Category Archives: US voting rights

Rightwing group pours millions in ‘dark money’ into US voter suppression bid

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Tax filings reveal advocacy arm of Heritage Foundation spent $5m on lobbying in 2021 to block voting rights in battleground states

The advocacy arm of the Heritage Foundation, the powerful conservative thinktank based in Washington, spent more than $5m on lobbying in 2021 as it worked to block federal voting rights legislation and advance an ambitious plan to spread its far-right agenda calling for aggressive voter suppression measures in battleground states.

Previously unreported 2021 tax filings from Heritage Action for America, which operates as the foundation’s activist wing, shows that it spent $5.1m on contracting outside lobbying services. The outlay comes on top of $560,000 the group invested in its own in-house federal lobbying efforts that year, as well as registered lobbying by Heritage Action staffers in at least 24 states.

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Deadline extended for 1,000 absentee Georgia voters who didn’t receive ballots

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ACLU of Georgia, SPLC and Dechert LLP had filed an emergency lawsuit urging election officials to extend deadline

A judge has agreed to extend the deadline to return absentee ballots for voters in a suburban Atlanta county who didn’t receive their ballots because election officials failed to mail them.

The move came after the ACLU of Georgia, Southern Poverty Law Center and Dechert LLP joined forces to file an emergency lawsuit urging officials to extend the deadline for these voters to return their ballots.

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US far-right group sparks legal firestorm over drive to monitor drop-box voting

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Melody Jennings of Clean Elections USA teamed up with True the Vote for project that echos Trump’s false claims about 2020

A far-right group run by a Christian pastor has sparked a legal firestorm by spearheading a drive to aggressively monitor drop-box voting for fraud in Arizona and other states, in an echo of Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election results were rigged.

Melody Jennings, who runs Clean Elections USA, has teamed up with the conservative group True the Vote, which has a track record for making debunked charges of voting fraud. Together they are promoting a project to hunt for alleged drop-box fraud, which Jennings boasted in multiple interviews on Steve Bannon’s podcast War Room and the MG Show, a conspiratorial QAnon program.

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Early voters in Arizona midterms report harassment by poll watchers

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Complaints detail ballot drop box monitors filming, following and calling voters ‘mules’ in reference to conspiracy film

A voter in Maricopa county, Arizona, claims a group of people watching a ballot drop box photographed and followed the voter and their wife after they deposited their ballots at the box, accusing them of being “mules”.

The voter filed a complaint with the Arizona secretary of state, who forwarded it to the US Department of Justice and the Arizona attorney general’s office for investigation, according to Sophia Solis, a spokesperson with the secretary of state’s office.

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Anger as DeSantis eases voting rules in Republican areas hit by hurricane

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Executive order makes voting easier in Florida’s Lee, Charlotte and Sarasota counties but not in Democratic Orange county

Governor Ron DeSantis has made voting easier in certain Florida counties battered by Hurricane Ian – but only Republican-leaning ones.

DeSantis signed an executive order on Thursday that eases voting rules for about 1 million voters in Lee, Charlotte and Sarasota counties, all areas that Hurricane Ian hit hard and that all reliably vote Republican.

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The ‘all-out’ effort to overcome Georgia’s new restrictive voting bill

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SB202 is forcing officials and voting rights groups to use every resource to ensure elections run smoothly

In 2021, the Election Integrity Act sent shockwaves across Georgia as citizens learned of new restrictions, such as curbing the way churches could provide pizza and water to voters. However, there are much broader effects of the bill being felt across the state as communities across Georgia prepare for midterm elections, the first major election since the signing of the controversial bill.

The 98-page bill, also called SB202, impacts a litany of election elements ranging from voter ID laws to the distance at which food and water can be distributed to voters waiting in line. Election officials say they are being forced to use every resource at their disposal to navigate the bill and ensure this election season runs smoothly. But there is widespread concern that the new law will create fresh barriers to voters of color and the changing Georgia electorate.

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Kamala Harris says ‘everything on the line’ in midterm elections

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Vice-president warns that the elections will determine whether ‘age-old sanctity’ of right to vote would be protected

Kamala Harris warned on Sunday that the midterm elections in November would determine whether the “age-old sanctity” of the right to vote would be protected in the US or whether “so-called extremist leaders around the country” would continue to restrict access to the ballot box.

