“We don’t vote just to win elections."

Image credit Robert Stinnett on Wunderstock (license)

Image credit Robert Stinnett on Wunderstock (license)

Topics Discussed

  • Covid-19 Pandemic Anniversary

  • Vaccination Rates

  • New State Voting Legislation

  • HR1

  • Outside of Politics: Sarah’s Hips

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Episode Resources

VOTING LEGISLATION

Transcript

Sarah: This is Sarah

Beth: And Beth, 

Sarah: You're listening to Pantsuit Politics.

Beth: The home of grace-filled political conversations.

Sarah: [00:00:00] Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Pantsuit Politics. If you are new here, thanks to the Apple spotlight program. We are so pleased to have you, you know, the community surrounding our show is just, it's just the driving engine behind everything we do here. 

Today's show comes out the day after the one-year anniversary of the world health organization, declaring COVID-19 as a global pandemic so we're all thinking through that anniversary. Now on Tuesday, we're going to be talking about the impact of the pandemic with Dr. Carla Vermilion, who is an expert on mental health and disasters, which is such a fascinating and important angle to examine this anniversary through. 

And then if you're new to the show and you haven't heard our community COVID 19 episodes from last summer, in those first few months of the pandemic, we featured stories from our listeners who were facing the pandemic in their own voices and deeply personal ways and we're really proud of that work so check that out as well. Before we talk about [00:01:00] the anniversary in more depth, we are actually going to spend the majority of this show on the state legislative efforts to affect voting rights across the country, both efforts to suppress the vote and our efforts to expand the vote.

We're going to be talking about federal legislation and cases before the Supreme court with regards to voting rights. And then we're going to wrap up the show as we always do with outside politics. I want to give you all an update on my sore, sad little hip. So I know y'all are just dying for that update. That's coming later in the show, but first we really did want to talk about this anniversary. 

Beth: [00:01:31] Anniversary is such a hard word to mark something like this. It's the best word that we have. It's a year since things got very real for us in the United States. Certainly it is more than a year since COVID-19 really became a global health issue, but this is when we started to understand it with the NBA shut down, with the declaration of national emergencies, with lots of workplaces and schools saying we're going to have to go remote. The West coast, obviously dealt with things more rapidly [00:02:00] than the rest of us and we had Americans on cruise ships, but March 11th is about as close as we have to kind of a national date to take stock of where we are after a year of living in a really new way.

Sarah: [00:02:13] So let's look at the numbers around the world and here in the United States. Nearly 118 million people globally contracted COVID 19 and 2.6 million people around the world have died from the disease. In The United States, we've lost almost 528,000 members of our community due to COVID-19. A year ago the death toll was only 38, which is so difficult to think about. I think back about that time when they were saying well, Oh my goodness, we could get to 250,000 deaths and we were all horrified. And here we sit a year later at 528,000 deaths. 

Beth: [00:02:48] We had a listener. Mike, send us a medium piece about the anger that so many people feel about the fact that we've reached that number and how difficult it is to sit with the [00:03:00] anger that the United States fared so poorly compared to other countries, that we politicized so many aspects of taking some pretty basic public health precautions. And I understand that anger, even as I try really hard to be grace-filled in my assessment of understanding how we were all thrust into a new situation, and a situation that pulled at us emotionally in so many directions, that pulled at our energy in so many directions, that required adaptation in ways that many of us have never had to adapt before.

It is very hard. And I'm glad that we're going to spend some time on Tuesday with an expert talking through what the other side of this looks like, because we are talking about the numbers in past tense. We know there are still very real threat out there. We know that people are still contracting this disease, that they are still in hospitals, that they are still dying.

The fact that we're on a good trajectory with those [00:04:00] numbers, does it make any person suffering today less valuable than people who suffered previously? And so, um, there's just a long way to go. Even once we get to something like herd immunity, recovering emotionally from this is going to be difficult. 

Sarah: [00:04:17] I think the other important timeline to talk about is the timeline of the vaccines. You know, we all know that I'm an eternal cheerleader for the vaccine, but I just remember having so many conversations with people when this started and by people I mean, my husband, where he was bulking at my optimism, that we would have a vaccine in 18 months. I was like, no, I trust Dr. Fauchi. I think when he says we'll be looking at it about 18 months, we'll be there and here we are, even faster than that timeline. 

You know, we had never had a vaccine faster than several years and I loved how Axios put it. They were talking about, you know, when we speak about the suffering and the way our lives have been up ended, it seems like an eternity but the timeline for [00:05:00] when we went to declaring a global pandemic to having 60 plus million Americans receiving at least one dose of the vaccine is an instant in sort of the, the previous orientation to how long these things should take.

Beth: [00:05:12] And we're going to process that more with an organic chemist, who is an expert on manufacturing distribution for vaccines very soon, so lots more coming on the COVID front, but we felt like it was important to spend a minute here today just acknowledging where we are and our moment of hope, uh, dovetails very nicely with your optimism, Sarah.

Sarah: [00:05:32] Yes.  The Native American community, which is one of the groups most at risk for COVID communities that have seen just devastation when the virus takes hold, there are actually getting vaccinated at a rate higher in all but five States. So their vaccination campaigns have been incredibly successful. The White Earth Nation in Minnesota began vaccinating non tribal members and his vaccinated nearly [00:06:00] 90% of their elders.

So many of these tribes are doing so well that they're starting to offer doses to near by residents. That's happening in Laguna Pueblo, which is Deb Haaland's tribe. So they've started offering doses to near by residents in New Mexico, because they've been so successful at vaccinating members of their community, which what a success, what a wonderful success to see happening.

Beth: [00:06:22] And relying again on the reporting from Axios twice in about two minutes here, I loved the three indigenous principles they cited as helping provide the impetus for getting people vaccinated, which has had to happen mostly through word of mouth and tribal outreach. You know, internet access on native lands in this country is, is a really, it's just a national embarrassment in terms of the infrastructure situation and the federal government needs to provide more access.

