July 28: Some Basic Realities For Democrats on Voting Rights
Watching an intra-Democratic argument on voting rights strategy intensify in Washington, I offered some advice to both sides at New York:
There has been an underlying disagreement within the mostly Democratic coalition favoring voting rights that was nicely captured in this New York Times report on Friday:
“A quiet divide between President Biden and the leaders of the voting rights movement burst into the open on Thursday, as 150 organizations urged him to use his political mettle to push for two expansive federal voting rights bills that would combat a Republican wave of balloting restrictions … In private calls with voting rights groups and civil rights leaders, White House officials and close allies of the president have expressed confidence that it is possible to ‘out-organize voter suppression,’ according to multiple people familiar with the conversations.”
Both sides in this argument are partly wrong. Those who expect Joe Biden to force the For the People Act or the John Lewis Voting Rights Act through the Senate via some major revision in the ability to filibuster are probably expecting the impossible. Yes, perhaps if Biden personally and insistently and abrasively lobbied Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema to abandon her very consistent defense of the filibuster, up to and including encouragement of a primary challenge to her when she is up for reelection in 2024, she might decide her current and very insistent independent-maverick “branding” isn’t going to keep working for her. But Joe Manchin? He would be thrilled to get attacked by a Democratic president or Democratic advocacy groups for insisting that he won’t support voting-rights measures unless at least some Republicans support them. His state is so very red that the threat of a primary challenge to the sole remaining successful West Virginia Democrat is a laugher.
Short of a nuclear attack on West Virginia, it’s hard to identify anything Biden might do to Manchin that wouldn’t run a high risk of backfiring. And he does need Manchin on the reconciliation bills Democrats are using to get around the filibuster to enact Biden’s social and economic agenda. It’s just too bad voting-rights bills don’t qualify for reconciliation.
Yes, it is intensely frustrating that Biden cannot bring himself to come out forthrightly for filibuster reform, but it probably doesn’t matter since it is not happening unless the Democratic Senate Conference gets bigger, making senators like Manchin and Sinema irrelevant on the subject. So at some point voting-rights advocates need to focus on that goal.
At the same time, White House claims that Democrats can “out-organize voter suppression” are partially wrong as well. Yes, restrictive provisions like voter-ID requirements, limits on voting by mail, and even voter-roll purges can be countered and perhaps overcome by intensive efforts to educate and energize the voters Republicans are trying to keep from the polls. But you cannot out-organize a partisan gerrymander, or a law that lets election officials or state legislators overturn the outcome of an election after votes are cast.
Voting-rights advocates will eventually have to play the cards dealt to them by the system as it currently exists. That means refraining from too much anger aimed at Democratic pols who have little choice but to concede defeat on some legislation and concentrate on legislation (i.e., those reconciliation bills with many items vital to the people whose voting rights are also under attack) they can enact with no margin for error in the Senate and little in the House. At the same time, Biden and his staff and Democratic “pragmatists” in Congress should never for a moment be cavalier about the legislative obstacles they face in defending democracy itself. They may have to accept a tactical defeat on voting rights in this Congress. But they should never, ever, give up on making it happen later if not sooner.
Mark makes an interesting point, but I must defer to the key argument of the original piece: “State laws restricting felons from voting should be scrapped because the technology is not available to generate fair and accurate felon lists. As long as felon lists are inaccurate, innocent people will be denied the right to vote because they have the bad luck of having the same name as a convicted felon.” That is a powerful argument.
Another argument for restoring the right to vote to felons that have served their time – as decided by the people – is that felons are still required to pay taxes and abide by the laws of the land. As a former resident of Washington, DC, I am reminded of the 1990’s license plate: “Taxation without Representation” (tellingly, this tag was on the Clinton presidential limo but immediately removed as soon as Bush entered office). If we expect that felons will pay taxes and (hopefully) follow the law, then they should be given the right to decide, though a vote, which lawmakers are in power to make these laws.
But, no matter what side of the fense one is on, it can’t be disputed that the current policy must be reevaluated and become uniform at the national level. The right to vote is a national right and should not be left to individual states to decide. The current process leaves the door wide open for intentional and illegal abuse by those in power at the state level. A national policy would be more transparent, accurate, and fair.
This _IS_ exactly what the Democratic leadership is missing about the vast American Middle. It appears that the Democrats are pandering to convicted felons (many or most of whom deprived other Americans of their rights and are there fore where they deserve to be) for their votes just to gain power for the sake of power.
Most opinion polls would depict that the majority of Americans believe in fairness, but also in law and order. They go to work every day without stealing or harming their neighbors, and raise their families to do well in the world. The Felon Vote is the antithesis of middle America and its values.
If the Democrat leadership focused as much attention on Working America as they due on justly convicted felonss, they might actually win back power, and then be in a position to herald in some needed changes, but not if they keep courting felons.
What good is it to gain the votes of justly convicted felons, only to lose the massive voting power of law abiding middle america?