"Unreal. Half of North Carolina Senate Dems largely voted for the GOP's new modestly-less-gerrymandered map, likely in part because some Dems got favorable seats to protect neighboring GOP incumbents. This happened in MO, OH, & PA after 2010, now it's happening again #NCpol #NCGA"
- PoliticsWolf is a blogger, but detailing actual information out of North Carolina.
So, looks like outside of an unprecedented shift, we can write off North Carolina for the next couple decades, because the elected Democrats are feckless shitbirds protecting their seats.
So fucking tired of seeing a break against Republicans hackery, completely fucking squandered by Democrats for their own personal interest or trying to be bipartisan.
So couldn't the people that brought the suit argue that this map still doesn't address their grievance. All these idiots did was just rig the map less and that's exactly why it was thrown out by the court to begin with. Half the democrats being A-OK because it rigs the seats for them won't be consider making it acceptable.
That was actually one of the defenses raised by one of the fucknugget Democrats that voted IN FAVOR of the districting.
"Amazing. Another NC Senate Dem who voted for the GOP's new gerrymander is outright acknowledging here that the court may indeed step in to fix this cockup and draw new maps itself"
*retweet of Sen. Jay Chaudhuri of NC saying such*
- David Nir is a reporter for the Daily Kos.
Essentially "Yeah, we ACTIVELY did a bad thing, but the courts will fix it, we hope."
Just fucking retire and go home the fucking lot of you. The 9 who voted against this stupid map excepted.
Get people in there that'll fight for FAIR elections. If Republicans can win on the merits (Narrator - "They can't"), then so be it. I'd rather have a progressive government than a conservative one, but I'd rather have an election that's based on the will of the people (no matter how fucked in the head some are) than government by suppression of the vote.
Yeah, those guys should retire. I could see the gamesmanship. Vote for a shitty thing because they figure the court fixes it and then it denies the GOP the talking of democrats were being too obstinate and thus allowed the courts to take our power. Problem is this is unacceptable behavior, creates new problems for the democrats because it's going to piss of their base and the GOP is still going to claim that the democrats allowed the courts to usurp power to draw districts. The only winning move was to not play along with the GOP's bullshit, kind of like what VA democrats did. Let the asshole republicans make their bullshit claims, you can at least run on principle, not alienate your voters and anyone that buys that shit probably wasn't voting for a democrat anyways (hell, probably one of those assholes that threatens to call the cops on people canvassing for the democrats because they believe it's illegal for anyone but a republican to run).
Yeah, those guys should retire. I could see the gamesmanship. Vote for a shitty thing because they figure the court fixes it and then it denies the GOP the talking of democrats were being too obstinate and thus allowed the courts to take our power. Problem is this is unacceptable behavior, creates new problems for the democrats because it's going to piss of their base and the GOP is still going to claim that the democrats allowed the courts to usurp power to draw districts. The only winning move was to not play along with the GOP's bullshit, kind of like what VA democrats did. Let the asshole republicans make their bullshit claims, you can at least run on principle, not alienate your voters and anyone that buys that shit probably wasn't voting for a democrat anyways (hell, probably one of those assholes that threatens to call the cops on people canvassing for the democrats because they believe it's illegal for anyone but a republican to run).
Also, it's counting on the courts doing the right thing, and not just going "Fuck it, the vote was signed off on by the opposition party, that's good enough for us, case closed."
Cause anyone who has been paying even the barest attention knows that expecting the courts to do the right thing every time, is delusional.
They still might. I'm not ruling that out. I'm just saying that risking at least 10 years (and who knows if Democrats will have the opportunity to intervene in 2029) of all but permanent Republican rule, is a fucking stupid bet to take.
In the best possible reading of the situation, Dems knew they could never pass a fair map so they are now punting to the courts. Essentially, they are hoping accelerationism will work in their favor.
For the people of North Carolina I hope they are right, but I fully expect the judge see the bipartisan support this map had and declare the situation fixed.
The game seems to be "protect my job first, do that job a distant second". Which is depressing but not entirely unexpected. Especially at lower levels of government.
It's the flip-side to all the Republican retirements recently. A lot of politicians don't want to have to fight a real race. Or have any ambition to enact a real agenda.
Also, even if they were going to leave this back up to the courts; that shit takes time and they need to get this locked down ASAP so the Pubs can't stall until after the 2020 election.
So... it turns out Republican fuckmuppetry continues to be the order of the day, and proof that just because it's not a national headline, doesn't mean it's not fucking important.
COLUMBUS, Ohio — State officials have canceled more than 182,000 registrations in the most recent purge of inactive voters from Ohio’s rolls, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose announced Friday.