And I hope that when she is confirmed as secretary of the interior, Deb Holland will be very focused on that. I have every [00:07:00] confidence that she will be. But activist Elle Young, a citizen of the Navajo nation, shared these three principles that have helped this effort: recognize how native Americans actions will impact the next seven generations, act in honor of ancestors who fought to ensure their survival and elders who carry on their traditions and cultures, hold on to ancestral knowledge in the ongoing fight to protect mother earth. 

Sarah: [00:07:26] I love that. I love that that's the guiding values and that there we're seeing those play out in such real ways to a community that has experienced such suffering over the last year. Next up, we're going to go ahead and roll into our main segment because we have a lot to tackle when it comes to voting rights in the United States.

As we begin this conversation, making sure and starting with the historic turnout in 2020 seems really important to me. We had 158.4 [00:08:00] million ballots cast in the United States, nearly two thirds of estimated eligible voters. That's seven points higher than in 2016. And you saw turnout rates increase in almost every state compared with 2016, but the States you saw with the most turnout, the highest increases, conducted their elections either entirely or mostly by mail.

 So I think that's super interesting. Six of those States had just recently adopted all mail voting, permanently in the case of Hawaii who saw their turnout rise by 42.3%. That is mind boggling to me. What a success. Now, while we're just handing out love, it is important to note that Minnesota still has the highest turnout of any state last year, with 79.4% of estimated eligible voters casting ballots. Minnesota, I just want you to keep up the good work. That is admirable. Good job.

Beth: [00:08:58] I also think it's important [00:09:00] in thinking about 2020 to remember what a mixed bag it was for both parties, because while you had Democrats winning the white house, Republicans did much better in both the house of representatives and the Senate and in local elections, then still 

Sarah: [00:09:16] And also got a ton of votes for the losing candidate. They still got a ton of votes. 

Beth: [00:09:20] They definitely over-performed compared to where many commentators expected the party to be and so you have this increase in turnout, exciting people on both sides of the aisle. You had these different opportunities to vote, reaching people on both sides of the aisle. And certainly we had a narrative that more blue votes would come through the mail. And I think that is self-selecting entirely because of the way president Trump chose to talk about that process.

 We also know though that we had people who never voted before, come out and vote for president Trump with expanded early voting. And so I don't [00:10:00] think you can look at the experiment we just had in terms of how people vote and what opportunities exist and call it something that necessarily inures to the benefit of one party or the other, or that it operates to the detriment of one party or the other. 

Nevertheless, that is the narrative coming out of 2020. Because we have become so focused on the office of the presidency, the narrative coming out of 2024, a frighteningly large percentage of the Republican party is that something went terribly wrong in this election. Even though many, many Republican candidates were successful, something must have gone terribly wrong. And so now you see an interest in rolling back those opportunities to vote across the country. 

Sarah: [00:10:52] To me, that is the key point is even if they were basing much of this [00:11:00] legislation On data from the 2020 election, that would be foolhardy because it's such ahistoric election because we had a global pandemic because there were, you know, just a prolific amount of voting changes, both permanent and temporary.

And you had a presidential candidate really campaigning actively against the election itself. So, but let's just pretend like even in the face of all that, based on the data from that campaign, from that election writing legislation, you know, which some of this is really interested in absentee voting, lots of States. It's like only six of the 44 States that have introduced election bills have not proposed policies to alter absentee voting. 

So there's this huge interest on voting on absentee voting, which is based a little bit in reality of 2020, even though that reality is very special and very unique. But on top of that, [00:12:00] you have all this legislation that just isn't based in any reality. That is based on all the big lie that the election was stolen only at the presidential level, not at any lower level, as you just pointed out. That it was stolen and that there's just this massive fraud that we need to prevent.

And so to me, both of those things, like, even if you're, if you're really trying to place this in some foundation of reality, based on 2020, 2020 is so special you might end up hurting your own party. And two, you're doing this based on the big lie and this fundamental campaign of misinformation against the election and so you're really not based in any reality that could, again, end up with legislation that hurts your party. 

To me, it's just, there seems to be no long game here. There seems to be no desire to actually, you know, pay attention to what will have impact. And like, I'll even give you, like, be as [00:13:00] cynical as possible, like even impact on your own party, right? Like if we're talking about Republican legislators introducing all of these bills, but we're getting pretty far into the philosophy of this. Let's talk about some of the bills themselves. 

So the Brennan Center for justice has been tracking all this legislation. And as of February 19th of this year, state lawmakers have either carried over from previous legislative sessions pre-filed or introduced over 253 bills with proficiency that either restrict voting access in 43 States and 704 bills with provisions that expand voting access in a different set of 43 States.

So this is especially with the, the provisions restricting votes, this is seven times the number introduced in state legislators by this time last year. So there's an enormous momentum, especially in States like Arizona and Georgia, where there were red States that went blue, but even in Pennsylvania and sort of the, the headliners, [00:14:00] right, the swing States where we saw an enormous amount of controversy, where you saw members of the house of representatives vote against those election results in electoral college. So like the big names where you would expect to see a lot of this are there, but it's really across the country. 

Beth: [00:14:15] So as it relates to mail-in voting, we have States moving to either limit the opportunities to vote by mail or eliminate no excuse mail in voting, going back to a short number of reasons that you can vote absentee. Some States permit voters to join a permanent absentee voting list. This is called single sign-on and this option can be offered to all voters or to a limited number of voters based on certain criteria. We have now lots of bills that have been filed to make it harder to get on that permanent absentee voting list or to make it not really permanent, where you have to sign up year after year, every single election, you have to go back and say, here's why I'd like to vote absentee. May I do [00:15:00] that? 

Sarah: [00:15:00] And that's really important. I mean, that's, that's an access issue. We have lots of people who are homebound or people in the military, or people that travel for jobs. People have real reasons to be on that list permanently, and we want them to be able to vote. And so to make it where you're constantly having to check, although listen, constantly having to check your voting status is a thing that happens to people not trying to get on the permanent list.

