“On this vote the Yeas are 50, the Nays are 50, 3/5th of the Senators duly-chosen and sworn not having voted in the affirmative, the motion is not agreed to…”
With those words, Democrats’ attempted power grab, S.1, was effectively defeated by Republican filibuster. With those words, Democrats’ campaign to weaken our elections and consolidate power in Washington suffered a devastating blow. However, although the first battle was won by Republicans, the war against Democrats’ authoritarian power grab is far from over.
Democrats, now forced to retreat in the face of defeat, are going back to the drawing boards where they have already begun work on their backup plan to consolidate power in Washington. Their next move is as tired as it is predictable.
Their next attack against the security of our elections and the sovereignty of individual states will take a two-pronged approach:
1.) Renewing their attacks against the filibuster, decrying it as “racist” and a “relic of the Jim Crow Era.”
2.) Re-introducing H.R. 4, Democrats’ back-door attempt to pass the worst parts of the Corrupt Politicians Act and consolidate power in Washington.
The renewed attacks against the filibuster will begin first. While they don’t actually believe that they’ll be successful in this regard, seeing as Joe Manchin has already made his position abundantly clear, their goal with the renewed attacks is not truly the destruction of the filibuster. Although they’d like that outcome, because it would allow them to ram through their radical agenda, they know presently it’s not realistically possible. Their motive is all about setting a scene.
They will decry the filibuster as a racist relic of the past, being weaponized by the GOP to stand in the way their legislation…omitting the fact that they’ve used it hundreds of times over the past 10 years. Their desire is to convince the American people that the Democrats’ fight is one against “racist systems of power” and the dastardly Republican boogeyman. Once they feel like they’ve pushed this outright lie enough (with the help of a complicit media) and effectively set the scene, they will unveil their new legislation that just coincidentally solves all the “problems” they’ve been talking about for months. Just one issue, their “problems” are nothing more than figments of their imagination.
Their goal with the renewed attacks against the filibuster is to engineer a mythical problem, convince the American people it’s a “fundamental threat to democracy,” and then introduce legislation that just coincidentally “solves” that problem entirely.
It’s like spilling a drink on your couch just so you can show-off the new couch cleaner you’ve found to your spouse. It’s tired, predictable and like something out of a bad infomercial.
While their renewed attacks against the filibuster are entirely predictable, their intent with H.R. 4 is far more nefarious and complex… They will try to sell it as a simple legislation, that’s for the common good, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Just like the Corrupt Politicians Act, H.R. 4 provides a clear path for those in power to take complete control of our election process.
H.R. 4, better known as the ghost of Eric Holder’s Justice Department, seeks to provide a clear path for the Biden Justice Department to have the final say in any and all state election laws, for all 50 states.
It would effectively overturn the Supreme Court’s ruling in Shelby County v. Holder, which struck down the coverage formula required for Section 5 of The Voting Rights Act (VRA) of 1965.
Section 5 required that “covered jurisdictions” (areas found to be discriminatory during the actual Jim Crow Era) seek approval from the Justice Department before making changes to their voting laws. While this section was necessary in 1965, it is no longer necessary in 2021, over half a century later.
Why? Let’s look at our last election…
According to a report from the U.S. Census Bureau, the 2020 election had the highest voter turnout of the 21st century. And, more specifically, African-American voter turnout is generally on par with/exceeding white voter turnout in many of the previously “covered jurisdictions.” In fact, in the eight years since the Supreme Court’s decision, there has been no widening of black-white turnout gaps in the previously “covered jurisdictions.”
So, if this section is no longer necessary for the originally articulated reason, why are Democrats pushing for it now?
Simple, because they want to follow Eric Holder’s formula of politically weaponizing the Department of Justice to incessantly attack states that pass common-sense election security measures which they don’t like — such as voter ID, bans on ballot trafficking, etc. We’re already seeing a sneak preview of this in the Department of Justice’s lawsuit against the state of Georgia.
H.R. 4 is intended to provide a clear path to a world in which the DOJ has the final say over state election laws. It doesn’t matter if the state legislature has passed it and the state’s duly elected governor has signed it into law, in a post-H.R. 4 world, the law could not be enforced unless it has DOJ approval.
And right in line with their renewed attacks against the filibuster, Democrats claim that the purpose of H.R. 4 is to prevent modern racial discrimination in voting. A notion that has been completely dispelled U.S. Census Bureau report(s). But, you see the pattern, right? They’re claiming to fix a problem that is entirely mythical and disproven by 2020 election data.
Not only that, but the VRA presently prohibits any election procedure that denies or abridges “the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color.” In other words, the VRA still protects against any and all forms of racial discrimination in voting.
But, they want it set up this way, so if you disagree with their claims and call out their authoritarian push, they can slander you as a racist and, they hope, club you into submission.
H.R. 4 is nothing more than another Nancy Pelosi power grab. It’s Democrats’ attempt to take control of elections so they can gut common-sense election safeguards, and increase their chance of winning, thus cementing a Democrat-majority in Washington for years to come.
H.R. 1 had the same objective and when voters found this out they were NOT in favor of it. Only 28 percent of Americans supported the passage of H.R. 1, before its sister-bill S.1 died in the Senate. Whereas, conversely, 80 percent of registered voters agree that strong safeguards and ballot protections inspire confidence in elections. In other words, a vast majority of Americans want their elected representative to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat.
H.R. 4 must be rejected, just like the Corrupt Politicians Act.
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