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Yet while the rescue plan did not receive the support of a single Republican in the US Senate or US House of Representatives, according to a recent CNN poll, 61% of Americans supported the bill — with several key provisions garnering even greater support, including the $1,400 stimulus checks and larger tax credits for families.
This disparity between who is heard and who speaks matters. The 50 senators who moved this bill forward represent 41.5 million more Americans than the 50 senators who opposed it (one Republican senator missed the vote but still acknowledged his opposition to it). Further, were it not for a budget bill loophole of the Senate’s historically racist and indisputably undemocratic filibuster rule, a bill that will slash poverty, save businesses and deploy vaccines nationwide would have failed.
These dramatic changes are happening only because of the willingness of voters to brave obstacles, threats and the pandemic to cast ballots in November 2020 and again, in Georgia, in January 2021. Together, millions of Americans banded together to elect President Joe Biden, and then to send Georgia’s first Jewish and first Black senators to Washington, DC. That these men came from a former Confederate state is not lost on those who know its history.
Shamefully but not surprisingly, Republican state legislators in Georgia and across the country have responded to Democratic victories by attempting to resurrect parts of that painful history. They have responded to record numbers of voters of color and young voters by pressing legislation to stifle their participation.
This is not hyperbole: according to the Brennan Center for Justice, Republicans have proposed more than 250 voter suppression bills in 43 states, leaning on the decentralization of election laws that limit an eligible voter’s registration access and ability to vote depending on the state in which the voter lives. Black and brown voters in Georgia, Latinx and Native American voters in Arizona and young voters in New Hampshire are particularly vulnerable. In each of these states, these voters have played a critical role in statewide Democratic victories, despite Republican domination of the governorship and the state legislatures.
Across the country, many Republicans have weaponized the 2020 election lies as the impetus to propose sweeping efforts to suppress voter access. The litany of proposed changes is dizzying — from making voting by mail more difficult by eliminating no-excuse…
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