But I think that that is really what we saw in 2020 is just the breadth of human experience and how it seems like voting should be such an easy thing to do, but that we're all so limited by our own personal experiences. And when you see and read about like reasons people are on the permanent absentee voting list, what an experience or an experiment and empathy, right to understand like, wow, there's just so many life situations that I not only don't understand myself, but might not even know anybody with that experience. 

Beth: [00:15:53] We'll talk more about that in particular in a few minutes, but we also have legislation [00:16:00] proposed with respect to absentee voting about postmark dates, because we had so many court cases about that during COVID 19. And listen some of the bills being filed here are good and helpful, and it is important to set some statewide standards. And for those standards to be set by legislatures instead of officials in the midst of a crisis. So I don't want to paint a picture that everything going on is terrible.

 I do want to say again, Arizona and Georgia places where the world really changed in surprising ways for Republicans, you see some of the most extreme proposals and one of those comes from Arizona, where they are requiring now mail ballots to be, the proposal is to require mail ballots to be postmarked by the Thursday before election day. 

Even if the ballot arrives at election offices on election day, before the polls close, they want the ballot to be postmarked by the Thursday before. And that to me is the kind of thing that should never make it out of someone's office [00:17:00] just being kicked around as an idea. What are we doing if we're saying we don't want to count absentee ballots unless they were cast well in advance of election day? 

Sarah: [00:17:09] You also see a lot of restrictions to assisted voting. Conservatives call this ballot harvesting. Democrats call this ballot collection. I think a lot of the disagreements found right there in the language. And so you see legislators in about eight States proposing bills that impose or increased really strict limits on who can assist in returning a voter's ballot. A South Carolina bill would impose a photo ID requirement for anyone returning another absentee ballot.

And you know, this is interesting, Beth. I saw a write up of the proposal you talk about all the time that was written by a former president, Jimmy Carter and former president Gerald Ford after the 2000 election. And they actually had some really interesting limits on who could assist someone in casting the ballot, but they also had you know, lots of recommendations that touch on other areas of this there's enough in that [00:18:00] proposal, which I know you've talked about a lot that either side can cite, and I'm sure we'll talk about this in a little bit, but it seems like the most important part is taking the whole thing as a, as a comprehensive recommendation and, you know, I think that's the problem with so much of these, these state bills. 

Like, even if I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you think fraud is a problem, this sort of like intense scrutiny on certain sections of voting regulations without the acknowledgement that like this is, this is a system that works comprehensively and so without sort of comprehensive reform, or at least an understanding of the way all these pieces fit together, you're going to have pieces of the bill that impacts some communities more harshly than others, although I think, you know, if you're being, you're not giving him the benefit of the doubt, I would say that's the design.

Beth: [00:18:48] According to that report, assisted voting is the greatest opportunity for fraud that we have across the board in our elections. And so I think it's reasonable to be [00:19:00] investigating, okay, what are some safeguards around this process? The trouble is state by state, the reason people need to assistance voting can vary.

And the types of communities where that's happening legitimately are usually not the types of communities on lawmaker's minds when they make these provisions or maybe they are and there's actual discriminatory animus against those communities, which I think there's a reasonable argument to be made in some cases for too. So this is one where I think a state by state approach theoretically should work. I also think that in terms of oversight and ensuring that discrimination doesn't inch into that process, we need some minimum standards from Congress. 

Sarah: [00:19:44] So we have several States that are paying attention to voter ID laws and 10 States that do not require voters to present a photo ID. Legislators have introduced bills to impose an ID requirement. You have six bills in Arizona, Missouri, and New Hampshire that would Institute stricter voter ID [00:20:00] requirements for early in person voting and Missouri would make their ID requirements stricter for election day voting. So again, those voter ID laws and the restrictions on like what kind of ID you can have that just puts up more and more barriers for people to vote.

Beth: [00:20:16] We also have barriers in the form of voter registration laws. So 10 bills have been introduced to cut back on opportunities to register to vote on election day. Legislators in five States have introduced bills to eliminate election day registration entirely. So there would be a date in advance of the election.

Now some of us have had that in place our entire life. We've never seen same day election day registration and so that might sound like no big deal to us. And again, it's no big deal depending on what you are accustomed to and what opportunities you have and your level of education and your level of interaction with the government. Alaska and Georgia legislators have introduced bills to eliminate automatic voter registration.

Again, some States we've never experienced automatic voter registration. That [00:21:00] Carter commission recommended automatic voter registration across the United States so this is going in a different direction. And then we have bills targeted at voter purges. 12 States have introduced 21 different bills that would expand purges of voter rolls or adopt other practices that would risk improper purges.

Now, this is where we get into like every anecdote sounds terrible. Anytime you hear about someone who is dead voting or someone who moved out of state voting, every anecdote sounds terrible. Often those anecdotes are being told in ways that are incomplete and there are some errors and I think it is important to try to reduce errors. And I also think it should be really hard for a state to take someone off their voter rolls. 

Sarah: [00:21:51] So here's an important piece of this conversation. Whenever there is a flurry of state legislation, [00:22:00] it's really difficult to pay attention to what matters and what I mean by that is all, there are a lot of bills out there right now, and they're not all going to become law.

And so where do we focus our energies and our attention to where they really are making progress through the legislative system? You know, Iowa has just this week passed legislation and the governor signed it into laws that really, really restricts voter access. They cut early voting by nine days. They are closing the polls an hour earlier that you're tightening rules on absentee voting.

They're stripping away the authority of County auditors. You know, I try to, to read these statements and watch these press conferences with an open mind, but I do not see how you justify anything that's just continuing to limit voter access. So that's law in Iowa. Now we're going to talk about this in a minute because the next thing that will happen is that this law is going to be challenged in court.

And we're gonna [00:23:00] talk about the Supreme court and voter rights too. But I think the other place where this is really moving forward quickly is in Georgia. This was what I thought was so interesting about the, the legislative strategy in Georgia. So the Republican secretary of state Brad Raffensperger is prolific in his praise and in every press release he released and he got a lot of attention during the 2020 election. We all know his name. 

