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New Voter Law (elections reforms)?

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by NewRoxFan, Sep 14, 2021.

  1. fchowd0311

    fchowd0311 Contributing Member

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    This is all fluff handwaiving of the actual issue with recent voting legislation from these red states that transfer power to deny certification of results to the partisan state legislatures. That's where the actual suppression will happen.
     
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  2. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    Not sure why people want to show concern about the filibuster when they didn’t recently. Turtle already got rid of it to push through Supreme Court nominees that he said should not be done in an election year. When republicans said don’t do something, know that it’s a lie and they will do it once it’s to their advantage.
     
  3. Commodore

    Commodore Contributing Member

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    the goal is:
    • illegal alien/noncitizen voting
    • unattended ballot drop boxes
    • anyone can collect and drop off thousands of ballots (harvesting)
    • voter registration roles with as many dead/inelligible voters on them as possible
    • ban ID requirements
    Basically anything you can think of that minimizes chain-of-custody, transparency, and confidence in the accuracy of the outcome.
     
  4. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    RNC cutting off video. Politics as usual.

    He needs to do more homework. Delaware doesn't have problems with long lines or registration or a history of suppression. For NY, it's fair given they do have election problems. But he's wrong. Democrats do complain about blue state election laws.

    New York State Senate Dems push voting reforms (msn.com)

    State Senate Democratic leaders pushed a package of election reforms to make it easier for New Yorkers to cast their ballot. The upper chamber's leading politicians in Albany promoted 11 pieces of legislation to expand voting access, noting other predominantly Republican states that have recently worked to limit the political franchise.
    Governor Carney Signs Early Voting Legislation - State of Delaware News

    On Sunday, the final day of the 2019 legislative session, Governor Carney signed legislation into law that seeks to increase voter participation in Delaware elections by allowing early, in-person voting.

    As importantly, blue states are not going backward in voting access like red states are. GA, TX, other red states, states with a history of suppression, are going backward and to an extreme.

    This attempt of equalizing blue states election laws to what these red states are doing is either foolish or another political attempts to blind reality. Republicans are pushing against democracy while Democrats are trying to protect it. You see the evidence in election laws being passed.
     
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  5. CCorn

    CCorn Member

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    ****, they tried to throw out votes in Harris County because they were afraid his loser ass might even lose texas.
     
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  6. NewRoxFan

    NewRoxFan Contributing Member

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    With all of your fears of voter fraud, why is it the only real instances of voting fraud were four old republicans in Florida and one on Texas?
     
  7. NewRoxFan

    NewRoxFan Contributing Member

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    The pillowguy is trying to help you out with evidence of wide-spread voter fraud...

     
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  8. FranchiseBlade

    FranchiseBlade Contributing Member
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    The system we have has been effective at all of those things. There have been no recent problems with voter fraud in any way which had threatened the legitimacy or outcome of federal elections.

    The preventative and protective measures in place are effective.
     
  9. CCorn

    CCorn Member

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    obviously every American, including children, outside of Texans voted illegally. Look at the math stupid.
     
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  10. Os Trigonum

    Os Trigonum Contributing Member
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  11. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    Since the usual suspects are now starting to lie about the Freedom to Vote act, below is what is in it. This was the compromised and trimmed down version of the For The People Act the House passed. It's established baseline standards. Nothing here is controversial. Some things here are hugely popular. Republicans are against this not because it's federal (Congress passed federal election law 98-0 in 2006), but because...

    https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/freedom-vote-act
     
  12. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    This is what is bizarre about the arguments Senate Republicans are making. Romney and others argued that the 2020 election was fine given that there was record turnout and very very little evidence of fraud. McConnell is going so far as to call Democrats call for national election reform as "a Big Lie" because the last election went so well.

    What doesn't make sense is that if it went so well then why are state legislatures changing their election laws and why are Senate Republicans not addressing those?
     
  13. Os Trigonum

    Os Trigonum Contributing Member
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    Althouse on Biden's trip to Georgia:

    "[Stacy] Abrams hasn’t specified what led her to bypass Biden’s event... Her decision triggered speculation... that she was avoiding the president’s souring approval ratings."
    by noreply@blogger.com (Ann Althouse)

    "But that narrative hasn’t reflected her strategy. She has closely aligned herself with Biden, campaigned to be his running-mate and launched her bid [for governor] with a promise to back the president’s agenda.... While Georgia Democrats typically celebrate a Democratic president’s visit to the state, Biden’s trip was met with complaints from activists and party officials. Some grumbled about the lack of coordination with local Democratic leaders and the timing of an event scheduled a day after Georgia played in the college football championship game in Indianapolis. Others questioned why Biden didn’t hold a fundraiser for Georgia candidates during his trip and lamented that Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris made the trip at all given that the Democratic U.S. senators who needed to be convinced to relax filibuster rules were in Washington."

