On the same day when President Barack Obama unveiled the Rosa Parks statue in Statuary Hall at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., The Supreme Court heard arguments that could throw out the Voting Rights Act.
Scalia attributed the repeated renewal of Section 5 to a “perpetuation of racial entitlement.” He said, “Whenever a society adopts racial entitlements, it is very difficult to get out of them through the normal political processes.”
Let that sink in for a moment.
A shocking statement to be sure, but considering the source, it shouldn't be.
(See the transcript here, and for context, see a more detailed discussion here.)
Acting three days after the nation’s minority voters showed that they have increased and still growing power in U.S. elections, the Supreme Court agreed on Friday to rule on a challenge to Congress’s power to protect those groups’ rights at the polls. The Court said it would hear claims that Congress went beyond its authority when it extended for another twenty-five years the nation’s most important civil rights law, the Voting Rights Act, originally passed in 1965 and renewed four times since then.
Specially at issue is the constitutionality of the law’s Section 5, the most important provision, under which nine states and parts of seven others with a past history of racial bias in voting must get official clearance in Washington before they may put into effect any change in election laws or procedures, no matter how small. The Court came close to striking down that section three years ago, but instead sent Congress clear signals that it should update the law so that it reflects more recent conditions, especially in the South. Congress did nothing in reaction.
With President Obama's reelection, it's more than likely there will new justices in the next couple of years that could change the current makeup of the court that has become a five-four conservative leaning majority.
Any ruling the court makes would now come well before any new justices are appointed.
If you missed seeing this speech by civil rights leader, Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) Thursday night at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, please take a moment to watch. He speaks so eloquently of the subject he knows all too well: Voter suppression. His words have even greater resonance now as we face the active role Republicans are taking in order to change the rules for voters in several states, just as Governor Rick Scott has been trying to do in Florida. Even as courts have blocked many of those restrictions, he has continued to try and find a way to block the vote; while at the same time claiming he wants to make sure everyone can vote. If that were true, there would be no need for changes in the law.
Scott and his fellow Republicans do "want to go back" by changing the rules. That's clear. It's up to us to stop them, and the best way to fight back is with our vote. (Full text of the speech below.)
I first came to this city in 1961, the year Barack Obama was born. I was one of the 13 original "Freedom Riders." We were on a bus ride from Washington to New Orleans trying to test a recent Supreme Court ruling that banned racial discrimination on buses crossing state lines and in the stations that served them. Here in Charlotte, a young African-American rider got off the bus and tried to get a shoe shine in a so-called white waiting room. He was arrested and taken to jail. On that same day, we continued on to Rock Hill, South Carolina, about 25 miles. From here, when my seatmate, Albert Bigelow, and I tried to enter a white waiting room, we were met by an angry mob that beat us and left us lying in a pool of blood. Some police officers came up and asked us whether we wanted to press charges. We said, "No, we come in peace, love and nonviolence." We said our struggle was not against individuals, but against unjust laws and customs. Our goal was true freedom for every American.
Since then, America has made a lot of progress. We are a different society than we were in 1961. And in 2008, we showed the world the true promise of America when we elected President Barack Obama. A few years ago, a man from Rock Hill, inspired by President Obama's election, decided to come forward. He came to my office in Washington and said, "I am one of the people who beat you. I want to apologize. Will you forgive me?" I said, "I accept your apology." He started crying. He gave me a hug. I hugged him back, and we both started crying. This man and I don't want to go back; we want to move forward.
Brothers and sisters, do you want to go back? Or do you want to keep America moving forward? My dear friends, your vote is precious, almost sacred. It is the most powerful, nonviolent tool we have to create a more perfect union. Not too long ago, people stood in unmovable lines. They had to pass a so-called literacy test, pay a poll tax. On one occasion, a man was asked to count the number of bubbles in a bar of soap. On another occasion, one was asked to count the jelly beans in a jar—all to keep them from casting their ballots.
Today it is unbelievable that there are Republican officials still trying to stop some people from voting. They are changing the rules, cutting polling hours and imposing requirements intended to suppress the vote. The Republican leader in the Pennsylvania House even bragged that his state's new voter ID law is "gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state." That's not right. That's not fair. That's not just.
And similar efforts have been made in Texas, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, Arizona, Georgia and South Carolina. I've seen this before. I've lived this before. Too many people struggled, suffered and died to make it possible for every American to exercise their right to vote. And we have come too far together to ever turn back. So we must not be silent. We must stand up, speak up and speak out. We must march to the polls like never before. We must come together and exercise our sacred right. And together, on November 6, we will re-elect the man who will lead America forward: President Barack Obama.
