Throw Out the Vote

You knew it was going to happen. Senate Democrats brought up the sweeping election reform bill passed by the House, and Senate Republicans blocked the upper house from even debating it, never mind voting on it.  Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell charged that it would federalize elections and take power away from the states to run elections.  He's right.  And that's exactly why you should support voting reform.  Because, with fourteen states having passed severe voting restrictions, particularly in Republican states where Republicans almost lost key Senate and presidential-elector elections, to make damn sure that never happens again, the states (at least Republican states) can't be trusted to run elections. And Congress is clearly within its bounds constitutionally to set guidelines for how states run elections.

To be fair, the "For the People" Act, as written, was probably too sweeping and too constitutionally dubious to pass muster with the courts.  But the GOP won't even consider West Virginia Democratic Senator Joe Manchin's compromise proposal , which would allow for voter ID and require no more than a utility bill but also allow fifteen days of early voting and eliminate partisan gerrymandering.  But then, Stacy Abrams, quickly replacing Nancy Pelosi as the national bogeywoman, said something that convinced Republicans to be against it.  She said she was for it.

There might be a way to convince Manchin to weaken the filibuster enough to allow an exception for voter laws, just as there might be a way to convince Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) to endorse climate-change legislation.  Manchin was actually for filibuster reform when he first joined the Senate back in 2011, but he's long since changed his mind about that.  Six years in the minority will do that to you.  For now, therefore, voter reform legislation is on the back burner, but Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer has made it clear that it's not off the stove.

"Make no mistake about it, it will not be the last time voting rights comes up for a debate in the Senate," Schumer, above, said.  "We have several serious options for how to reconsider this issue and advance legislation to combat voter suppression. We are going to explore every last one of our options."  

They'd better.  And it's worth noting that will the bill up for no debate ensures the casting of a ballot, it said little if anything about making sure that ballots are counted.  Some states are already setting things up so that legally cast votes can be thrown out by partisan poll oversight boards based on the mere suspicion of fraud however unfounded.  This could allow the Republicans to steal enough seats to win both houses of Congress in 2022 and overturn popular majorities for the Democratic presidential ticket in 2024.  And if that happens . . . well, it's one giant leap to authoritarianism.

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P.S.  It has since been reported that Donald Trump wanted to send Americans living or traveling abroad infected by COVID to Guantanamo Bay to keep the case numbers down early in the pandemic.  The next Republican President - who could be named Donald Trump, and not necessarily the one who just left the White House - could, once installed in the White House in a fraudulent election, use an emergency similar to COVID to have a law expanding his powers passed and use it to shut down opposition parties and CNN.

And after that, the only question about the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers will be which group will be nationalized into our new secret police. 😠