New year. Old battles. 1. Congress makes a (symbolic?) effort to reform election laws The first bill proposed by the new Democratic-controlled Congress is H.R.1 — modestly titled the “For the People Act of 2019” — a sweeping proposal to improve voting...
1. Surprised? Florida’s recount is a dumpster fire of flawed election laws, right-wing conspiracy theories, baseless “fraud” charges, and inept ballot design Florida’s Senate and governor races are all too close to call and undergoing a...
1. Voter suppression might be decisive in key races in Tuesday’s election Ari Berman breaks down the real possibility of voter disenfranchisement deciding key races for Governor and the control of the U.S. Congress in the New York Times. Jelani Cobb surveys...
1. The real threats to election integrity have nothing to do with Voter ID Three recent stories point to the alarming vulnerability of our election systems to attack. First, the New York Times Magazine has an in-depth feature on "The Crisis of Election...
1. Georgia’s Brian Kemp has a stunningly bad record on voting rights Georgia Secretary of State and would-be Governor Brian Kemp has not only embraced Donald Trump’s political agenda, but also his open hostility to voting rights. As the highest elections...
1. John McCain and the lost battle for campaign finance reform Last week, Senator John McCain died. And while I didn’t agree with most of his policies or politics, I will always admire his central role in the last great effort to pass bipartisan campaign finance...
1. Michigan is a gerrymandered mess. But maybe not for long. When it comes to discussing heavily gerrymandered states, I’ve often pointed to Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, or North Carolina. But Michigan sucks, too. Until I dug into the numbers this week, I...
Donald Trump claimed, without evidence, that more than three million noncitizens voted against him in 2016. Likewise, Republicans across the country use fears of “voter fraud” — especially the alleged threat of noncitizens voting — to justify a wide range...
When Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement on June 27th, many of us looked at it as a big blow for hopes for the Supreme Court to help reign in partisan gerrymandering. Over the last few years, there had been much speculation about how Justice Kennedy might...
The Supreme Court is not coming to the rescue on voting rights It’s been three bad weeks in a row if you care about protecting the right to vote. In three straight weeks, the Supreme Court has ruled against efforts to defend the vote against efforts to suppress...
Within the next few weeks, possibly days, the Supreme Court is expected to rule on two cases that will have a major impact on the fairness of elections and voting. It’s not hyperbole to say that these decisions could shape the nature of American...
“Everybody does it”… but do they? A reader wrote me after last week’s issue and pointed out that as I detailed examples of states with extreme gerrymandering, I only highlighted states where Republicans redistricted to favor their...
Gerrymandering distorts the democratic process, skewing election outcomes in ways that don’t fairly reflect the electorate. In many states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and North Carolina, partisan gerrymandering has grossly distorted state and...
