Gerrymandering is not a Republican thing, firstly. Secondly, you haven’t shown the closures negatively impact democrats more. The dem party is the party of the rich so closing polling places in poor areas might negatively impact republicans. Thirdly, you left out the fact the polling places were closed in large part due to the pandemic and democrats voted way more via absentee ballot during that time. As far as caging lists and removal off the polls, democrats have allowed this without a peep since W. Would this have swung an election here? You haven’t shown this at all but such removals can lead to abuses from sec of states. Lastly, you cite no evidence of past fraud. Have you analyzed actual election audits to this effect? I looked into that by state and I have to say, these audits are rather opaque. To do them properly certainly would take something. I haven’t seen it exactly but perhaps I can search more thoroughly, though, it’s a dumb point. The election was for two corporate warmongering genocidal shitpawns, neither of whom will do anything for the American people beyond pathetic meaningless paltry differences serving a theater of choice only…like the age old issue the democrats refused to codify when they could have, abortion.
Do we have numbers proving that if these tactics hadn't been employed, the dems would have won? All the numbers I saw show that trump had a very substantial lead among most demographics. I would be curious to see whether a strong counter hypothetical exists.
I had no idea about shutting down polling places!! I never heard that reported to combine with the gerrymandering, suppression laws and bs objections to people voting. When I was an asst states atty, we visited and observed all polling places in our county each election, also investigating and solving complaints (like campaign signs too close to the polling place or someone helping an older voter).
In Brooklyn, Illinois people voted in a room built at the end of a two car garage with folding tables and there was no side walk to get there. I thought that was weird but it was easy for those in the neighborhood. I am now appreciating all the places set up to help voters vote more easily. Grateful to be back in Illinois where we accommodate and encourage voting. Suppressing the vote in whatever “legal” way is cheating as much as illegal gerrymandering. And let us recall that the gerrymanders don’t fix their illegality even when the Supreme Court tells them to so this anti voting conduct is also about disrespect of law not just cheating to be in power to pass laws to control and oppress others.
The Democratic Party (and voters' rights organizations) did not stand by. That said, the balance between vote suppression and vote suppression suppression (which is a challenge in every election) probably shifted in the Republicans' favor this time around. Whether it was decisive. . .I don't know. I'm sure a lot of statistical work will be done on that.
What might have been more decisive: "Every governing party facing election in a developed country this year lost vote share, the first time this has ever happened" https://x.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1854485866548195735
From where I’m sitting, I don’t se a lot of evidence of an aggressive Democratic Party attack on Republican voter suppression, nor any forceful effort in Congress to address real election concerns nationally. Tepid efforts at best.
Hard for elected officials to fight when they are in the minority and when the nation is having a red wave where many citizens don’t and won’t hear or seek out issues of concern beyond known self interest.
They certainly gave it no loud, continuous and fierce try.
The Process (TM), you know!
Our “leadership” is quietly and politely allowing fascism and corruption to take over. We are all watching this unfold, even as we do all we can to lobby for a different course.
There are many things Bender Biden could do now within the law to help slow Trump’s agenda, yet he sits quietly on his hands, “going high.”
No wonder we recognize that the Democrats play to lose.
Note that gerrymandering is a _strong_ underlying issue in this area - this makes races for state legislatures national races. This is a tougher nut to crack than some of the other issues. I'm hoping for a big backlash it the mid-terms (it seems like a pretty good bet, but candidates and their organizations need to be positioned to take advantage of it)
P.S. while we're in this territory, have you lobbied the Unicode Consortium on boustrophedon? I think this is an outstanding issue - I found email on the topic going back to 2008 https://unicode.org/L2/L2008/08419-boustrophedon.txt
Not a Bannon reference. I didn’t know of that. It’s a sarcastic comment about the Democratic Party playing to lose.
I know the Democratic Party has done some things, but the kind of fierceness from the left just isn’t there. The (white, wealthy, ‘liberal’) Donor Class wouldn’t appreciate the ruckus.
