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| The John Lewis Voting Rights bill clears the House. |
PROTECT BLACK WOMEN!
WEAR A DAMN MASK! SAVE A LIFE! TRUST SCIENCE AND MEDICAL EXPERTS! THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC IS FUCKING REAL!
HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE NOW! VOTE THESE DUMBASS LAWMAKERS OUT OF OFFICE! STOP SUPPORTING ALL FORMS OF EXTREMISM!
GOOGLE'S BLOGGER IS STRAIGHT UP TRASH! THE BLOGGER INTERFACE IS A TOTAL DISASTER AND IT'S RIDICULOUS!
WHITE PRIVILEGE IS REAL!
YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID!
Overnight, the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed the H.R. 1, The John Lewis For The People Act. The bill will hopefully change the way Americans vote. It will be a sweeping voting and ethics legislation that could finally make voting fair.
House Resolution 1 passed with 220 to 210. The Democrats want to restrict partisan gerrymandering, strike down hurtles to voting registration and bring transparency to a murky campaign finance system that allows wealthy donors to anonymous bankroll political causes.
It appears that Republicans wants to make sure they'll stay in power for generations to come. They are trying to pass state legislation to keep voter turnout down and continue to push draceon laws to keep Americans from voting.
Fear not, the Democrats are ready to sue if the state governors sign off the bills.
It was not a close election. Former president Donald J. Trump lost the electoral college and popular vote.
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| Rep. Nikema Williams (D-GA) sponsored the John Lewis Voting Rights bill. |
The electoral college says that Joe Biden/Kamala Harris won 306 electoral votes and Donald J. Trump/Mike Pence won 232. Biden managed to win over 81 million votes to Trump's 74 million.
The largest turnout in the middle of a pandemic and global chaos.
Washed Up 45 continues to push the big lie. He claims that voting by mail and early voting is illegal and urges Republicans to take up the fight to stop Trump and far-right Republicans continue to deny the fact that Biden won far and square.
It led to the insurrection which the Republicans want us to just ignore.
The January 6, 2021 insurrection was sparked by Trump and his allies in Washington and in the junk food media. They continued to push false claims that Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Nevada were conducting in voter fraud. Biden win flipped Arizona and Georgia. It gave the states two Democrats senators. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) beat Martha McSally and Kelly Loeffler, two deeply unpopular Republicans who were entangled with Trump.
Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) went on to beat David Perdue and McSally the first time.
This bill “will put a stop at the voter suppression that we’re seeing debated right now,” said Rep. Nikema Williams, a new congresswoman who represents the Georgia district that deceased voting rights champion John Lewis held for years. “This bill is the ‘Good Trouble’ he fought for his entire life.”
In a statement, Biden said he looked forward to refining the measure and hoped to sign it into law, calling it “landmark legislation” that is much needed “to repair and strengthen our democracy.”
To Republicans, however, it would give license to unwanted federal interference in states’ authority to conduct their own elections — ultimately benefiting Democrats through higher turnout, most notably among minorities.
“Democrats want to use their razor-thin majority not to pass bills to earn voters’ trust, but to ensure they don’t lose more seats in the next election,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said from the House floor Tuesday.
The measure has been a priority for Democrats since they won their House majority in 2018. But it has taken on added urgency in the wake of Trump’s false claims, which incited the deadly storming of the U.S. Capitol in January.
Courts and even Trump’s last attorney general, William Barr, found his claims about the election to be without merit. But, spurred on by those lies, state lawmakers across the U.S. have filed more than 200 bills in 43 states that would limit ballot access, according to a tally kept by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.
In Iowa, the legislature voted to cut absentee and in-person early voting, while preventing local elections officials from setting up additional locations to make early voting easier. In Georgia, the House on Monday voted for legislation requiring identification to vote by mail that would also allow counties to cancel early in-person voting on Sundays, when many Black voters cast ballots after church.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court appeared ready to uphold voting restrictions in Arizona, which could make it harder to challenge state election laws in the future.
When asked why proponents sought to uphold the Arizona laws, which limit who can turn in absentee ballots and enable ballots to be thrown out if they are cast in the wrong precinct, a lawyer for the state’s Republican Party was stunningly clear.
“Because it puts us at a competitive disadvantage relative to Democrats,” said attorney Michael Carvin. “Politics is a zero-sum game.”
Battle lines are quickly being drawn by outside groups who plan to spend millions of dollars on advertising and outreach campaigns.
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| Pelosi vows to push Biden's agenda. |
Republicans “are not even being coy about it. They are saying the ‘quiet parts’ out loud,” said Tiffany Muller, the president of End Citizens United, a left-leaning group that aims to curtail the influence of corporate money in politics. Her organization has launched a $10 million effort supporting the bill. “For them, this isn’t about protecting our democracy or protecting our elections. This is about pure partisan political gain.”
Conservatives, meanwhile, are mobilizing a $5 million pressure campaign, urging moderate Senate Democrats to oppose rule changes needed to pass the measure.
“H.R. 1 is not about making elections better,” said Ken Cuccinelli, a former Trump administration Homeland Security official who is leading the effort. “It’s about the opposite. It’s intended to dirty up elections.”
So what’s actually in the bill?
H.R. 1 would require states to automatically register eligible voters, as well as offer same-day registration. It would limit states’ ability to purge registered voters from their rolls and restore former felons’ voting rights. Among dozens of other provisions, it would also require states to offer 15 days of early voting and allow no-excuse absentee balloting.
On the cusp of a once-in-a-decade redrawing of congressional district boundaries, typically a fiercely partisan affair, the bill would mandate that nonpartisan commissions handle the process instead of state legislatures.
Many Republican opponents in Congress have focused on narrower aspects, like the creation of a public financing system for congressional campaigns that would be funded through fines and settlement proceeds raised from corporate bad actors.
They’ve also attacked an effort to revamp the federal government’s toothless elections cop. That agency, the Federal Election Commission, has been gripped by partisan deadlock for years, allowing campaign finance law violators to go mostly unchecked.
Another section that’s been a focus of Republican ire would force the disclosure of donors to “dark money” political groups, which are a magnet for wealthy interests looking to influence the political process while remaining anonymous.
Still, the biggest obstacles lie ahead in the Senate, which is split 50-50 between Republicans and Democrats.
On some legislation, it takes only 51 votes to pass, with Vice President Kamala Harris as the tiebreaker.
On a deeply divisive bill like this one, they would need 60 votes under the Senate’s rules to overcome a Republican filibuster — a tally they are unlikely to reach.
Some Democrats have discussed options like lowering the threshold to break a filibuster, or creating a workaround that would allow priority legislation, including a separate John Lewis Voting Rights bill, to be exempt. Biden has been cool to filibuster reforms and Democratic congressional aides say the conversations are fluid but underway.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has not committed to a time frame but vowed “to figure out the best way to get big, bold action on a whole lot of fronts.”
He said: “We’re not going to be the legislative graveyard. ... People are going to be forced to vote on them, yes or no, on a whole lot of very important and serious issues.”
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