With just 56 days to go until the elections, and with the paper-thin Democratic majority in both chambers of Congress, the vice-president said that “everything is on the line in these elections”.

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Florida officials arrest and charge 20 people with illegal voting, DeSantis says

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Move designed to show muscle of a new office tasked with policing voting in the state and comes days before primary election

Florida officials have arrested and charged 20 people with felony convictions and charged them with illegal voting, Florida governor Ron DeSantis said on Thursday, a move designed to show the muscle of a new office tasked with policing voting in the state.

The announcement came just days before the state’s primary election and as early voting is under way. DeSantis, flanked by law enforcement, said the 20 people were charged with voting in Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties, some of the most Democratic in the state.

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Florida Republicans targeted Black voters, justice department says in filing

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The agency claims the restrictions, including a ban on providing water and food to those lining up to vote, are racially motivated

Florida Republicans intentionally targeted Black voters when they enacted new voting restrictions last year, the justice department said in a court filing on Wednesday.

The department told a federal appellate court that a lower court had correctly evaluated claims of racial discrimination when it came to Florida’s new law. In March, US District Judge Mark Walker blocked new restrictions on the availability of absentee ballot drop boxes, regulations for third party voter registration groups, and a ban on providing food and water to people standing in line to vote. The US court of appeals for the 11th circuit paused that ruling earlier this year while it considers an appeal from Florida officials.

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Voting is significant determinant of health, US medical association declares

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Some advocates suggest AMA could partner with civic groups to encourage voting, which correlates to better health outcomes

Access to voting is now considered a health issue, according to the country’s largest physician group.

The American Medical Association (AMA) House of Delegates adopted a resolution calling voting a social determinant of health, a term used to describe non-medical factors that affect health and wellbeing. Co-sponsored by the National Medical Association, the resolution also recognizes that gerrymandering limits access to care and leads to worse health outcomes.

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‘Downright dangerous to our democracy’: Wisconsin’s supreme court restricts use of absentee ballot boxes

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Drop boxes may be placed only in election offices and voters must return ballot in person, in blow to Democrats in battleground state

Wisconsin’s conservative-controlled supreme court ruled on Friday that absentee ballot drop boxes may be placed only in election offices and that no one other than the voter can return a ballot in person, dealing a critical defeat to Democrats in the battleground state.

The court did not address the question of whether anyone other than the voter can return his or her own ballot by mail. Election officials and others had argued that drop boxes are a secure and convenient way for voters to return ballots.

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Next up: voting rights, as US supreme court set to tear up more protections

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The ideologically driven conservative majority is likely to further weaken key civil rights legislation after a term of radical rulings

The final days of the US supreme court’s term offered a clear look at the way its new 6-3 conservative majority is bluntly using its power to reshape American life, but its next term is also set to hear cases that could prove equally, or even more, consequential.

“This really is the ‘Yolo’ [you only live once] court,” said Leah Litman, a law professor at the University of Michigan who closely follows the court. “I don’t think people fathom just how much more they will do.”

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Texas court ordered to reconsider decision to uphold prison sentence for woman who voted

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Crystal Mason was sentenced to five years in prison for casting a provisional ballot in the 2016 election

A Texas appeals court must reconsider its decision to uphold a five-year conviction for Crystal Mason, the Texas woman sentenced to prison for casting a provisional ballot in the 2016 election, the state’s highest criminal court ruled on Wednesday.

Mason showed up to the polls to vote in 2016, while on supervised release – which is similar to probation – for a federal tax felony. She cast a provisional ballot at the urging of election workers, which was ultimately rejected because people with felony convictions in Texas cannot vote while they are serving any part of a federal sentence.

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Ron DeSantis signs bill to create Florida voter-fraud police force

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Republican governor embraces top priority of his party, following Donald Trump’s false claims that his 2020 re-election was stolen

Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill Monday to create a police force dedicated to pursuing voter fraud and other election crimes, embracing a top priority of Republicans after Donald Trump’s false claims that his reelection was stolen.