The latest chapter in Rick Scott's War On Voters comes on the heels of him flipping off the Supreme Court, President Obama and anyone in the state of Florida who needs health care.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Florida, along with State Senator Arthenia Joyner, and the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) filed an administrative petition against Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner challenging his implementation of a dual election system involving restrictive changes in election procedures adopted by the Florida Legislature in 2011. Along with the ACLU of Florida, petitioners are represented by the Brennan Center for Justice and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.
Currently, the State of Florida is operating an unlawful dual system of elections in violation of the state “Uniformity Statute.” Sixty-two Florida counties are enforcing restrictive 2011 changes to the Florida election code. However, the previous law still applies in the five counties that are “covered” under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) while the state awaits a federal court decision on whether the 2011 changes violate Section 5.
“Gov. Scott’s insistence that the state go forward with two different sets of voting laws and procedures in different counties not only violates Florida law requiring uniform elections throughout the state, it is a recipe for chaos and another embarrassment for our state,” said Howard Simon, Executive Director of the ACLU of Florida. “The Governor’s insistence that the state can push the Voting Rights Act aside and not wait for approval from either the Department of Justice or the federal courts, is the clearest indication yet of his agenda to trample on the voting rights of the people of Florida.”
In 2011, the Florida legislature passed a law, referred to by many as the “Voter Suppression Act,” which included changes that make it more difficult for individuals to register to vote, reduce the number of days of early voting, specifically ban early voting on the Sunday prior to Election Day, and increase the odds that Florida voters will be required to cast provisional ballots. In the 2008 Presidential Election less than half of provisional ballots cast in Florida were counted. As required by Section 5 of the VRA, Florida must submit any changes to elections laws to the federal government for “preclearance” to ensure that they do not violate the voting rights of minorities in the five covered counties. While many provisions of the 2011 law have received Section 5 preclearance, the restrictive portions have not.
Contrary to past practice and state law, and even though the restrictive portions of the 2011 law are not in effect in the five covered counties, Florida ordered elections officials to go forward with implementing the 2011 restrictive changes in the remaining 62 of the State’s 67 counties, while the five counties triggering the VRA review continue operating under the pre-2011 elections code. This has created a confusing and non-uniform election system across Florida.
"The petitioners are asking simply that Florida abide by state law which requires that the same voting rules apply throughout the State," said Robert Kengle, co-director of the Lawyers' Committee's Voting Rights Project. "The State is failing to apply the state Uniformity Statute in the same way it applied it in the past."
Once again a court action is required merely to get Governor Rick Scott to follow the law.
Florida elections supervisors said Friday they will discontinue a state-directed effort to remove names from county voter rolls because they believe the state data is flawed and because the U.S. Department of Justice has said the process violates federal voting laws.
[...The Justice Department letter and mistakes that the 67 county elections supervisors have found in the state list make the scrub undoable, said Martin County Elections Supervisor Vicki Davis, president of the Florida State Association of Supervisors of Elections.
"There are just too many variables with this entire process at this time for supervisors to continue," Davis said.
Ron Labasky, the association's general counsel, sent a memo to the 67 supervisors Friday telling them to stop processing the list.
"I recommend that Supervisors of Elections cease any further action until the issues raised by the Department of Justice are resolved between the parties or by a Court," Labasky wrote.
Davis said the effect on supervisors will be "if they've started the process and they do find out that someone is ineligible to vote and they have credible and reliable information to back it up, then they will remove that person from the database. But if they have not had contact with someone on the list, they're stopping at that point."
"As Florida's Chief Election Officer, I am committed to ensuring the accuracy of Florida's voter rolls and the integrity of our elections. . . . The Department will continue to act in a responsible and cautious manner when presented with credible information about potentially ineligible voters. No one that has the right to vote has been denied the opportunity to cast a vote, and as the Secretary, it is my duty to ensure that remains the case."
Except that knowingly using inaccurate lists is not acting in a responsible or cautious manner, and those who have the right to vote are being denied the opportunity to cast a vote if they're purged from the rolls. That is exactly what they are doing.
Again the Republicans are asking us not to believe our lying eyes just because they say one thing and do the opposite as we all look on. No, no one is asking them to let those who have no right to vote do so. It's just a convenient thing to say as a distraction.
As for all those "ineligible voters" Detzner and his spokesperson keep telling us about, where is that list, exactly?