Qasim, thank you so much for your post. Do we know, or has anyone compiled the numbers on just how many eligible voters have been removed from the voter rolls since the 2020 election? I keep reading that approximately 11M people who voted in 2020 “decided” not to vote in this election. I can’t help but wonder how many of them didn’t vote due to being incorrectly removed from the voter rolls or other voter suppression tactics.
Thank you, Mr. Rashid, for your important post. To illustrate Republican voter suppression, I’d like to offer my own suppression as a citizen of Florida. I moved here in 1971, registered to vote in 1972, and have voted in every election since. Governor DeSantis, aided and abetted by his super-majority legislature, decided every voter had to file a new application to vote in this election, with renewal every two years thereafter.
I made application to re-register and shortly after requested a vote-by-mail ballot. I received no response of any kind! Nothing whatsoever. I had to attempt to re-register to vote, but the deadline for VBM had passed. I have a college degree with an MS in Psychology and classes toward obtaining my PhD. My educational background is not the point. I was troubled to think of the many (millions) residents having similar problems, in ill health, and lacking a companion to help with the process. Access to transportation questionable for a ride to the polls.
I felt targeted, as I’ve been a registered Democrat from day 1 and have voted consistently. A provisional ballot could have been granted were I to have come unknowingly unregistered on Election Day. Then additional steps to clear the “provisional” status to appear as a regular voter. Now I’m left with no choice but to verify my voter status before every new election.
From the Mark Thompson Show. Completely supports what you are saying about voter suppression and even worse than I thought. It wasn’t a landslide and it was close but should have been in the other direction. Republicans used to pretend they were part of a democratic system, but all pretence is gone and the machinery is fully revealed.
Attack tip: Marc Elias’ Democracy Docket was out there full time taking on all the red challenges that MAGA was throwing at voters with significant success given the complicity of the Supreme Court in voter suppression. Also worth checking out and supporting. Two other worthy organizations include Protect Democracy and Brennan Center for Justice. We are not in this battle alone. Seek allies. Stay engaged. Silence is obeying in advance. Freezing up is not an option. Trump will stumble. Midterms will begin to provide some corrections. Those who were duped by Trump/Musk won’t be happy when Project 2025 begins back firing. Above all. Forward.
It's sort of worse if we're not in this battle alone. We're losing, with whatever allies we have.
The problem, as Qasim said, is that Reps/cons can't win on ideas and policies. The public are against them. The only way they can win is if they cheat. And they're good at it.
When you say cheating is not winning, who's the president-elect? What will be the majority party in both houses of Congress? In which direction does the SCOTUS heavily lean?
No, it's certainly true that they don't believe in the Constitution, but it sure looks to me like they're winning. They're sort of trying to re-prosecute the Civil War, because they want a victory there, too. There's partisan gerrymandering, irrational disqualifications of registered and regular voters, and now "poll-watching." (I don't know what they think they're watching, since the ballot is secret, but they clearly want to intimidate. The last calculation I heard is that Harris lost because too many Dems didn't vote. Intimidation, or suppression, is working. They're cheating, and they're winning.)
I agree they cheat and we just read evidence of that - it is not only ok with them but it is a preferred strategy. That’s the best reason not to vote Republican (or to become an insurance defense attorney in my view). So shameful in a country that touts rule of law and freedom from harm. Even so, we cannot say republican policies are rejected when so many who did vote voted for them. We need to teach civics better and figure out how to address the feeling of disenfranchisement by so many rural voters while teaching compassion and proper treatment of others. It’s complicated in its simplicity. Still we clearly have a problem beyond cheating —acceptance of cheating as an approach. We have folks who view their own perceived self interest (or morality) as so important that they accept the ( immoral) cheating. When founding principles can be thrown out by voters like they have been by our “after the fact” bribe taking Supreme Court, well that’s as big a problem as the actual cheating.
For years now, politicians, especially Republican politicians, have been ignoring the things a majority of Americans have supported. With Republicans in charge, what chance does the people’s voice have of being heard?
Trump wants to be president for life, and the Republicans will never cede their total control; my fear is that there will be no more elections as we think of them; they will be like those in Hungary or any other autocratic regime. So it makes me crazy when the MSM and pundits, as they did during the campaign, talk about Trump as they would about any “generic” president-elect. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The naiveté is astounding. The failure of the media to inform about what Qasim writes about; and misinforms by omission is how autocrats get elected and stay in power. The actual coup was completed before Jan. 6th when Trump’s three Justices were “shoe-horned” in by McConnell. Jan. 6th was a side show for visual appeal. The country is changed, for sure. Exactly how it will function remains to be seen. For Trump/MAGA Cult, and his enablers and supporters the rest of us are just collateral damage. We, perhaps, can limit the damage, but we will never go back to when, with all our flaws, we were great and offered the world a safe harbor and that most precious commodity: hope.
This makes it all the more infuriating that the Dems refused to abolish the filibuster to pass voting rights. A terrible mistake and one that will have generational harm.
Yes. Well, the law of unintended consequences always applies. Truly intelligent people of integrity aiways try to look ahead for such moments. Congress lacks both attributes……and has for years.
2. I'm sorry but when you're the Dem POTUS or Dem Senate Majority leader, you use your bully pulpit to get your team in line to fulfill the promises you made to do good for the American people.
We will soon be in a hitleresque hell. How do we get out of it? I feel doomed. My heart goes out to future generations who will be affected by social security changes, polio and measles possibilities, no more voting rights (already happened and will continue) or elections, civil liberties removed, women losing their lives because their bodies are not their own, religious freedom disappearing, and so much more. Now is the time for good men to come to the aid of the people. The current government needs to act and they won't. Over 85M created our disastrous future. I am sorry to say this, but I hope they suffer tremendously for there stupid voting decisions. Minorities (and I am one) who voted for that POS, convicted felon will soon start to feel their choice to put him back in office. He doesn't want to deport criminals. He wants to deport anyone who isn't a White Christian. Can you imagine what the world would be like if hitler was eliminated, before he became the fuhrer? trump is now, more than ever, an existential threat to our democracy and freedom and the entire world will feel it too.
Simple, focus on the 2026 midterms- try to take away Texas from the GOP, too, want to end the electoral college that’s how you do it (I hope Beto runs again, this time he won’t have the drag he had in 2022 if he does so and could actually win, vs Greg Abbott).
We will not have 2026 elections if Trump is president. If the current election is not challe ged and was scammed, then the 2026 election will be WORSE.
We must demand a challenge to the count. Even then Trump will be ready for a other insurrection whether he won or lost.
We must demand democracies a recount and involve our military now. So not rely on laws. None are safe.
But will only work if there is a massive movement to regenerate registered voter lists, starting now. And more efforts to get voters to the polls. Hire buses to transport to distant polling stations, more carpools, working through community organizations. 65% turnout is scandalous considering how important this election was.
I hope Beto runs again too. I don't live in Texas but I donated to his campaign the last run. I think we will have a problem with the midterms. The GOP and trump will try to end it, or more voting rights removed and purging, etc. And now there is no way the Electoral College will end. It has always been a GOP assist.
Where does the statistic come from that 36% of eligible voters chose not to vote in this election? I called people, first for Jamaal Bowman, and then for Rashida Tlaib. For Tlaib our job was to find out why voters who asked for primary ballots did not return them. One man said that he was voting for Trump. I asked why. "He put the US embassy in Jerusalem." "Didn't Biden sending thousands of tons of bombs to Israel equal or outweigh that?" "No." Others were so discouraged as to their choices--Gaza was doomed either way--that they voted down ballot but not top of ticket, or voted third party. Another discouragement for registered Dems: the Dem party ignores the working class. FDR was our last great president who worked for the working people. Now we are thrown scraps. Nobody can afford to pay a mortgage, even with $25,000 help from the government. And people were able.read through the bull of that one. Billionaires were cheered and celebrated at the DNC, like they were actually doing something for society, instead of for themselves. Yes, Pritzker is not a good look for people yearning for more equality. And then this "joy" garbage when people just wanted more security in their lives. (I apologize for being a wet blanket. But I am angry and disheartened with my party. Thank goodness Rashida Tlaib is going back to Congress.)
Right. But people watching the embrace of the Cheneys felt that it represented the value placed on that relationship: pro-war, pro-weatlh, and pro-MIC, where Cheney made much of his wealth. It's a reminder of what Schumer said about gaining two votes from moderate Republicans and being OK losing one vote of the working poor. As if they said, "good riddance!" That doesn't feel great. As a leftie, I was shocked. Where was my party? As if they had buried it.
You may not be one of them, but most young people have no hope of owning a home unless their parents or grandparents are able to help out. And rents here where I live take up more than half most workers' salaries. According to Michael Hudson and Richard Wolff, it's just going to get worse.
No, no, I'm truly lucky, I was able to buy a home with the help of my parents. I otherwise would not have been able to for maybe another ten or fifteen years. My parents are maga folks now, btw. I honestly don't know if they would have helped me nowadays because I don't see how they could have voted for him when I'm their queer Asian daughter, and I told them so. But I guess a lot of people did that, I guess a lot of people experienced that.
It was everyone's choice to vote, but all I saw was a bridging of parties to recognize that whatever else they felt differently about, there was going to be no political DISCOURSE available to happen in the future if they didn't campaign together.
Why do you fault the democratic party for "nobody being able to pay their mortgage"? I don't see this particular problem as one that can be directly attributable to either party. I'm really curious to know, not trolling you.
Thank you for asking. Most people are on a steady salary. If they bought a house, giving themselves a mortgage, then, with inflation, their other costs are going to rise, making it harder to maintain the cost of their homes. Then, with medical bankruptcy, which happens to 500,000 people per year in this country, people are losing their homes. You may have noticed that dems are no longer calling for Medicare for All. It's a matter of tinkering around the edges with the ACA and Medicaid. I met plenty of homeless people when I used to work downtown. Now that I'm retired I no longer see the travesty that both Democrats and Republicans visit on the working poor.
Just so you know: in 2006 I called up the Dem county office and asked how I could help. I was given a list of people to call, consistent voters, who might agree to walk in their precincts. Approximately 4,000 calls later I had a cadre of 61 volunteers that I trained and kept track of. I have knocked on thousands of doors over the succeeding 18 years, talking to people. The last time it was for Bernie's campaign in the working-class part of town. And I learned an important lesson: registered dems don't vote because they feel that neither the dems nor repubs are willing to help them. You might argue with them, but it's their circumstances and their lives that you'd be arguing with. Bernie was my last and only hope. I couldn't even walk my own precicnt for the first time in 18 years. I am saddened and angered that the dem party embraces the Cheneys and the billionaires instead of being the party of the working class. They have no one to turn to. (I did make phone calls for Qasim Rashid's campaign four years ago. He was not elected, unfortunately.) Again, thank you for asking.
I figured that dems stopped talking about universal healthcare because there was no way they would get it through the house or senate.
I see how you can feel directly disappointed by the democratic party. You were actively involved. I know intellectually that canvassing on the ground is most effective and yet I never have because it's really scary to me.
But I have always voted since I became old enough, registered as a democrat but I have not always voted democrat. I have done what I considered due diligence on the candidates, and politicians records of bipartisan voting and legislating was always important to me.
Honestly, my view of our country and its electoral process is probably not popular. I did not graduate high school knowing the fundamental workings or structure of our government. Something that I think reflects a middling, somewhat floundering quality of public school education. I had to teach myself but after I did, I took to heart that the systems put in place were meant to prevent a lot of change from happening quickly or all at once. Laws were meant to be written, thought about, debated about, modified, compromised, amended, then voted on by congressional representatives and passed to the senate for more of the same, and then finally to the president who had veto power but whose veto power could be overridden if 2/3 of both the senate and the house voted to pass it. It was meant to be a slow and somewhat onerous process. I believe they understood that big changes introduce instability and possibly civil unrest. And EVERYONE, whether they agree with policies, is typically better under STABLE, steadily progressing governance. I believe there were times it was right to change things quickly, like with the civil rights act, because there could be no fundamental equality without it.
I am not pleased with the way things are, but I have always been a democrat and voted for the things that modern democrats typically put on the table, social support stuff, knowing that republicans typically call for and legislate fiscal conservancy, which has always meant not increasing spending on things that do not generate revenue. I've voted this way, knowing it was always countered yet also having faith that it was never wholly off the table, looking to a future where the incremental advancements through social justice amd social equity initiatives were made noticeably manifest.
I think the passing of the ACA was a huge accomplishment, even though it's flawed, and even though I can't use it. My income has always been too high to make marketplace plans affordable to me, but I know it has helped many people and I had hoped it would be a stepping stone to universal healthcare. I fully believe it could have been, if there hadn't been such strong republican campaigning against it at a time when democrats lost the house or senate, or both, I don't recall. I mean, everything is off the table now. I've had to exert more effort to pay my mortgage, too. I still voted for Kamala because I did see THIS election as black and white.
We either elected someone who was going to maintain the established structures and protocols and deference to democratic process, or we were going to vote for someone who literally ran on a platform telling me he intended to steal my civil liberties and dismantle our 250 year old democratic processes.
I am still not convinced that mortgage payment increase is due to anything that the democratic party did, even though the perception is that they haven't done anything for working class people. I'm convinced that it is not party-specific. I know my concerns about inflation and increased cost of food came in second to not wanting donald dump and project 2025.
There is something else that is hard for me to explain. Michael Hudson and Richard Wolff explain it on various youtube videos: the wealthy buy up homes/real estate, and then sell at raised and high prices, which prevents average people from buying a home at a fair price. Interest rates are very high now. (I refinanced at a bit under 3% and will be paying for my home and cello until I'm 90.) Their rents raised, it's very hard for most people to save up to buy a home.
And yes to the scariness of walking and knocking on doors. I'm usually not afraid of dogs, but when I see a dog racing up to me with nothing between us but an overturned chair, that'll raise my adrenaline level! So it's got to be worth it. It was worth it for Bernie. Now, not so much.
It's not that their mortgage would increase. It's that they would need to move/sell because it was no longer affordable because of cost of healthcare, food, utilities, etc.
FDR brought us Social Security. Before that people worked til they dropped, or had help from family, who also had to work. This was earth-shattering. There was definitely push back also from the formation of unions. My grandfather was beaten up and put in jail for trying to form a union. Others were murdered. And Johnson brought us Medicare. Yes, he twisted some arms, but he got it through.
I'm tired of the dems saying, "We'll compromise with the Republicasn" and the Republicans saying, "No compromise with those Communists!" So rightward we went. Clinton with the GATT and GATS treaties, shipping jobs overseas, "the end of welfare as we know it." Might as well have talked about welfare queens. a term coined by Ronald Reagan. Right now the party is to the right of Eisenhower. I want to go back to FDR. I know that's not possible.
I will tell you what really depressed me: a conversation between Michael Hudson and Richard Wolff. They are predicting revolution. Thomas Piketty also predicted a bloody revolution if the wealth inequality index remained on its current (2012) trajectory. It's gotten worse. The Cheneys will be fine. The Biden and Harris families will be fine. And for sure the Clintons and Obamas. Do they care about us middle class and working class people? Do we donate millions to their campaigns or their non-profits?