This purge was supposed to wrap up in early September, but I'm sure the delays were completely unexpected. And there's no malfeasance there.
So... when's the last day for voter registration for voting in this November's Ohio election? I'm sure they'll give people more than enough time to a) find out about the purge, b) check to see if they're still on the rolls, c) re-register if they've been purged.
*checks enrollment deadline*
October 7th. This coming Monday.
Jesus fucking Christ. And the President, when talking about the "coup" talked about Democrats taking away people's vote.
I know the Democrats will have a high priority on "first 100 days directives" if they win in 2020, but one that should be up there, is a federal law that requires all electoral roll deletions to be concluded no later than 6 months prior to the next federal or state elections enrollment deadline*. Personally, I think purges sound inherently disenfranchisey, and see no need for it at all, but at the very least, you want to fuck with the rolls, then you do it in the 6-18 months (depending if your state does off-year elections or not) following an election.
Doing it 10 days before enrollment ends (four of those being weekends), should be fucking criminal.
* I was initially going to say "prior to the next fed/state election", but then realized no, if you want to have an enrollment deadline that's not same day, fuck you, it's six months prior to that date, so you can't undercut it by making the enrollment deadline 6 months before the election, because that's the kind of fucking thing I'd expect from these scumbags.
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OrcaAlso known as EspressosaurusWrexRegistered Userregular
Combination of being emboldened by the national mood/powers that be, and demographic shifts hitting a critical point, where their backs are up against the wall and if they don't get this shit done now (while they can) they may well never get elected again.
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IlpalaJust this guy, y'knowTexasRegistered Userregular
“Let us begin with the fact that, probably, your notes from this conference, and this workshop, will probably be part of a discovery demand,” Mitchell said on the recording, dropping the sarcasm. “My advice to you is: If you don’t want it turned over in discovery, you probably ought to get rid of it before you go home.”
Westmoreland recalled inviting the members of the “black caucus” to his office, “off campus,” to create their “perfect map.” One incumbent, he said, “finally fell into the trap and came over there and drew his perfect district.” To show the redistricting plan benefited black Democrats too, he “immediately got the local paper down there” to run an article on that lawmaker’s perfect district. Westmoreland then included a district as close as possible to that overwhelmingly black and Democratic one in the state’s official map. The legislator, he said, voted against the map and soon lost his seat.
The idea that Republicans are simply fighting similarly skewed Democratic gerrymanders has been debunked. According to a University of Southern California study, 59 million Americans live in states where at least one chamber of the state legislature is controlled by the party that won fewer votes in 2018. In every case, Republicans drew the lines, and hold minority control.
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Fuck Joe Manchin
Anyone want to take the bet that the Kentucky Republicans will take this on the chin and stop being fuckers about it, and either disregard this ruling or do something at least equally egregious? Anyone? What if I gave odds? Noone? Didn't think so.
More importantly there's a gubernatorial election in three weeks.
For Kentucky?
No chance the reinstatement of those names suffers some kind of hiccup. You know, like a glitch to the update keeping it from propogating to the terminals at the local polls for people to be checked (if it's done online), or the printing of the electoral rolls if it's in print form.
Clearly that won't happen. Not after
But when it does, I hope the judge won't accept the inevitable "It was an accident, honest!" as the excuse.
I do wish judges would make it clear what the consequences are for failure to abide by their rulings. We see it akl the time, from Trump's "you're not allowed to block people" to all sorts of Republican malfeasance.
Like "and if more than a margin of error of people (I can accept a small error rate reenrolling people, but more than a few percentage points would be unacceptable) aren't returned to the rolls, I'm going to <insert crippling penalty>".
Because Republicans seem way too comfortable with defying court orders, and then claiming "Oops." and using that as a defense. Or claiming that there isn't sufficient time.
Fuck that. You do what a judge tells you. And if you don't, there should be consequences.
“Let us begin with the fact that, probably, your notes from this conference, and this workshop, will probably be part of a discovery demand,” Mitchell said on the recording, dropping the sarcasm. “My advice to you is: If you don’t want it turned over in discovery, you probably ought to get rid of it before you go home.”
Westmoreland recalled inviting the members of the “black caucus” to his office, “off campus,” to create their “perfect map.” One incumbent, he said, “finally fell into the trap and came over there and drew his perfect district.” To show the redistricting plan benefited black Democrats too, he “immediately got the local paper down there” to run an article on that lawmaker’s perfect district. Westmoreland then included a district as close as possible to that overwhelmingly black and Democratic one in the state’s official map. The legislator, he said, voted against the map and soon lost his seat.
The idea that Republicans are simply fighting similarly skewed Democratic gerrymanders has been debunked. According to a University of Southern California study, 59 million Americans live in states where at least one chamber of the state legislature is controlled by the party that won fewer votes in 2018. In every case, Republicans drew the lines, and hold minority control.
I did some different math on the last one, assessing the 2010 redistricting process by state according to who controlled it: Democratic, Republican, unclear, or independent. ('Unclear' was frequently the result of neither party having undisputed say on paper, but also sometimes came into play when the final maps got general approval, or when it looked like regional concerns held more sway than partisan ones. 'Independent' referred to official commissions in charge from the start, or the legislature squabbling until the courts drew the map instead.)
Each party managed about a 13-14% gap in 2016 -- for example, Democrats managed 43.6% of the vote in the 18 states in which Republicans had drawn the lines, but took 29.7% of the seats. 2018 was a little different, with Republicans pushed down to a 10.7% margin, while Democrats bumped up to 16.2% in their 7 states. The big thing is, though, that in 2016 Republicans engineered 222 districts, to Democrats' 48. (Pennsylvania had its lines redone by a judge between cycles, and completely noncoincidentally went from a 13-5 GOP advantage to parity.)
This seemed like good news at first, but the first ruling on Florida's de facto poll tax undercutting the ballot measure that restored felon's right to vote is super narrow and says that only people who really for REALS can't pay can't be blocked from voting.
“The court held that the right to vote cannot be denied based on a person’s inability to pay fines and fees. This ruling recognizes the gravity of elected officials trying to circumvent Amendment 4 and create voting roadblocks based on wealth,” said Julie Ebenstein, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, who represented some of the plaintiffs.
The law came after Florida voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment in November 2018 to repeal the state’s lifetime voting ban for people with felony convictions. Critics said the Florida law, passed in May, was an effort to undermine that change and effectively imposed a poll tax on people who couldn’t pay.
The ruling is super narrow and still leaves it wide open for people to be blocked from voting if they aren't like... penniless and begging on the streets.
The amendment said "felons get their voting rights back". It did not say anything about the legislature being able to set conditions. By the wording, their voting rights were restored immediately upon passage as well - legislatures can't take voting rights away by decree either (actually, would that qualify as ex post facto in this case?).
It's silly and the courts really should have slapped it down entirely, it's not even a question.
I feel like if the democratic party had any sense of a long term plan for their future success they would be hammering these points to all college students that the republicans are trying to actively suppress their right to vote, and calling that out
State court (note: STATE, not federal) says NC's congressional districts cannot be used for 2020.
And now the question becomes, what districts will they use? We all know the Republicans will do whatever they can to delay and obstruct until it is too late to make the change, so is the court going to draw districts and force it on everybody, are they going to ask for submissions from both sides and pick between them, are they going to have the current districting authority submit a new one for review? Still a lot of ways this can end poorly.
State court (note: STATE, not federal) says NC's congressional districts cannot be used for 2020.
And now the question becomes, what districts will they use? We all know the Republicans will do whatever they can to delay and obstruct until it is too late to make the change, so is the court going to draw districts and force it on everybody, are they going to ask for submissions from both sides and pick between them, are they going to have the current districting authority submit a new one for review? Still a lot of ways this can end poorly.
The Democrats also did not cover themselves with glory in this process, as there were several who made deals that preserved the GOP lock in exchange for making their personal seats safer. The court really needed to bring in an outside expert.
According to The Hill's report, Roy Blunt of Missouri has killed the bill because it would "give the federal government unprecedented control over elections in this country."
All because the proposed bill would set standards for ballots, early voting, and require the disclosure of tax documents before elections. And we don't want that. Instead Blunt wants the states to continue to control these things. Until the next time he decides that California and New York aren't states.
All opinions are my own and in no way reflect that of my employer.
Oh, let's have some positive news: NY now has early voting! It isn't great but for the ten days before the election there are a few hours in various locations in my county where I can go and vote. They do change up the times so it's open late a couple nights and early some others. I'd like more but this is a positive first step.
Also: I voted last night! I even had choices in some of the races.
"A Republican candidate and party official have been charged with election fraud in Ohio."
Links to a tweet from a Columbus Ohio reporter.
- Jon Favreau (not the actor/director) is a podcast host, and former White House staffer for Obama.
I'm shocked. Absolutely shocked. Just flabbergasted.
Just think, if we could harness the power of Republicans capacity for projection, we'd have fullblown hologram technology by now.
"A Republican candidate and party official have been charged with election fraud in Ohio."
Links to a tweet from a Columbus Ohio reporter.