He said Georgia is recognized as a national leader in elections because it was the first state in the country to implement the trifecta of automatic voter registration, at least 16 days of early voting and no excuse absentee voting. And these bills before the Georgia legislator would reduce or eliminate all three of these that the Republican secretary of state has been holding up as an accomplishment of their system and the gold standard of election reform. 

And look, I don't think that everything Brad Raffenspurger has done has been [00:24:00] with the effort of voter expansion. I think that he has done a huge amount. And, you know, despite this sort of sudden hero status because of his interactions with president Trump, his record is far from clear, but the fact that he holds these three things up is like the gold standard and the Republican party in the, in the Georgia legislator is trying to run back all three.

Beth: [00:24:21] I also think George's proposals are in that category of how did this get out of someone's office? There is a proposal to ban activities like passing out water and blankets when people are standing in long lines. Now, look, I just, I want to just propose in the universe a little guidepost. If you are talking about making it a misdemeanor to hand someone a bottle of water in any context, I think something's wrong.

I should just take a couple steps back and assess, what are we doing here? And this is the thing. All of these proposals to [00:25:00] restrict early voting, to limit absentee voting are going to cycle around to the problem that we've seen in previous elections of people standing in line for hours to vote in parts of the country.

Again, we have to think about more than just our community experience, even when we are only allowed to vote on election day in Kentucky, I have never had to stand in line for more than 20 minutes to vote. Yeah. So it is easy for me to sit here in my comfortable Kentucky suburb and say, well, what's the big deal, but that's because I've never had to stand in line for five, six, 10 hours to cast my ballot. And that is a reality in lots of places. And it's a reality in Georgia so much so that they are mad at people for trying to keep people in those lines and calling it improper election activity, improper campaign activity, as people are standing and waiting to vote.

 I just think that is really silly. And so much of what's being [00:26:00] proposed here to me, feels like it is coming from a place of deep paranoia and deep cynicism that a mistake is always a fraud, that a limitation is always needed because human nature is inherently bad, that the vast majority of Americans, if given the opportunity to cheat the system would do so. I just don't start in those places. 

Sarah: [00:26:26] Yeah. Well, and look, it's not a United front. The Lieutenant governor, Jeff Duncan has opposed these efforts to the point where he did not attend the legislative session. He gave up his gavel and walked to his second floor suite because he was so opposed to these, to the passage of this legislation.

Jimmy Carter has come out in opposition. And I think that you see a lot of activism, a lot of acknowledgement that, you know, not only are these motivated by cynicism, but that the impact of these laws will [00:27:00] disproportionately affect African American communities. That these laws are targeting communities who have historically had their right to vote suppressed, or basically eliminated them during Jim Crow and that we are in desperate need for federal legislation that will begin to address what you were just talking about, that, that we need a comprehensive approach. 

And I think what you were just talking about what you were just saying about like my own experience. I think that's true of, so many aspects of this. You know, it was so funny when we would talk about mail-in voting and our people in Oregon were so legitimately confused by this conversation, like people were concerned about mail-in voting and they are just, they don't understand because they've been mail in voting forever. They're like, well, I don't understand y'all's concerns. 

Or like, if you are a upper income educated person and you have a lot of socioeconomic access and power, voter ID laws don't make sense to you. What's the big deal. [00:28:00] Just show them your license. But that is a big deal. We are a big complicated country and, you know, down to the different regions and the way they approach voting. You know, the West has always had more expansive voting laws and better opportunities to vote.

And it's not just the South that has terrible voting restrictions. I mean, new England, New York and New Jersey, it's notoriously difficult to vote there. And when you talk about the range of experience to say like the usual filter of our personal experience is applicable here can just lead to really short-sighted opinions, shortsighted politics, short-sided legislation, short-sighted political strategies, in my opinion and I think that's really what we're looking at here. 

Beth: [00:28:44] And the trouble is when you bring a short-sighted approach to voting, then you get a short-sighted approach, a marginalizing approach, that centers high earning white people in our governance [00:29:00] and so that's problematic. I wanted to just point out a couple of things that I think are not horrible pieces of legislation moving forward and this is not a comprehensive list. There is some good work being done out 

Sarah: [00:29:10] there. I love this. This is the optimistic part of the portion of everybody show, the not horrible things. 

Beth: [00:29:16] Like I said, there some good things out there, but there are some. There's some tough proposals in Florida, but there is a provision on the table that would allow election officials to begin mail ballot tabulation earlier in the election cycle and state election supervisors are excited about that. We as a country should be excited about that because waiting on Florida is always part of our national calculus because of the way it's situated in the electoral college. And I think that across the country, if we want to alleviate some of the burden on the people who run our elections, allowing them to start counting earlier is a good piece of that.

I read about Alabama's proposal to eliminate straight ticket voting in a piece that was [00:30:00] criticizing all of these measures and the critique is that this could create longer lines. That the longer you stand people, you require people to stand in line and check off every box, the longer the process will take. As we've talked about here before I am in favor of eliminating straight ticket voting options. I think that we get better thought and there's less confusion and clear expressions of our preferences when we don't vote straight ticket so I like that proposal. 

And then this is a moment when we can highlight in Kentucky. You know, we have election reform, that's happened as a result of lots of bipartisan compromise and it doesn't go as far as most of us would, like it only allows for three days of early voting, but there is an expansion of the right to vote in Kentucky proceeding through the legislature with widespread bipartisan support and what a gift that is here in 2021.

Sarah: [00:30:58] And I'm thrilled. I'm thrilled to [00:31:00] see it. And I know that again, the progressive side of the democratic party in Kentucky is not getting everything they want, not getting everything I want. We're still not going to have no excuse absentee balloting, which I really wished that we had, but I'm happy with what we are getting at.

Listen, we have a democratic governor. I think that's part of the, the puzzle piece here. I think when you have divided government in a way that people have to make some concessions and, and more like not just run rough shot, right. And get everything they want to think about it, which seems like what's happening in Arizona or Georgia. Although I will say the governor Kemp has not stated what he's going to do, whether he's going to sign this legislation or not. But yeah, when I read this story and Kentucky was being praised for these bipartisan election reform efforts, I was just so thrilled, so proud. 

