The Daily Escape:
Capitol Reef NP -December 2021 photo by Jonathan Vandervoorde
Shouldn’t we be on the side of democracy? Georgia’s Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock says yes. He spoke in the Senate on Tuesday, and what he said is consistent with Wrongo’s thinking.
Warnock asked why the Senate could suspend its rules in order to pass an increase in the debt ceiling by a simple majority but couldn’t do the same thing for something as critical to our democracy as voting rights. From Warnock:
“Before we left Washington last week, we in this chamber made a change in the Senate’s rules in order to push forward something that all of us think is important. We set the stage to raise the nation’s debt ceiling, and yet as we cast that vote to begin addressing the debt ceiling, this same chamber is allowing the ceiling of our democracy to crash in around us….Be very clear, last week we changed the rules of the Senate. To address another important issue, the economy. This is a step, a change in the Senate rules we haven’t been willing to take to save our broken democracy, but one that a bipartisan majority of this chamber thought was necessary in order to keep our economy strong.”
The Jan. 6 attempted coup and the many state anti-voting laws passed by Republicans subsequent to that, come from the same poisonous well: A growing anti-democratic movement of fellow travelers including American conservatives, Right-wing extremists, and political entrepreneurs on the Right who have made the Republican Party their political vehicle.
They’re close to winning in the 2022 mid-terms. If the Senate adjourns without acting on voter suppression, it will help them get there. Buzzfeed reports that in some states, Republicans are going door-to-door in order to “check” to make sure there aren’t any illegal voters in your home:
“Individual election deniers and grassroots groups are canvassing for election fraud in states…including New Hampshire, Arizona, Colorado, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, Utah, and Nebraska.”
They’re targeting registered Democrat voters. It’s part of a broader effort by Trump supporters and Republican Party leaders to cast doubt on our elections going forward. In Colorado, a member of the Three Percenter militant group is helping lead the canvassing effort. According to the Colorado Times Recorder, that member suggested volunteers carry firearms to provide security for the group as they went door-to-door.
Let’s call this what it is: Voter intimidation on a multi-state scale. It’s a message that if you are a registered Democrat, the Trump cultists know who you are, and where you live. This intimidation should be illegal, but it’s not.
And it’s another part of the problem that the Senate needs to address right now.
The Democrats have what amounts to less-than-a-majority in the Senate in favor of suspending the filibuster rules for voting rights. In June, Majority Leader Schumer outsourced an effort to garner a filibuster-proof majority on voting rights to Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WVA), but Manchin’s effort failed.
Despite that, Schumer was able to finesse the filibuster to act without Republican votes to increase the debt ceiling. He was also able to corral all Democratic Senators, including Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema, who are on the record as being against any change in the filibuster rules.
But voting rights, the most fundamental of all Democratic principles, are being sacrificed to the crusty parliamentary rule that these same two Democrats have so far refused to consider. This week, Schumer appointed a group of Democratic senators, who lead the talks on voting rights legislation, to spearhead discussions with Joe Manchin about how to change the Senate rules. They met with Manchin on Tuesday.
It’s time for Sen. Schumer to wrestle Manchin and Sinema to the ground, and make them vote to suspend the filibuster rules a second time.
Barton Gellman, who wrote a recent Atlantic magazine article that Wrongo quoted last week, recently told Terry Gross of NPR:
“This is, I believe, a democratic emergency, and that without very strong and systematic pushback from protectors of democracy, we’re going to lose something that we can’t afford to lose about the way we run elections.”
We’re facing a crisis. Biden and all Democrats have to make this a “whose side are you on?” issue for Washington politicians and for voters everywhere.
Warnock has a powerful message. He’s the one Democrat willing to speak about the elephant in the room. Watch his speech:
