Who’s screwed? Voters. Republicans are exploring a new strategy to win elections in the future – repealing the 1965 Voter Rights Act. Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli recently said that his state has, “outgrown racism” and should be exempted from many of the requirements of the Voting Rights Act - which prevent state lawmakers from carving out congressional districts to suppress or isolate minority voters or use tactics to intimidate minorities.
In an interview with ThinkProgress – former Republican Senator Norm Coleman agreed with Cuccinelli and admitted that Republicans have a lot to gain if the Voting Rights Act is repealed, saying they could pick up as many as 15 to 20 new seats in Congress. So let’s see – the Republicans want to flood our democracy with secret, corporate cash – they want to require voters to have expensive government ID – they want to take down organizations like ACORN who help register minority voters – they often practice voter caging to purge potential voters off the rolls if they move out of a house and forget to update their address – and they engage in the most negative campaigning to turn voters off altogether and suppress the turnout.
Now – they want to gerrymander districts to limit the impact of the minority vote. Do these guys event want a democracy? Or – do they want decades of rigged elections to bring about one party rule…like Egypt.