Beth: [00:31:45] So the Washington post has a good summary of where we are. You have 33 States proposing restrictions to mail in and early voting in those 33 States, 85 million people used one of those methods to vote in the last election. [00:32:00] The outlook that legislation, as Sarah pointed out, some of this will go through and not all of it. You have to think about where does one party control, both legislative chambers.

We have 38 States like that, where you have control of both legislative chambers and the governorship. 23 of those are Republican States. 15 are democratic States and the States with the most restrictive proposals, Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, Missouri, and Florida, there is a GOP trifecta. 

Sarah: [00:32:28] Hmm. So as this legislation gets passed, what's going to happen next. Well, people are going to sue. Lots and lots of people are gonna sue. And much of this will end up before the Supreme court. And so we wanted to take a minute to talk about where the legislation, specifically the voting rights act, currently stands and what that tells us about the Supreme court as these cases come before them.

So the voting rights act has three parts. It had a component called pre-clearance so that any new voting related laws within [00:33:00] certain jurisdictions had to go to the federal government and say, is this okay? Can we do this? Now, this was eliminated by the Supreme court, infamously, pretty famously by John Roberts, writing the majority majority opinion in Shelby County.

So. You know, they, they get it pre-clearance and they said that requiring States to get federal permission before changing, changing their own voting laws, because the constitution does give the running of elections to state officials was an extraordinary measure, adopted to a distress and extraordinary problem, which was Jim Crow and that half a century after the voting rights act, that first became law that we didn't need pre-clearance anymore. 

And so then you see a rush of laws, particularly in Southern States, experimenting with voter suppression. Let's just, let's just say, this is the, this is what happened. And so all these laws came through. And so then you have two other ways under the voting rights act to address these laws. The first was section two, which is the intent. So did the legislators have racist intent when they passed [00:34:00] these laws? And the Supreme court had already interpreted section two so strictly that proving legislators had racist intent was dang near impossible.

And so when they did this, Congress came back and said, okay, well, let's add a section where you have to prove that there, even if you can't prove that they're a racist intent with these laws, you can prove that they were racist results. And so that's basically the only arm of the voting rights act that still stands. Can you prove that there were racist results to these voting laws? 

And so you probably heard a lot of media coverage about Bernavich versus democratic national committee in Arizona, Republican party versus democratic national committee that came to the court earlier this month. These are two Arizona laws at issue, which is bar that bars counting and provisional ballots cast in the wrong precinct and bars collection of absentee ballots by anyone other than a family member or caregiver.

And this was a big deal for rural areas of Arizona and the Navajo nation, which is very remote, lots of poverty so people have to travel, you know, an hour or more to get to a [00:35:00] mailbox to mail their ballot and so depending on people to collect those ballots was really helpful. Okay. So. These challenges to these laws, uh, which the ninth circuit, which found no evidence of ballot collection and delivery fraud in Arizona and struck this down as violating section two.

So the Arizona GOP appealed to the Supreme court and that's where we got with the oral argument, which everyone is trying to read like tea leaves to decide how people are going to shake out. I mean, we know where justice Roberts stands. Justice Roberts has, way back in the eighties, when they first added the results section to the voting rights act wrote memos to Reagan saying, don't do this, don't do this.

We've gotten rid of intent. We can not add a results test um, and he lost. Reagan to his credit, um, signed the bill that added the, um, results test. But he, you know, he's sort of notorious as being opposed to this legislation. So I think we're, we know where he stands, but I'm interested to hear what you think, Beth. I was listening to some analysis that said, basically this might be a stay of execution. 

There's probably going to become, like we [00:36:00] said, more legislation challenging the test under the voting rights act, but that the Arizona GOP got a little greedy and they went too far and you could see this in a lot of the questioning, even from the more conservative justices that they were basically arguing any time place or manner, regulation was okay as far as voting and apparently justice Kagan was like, Oh, so we could require everyone to vote in a country club. And the, the lawyer for the Arizona GOP was like, Oh no, no, no, no, no, that's not what we meant. And it, it quickly became apparent that they sort of over estimated how far the court was willing to go, um, with regards to this, but this particular test of the voting rights act where you can prove, uh, discriminatory results is still in a lot of trouble.

Beth: [00:36:43] I've read analysis that the Republican position went too far here and analysis that the democratic position is too aggressive here and that overall, this is a really unfortunate test case regarding the standard around section two, because most voting rights cases are brought by [00:37:00] voters who have experienced some form of disenfranchisement and this is a true battle between the parties and that's a terrible posture for the Supreme court to consider something as important as how they're going to decide section two cases. 

You probably heard in media coverage of the oral argument that justice Barrett asked, why is the Arizona Republican party here? And the lawyer for the Arizona Republican party said, well, Because the ninth circuit ruling puts us at a competitive disadvantage relative to Democrats politics is a zero-sum game and every extra vote they get through unlawful interpretations of section two hurts us. It's the difference between winning an election 50 to 49 and losing well that's discouraging as well to have parties in front of the United States Supreme court, putting to them such a plainly political question.

I was interested in hearing justice Kagan's reflection during oral argument, that the [00:38:00] longer it went on, the less clear she was as to what standards each party was advocating for. And I think that's the problem. It is hard for me to imagine that we get something that fundamentally reshaped section two of the voting rights act from a case like this, because of all those factors. At the same time, I am not optimistic that section two will survive this court and that's why I think it is really important to see what Congress is working on now and how the court might look at what Congress does next.

Sarah: [00:38:32] Well, and here's why I think that's important. You know, I do not agree with justice Roberts on lots and lots of things, and I most likely would have voted to leave pre-clearance intact. That being said, this legislation was written for a very specific moment in time and very specific challenge. I read an article the other day that talked about that our democracy [00:39:00] really is only about 50 years old for the passage of the voting rights act, because we weren't a democracy up until that point. In the middle of the Jim Crow South, that wasn't a democracy and I think all that's true. 

