That legislative measure sparked nationwide controversy earlier this year, particularly over a detail in the bill that would have made it more difficult for married women to vote. The backlash on Capitol Hill was grave, so much so that it gummed up efforts to fund Homeland Security for several months. Republicans eventually had to bail […]
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Source: Anadolu / Getty Voting is the linchpin of our democracy. But as the nation nears its 250th birthday, it is appropriate to question not only the strength of the franchise, but whether we are now living in an illusion of democracy itself. To assess democracy in this moment without the benefit of a spiritual […]
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Redistricting efforts in Alabama, Louisiana, and Tennessee have disrupted elections and voting, with maps repeatedly redrawn. Racial gerrymandering has been a major concern, with judges ruling against redrawn maps that disproportionately impact minority voters. Candidates and voters are left in limbo as the legal battles over redistricting continue, causing logistical nightmares and voter confusion. Source: […]
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Source: Bongarts / Getty Former NBA player Derrick Coleman is taking a stand against Alabama’s redistricting efforts after announcing he will not attend his induction ceremony into the Mobile Sports Hall of Fame. “I declined because this moment is bigger than an award,” Coleman wrote in the Facebook post announcing his decision. “We are living […]
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To that end, Congress amended the VRA in 1982 to reverse the Supreme Court’s ruling and specifically prohibit laws that had a discriminatory effect, regardless of intent, under Section 2. The high court accepted Congress’s vote-dilution framework in the 1986 case Thornburg v. Gingles and laid out a multi-part test to determine when and how […]
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Source: Calvin Duncan / other Louisiana simply doesn’t like Black people. That’s the only conclusion I can come to after how they’ve been moving the last several months. It’s bad enough that a group of Louisiana voters successfully convinced the Supreme Court to gut the Voting Rights Act and pave the way for a new […]
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I am not so sure. During the 2020 Democratic primaries, the candidates with the policy agendas that would most help Black Americans pay for health care, afford college, and otherwise thrive were Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, not Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, and Deval Patrick. Joe Biden’s administration prioritized policies to advance racial equality much […]
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Source: Ladanifer / Getty In November 1910, one year after its founding, the NAACP launched its official communications hub, The Crisis magazine, which documented lynching, disenfranchisement, segregation, racial terror, and the everyday humiliations of Jim Crow. Its founding editor, the civil rights activist and child advocate W.E.B. Du Bois, featured a drawing of a Black […]
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Source: Sean Rayford / Getty The ongoing redistricting roller coaster has taken another turn after a redistricting effort backed by President Donald Trump stalled in the South Carolina Senate. The New York Times reports that the state Senate voted against ending the debate period on the new map, effectively preventing its implementation ahead of the […]
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Source: pepifoto / Getty Primary elections in Alabama and several other southern states became unnecessarily complicated after the Supreme Court effectively gutted the Voting Rights Act last month. Alabama postponed the primary election in several districts so state legislators could move forward with implementing a map previously found to be racially gerrymandered. While it looked […]
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In another post, Trump said that his deal would be “the exact opposite” of the Iran deal brokered by former President Barack Obama, although he added that “nobody has seen it, or knows what it is.” Trump also noted that any potential deal to end the Iran war should come with a stipulation requiring Tehran […]
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In another post, Trump said that his deal would be “the exact opposite” of the Iran deal brokered by former President Barack Obama, although he added that “nobody has seen it, or knows what it is.” Trump also noted that any potential deal to end the Iran war should come with a stipulation requiring Tehran […]
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The Biden presidency illustrated both the decline of the old Black politics and the struggles of the M4BL version. Biden overwhelmingly won the older Black vote during the Democratic primary, in part because the pastors and politicians of the Black Old Guard embraced him. He maintained close relationships with longtime Black officials like Representative James […]
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Source: The Washington Post / Getty Trust in the Supreme Court has reached historic lows in recent years under its current 6-3 Republican supermajority. This is largely fueled by the perception that the court is more concerned about serving the GOP than the American people. While Chief Justice John Roberts has lamented that the court […]
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The Supreme Court put Black voting rights on the chopping block with its ruling on Callais v Louisiana. Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act was intended to protect Black voters from disenfranchisement, but that’s all changed after the Callais decision. In this week’s Le[e]gal Brief, attorney Lee Merritt breaks down what can be done […]