- Jon Favreau (not the actor/director) is a podcast host, and former White House staffer for Obama.
I'm shocked. Absolutely shocked. Just flabbergasted.
Just think, if we could harness the power of Republicans capacity for projection, we'd have fullblown hologram technology by now.
So, does anything actually happen if they get convicted assuming they win? Like, they'd get charged with the crime, but there's no, like, do-over election or anything right? Unless there's a recall election or something, they'd just keep serving in their stolen seat?
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
The results can be vacated or rejected, but it depends on the state
Posts
That was actually one of the defenses raised by one of the fucknugget Democrats that voted IN FAVOR of the districting.
"Amazing. Another NC Senate Dem who voted for the GOP's new gerrymander is outright acknowledging here that the court may indeed step in to fix this cockup and draw new maps itself"
*retweet of Sen. Jay Chaudhuri of NC saying such*
- David Nir is a reporter for the Daily Kos.
Essentially "Yeah, we ACTIVELY did a bad thing, but the courts will fix it, we hope."
Just fucking retire and go home the fucking lot of you. The 9 who voted against this stupid map excepted.
Get people in there that'll fight for FAIR elections. If Republicans can win on the merits (Narrator - "They can't"), then so be it. I'd rather have a progressive government than a conservative one, but I'd rather have an election that's based on the will of the people (no matter how fucked in the head some are) than government by suppression of the vote.
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
Also, it's counting on the courts doing the right thing, and not just going "Fuck it, the vote was signed off on by the opposition party, that's good enough for us, case closed."
Cause anyone who has been paying even the barest attention knows that expecting the courts to do the right thing every time, is delusional.
They still might. I'm not ruling that out. I'm just saying that risking at least 10 years (and who knows if Democrats will have the opportunity to intervene in 2029) of all but permanent Republican rule, is a fucking stupid bet to take.
For the people of North Carolina I hope they are right, but I fully expect the judge see the bipartisan support this map had and declare the situation fixed.
It's the flip-side to all the Republican retirements recently. A lot of politicians don't want to have to fight a real race. Or have any ambition to enact a real agenda.
Probably still worth primarying some people, I guess. Vote for what's right if the conclusion is already certain, etc.
29/47 is 61%, 38/47 is 81%. The Governor is a Democrat. So yeah, pretty big deal.
Hopefully he vetoes the damn thing?
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My point is with the Dems on board with this shitty plan they can override.
Posted last Friday night (not like anything interesting was occupying the news, so I'm sure this got coverage).
https://www.cleveland.com/open/2019/09/purge-wraps-up-as-ohio-voter-registration-deadline-approaches-capitol-letter.html
This purge was supposed to wrap up in early September, but I'm sure the delays were completely unexpected. And there's no malfeasance there.
So... when's the last day for voter registration for voting in this November's Ohio election? I'm sure they'll give people more than enough time to a) find out about the purge, b) check to see if they're still on the rolls, c) re-register if they've been purged.
*checks enrollment deadline*
October 7th. This coming Monday.
Jesus fucking Christ. And the President, when talking about the "coup" talked about Democrats taking away people's vote.
I know the Democrats will have a high priority on "first 100 days directives" if they win in 2020, but one that should be up there, is a federal law that requires all electoral roll deletions to be concluded no later than 6 months prior to the next federal or state elections enrollment deadline*. Personally, I think purges sound inherently disenfranchisey, and see no need for it at all, but at the very least, you want to fuck with the rolls, then you do it in the 6-18 months (depending if your state does off-year elections or not) following an election.
Doing it 10 days before enrollment ends (four of those being weekends), should be fucking criminal.
* I was initially going to say "prior to the next fed/state election", but then realized no, if you want to have an enrollment deadline that's not same day, fuck you, it's six months prior to that date, so you can't undercut it by making the enrollment deadline 6 months before the election, because that's the kind of fucking thing I'd expect from these scumbags.
Has the ACLU filed suit yet?
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Because there's no law preventing it, and it's mostly been governed in the past by fair play, which Republicans no longer give a fuck about?
Or was that a rhetorical question?
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Fuck Joe Manchin
"BREAKING: In a major victory for Kentucky Democrats, Judge rules to restore 165,000 ‘inactive’ Kentucky voters back to regular voting rolls"
https://www.wlky.com/article/judge-rules-to-restore-165000-inactive-kentucky-voters-back-to-regular-voting-rolls/29463802
- Marc Elias is a lawyer and voting rights advocate. WLKY is a Kentucky news affiliate.