And I think that the legislation, because it was written to really tackle the Jim Crow South and such overt, prolific, and just intense attempt to, you know, not just prevent or make it harder for Black people to vote, but just to remove them from the political process completely, the challenges we face now are very different and I think the challenges we face, making sure that all manner of marginalized communities are not, do not have so many barriers in front of their ability to vote is it just, it's a different problem to tackle the problem the voting rights act was written for, right? 

And so that's why I am encouraged that we have [00:40:00] new legislation that is better equipped and, but still prolific and essential in its own way and tackling our, you know, 21st century challenges when it comes to making sure that our democracy is getting better and not worse when it comes to voting access.

Beth: [00:40:20] So the house has passed HR one. It will probably become a focus of time and attention in the Senate now that we have the American rescue plan being signed into law, as we are recording today. HR one, I think before we start talking about the details of it and specifically the voting details of it, reminds me of a conversation we had a long time ago, Sarah, about the affordable care act and how there is so much in the affordable care act. It embodies so many different ideas.

 If you're going to examine it in an intellectually honest way, it is hard to be [00:41:00] just for it or against it, right? Surely you will find something in it that you think is a good idea. And surely you will find something in it that you think is not. And I think that's how we have to approach HR one because it covers not only voting and elections, it covers campaign finance and it covers ethical issues. All of these are massively complex areas of the law. They are beyond the grasp of most Americans and our everyday experience.

And so there's a lot going on here. And I say that because I worry that when we start talking about the parts of HR one that I believe are essential and that must be passed, we are setting up anyone who has a critique of HR one as an opponent of democracy. And I don't think that's fair. 

Sarah: [00:41:46] Well, just ask the ACLU. The ACLU came out in opposition, particularly to the campaign finance and the transparency measures and the disclosure measures contained in HR oneand [00:42:00] look, we, we can do a whole podcast on that. So I think we should stay focused for today on the provisions that directly address voting in elections. What do you think?

Beth: [00:42:11] I think that's a good plan. I just want to say there are some valid critiques beyond that and it is important for this and it to do some work around that I think. So what is HR one do in terms of voting? Well, 

Sarah: [00:42:25] well, can I ask you a question first? Yeah. So as a person that, that thinks deeply and cares quite a bit about federalism and understanding that I know your journey on this has changed a little bit, tell me how you feel about the federal government playing such an active role in a process that the constitution delegates to the States.

Beth: [00:42:49] I think it is important to think about specifically how the constitution delegates the process to the States because the constitution also gives Congress a big role to play [00:43:00] around congressional elections and around preserving the purity as the Supreme court has said of the presidential election. 

And so I think like a lot of things in terms of federalism. Where you have Congress saying what the floor is and States deciding where their ceilings go, that's a good balance, right? There are so many logistical aspects of voting that could only be done well by the States that I don't think the States lose a ton of power here.

What I think we see with this proposal is Congress saying, let's revisit what the minimum acceptable standards are going to look like across the country and we're not going to raise those standards without correspondingly giving you some money to comply with those new standards. And look, if that doesn't work, like we got to shut the whole United States experiment down cause that's what we do in almost every area where Congress has a role [00:44:00] to play, right. 

They set some standards and then they tie the receipt of funds to States coming along with those standards. And so I don't think this is an encroachment on the role that States constitutionally are supposed to play in our elections and I actually think that there is a ton of benefits for States wrapped up in this legislation. 

Sarah: [00:44:20] Well, let me say, as a Democrat, someone who's, you know, historically been concerned, um, with individual rights and marginalized community, I think this is exactly the place for federal involvement, where you have populations across the country who are seeing barriers put up in front of their ability to register to vote, their right to vote, absentee vote and all these things.

 And I mean, I think this is, this is the role the federal government is supposed to play, right. Is to say, look like you said, this is the floor because we're going to worry about the population in your state or locality that is a minority. That, and I don't mean just an [00:45:00] ethnic minority or racial minority, it could be lots of different minorities, right? And that if, if the federal government does not provide the floor, then they will be permanently shut off from political power or political access or participation inside their democracy.

And I think that problem looks different in 2021. And the provisions of HR one really tries to get, get at that. I mean, I think the biggest one, the most important one, the one that to me affects everything, expansion of the right to vote, particularly to minority or marginalized communities, to campaign finance reform, even just to the, the basic functioning of our government is, it contains a section on redistricting reform and requires States to use nonpartisan redistricting commissions to draw district lines.

We're seeing that across the country, but we're seeing it in blue States. And so, you know, the idea that we'll have blue States participating in moving forward and red States, you know, thumbing their noses at these [00:46:00] reforms and continuing to sort of exploit a system that we know is easily exploitable to me like that's the, the most beautiful part of this legislation. I want nationwide redistricting reform. 

Beth: [00:46:12] And we'll link to a piece from Politico about this provision. It had to be negotiated a lot in the house among Democrats, because there were members of the congressional Black caucus who said, wait a second, there are States in which an independent commission is still going to be really bad for Black voters, we have to be careful about that. And so that language has been negotiated and I imagine it will continue to be negotiated, but I agree with you that finding a way to have confidence in the way congressional districts are drawn, whether you are in a state dominated by Democrats or Republicans is critically important. 

Sarah: [00:46:50] Because that affects every other aspect of this, right? It affects your representation. It affects the makeup of these state legislators passing this law and in fact it impacts, [00:47:00] um, campaign finance reform. I was listening to, um, coverage of HR one and like, it was, it was largely the effort of, uh, a lot of voting rights organizations coming together and being like, what's our, our just dream bill look like. And so, so many of them touch on redistricting reform as just the beating heart of this bill that really would have broad and positive impact. 

Beth: [00:47:24] I think it is so fundamental because especially as we were traveling around the country, when we were able to do that, a lot of conversations that we would be having about possibilities for structural reform and just really needed good substantive legislation would end at gerrymandering.

