Fwd: GMOM - News update; meeting on March 25
Charlie Cooper
March 19, 2024
Colleagues,
Focus on bills in Congress
There has been action in Congress in the past two weeks to promote legislation to bolster political equality and counter the disproportionate influence of big money that corrupts or politics:
- Eleven years ago the Supreme Court struck down the
pre-clearance provisions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. The U.S.
Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on March 12 on the John
Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Ac to restore and update pre-clearance
requirements. Bill advocates gave examples of specific discriminatory
voting restrictions by states that could have been prevented if a
pre-clearance law were in place. Opponents of the bill denied that
voter suppression exists and said that pre-clearance would put voting
law authority in the partisan hands of Department of Justice lawyers
instead of in control of the states where it belongs. (Watch
here.)
- The Democracy Restoration Act would restore voting rights in all federal elections to any citizen who has been returned to the community after serving time in prison for a felony. Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D, TX) introduced the House bill, and Maryland's Ben Cardin is the Senate sponsor.
- The Fair Representation Act was introduced in the House by Rep Don Beyer (D, VA). Maryland's Jamie Raskin is a co-sponsor. The bill would require states to use ranked-choice voting for the selection of both senators and representatives and would ban partisan and racial gerrymandering. Moreover, it would establish districts with three to five House members for all states that have six or more representatives. Rep. Raskin has been thinking about these ideas for a long time, and I remember him explaining them to me almost a decade ago. Advocates say that the bill's provisions, taken together, would result in "greater inclusion for people of color, urban Republicans, rural Democrats, Independent and third-party voters, major party bases and other voters across the political spectrum." For more explanation of this innovative proposal go here.
These activities are meant to maintain momentum until such time as Congressional leadership is more favorable to enacting pro-democracy legislation.
Election bills blocked in Annapolis.
GMOM offered written testimony supporting ten bills during the current legislative session.
- HB 627, to institute automatic voter registration through the State Department of Corrections and Public Safety, has passed the House.
- HB 585/SB 480, put forward by the State Board of Elections to protect election workers, seems to be on its way to passage.
Everything else is stalled, including any pilot programs for local use of ranked-choice voting, streamlining automatic voter registration, extending voting to incarcerated individuals, allowing unaffiliated voters more time to register with a party prior to a primary election, instituting scientific post-election audits, and modernizing the process of gathering election-related petitions. A couple of other worthy bills may move forward in the remaining days.
Supreme Court cases
In two pending cases (Relentless and Loper Bright Enterprises), the Court is considering changing the standard for when federal agencies may regulate private enterprise. Critics are worried that the Court may eviscerate executive branch power to protect health, safety, environment, and financial equity by eliminating a principle (known as the Chevron defense) established 40 years ago by none other than Clarence Thomas that allowed federal agencies wide latitude in setting regulations. At that time, Reagan was President. Conservatives are arguing that SCOTUS should overturn the Chevron defense because the bureaucracy is too fickle, as it can change with every administration. Therefore, only Congress can make important regulations. (Of course, the current Congress has difficulty agreeing on anything -- so the result would likely leave business free to do as it pleases.) At the same time, the MAGA movement argues that the independence of the civil service should be dismantled so that the bureaucracy is more under the control of the President, making it more likely to institute far-reaching policy changes.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that local and state officials can remove people from office based on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment (the "insurrection clause"). Earlier in this session they had ruled that Colorado cannot remove Trump from the presidential ballot because state-by-state enforcement would lead to chaos. However, that decision indicated that states can decide whether 14.3 applies to state and local officials (and, perhaps, to candidates). The court refused to hear an appeal from a New Mexico man who was convicted for his role at the U.S. Capitol on January 6. Couy Griffin was removed from office as a county commissioner and is barred from serving in office in the state.
Popular Information: Adeel Mangi was nominated by Pres. Biden to be the first Muslim American to serve on a federal appeals court. The Judicial Crisis Network -- yet another group formed and directed by right-wing money man Leonard Leo -- is leading a smear campaign against him based on his religion, and some senators are gleefully participating.
Rolling Stone: Will election denialism grow among local election boards? This report chronicles several attempts by local election board members to subvert the counting of votes and/or undermine the certification process.
GMOM and For the People -- Maryland teleconference
Meeting Monday, March 25, 2024, 7:30 pm
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Onward together,
Charlie Cooper
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Get Money Out - Maryland · Baltimore, MD 21209, United States
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