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Source: Barry Williams / Getty As America approaches its 250th birthday, we can look around us and see all the ways our democracy and society have been enriched by becoming more inclusive. Yet, recent regressions in law and policy are attempting to cement us to a reality where only wealthy, white men have a voice, […]
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On February 10, Donald Trump purchased between $1 million and $5 million worth of stock in Nvidia, a massive AI chip maker. A week later, Nvidia announced a major computer processing power deal with Meta. Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s CEO, has spent more than a year cozying up to Trump. Trump previously purchased between $500,000 and […]
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Source: SAMUEL CORUM / Getty Another day, another southern state announcing its desire to bring back the days of Jim Crow. On Wednesday, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp called a special legislative session to draw a new congressional map. CBS News reports that Kemp signaled he would trigger a redistricting effort shortly after the Supreme Court […]
Read MoreSource: peshkov / Getty When does the federal government protect us, and when does it get in the way? Whatever the right balance is, the Trump administration and its yes-men in Congress and on the Supreme Court are doing the exact opposite. The proposal they are pushing on AI proves how far backward they want […]
Read MoreSource: Leonid Andronov / Getty Over the last week, several Republican led state legislatures throughout the South have shown that they believe the “fair” part of free and fair elections to be entirely optional. While redistricting efforts to disenfranchise Black voters are currently underway in Alabama, Tennessee, and Louisiana, South Carolina made the surprising move […]
Read More“Oh wow, I’m so sorry for calling you a Jew,” Paul said. The senator’s son then went on a rant against Jewish people, calling them anti-American and claiming Lawler and his “Jewish supporters” served Israel over America. Lawler argued with Paul and defended his support of Israel, telling him that he was antisemitic. Paul then […]
Read MoreOther CEOs who are planning to travel with Trump include Tesla’s Elon Musk, Apple’s Tim Cook, BlackRock’s Larry Fink, and Boeing’s Kelly Ortberg, as well as officials from Meta, Visa, Mastercard, Citi, Goldman Sachs, Blackstone, GE Aerospace, Cargill, and Illumina. The group also included CEOs from major semiconductor manufacturers Qualcomm, Micron, and Coherent. As a […]
Read MoreSource: Erika Goldring / Getty Last month, we reported that Louisiana Republicans decided to postpone the state’s congressional primaries amid the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision to strip away Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which resulted in the blocking of a Black-majority congressional district in Louisiana just weeks before the election. And in doing so, the Louisiana […]
Read MoreSource: diane555 / Getty On Monday, the Supreme Court cleared the way for Alabama to use a congressional map that a lower court previously ruled was racially gerrymandered. NBC News reports that the Supreme Court set aside those previous rulings and sent the case back to the lower courts for relitigation. Alabama has tried for […]
Read MoreSource: State of Louisiana / State of Louisiana The next time white Republicans — or anyone, for that matter — accuse Black people of being on a “Democratic plantation” because we refuse to vote for the current party of white supremacy, remind them that the gutting of the Voting Rights Act came as a result […]
Read MoreSource: Kevin Dietsch / Getty In today’s episode of Every Allegation Is A Confession — It’s The MAGA Way, President Donald Trump announced that he will deploy an “Election Integrity Army” to police election interference that does not exist, and protect voters from voter suppression committed by Democrats, as if it’s not Republicans who engage […]
Read MoreIn late April, the Supreme Court effectively gutted the Voting Rights Act in its ruling in Louisiana v. Callais. In this week’s Le[e]gal Brief, attorney Lee Merritt breaks down what the ruling means and the steps we can take to fight back going forward. In gutting Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, the Supreme […]
Read MoreSource: Douglas Rissing / Getty Last month, the Supreme Court effectively gutted the Voting Rights Act through its ruling on Louisiana v. Callais. As a result of that ruling, several red states have already moved to implement redistricting efforts that would disenfranchise Black voters. Below are the states that are gleefully rebooting the Jim Crow […]
Read MoreSource: Win McNamee / Getty In a country where white nationalists are essentially dominating all three branches of government, and making white nationalism the law of the land again, we need more public officials, especially Black public officials, to publicly regard white supremacy as exactly what it is, and talk to it as such. So, […]
Read MoreUsing the DOJ’s data, Alito also elided the fact that the racial voter gap is actually widening. In the three most recent presidential elections since Barack Obama was on the ballot, Black voter turnout has trailed white voter turnout, according to The Guardian’s analysis. In Louisiana, the disparity grew wider between 2016, 2020, and 2024. […]
Read MoreSource: The Washington Post / Getty The hits really don’t stop coming. As if the Supreme Court’s decision to gut the Voting Rights Act last week wasn’t bad enough, on Friday, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled that the state’s Democratic-led redistricting effort was unconstitutional. AP News reports that, in a 4-3 ruling, the court found […]
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