DeSantis, who is running for reelection and considered a potential 2024 Republican presidential candidate, made voting legislation a focus this year, pushing the Republican-controlled Legislature to create the policing unit in a speech where he referenced unspecified cases of voter fraud, which have become popular talking points in his party.

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‘Democracy in Florida is not functioning.’ Governor’s rigged maps rob Black voters of power

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Governor Ron DeSantis’s redistricting gambit means ‘for all intents and purposes, there’s currently … one-man rule’, says one former GOP strategist

As Florida Republicans gave final approval to new congressional districts on Thursday, Black lawmakers staged a sit-in on the floor of the legislature, praying, chanting and singing that Black voters were under attack in the state.

The extraordinary moment served as a remarkable endpoint to a brazen attack by the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis.

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Florida Republicans pass congressional map severely limiting Black voter power

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Plan drawn by Ron DeSantis gives Republicans a significant boost and is one of the most aggressively gerrymandered maps in US

Florida Republicans approved a new congressional map that severely curtails Black voting power in the state on Thursday, taking a final vote as Black lawmakers staged a sit-in on the floor of the legislature.

The new plan, which was drawn by Governor Ron DeSantis, gives Republicans a significant boost in the state and is one of the most aggressively gerrymandered maps passed in recent months. Republicans would be expected to win 20 of the state’s 28 congressional districts, a four seat increase from the 16 they hold now. It also eliminates two of four districts where Black voters have been able to elect the candidate of their choice.

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The US supreme court’s assault on voting rights hits a new low

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Ruling throws out Wisconsin’s redrawn electoral map, which included a new district to account for Black population growth

Even for experts who closely follow the US supreme court, there was something stunning about an emergency decision from the justices on Wednesday.

In an unexpected move, the court decided to throw out new districts for the state legislature in Wisconsin that had been picked by the state supreme court. But what was even more surprising was that the court’s conservative majority seemed to go out of its way to attack the Voting Rights Act, one of the most important civil rights laws designed to prevent discrimination in US elections. “Extra headspinning,” was how Michael Li, a redistricting expert at the Brennan Center for Justice, described it. “Bizarre,” observed Richard Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California, Irvine. David Wasserman, a redistricting expert at the non-partisan Cook Political Report, tweeted that the supreme court had entered “uncharted territory”.

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Maryland judge rules Democratic-drawn electoral map is unconstitutional

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Legislature was accused of gerrymandering after substituting its own new district maps for ones drafted by outside commission

A Maryland judge ruled on Friday that the state’s new congressional map is unconstitutional, the first map by a Democratic-controlled state legislature to be struck down by a court this redistricting cycle.

So far courts have intervened to block maps they found to be GOP gerrymanders in North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania, infuriating Republicans and leading conservatives to push for the US supreme court to limit the power of state courts to overturn maps drawn by state legislatures.

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US supreme court blocks new Wisconsin voting maps in boost for Republicans

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Court took issue with decision to add an additional Black-majority state assembly district in the Milwaukee area

The US supreme court threw out Wisconsin’s new state legislative maps on Wednesday, in a ruling that boosts Republicans and takes aim again at one of the last remaining provisions to protect voting discrimination.

The ruling is the latest of many in recent years in which the US supreme court has been hostile to voting rights. In an unsigned ruling, the court took issue with the decision to add an additional Black-majority state assembly district in the Milwaukee area, raising the total in the map to seven. The Wisconsin supreme court picked the plan, drawn by Tony Evers, the state’s Democratic governor, earlier this month.

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‘We must march forward’: Kamala Harris commemorates Bloody Sunday anniversary in Selma

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US vice president takes to Edmund Pettus Bridge in Alabama as congressional efforts to restore the 1965 Voting Rights Act falter

US vice president Kamala Harris visited Selma, Alabama on Sunday to commemorate a defining moment in the fight for the right to vote, making her trip as congressional efforts to restore the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act have faltered.

Under a blazing blue sky, Harris took the stage at the foot of the bridge where in 1965 white state troopers attacked Black voting rights marchers attempting to cross.

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