll see. There are a lot of people — a lot of people — my opinion, and based on proof — that try and get in illegally and actually vote illegally. So we just want to let them know that there will be prosecutions at the highest level.”

There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the United States. Trump formed a commission to study the issue shortly after he took office that was disbanded without finding evidence of fraud after states refused to turn over voter data.

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Why Oprah votes … and wants you to

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Oprah Winfrey delivered an impassioned call to voters Thursday in a fiery stump speech in support of Georgia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams. Stumping for Abrams, Oprah makes impassioned plea for turnout:

“I’m here today because of the men and because of the women who were lynched, who were humiliated, who were discriminated against, who were suppressed, who were repressed and oppressed, for the right for the equality at the polls,” Winfrey said. “And I want you to know that their blood has seeped into my DNA, and I refuse to let their sacrifices be in vain. I refuse.”

Video link.

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Oprah then recounted the story of Otis Moss, Sr., a black man who tried to vote on election day in Georgia but was given the runaround by white poll workers. He walked for 18 hours that day to three different polling places, and at the end of the day he was told “Boy, you’re too late, the polls are closed.” And he never never had a chance to vote. By the time the next election came around he had died.

Oprah then says, “So when I go to the polls and I cast my ballot, I cast it for a man I never knew. I cast it for Otis Moss, Sr. who walked 18 miles one day just for the chance to vote.”

“And when I stand in the polls I do as Maya Angelou says, ‘I come as one but I stand as 10,000.'” “For all those who paved the way that we might have the right to vote.”

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Steve Gaynor raises red flags in Secretary of State race

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There has not been much good reporting on Steve Gaynor, the Republican candidate for Secretary of State who ousted Secretary of State Michele Reagan in the Arizona GOP primary, but what little I have seen reported raises red flags about this guy seeing his role as the chief elections officer in Arizona as classic GOP voter suppression in the tradition of Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach and Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, both of whom are running for governor in November.

Earlier this year, Secretary of State Michelle Reagan settled a lawsuit over Arizona’s bifurcated dual voter registration system for those who use the federal voter registration form.

Gaynor focused his criticism on the aspect of the settlement that requires the state to register voters for federal elections even if they use the state form. He said Michelle Reagan should not have settled and fought the issue all the way to the Supreme Court, if necessary.

I covered this at length in an earlier post. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach had his ass handed to him in federal court over this same issue. So much for this litigation criticism.  Michelle Reagan is terrible, but Steve Gaynor fancies himself the next Kris Kobach. (Kansas and Arizona were the only two states who maintained this practice).

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Bad day in the AZ Supreme Court for initiatives, and for democracy

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The day after the primary election, the Arizona Supreme Court signaled the death knell for democracy in Arizona, upholding our lawless GOP legislature’s machinations to severely restrict your constitutional right to citizens initiatives in lickspittle service to their corporate masters. The court sided with the corporatocracy.

The Arizona Supreme Court blocked the InvestInEd initiative and Outlaw Dirty Money initiative from appearing on the ballot.

The Arizona Capitol Times reports, Supreme Court bars tax on rich ballot measure from vote:

The Arizona Supreme Court won’t allow a vote on a citizen initiative to raise taxes for public education.

In an order signed by Chief Justice Scott Bales, a majority of the justices ruled that the #InvestInEd initiative’s description of the campaign’s proposed tax hike on the wealthiest Arizonans, and the omission of any language describing how the law would affect the income tax brackets for Arizonans at every income level, was inadequate.

The two drafting errors collectively created “a significant danger of confusion or unfairness,” Bales wrote in the decision barring the initiative from a vote on the November ballot.

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