I appreciate your sharing, too. I know the democratic party is currently to the right of Eisenhower policies, because they keep believing that the key to democracy with an obstinate party is to be the one that keeps compromising. I would also like to see the party embrace FDR-like stimulus initiatives. It's a true legacy.
And I do know that even the people saying they will be the agents of change don't have much to lose. Do I believe they care? Yes, but not so much that they will stand shoulder to shoulder with the people who are at risk of losing everything, who have no walls to shelter behind, literally and figuratively.
It seems there is a sense of personal abandonment by the democratic party, while it's just a sense of resignation about the old republican party. But again, yeah, I donated to the Harris Walz campaign for two reasons. I did want them to win. I did want establishmentarians to remain and not a crackpot dictator. I felt that establishmentarians left us the possibility to work for slow change and that dump would leave no one anything to work with. The second reason I donated to Harris Walz was because they actually sent some of their funds to downballot election contests that needed it. I was ever hopeful in the preservation of the institution of democracy, for what it's worth.
The Supreme Court broke with precedent (Purcell Doctrine) and allowed Glenn Youngkin run his purge on over 1600 voters in Virginia within weeks of the election. SCOTUS is complicit in voter suppression since gutting the Voting Rights Act in 2013.
Gerrymandering is not a Republican thing, firstly. Secondly, you haven’t shown the closures negatively impact democrats more. The dem party is the party of the rich so closing polling places in poor areas might negatively impact republicans. Thirdly, you left out the fact the polling places were closed in large part due to the pandemic and democrats voted way more via absentee ballot during that time. As far as caging lists and removal off the polls, democrats have allowed this without a peep since W. Would this have swung an election here? You haven’t shown this at all but such removals can lead to abuses from sec of states. Lastly, you cite no evidence of past fraud. Have you analyzed actual election audits to this effect? I looked into that by state and I have to say, these audits are rather opaque. To do them properly certainly would take something. I haven’t seen it exactly but perhaps I can search more thoroughly, though, it’s a dumb point. The election was for two corporate warmongering genocidal shitpawns, neither of whom will do anything for the American people beyond pathetic meaningless paltry differences serving a theater of choice only…like the age old issue the democrats refused to codify when they could have, abortion.
Do we have numbers proving that if these tactics hadn't been employed, the dems would have won? All the numbers I saw show that trump had a very substantial lead among most demographics. I would be curious to see whether a strong counter hypothetical exists.
Gerrymandering should be punishable by death. It has destroyed Ohio.
With all stated then how are we going to get Harris to demand a recount by hand.
Trump needs to be stopped from being President. Once he is he will win as he has every step of the way.
I had no idea about shutting down polling places!! I never heard that reported to combine with the gerrymandering, suppression laws and bs objections to people voting. When I was an asst states atty, we visited and observed all polling places in our county each election, also investigating and solving complaints (like campaign signs too close to the polling place or someone helping an older voter).
In Brooklyn, Illinois people voted in a room built at the end of a two car garage with folding tables and there was no side walk to get there. I thought that was weird but it was easy for those in the neighborhood. I am now appreciating all the places set up to help voters vote more easily. Grateful to be back in Illinois where we accommodate and encourage voting. Suppressing the vote in whatever “legal” way is cheating as much as illegal gerrymandering. And let us recall that the gerrymanders don’t fix their illegality even when the Supreme Court tells them to so this anti voting conduct is also about disrespect of law not just cheating to be in power to pass laws to control and oppress others.
Spot on. This is exactly how it was done. And, it was done openly while the Democratic Party stood by, “going high.”
Sad views and sad times right now. Hopefully Biden will do some wonderful things in his last month.
I have little confidence that Bender Biden will. He attempts to buy goodwill with complaisance.
The Democratic Party (and voters' rights organizations) did not stand by. That said, the balance between vote suppression and vote suppression suppression (which is a challenge in every election) probably shifted in the Republicans' favor this time around. Whether it was decisive. . .I don't know. I'm sure a lot of statistical work will be done on that.