Yep. Because there can be no accountability in a gerrymandered system. And the Supreme court has written about how difficult it is to know when you have gerrymandering that's appropriate and when you don't and how hard it is to establish good standards around this, this is [00:48:00] not an easy fix. And I think it's probably one of those things that no one will ever look at the way districts are drawn and say like a plus a hundred percent, this was perfect, right?

Because it's very, very challenging. Uh, but we can do better than we're doing now. We can at least not try to do harm through the way these districts are drawn and that is not happening everywhere. So I agree with you that I think that's really important. We have put together some bullet points on everything that's in HR one that we can include in the show notes, because it is just the voting portion of HR one is a lot.

 When I try to think about what problems are we trying to solve here, I really love and appreciate the focus of HR one on cyber security and on establishing some national standards for paper ballots as backup so that we can always audit election results, some minimum standards for voting equipment across the country, so that we have confidence in each other's systems.

You know, this is the federalism thing too, because [00:49:00] federalism to me doesn't mean that we treat each state as a social Island. Especially if you're making an argument that the electoral college should continue to exist, you must recognize that our fortunes are tied together around our federal elections and that a voter in any state of this country feeling confident that ballots were cast and counted properly with the same opportunity for every person eligible to vote being presented is just critically important.

 I think that's true even if you are for abolition of the electoral college. Our fortunes are still tied together around national elections even as we're electing our members of the house of representatives, you know, the makeup of that body affects all of us. And so I really struggled to see the argument that HR one as to the voting provisions has some [00:50:00] kind of constitutional defect. 

Sarah: [00:50:02] Well, and it enfranchises people who have historically been prevented from voting, there's a felon disenfranchisement section of HR one, there's some modernization. There are just again, setting that floor so that the system can begin to, I just feel like it, I can feel it's like creaky gears, right?

 I just feel like there's a certain amount of just putting some gears back and process and getting some forward movement and momentum so that it's not this patchwork of approaches across the country that leads to disenfranchisement and suppression and those barriers to the right to vote because, you know, Why do we vote? It's not just a nice concept, right? It's because the more people that participate in our democracy, the better our democracy is, and the better the representation is. And therefore the better the solutions are and the better perception of the problems.

 Like I [00:51:00] just think like that's, it's not just a win. We don't vote just to win elections. We vote to govern. We vote to have our voices heard in how we want our government to function, not just so our team wins. And I think what I see in HR, one is just, uh, a centering of that motivating principle that we don't just vote to win elections. We vote to make our voices heard in the priorities of our representation and our democracy.

And I hope that this is just the beginning, truly. That this is that as the floor is set by the federal government, which I hope that HR one passes the Senate, RFP filibuster that everything we all know we're asking at this point, but that it's an engagement across the country now in our States to say, okay, well now we have the floor. What do we want the ceiling to look like in Kentucky?

 What do we want the ceiling to look like where there are large populations of native communities, because it's not [00:52:00] all gonna look the same. W th that's how we started this conversation is that we're big and we're complex. And we all face different challenges. But setting that foundation of this is we, we, we want more people voting and not just people that vote for us, everybody. 

Beth: [00:52:17] I think this issue is a really good illustration of how, in so many ways, our politics are being defined right now by how you characterize the scope of a problem. So if you look at everything we've talked about today, there are problems around voting and Democrats in Congress are aiming to solve a particular set of problems around voting. Republicans throughout a number of States, not in all of them, like we talked about in Kentucky, I think we have Republicans who are genuinely interested in expanding opportunities to vote. 

But there are state Republican parties and elected officials who are defining the problem around this idea that the [00:53:00] 2020 election was stolen and here's what I, I think the problem is for the people who are defining the problem that way. I don't know how you solve a proble. That's premised on something that is not true. We've gotten criticism of notch going through step-by-step why the election wasn't stolen. 

And I don't know how to do that besides reviewing court decisions and pointing to what Republican secretaries of state have said, it's almost impossible to prove a negative. It's almost impossible to say to someone I can refute any situation that you dream up when you don't feel any obligation to tie what you're telling me to something that's real.

And I'm trying to tie all my arguments to something that's real. And so when you start by defining the scope of a problem around things that just are not true, it's an unsolvable problem. The [00:54:00] problem only exists to perpetuate the theory of a case around one or a handful of politicians and so I can't imagine that people who are really invested in the big lie are going to hear about the types of laws being passed across the country, and then see another election cycle go through and go, Oh yeah, problem solved. We fixed it. Fantastic. I just don't think that there is going to be any satisfaction of the big lie because it's a lie.

Sarah: [00:54:35] Well, also in the most politically pragmatic calculus, it's also just dumb strategy. You know, Donald Trump lost because in large part, he lost those suburban, highly educated voters who are likely to vote, very likely to vote, no matter what barriers stand in the way and also because there are fewer barriers standing in their way.

So [00:55:00] how you're going to transform the suburbs to be more likely to vote Republican through these laws is just beyond me and also the expansion because Donald Trump did expand some of his margins across the country, that there were places that happened. But what you see is particularly with low trust voters, the voters who are susceptible to the big lie or susceptible to his particular form of populism, they don't have a high propensity to vote.

So if you want to, if you want to improve his margins, putting more barriers to people voting is not the way to do it. I mean, you saw it on January 6th where they talked about so many of the people arrested for storming the Capitol didn't even vote in 2020. So to me, it's like, it's not even, you know, I try to always think like people are motivated by power in politics and so we can talk about and should talk about values and sort of national priorities and constitutional principles.

 It's all very important, but [00:56:00] people are motivated by power and how to keep it. And I just think like, even under that, even under the most crave and calculus, these laws don't make any sense. They just don't. You know, they are motivated by a lot of white supremacy. No doubt about that. And there is aspects of this that the more barriers you throw up to in front of the African American community, then of course, that's going to impact the democratic party and democratic candidates.

 But I don't think it's as cut and dry as some people think it is and I don't think that I think that there are aspects of even these bills that really, really, truly just target in the most racist way marginalized communities, don't have impact beyond those communities.

