#Democracyfaces #threats #Trumpvoting
The survival of democracy should be a central issue in American politics next year. To insist on this is to be realistic, not alarmist. However, revealing this situation requires identifying two different threats. Need something to talk about? Message us for thought-provoking insights that might break the awkward silence. ArrowRight The first is Donald Trump, who is already at the center of our national conversation. The second is the ongoing attack on voting rights that rarely dominates the airwaves. Let’s start with the good news Treating Trump as a normal presidential candidate has become untenable, thanks his increasingly radical rhetoric, starting with his promise to use the Justice Department as a tool exact revenge on political enemies. The result was a partial but welcome shift in journalistic coverage that recognized Trump’s journey into what the New York Times called “more fascist-sounding territory.” The Economist, which is not an avatar of left-wing politics, attracted great attention with its statement that Trump “poses the greatest danger to the world in 2024.” It’s true that most Republican politicians are reluctant to call out former president’s orchestrated attacks on our constitutional democracy, but at least the issue is coalescing outside GOP cocoon. Dionne Jr.’s views Follow We pay far less attention to the long-term degradation of the right to vote, which is a fundamental building block of a democratic republic. It’s easier to overlook because eliminating ballot access has been an elaborate, decade-long process. This was highlighted in Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in Shelby County v. It began with Holder decision, which gutted Section 4 of Voting Rights Act, sharply limiting Justice Department’s authority to enforce law. This has led to an explosion of state abuses, including discriminatory voter identification laws, targeted purges of voter rolls, gerrymanders that undermine minority representation, and changes to early voting rules that often give some groups an advantage over others. Because such moves do not counteract the wholesale disenfranchisement of Black voters during the Jim Crow era , advocates of today’s restrictions insist they do not discriminate against anyone. But making it harder for some people to vote is no less than an attack on democracy. In his ruling in the Shelby case, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. argued that even without a strong Section 4, the Voting Rights Act prohibits discrimination under Section 2, which “is permanent, applies nationwide, and is not at issue in this case.” ” Permanent? Not unless the 2-1 decision handed down last week by the 8th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals is allowed to stand. The court’s majority arrogantly brushed aside what Congress clearly said it had done in passing the law, claiming that the law’s “text and structure” had miraculous powers to bar private parties, including civil rights groups, from suing under Section 2. As Atlantic’s Adam Serwer noted, the decisi
The Pulse of Washington D.C.