What might have been more decisive: "Every governing party facing election in a developed country this year lost vote share, the first time this has ever happened" https://x.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1854485866548195735
From where I’m sitting, I don’t se a lot of evidence of an aggressive Democratic Party attack on Republican voter suppression, nor any forceful effort in Congress to address real election concerns nationally. Tepid efforts at best.
Hard for elected officials to fight when they are in the minority and when the nation is having a red wave where many citizens don’t and won’t hear or seek out issues of concern beyond known self interest.
They certainly gave it no loud, continuous and fierce try.
The Process (TM), you know!
Our “leadership” is quietly and politely allowing fascism and corruption to take over. We are all watching this unfold, even as we do all we can to lobby for a different course.
There are many things Bender Biden could do now within the law to help slow Trump’s agenda, yet he sits quietly on his hands, “going high.”
No wonder we recognize that the Democrats play to lose.
Here are some of the things being done: https://www.lwv.org/legal-center-search?f%5B0%5D=issues%3A89#main-content https://voting.naacpldf.org/voting-rights/current-litigation/ https://www.aclu.org/court-cases?issue=voting-rights (and I'm sure there's quite a bit more, but that's what I got from a quick surf).
Note that gerrymandering is a _strong_ underlying issue in this area - this makes races for state legislatures national races. This is a tougher nut to crack than some of the other issues. I'm hoping for a big backlash it the mid-terms (it seems like a pretty good bet, but candidates and their organizations need to be positioned to take advantage of it)
P.S. while we're in this territory, have you lobbied the Unicode Consortium on boustrophedon? I think this is an outstanding issue - I found email on the topic going back to 2008 https://unicode.org/L2/L2008/08419-boustrophedon.txt
P.P.S. Process? Is this a reference to the Bannon quote on page 14 of Dominion motion for summary judgment? https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23685398-2023-02-16-redacted-dominion-opening-sj-brief-18#document/p14
Not a Bannon reference. I didn’t know of that. It’s a sarcastic comment about the Democratic Party playing to lose.
I know the Democratic Party has done some things, but the kind of fierceness from the left just isn’t there. The (white, wealthy, ‘liberal’) Donor Class wouldn’t appreciate the ruckus.
Qasim, thank you so much for your post. Do we know, or has anyone compiled the numbers on just how many eligible voters have been removed from the voter rolls since the 2020 election? I keep reading that approximately 11M people who voted in 2020 “decided” not to vote in this election. I can’t help but wonder how many of them didn’t vote due to being incorrectly removed from the voter rolls or other voter suppression tactics.
Thank you, Mr. Rashid, for your important post. To illustrate Republican voter suppression, I’d like to offer my own suppression as a citizen of Florida. I moved here in 1971, registered to vote in 1972, and have voted in every election since. Governor DeSantis, aided and abetted by his super-majority legislature, decided every voter had to file a new application to vote in this election, with renewal every two years thereafter.
I made application to re-register and shortly after requested a vote-by-mail ballot. I received no response of any kind! Nothing whatsoever. I had to attempt to re-register to vote, but the deadline for VBM had passed. I have a college degree with an MS in Psychology and classes toward obtaining my PhD. My educational background is not the point. I was troubled to think of the many (millions) residents having similar problems, in ill health, and lacking a companion to help with the process. Access to transportation questionable for a ride to the polls.
I felt targeted, as I’ve been a registered Democrat from day 1 and have voted consistently. A provisional ballot could have been granted were I to have come unknowingly unregistered on Election Day. Then additional steps to clear the “provisional” status to appear as a regular voter. Now I’m left with no choice but to verify my voter status before every new election.
You are making the case for federal law to stop this nonsense.