Tonight the Justice Department sent a letter to Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner ordering the state to stop Rick Scott's voter purge because the process hasn't been cleared under the Voting Rights Act.
DOJ also said that Florida’s voter roll purge violated the National Voter Registration Act, which stipulates that voter roll maintenance should have ceased 90 days before an election, which given Florida’s August 14 primary, meant May 16.
Five of Florida’s counties are subject to the Voting Rights Act, but the state never sought permission from either the Justice Department or a federal court to implement its voter roll maintenance program. Florida officials said they were trying to remove non-citizens from the voting rolls, but a flawed process led to several U.S. citizens being asked to prove their citizenship status or be kicked off the rolls.
That's two big losses in one day for Rick Scott, and two big wins for Florida voters and Democracy. Earlier today U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle struck down a provision of the Republicans and Scott's controversial Florida voter suppression law.
After Judge Hinkle's ruling Scott said he would review other options on those provisions.
The right to vote is under attack all across our country. Conservative legislators are introducing and passing legislation that creates new barriers for those registering to vote, shortens the early voting period, imposes new requirements for already-registered voters, and rigs the Electoral College in select states. Conservatives fabricate reasons to enact these laws—voter fraud is exceedingly rare—in their efforts to disenfranchise as many potential voters among certain groups, such as college students, low-income voters, and minorities, as possible. Rather than modernizing our democracy to ensure that all citizens have access to the ballot box, these laws hinder voting rights in a manner not seen since the era of Jim Crow laws enacted in the South to disenfranchise blacks after Reconstruction in the late 1800s.
Talk about turning back the clock! At its best, America has utilized the federal legislative process to augment voting rights. Constitutional amendments such as the 12th, 14th, 15th, 17th, 19th, 23rd, and 26th have steadily improved the system by which our elections take place while expanding the pool of Americans eligible to participate. Yet in 2011, more than 30 state legislatures considered legislation to make it harder for citizens to vote, with over a dozen of those states succeeding in passing these bills. Anti-voting legislation appears to be continuing unabated so far in 2012.
Unfortunately, the rapid spread of these proposals in states as different as Florida and Wisconsin is not occurring by accident. Instead, many of these laws are being drafted and spread through corporate-backed entities such as the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, as uncovered in a previous Center for American Progress investigative report. Detailed in that report, ALEC charges corporations such as Koch Industries Inc., Wal-Mart Stores Inc., and The Coca-Cola Co. a fee and gives them access to members of state legislatures. Under ALEC’s auspices, legislators, corporate representatives, and ALEC officials work together to draft model legislation. As ALEC spokesperson Michael Bowman told NPR, this system is especially effective because “you have legislators who will ask questions much more freely at our meetings because they are not under the eyes of the press, the eyes of the voters.”
The investigative report included for the first time a leaked copy of ALEC’s model Voter ID legislation, which was approved by the ALEC board of directors in late 2009. This model legislation prohibited certain forms of identification, such as student IDs, and has been cited as the legislative model from groups ranging from Tea Party organizations to legislators proposing the actual legislation such as Wisconsin’s Voter ID proposal from Republican state Rep. Stone and Republican state Sen. Joe Leibham.
You can read the entire report, including more details of the Florida voting restrictions, here.
Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL) is attending the U.S. Senate Subcommittee Hearing on Gov. Rick Scott's voter suppression election law in Tampa. In advance of the hearing, Castor was joined by representatives of the NAACP, National Council of La Raza, and University of South Florida Student Government to explain the harmful consequences of Gov. Rick Scott's voter suppression law.
The hearing is being held today with Sen. Bill Nelson and Sen. Dick Durbin. Gov. Rick Scott was invited to attend the hearing by Sen. Durbin, but his spokesman said Scott would be ignoring the letter of request and refused to attend the hearing because he was "busy and didn't write the law."
Rep. Castor released the following statement in regards to the hearing: "New State Voting Laws II: Protecting the Right to Vote in the Sunshine State" and Governor Rick Scott's voter suppression law:
“The diverse group joining me here today is representative of the harm that this new law will cause,” Castor said. “Students are the most likely to have moved and need to update their address on election day and minority voters have historically taken advantage of Early Voting opportunities.”
Florida is one of several states across the country to enact laws that will lead to voter suppression. The non-partisan Brennan Center study estimates these new voter laws will make it significantly harder for 5 million voters to cast ballots across the country.
“At a time when we should be encouraging more people to participate in our democracy, Gov. Scott and the Florida legislature are doing everything they can to make it harder for our neighbors to vote,” Castor said. “Nothing is more basic in our democracy than the right for our neighbors to vote and if any one person is discouraged or denied that right all of us suffer.”