    From "Abrams camp rejects ‘false rumors’ about her no-show at Biden event" (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution).

    Here's the transcript of the event, with the text of the speeches given by Biden and Harris. Did anyone even mention the glorious victory of Georgia's football team the day before? A tremendously uplifting event had occurred. It wasn't political. It was special to Georgia.

    But the Washingtonians descended upon the state with dramatic, racialized negativity. They insisting on setting the tone, and it wasn't jubilation.

    an hour ago


    "You could not invent a better advertisement for the legislative filibuster than what we’re just seeing, a president abandoning rational persuasion for pure, pure demagoguery."
    by noreply@blogger.com (Ann Althouse)

    "A president shouting that 52 senators and millions of Americans are racist unless he gets whatever he wants is proving exactly why the framers built the Senate to check his power."

    Said Mitch McConnell, quoted in "McConnell rips Biden’s voting rights speech as ‘profoundly unpresidential’" (NY Post).

    I didn't watch Biden's speech — I can read the transcript — but I did overhear it, and I said out loud, What is he yelling about? Why is he scolding us? He's using a ridiculous "tough guy" voice.

    You can criticize me for not attending to the substance, but he wasn't trying to use substance. He was using emotive sound effects. It was like a Trump rally — but no. A Trump rally would have humor and fun.

    And I don't think Trump ever relied on the argument that you're a racist if you don't agree with him. The anti-Trump rejoinder: Trump never called his opponents racists, because his between-the-lines message was always come all you racists and follow me.
     
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  14. FranchiseBlade

    FranchiseBlade Contributing Member
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    Very true. I think it is reasonable to conclude that state legislatures that impose restrictions on voting are doing it not for the security of the elections, but in order to keep people from voting that are likely to vote against those that hold power. It is specifically made to keep power and reduce the voice and democratic(small 'd') input from some citizens.

    I 100% support voting legislation to protect those as well as efforts to make voting easier and increase turnout. That being said, I'm not necessarily in favor of getting rid of the filibuster. It may be cutting off the nose to spite the face.
     
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  15. Andre0087

    Andre0087 Member

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    [​IMG]
     
  16. JuanValdez

    JuanValdez Contributing Member

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    How about 3/5ths?

    Thanks for the summary. To be honest, there's some things I like and some I don't. I doubt you can really say it's not controversial, though ironically the things I don't like are mostly the ones you say are hugely popular. What I don't like about the bill is the prescriptive approach of telling states how they should run their elections. Specifying how many days of early voting there should be, how ballots are collected, etc should not be dictated by the federal government. I'd have preferred they set metrical standards for voter experience and leave the states to decide what specific practices they should employ to get there, and consequences for failure. I do like the idea of setting standards for the protection of a citizen's civil right to vote federally, and setting standards for what is acceptable in the results states turn in to the federal government.

    I like these because they protect our civil right to vote in federal elections: Protections for those with disabilities, restoration of felons' voting rights, long line rules, private right of action, right to have your vote certified, protections against unlawful voter purges (they are already unlawful, after all). I would have liked for them to have explicitly included a 'right to register' in your voting right and gave grounds to sue if your voter registration was unduly encumbered -- then you could get away from trying to set rules for how voters should be registered.

    I like these because they set standards on acceptable voting results: Safeguards on politicized removal of officials, banning gerrymandering (depending on how this ban is written), district map drawing safeguards (depending on how written), post-election audit rules, grants for more secure voting systems.

    I like these because they are rules to regulate a fair political market in which some regulation of campaign speech is acceptable: campaign transparency (might get tossed on reasoning that freedom of speech includes freedom to speak anonymously, but I think that's bs), rules on super-pacs, campaign finance enforcement.

    Other: Election Day holiday, small donor matching (sounds like it'll never amount to anything, but nothing wrong with it).

    I don't like these because it is federal government trying to tell states how to do their roles: early voting rules, mail voting rules, voter validation standards (honestly, this was a good place to make some compromise with Republicans, but they didn't take it), automatic voter registration (unless it's a pot of money that states can choose to accept or refuse for AVR), same day registration, online registration, requiring paper records.

    I don't like these because they won't work or are dumb: Deceptive practices rules (it'll get tossed on first amendment grounds anyway, but would eventually by exploited by a tyrant to muzzle opponents), 'enhanced protections' of ballot records (much like voter ID, a rule to prevent a problem that doesn't exist and will probably cause unintended collateral damage).
     
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  17. DaDakota

    DaDakota If you want to know, just ask!

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    Someone needs to simply punch that man repeatedly in the face.

    With a pillow of course.

    DD
     
  18. Os Trigonum

    Os Trigonum Contributing Member
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    The New Voting Rights Bill Creates The Independent Office of Democracy Advance and Innovation
    To remove the director, the President must provide 30-days written notice to Congress.

    https://reason.com/volokh/2022/01/1...t-office-of-democracy-advance-and-innovation/

    excerpt:

    I can't see how this tenure protection survives after Seila Law. For a full month, the President is stuck with an "independent" Director that cannot be controlled. Moreover, the Director already knows he will soon be out of a job. That expiration date could provide even more incentive to misbehave. Sort of like when George Costanza was trying to get fired, but Steinbrenner wouldn't get rid of him.
    more at the link
     
  19. VooDooPope

    VooDooPope Love > Hate
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    Republicans yell about Rigged elections because they know the only way they can hold on to power to gerrymandering, suppressing the vote and working to rig elections while destroying the gullible's faith in our election process.

    Pure projection on their part yelling about a stolen election.
     
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  20. Os Trigonum

    Os Trigonum Contributing Member
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    https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-el...te-legislatures-11642199302?mod=hp_opin_pos_1


    The Election ‘Subversion’ Hunt
    GOP legislatures aren’t moving to overrule their state’s popular vote.
    By The Editorial Board
    Jan. 18, 2022 6:46 pm ET

    President Biden’s Georgia speech last week on voting and elections was riddled with too many falsehoods to count. But one of his claims deserves closer scrutiny. The President said the “endgame” of Republican state legislatures is “to turn the will of the voters into a mere suggestion—something states can respect or ignore.” Assuring listeners that this is “not hyperbole,” he added, “your vote won’t matter. They’ll just decide what they want and then do it.”

    Senate Democrats may vote Wednesday on a proposal that would nationalize election law. The assertion that GOP legislatures are preparing to overturn a future presidential vote in their state is a major justification. Let’s examine this claim to see if it’s true.

    ***
    Start with the constitutional basics. The Constitution’s Article II says that a state’s presidential electors shall be appointed “in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.” All state legislatures have passed laws directing that their electors be selected by a popular election in the state.

    Mr. Biden said GOP legislatures now want to turn the popular vote outcome in a state into a “suggestion,” presumably awarding electors instead to the candidate most legislators support. This could conceivably be done if states changed their laws to say so. But as of this month, it simply isn’t happening.

    Liberal legal and political groups are combing through state legislative dockets for evidence of GOP plans for election subversion. Barack Obama linked to one such roundup in his op-edlast week backing Mr. Biden’s speech. Titled “A Democracy Crisis in the Making,” it listsproposed laws in three states that represent “seizure of control over election results” by a state legislature.

    The first state is Arizona, where such efforts are most significant but still never passed a committee in either legislative chamber. A February 2021 bill backed by seven Republicans in the state’s House of Representatives would allow the Legislature to “reject or confirm the preliminary results” of the state’s election in a special session. According to the Legiscan tracker, it died in committee. Another Arizona bill with similar effect and a single sponsor also died in committee.

    A bill proposed in May 2021—also sponsored by a lone Arizona state Representative—would allow the Legislature to revoke a candidate’s certificate of election “by majority vote at any time before the presidential inauguration.” It died in committee.

    A February bill in Missouri, sponsored by a single GOP Representative in the state’s lower chamber, would also give the Legislature leeway to overturn the state’s popular vote. “The general assembly shall retain its authority to name presidential electors in cases of fraud,” it says, without elaboration. Guess the result? Dead in committee.

    Finally, there’s Nevada. Sponsored by five Republicans in March, legislation there called for a statewide referendum to implement something like the first Arizona proposal described above—that is, to make the state Legislature the body that certifies election outcomes.

    The proposal, which died in April, would never have passed the state’s Democratic-controlled assembly. And even if it did, it’s hard to imagine voters handing such power to the Legislature and possibly negating their own presidential choice.

    ***
    We can’t find any other proposed state legislation that would do this. That doesn’t mean legislators won’t call for overturning results after an election is over, as some did in Pennsylvania, Georgia and Arizona at the Trump campaign’s urging in 2020, with no effect.

    But such a post-election reversal would likely violate federal law, which says electors must be chosen on Election Day. Congress may try to strengthen this prohibition on after-the-fact legislative interference as part of a bill reforming the 1887 Electoral Count Act.

    Some GOP legislatures are rewriting election rules—in productive and unproductive ways—but they are not currently preparing to substitute their will for the will of the voters in a presidential election.

    Narrower administrative changes, like a provision of Georgia law Mr. Biden cited that allows the firing of local election officials for “malfeasance” in two elections in two years, don’t count. As we pointed out last week, the federal election legislation Democrats want to pass allows the firing of a local official for similar misconduct.

    There’s no guarantee, now or ever, that state officials won’t make bad partisan decisions in the administration of elections. But they remain constrained by the law, and Mr. Biden’s suggestion of a widespread state-level intent to nullify votes was, like the rest of his speech, a wild distortion.

    Appeared in the January 19, 2022, print edition.





     

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