Anyone want to take the bet that the Kentucky Republicans will take this on the chin and stop being fuckers about it, and either disregard this ruling or do something at least equally egregious? Anyone? What if I gave odds? Noone? Didn't think so.
For Kentucky?
No chance the reinstatement of those names suffers some kind of hiccup. You know, like a glitch to the update keeping it from propogating to the terminals at the local polls for people to be checked (if it's done online), or the printing of the electoral rolls if it's in print form.
Clearly that won't happen. Not after
But when it does, I hope the judge won't accept the inevitable "It was an accident, honest!" as the excuse.
I do wish judges would make it clear what the consequences are for failure to abide by their rulings. We see it akl the time, from Trump's "you're not allowed to block people" to all sorts of Republican malfeasance.
Like "and if more than a margin of error of people (I can accept a small error rate reenrolling people, but more than a few percentage points would be unacceptable) aren't returned to the rolls, I'm going to <insert crippling penalty>".
Because Republicans seem way too comfortable with defying court orders, and then claiming "Oops." and using that as a defense. Or claiming that there isn't sufficient time.
Fuck that. You do what a judge tells you. And if you don't, there should be consequences.
I did some different math on the last one, assessing the 2010 redistricting process by state according to who controlled it: Democratic, Republican, unclear, or independent. ('Unclear' was frequently the result of neither party having undisputed say on paper, but also sometimes came into play when the final maps got general approval, or when it looked like regional concerns held more sway than partisan ones. 'Independent' referred to official commissions in charge from the start, or the legislature squabbling until the courts drew the map instead.)
Each party managed about a 13-14% gap in 2016 -- for example, Democrats managed 43.6% of the vote in the 18 states in which Republicans had drawn the lines, but took 29.7% of the seats. 2018 was a little different, with Republicans pushed down to a 10.7% margin, while Democrats bumped up to 16.2% in their 7 states. The big thing is, though, that in 2016 Republicans engineered 222 districts, to Democrats' 48. (Pennsylvania had its lines redone by a judge between cycles, and completely noncoincidentally went from a 13-5 GOP advantage to parity.)
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/florida-felon-voting-rights-amendment_n_5daa2b1ae4b0f34e3a758b7a
The ruling is super narrow and still leaves it wide open for people to be blocked from voting if they aren't like... penniless and begging on the streets.
The amendment said "felons get their voting rights back". It did not say anything about the legislature being able to set conditions. By the wording, their voting rights were restored immediately upon passage as well - legislatures can't take voting rights away by decree either (actually, would that qualify as ex post facto in this case?).
It's silly and the courts really should have slapped it down entirely, it's not even a question.
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I feel like if the democratic party had any sense of a long term plan for their future success they would be hammering these points to all college students that the republicans are trying to actively suppress their right to vote, and calling that out
that's good right?
since the SCOTUS said it wasn't a federal issue
This will literally be the only legal election since the 2010 redistricting. Assuming it doesn't also violate the law.
And now the question becomes, what districts will they use? We all know the Republicans will do whatever they can to delay and obstruct until it is too late to make the change, so is the court going to draw districts and force it on everybody, are they going to ask for submissions from both sides and pick between them, are they going to have the current districting authority submit a new one for review? Still a lot of ways this can end poorly.
The Democrats also did not cover themselves with glory in this process, as there were several who made deals that preserved the GOP lock in exchange for making their personal seats safer. The court really needed to bring in an outside expert.
According to The Hill's report, Roy Blunt of Missouri has killed the bill because it would "give the federal government unprecedented control over elections in this country."
All because the proposed bill would set standards for ballots, early voting, and require the disclosure of tax documents before elections. And we don't want that. Instead Blunt wants the states to continue to control these things. Until the next time he decides that California and New York aren't states.
Also: I voted last night! I even had choices in some of the races.
"A Republican candidate and party official have been charged with election fraud in Ohio."
Links to a tweet from a Columbus Ohio reporter.
- Jon Favreau (not the actor/director) is a podcast host, and former White House staffer for Obama.
I'm shocked. Absolutely shocked. Just flabbergasted.
Just think, if we could harness the power of Republicans capacity for projection, we'd have fullblown hologram technology by now.
So, does anything actually happen if they get convicted assuming they win? Like, they'd get charged with the crime, but there's no, like, do-over election or anything right? Unless there's a recall election or something, they'd just keep serving in their stolen seat?
What, have they lost confidence in the disenfranchisement efforts?
Stevern Wolf is a writer for Daily Kos elections and writes about voting rights. Link is to an article on Daily Kos, natch.
EDIT: Forgot this was a political thread and needed substance. Is there anywhere else in the US with ranked choice?
Maine if I'm not mistaken