Beth: [00:56:45] I think something in my brain is connecting a tweet from Eric Erickson to what you just said. I know you didn't expect me to say that. Eric Erickson, if you don't know, is a conservative commentator and he put out a tweet this week that got a lot [00:57:00] of grief thrown his way.

It said, I know a lot of smart people are out there saying the GOP was so focused on Dr. Seuss, that they couldn't Mount an effective opposition to the COVID plan. I think they need to learn what I've started learning. More voters will remember Seuss when they vote than the COVID plan. I honestly wonder if a part of what's going on here is that if you feel beholdened to a group of people who are just angry that Joe Biden is the president and that Donald Trump is not, then you're looking for something to feed that group of people every day.

Yeah. And what we're feeding that group of people today are a bunch of laws to tell them yet that election was stolen and we will not let it happen again, but that's not your long-term plan, right? Your longterm play is more culture Wars, grievance, Mr. [00:58:00] Potato head, easy to remember, easy to fire people up about within their life experience.

And I'm not trying to say that to be condescending. That's why I didn't get mad at Eric Erickson for that tweet, because I didn't read it as I think these voters are dumb. I read it as I'm learning valuable lessons about human nature and we all should. We all have to stand back and learn some lessons about human nature if we want to do better in the system and Erik Erikson than I would certainly disagree about what better in the system looks like. I just don't know that there's long-term political strategy going on here in the state legislation, as much as it might seem as these proposals roll out. 

Sarah: [00:58:42] I hear that. And I see that and also I think that strategy works. It is true that people are consumed by culture Wars and grievance when they see no government in their own lives or when they are not reminded of the role of governance in their own lives. And I [00:59:00] think what you see with the Biden administration is learning the hard lessons of previous democratic strategies.

We'll just do the right thing and people will pick up on it. We will rescue the country from a recession. We will pat, we will expand healthcare across the country and people will just see the impact and make the connections. And I think what you see with, from the Biden administration, and I think this will hold through, hopefully through 2022 and 2024 is like, Oh no, we need to keep pointing that out.

We need to keep saying, I know the emotional reaction right now is Dr. Seuss and Let and I don't want to, you know, blow off your grievance and ignore it cause that's bad strategy too but let me remind you of the impact of government in your own life and it's not about whether you can get a Dr. Seuss book at your local bookstore.

It's about, are you more easily able to feed your children? Are we slashing child poverty? Right. Are you able to afford your medications? [01:00:00] Are you able to have student loan debt forgiven? I mean, I just think that it's, you have to keep reminding people and that, so I don't think it's human nature. I think that is also an aspect of strategy.

That you can't just do, you can't just govern well and depend on people to see it and be like, they did a great job because other people are going to be defining you as well and so you have to push back against that. So, I mean, I, I see his observation, but I don't think that's a permanent situation or even a complete analysis of the situation cause I think there's strategy on both sides that have to be paid attention to.

 And look, all of this gets to why the idea of voting at all is so complicated because when we talk about voting, we're not just talking about election day and we're talking about voter registration, we're talking about campaigns, we're talking about how do we appeal to voters?

We're talking about the representation we get on the back end of the election and what that means for the legislative priorities, what that means for people's lives. I mean, when you're in a democracy is one is [01:01:00] big and complicated as ours, when you say, Oh, we're gonna talk about voting. I mean, you're encompassing this entire universe of things.

And I mean, I think you see the enormity of that in HR one, I think you see the enormity of that in the legislation flowing across the country in different state legislators and I think you see the enormity of that and the turnout of 2020. So it's not something that even if HR one flies through the Senate and gets signed into law tomorrow we'll be done with, and that we'll have to keep talking and thinking about as our country continues to change and grow.

So up next, we're going to talk about what's on our mind outside politics.

Beth: [01:01:36] Sarah, you have promised the people a hip update. So let's hear it. 

Sarah: [01:01:41] There is a resource guide because I'm a brain. Every problem I ever have to people until the end of my days, because it's just a perfect way to solve a problem. I'm like, I'm struggling with this. And you guys are like, Oh, okay, here we have approximately 350 ideas for how to fix it. And it's, it's amazing. 

So we have shoe recommendation. There are lots and lots of shoe [01:02:00] recommendations. There were lots of, you know, like, are you thinking about your mattress? Which I wasn't, but I have to say the number one recommendation came from Amber. She recommended an online class from Catherine Middlebrooks called Happy Hips.

I spent my own cash money on this class cause you know, I'd already talked about like I wanted a more holistic approach and she's a corrective exercise specialist so there's like corrective exercise and yoga. Y'all the first day I did this class it got better. Cause I think. Okay. Here's the plot twist. I don't think it was my hips the whole time.

I think it was my glutes y'all. I mean, I don't mean to just shock everybody, but it really was and when she, she talks about like, we ask our hips to do too much, especially postnatal and particularly the glutes are weak. So I think what was happening is my glutes were weak. And so they were never getting like fully fired and then fully relaxing and so they were just hurting all the time. And I've been doing this class. I've convinced you to sign up for the [01:03:00] class and it has helped me tremendously. 

Beth: [01:03:02] I have signed up for the classes, it is very intense. It is helping me notice some things about my body, which I think is always a plus and I recommend it to anybody who I like the premise of, we just expect our hips to be sore and that is a poor expectation that we should not allow to perpetuate. So I know everybody's going to find this resource list really useful. Thank you to Alise for sorting through so much feedback to help us get that done and to all of you for being part of Sarah crowd sources her medical issues community. 

Sarah: [01:03:33] Yeah. Y'all, shouldn't have been so good at that cause that might just turn into a, like a forever segment on the show. Okay. Here's what's bothering me, what y'all got. Listen, I don't even think it has to be limited to health stuff. Our audience is just prolific with their recommendations, it's amazing. 

Thank you for joining us for another episode of Pantsuit Politics, as we took another, uh, characteristically wide ranging approach. We start with policy, we end in the, the philosophy of democracy. It's just how we roll here. And we love the journal always along [01:04:00] for the ride. We hope that you will be back here again with us on Tuesday for another episode. And until then, keep it nuanced, y'all

Beth: Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production.  

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