The Florida League of Women Voters discontinued their voter registration efforts citing that they could not put their volunteers at risk and “subject them to a process that can result in their facing financial and civil penalties.”
“Governor Scott’s voter suppression law is clearly an attempt to dilute the power of those who may vote against him and his failed policies,” Castor said. “Not only is it harder to register new voters, but this law makes harder for many of our neighbors to exercise their right to vote.”
Key features of the Florida Voter Suppression Law:
Reduces early voting from 14 days to eight
Prohibits early voting on the last Sunday before Election Day
Voters who attempt to change their addresses at the polls on Election Day may only cast provisional ballot
Voter registration groups must pre-register before engaging in any voter registration activity
Requires registration forms to be physically received within 48 hours of signature or face strict penalties and fines.
“Unfortunately, here in Hillsborough County we have a history of past racial discrimination that undermined voting rights and led to a special preclearance designation by the Department of Justice,” Castor said. “We must ensure that we do not repeat the mistakes of the past and do everything we can to inform voters about these new changes that may affect their ability to vote.”
Castor has long fought against any efforts that might suppress voter turnout. In 2008 she raised concerns about the lack of early voting locations in minority communities in Pinellas County (see attached letter). Last year, she also joined her Florida colleagues in asking the Department of Justice to use its authority under the Voting Rights Act to review the impact of the Florida law on the five Florida counties currently under preclearance requirements
A U.S. Senate panel is holding a hearing today in Tampa over Florida's new voter suppression election laws. Sen. Bill Nelson and Sen. Dick Durbin, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights will both be there.
"Governor Scott won’t be responding to the senator’s letter. He’s focused on passing meaningful jobs legislation, education and PIP reform and respectfully declines to further explain a law he didn’t write," spokesman Lane Wright said in an email.
The same goes for a public hearing about the law in Tampa, which Durbin, an Illinois Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, invited Scott to attend.
For instance, volunteers who register voters who are not their family members must sign up with the state and must turn in voter registration forms within 48 hours of obtaining the signatures. The previous time frame for submitting new voter forms was 10 days.
Volunteer registrars first must sign an oath warning of prison time and/or hefty fines if they violate the rules.
Because of the new restrictions, the League of Women Voters, a nonpartisan group that has been registering voters in Florida for 72 years, suspended its efforts.
The league and Rock the Vote, a group that focuses on registering young voters, have challenged the law in court.
"Overall, it creates a mountain of risk and red tape that has proved insurmountable to grass-roots groups like the League of Women Voters that has thousands of volunteers willing to work five hours on weekends to register voters," said Deirdre Macnab, president of the league in Florida.
The hearing will take several hours of testimony from a number of witnesses from across the state including elections supervisors, political scientists and a former Secretary of State.
The 2011 state law that revamped Florida's voting machinery by reducing the days of early voting, requiring third-party voter registration groups to register with the state and subjecting them to fines if they fail to submit voter forms within 48 hours.
A fourth section of the law requires voters to cast provisional ballots if they have moved from one Florida county to another since they last voted.
All four changes are under review by a panel of three federal judges and are not yet in effect in Hillsborough, Monroe, Collier, Hardee and Hendry counties.
Republican lawmakers who pressed for the law say it was necessary to bolster public confidence in election laws and reduce fraud. Democrats say the state has had virtually no voter fraud in recent years and call the changes an act of "voter suppression" by the GOP to make it more difficult for college students and minority voters to vote.
Below is Sen. Bill Nelson discussing the voter suppression law on the floor of the U. S. Senate yesterday:
Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll at the Florida GOP meeting Saturday:
"On Monday, we're going to be celebrating Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday and I can't think of anybody currently in my life right now that more epitomizes the values and the vision of Dr. King than Gov. Rick Scott," she said.
"When the governor selected me to be his running mate, he did not look at the color of my skin," said Carroll, who was the only black Republican in the Legislature in 2010. "He looked at the content of my character and my integrity and work ethic, and what I brought to the table. This is the dream of Dr. King that was realized for me."
A man who disenfranchises voters, wanted mandatory drug testing for welfare recipients, cuts any manner of social safety net out from under the poor, the sick, children, the elderly and veterans, to name just a scant few of the man's egregious policies. These are some of the values Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood for? Seriously?
This is a deplorable, contemptible comment coming from one who talks up the "content of her character."
What "character" would that be exactly, Lt. Gov. Carroll?
