Trump's SAVE Act will result in Democrats winning elections.
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| Official White House website |
Democrats are standing up for democracy as they defend broad access to the vote.
The more-is-better mindset comes out of the civil rights battles to end Jim Crow suppression of Black voters. Prior to the Voting Rights Act of 1965, in Mississippi only 6.7 percent of Blacks voted. After the act, in 1967, 59.8 percent did. Democrats had a mission: Let the people vote.
It is time for Democrats to rethink this. In low-turnout elections, Democrats win. Even in conservative Kansas, in a special election voters chose to retain abortion rights. In the last three presidential elections infrequent, disengaged voters chose Republicans when they voted. The Trump GOP is a populist party of the less-educated, the rural, and the people most tuned into conservative media.
Democrats won a majority of votes of people with an income of $100,000-plus. The SAVE Act will not cause problems for core Democratic voters: educated, middle and upper-middle class. These are the 50 percent of Americans with passports, people with the income to travel and the motivation to find their birth certificate, to dig out their naturalization paperwork, to find marriage licenses, then get these to a registration office.
Republicans do far better with married women than with single women. The SAVE Act has a step that gives single women (those "cat ladies" JD Vance mocks) and married women who retained their birth name an advantage over traditional married women. The SAVE Act requires that the birth certificate name match the current legal name, forcing women who took their husband's surname to prove the birth person and the voter are the same person.
The SAVE Act would kill vote by mail. That isn't a catastrophe. Originally, mailed voting was a GOP get-out-the-vote idea. Republicans switched positions on this only because Trump needed to blame something for his 2020 loss. Mail voting is convenient, and I like it, but there is nothing unique about it. Both ballot box voting and mail voting have vulnerabilities. Trump could cause election day disruptions in Democratic cities and create long wait times that discourage voters. But he could disrupt mail votes, too.Trump is in court now arguing that ballots that mysteriously aren't delivered by election day should not be counted.
The Wall Street Journal editorial board understands that the SAVE Act is a pyrrhic victory for Republicans, but Republicans officeholders aren't afraid of the WSJ; they are afraid of Trump.
Once the new electorate is in place and Democrats win the White House, House, and Senate, Democrats can do some things that need fixing: statehood for Washington, D.C, statehood for Puerto Rico, four new Supreme Court justices, and repeal of the Big Beautiful Bill. With that and other important work done, they can repeal the SAVE Act and restore democracy.
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13 comments:
I love mailing voting, it’s so easy. Once I used my fast signature and it got rejected and returned with my slow signature later being accepted. I wonder about these voting lines because as a voter in Alaska I never had to wait longer than 2 minutes to vote. Why was it so easy and quick and easy for me and so long and difficult in some places?
Sort of agree. SAVE could remove any excuses for a Democratic landslide, not that they aren't above saying the rigging is "like nothing you've ever seen".
However, failing to pass such a stupid measure would be a good sign that we're turning a corner towards some sanity.
Vote By Mail is proven to be both secure and cost effective. Like I said...stupid.
Washington DC should not become a state. It’s just a city. If its inhabitants want to have senators and a representative, DC should join an adjacent state, either Virginia or Maryland.
Democrats were confident that an uncontrollable influx of Latino illegal immigrants would ensure their electoral success forever. How did that work out for them?
It’s way too soon for Peter to be counting his Democratic SAVE Act eggs before they hatch.
The reasoning in today's column may or may not be sound. Nonetheless, it is beside the point. No person who meets the standards for basic criteria for voting should be prevented from voting because of procedural obstacles. Partisanship should nit be a consideration. The more people who participate, the better for democracy.
The point isn't whether D.C.is a city. It's whether U.S. citizens are disenfranchised. Both Vermont and Wyoming have fewer residents than D/C. Regarding the suggestion that DC should join with Virginia or Maryland as a way of enfranchising its residents, Trigoboff should know that the residents of DC have no ability to do that, any more than the self-pitying residents of eastern Oregon have the ability to become part of Idaho.
It sounds like you're saying Democrats were allowing illegal immigrants to vote. Do you have any evidence, or are you just taking Trump's word for it?
Republicans were confident that electing an uncontrollable madman would ensure prices would be reduced on day one. How did that work out for them?
Every election it is disclosed that illegals vote in Oregon elections. Illegals get registered to vote when they get a driver's license, then they get sent a ballot. Further, there are more registered voters in Josephine County than there are ELIGIBLE voters. How does that happen?
Actually, eastern Oregonians do have the ability to become part of Idaho. They just have to move there instead of waiting for Idaho to move here.
I published the above utterly false comment to show readers the factual delusion that consumers of right wing media exist in. It isn't just wrong, it is impossible. It presumes that Republican county clerks connive in this fraud. Possibly the commenter knows he is lying and trolling, but I think it more likely that the person is simply a gullible fool. There are lots of them, alas.
Herb, I'm 72 years old, and I have to show my ID EVERYTIME I buy cannabis. EVERYTIME. NO EXCEPTIONS. If I can show my ID to buy weed, then you can show your ID to vote.
Rothschild should know that the residents of DC also have no ability to make themselves into a state. Either way would require legislative action. Such action is a lot more likely to happen if it doesn’t automatically hand two seats in the Senate to the Democrats.
Any DC residents who feel it’s that important can easily “enfranchise“ themselves by moving out of DC. Of course, then they would also get to pay state taxes, which might be too high a price for the “privilege” of having two senators and a representative.
Given what uninformed dopes many people are, “more is better” might not lead to higher quality electoral results. Consider the case of Adlai E. Stevenson II, who ran for president and lost against Dwight D. Eisenhower in both 1952 and 1956:
Someone heard Stevenson make an impressive speech and said to him, “Every thinking person in America will be voting for you.”
Stevenson replied, “I’m afraid that won’t do—I need a majority.”
Stevenson didn’t get one. His articulate, intellectual effort lost to a campaign, whose main slogan was, “I like Ike,” set to an idiotic jingle.
There are many, in this great land of ours, who fool you by walking upright.
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