I just watched this video last night on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/tfs2kC0xOmU?si=uVuKBZJsBHIbsp3w
From the Mark Thompson Show. Completely supports what you are saying about voter suppression and even worse than I thought. It wasn’t a landslide and it was close but should have been in the other direction. Republicans used to pretend they were part of a democratic system, but all pretence is gone and the machinery is fully revealed.
Demand a hand recount.
What TF can we not do hand recount, especially in blue states? Governor can request it
Then we write to them but in red states that were key that may be difficult. There must be some way.
Yep, without these voter suppression bills, gerry mandering, voter purges, polling closures -- democrats win every election by a landslide.
Attack tip: Marc Elias’ Democracy Docket was out there full time taking on all the red challenges that MAGA was throwing at voters with significant success given the complicity of the Supreme Court in voter suppression. Also worth checking out and supporting. Two other worthy organizations include Protect Democracy and Brennan Center for Justice. We are not in this battle alone. Seek allies. Stay engaged. Silence is obeying in advance. Freezing up is not an option. Trump will stumble. Midterms will begin to provide some corrections. Those who were duped by Trump/Musk won’t be happy when Project 2025 begins back firing. Above all. Forward.
It's sort of worse if we're not in this battle alone. We're losing, with whatever allies we have.
The problem, as Qasim said, is that Reps/cons can't win on ideas and policies. The public are against them. The only way they can win is if they cheat. And they're good at it.
If they cheat we block. Cheating is not winning. They don't qualify they do not believe in the Constitution. Why is that not simply enough?
We try to block.
When you say cheating is not winning, who's the president-elect? What will be the majority party in both houses of Congress? In which direction does the SCOTUS heavily lean?
No, it's certainly true that they don't believe in the Constitution, but it sure looks to me like they're winning. They're sort of trying to re-prosecute the Civil War, because they want a victory there, too. There's partisan gerrymandering, irrational disqualifications of registered and regular voters, and now "poll-watching." (I don't know what they think they're watching, since the ballot is secret, but they clearly want to intimidate. The last calculation I heard is that Harris lost because too many Dems didn't vote. Intimidation, or suppression, is working. They're cheating, and they're winning.)
Not win. Meaning they should not win.
Oh. "Should." That, and a dollar and a half, as they say, will get you on the bus.
Cheaters must not be allowed to win.
I agree they cheat and we just read evidence of that - it is not only ok with them but it is a preferred strategy. That’s the best reason not to vote Republican (or to become an insurance defense attorney in my view). So shameful in a country that touts rule of law and freedom from harm. Even so, we cannot say republican policies are rejected when so many who did vote voted for them. We need to teach civics better and figure out how to address the feeling of disenfranchisement by so many rural voters while teaching compassion and proper treatment of others. It’s complicated in its simplicity. Still we clearly have a problem beyond cheating —acceptance of cheating as an approach. We have folks who view their own perceived self interest (or morality) as so important that they accept the ( immoral) cheating. When founding principles can be thrown out by voters like they have been by our “after the fact” bribe taking Supreme Court, well that’s as big a problem as the actual cheating.
For years now, politicians, especially Republican politicians, have been ignoring the things a majority of Americans have supported. With Republicans in charge, what chance does the people’s voice have of being heard?
I've provided the Absolute
Proof how to fix this and I keep getting ignored by main media and you yourself. I can fix the Voter's Rights Act of 2006, as amended, now.
Citation?
Trump wants to be president for life, and the Republicans will never cede their total control; my fear is that there will be no more elections as we think of them; they will be like those in Hungary or any other autocratic regime. So it makes me crazy when the MSM and pundits, as they did during the campaign, talk about Trump as they would about any “generic” president-elect. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The naiveté is astounding. The failure of the media to inform about what Qasim writes about; and misinforms by omission is how autocrats get elected and stay in power. The actual coup was completed before Jan. 6th when Trump’s three Justices were “shoe-horned” in by McConnell. Jan. 6th was a side show for visual appeal. The country is changed, for sure. Exactly how it will function remains to be seen. For Trump/MAGA Cult, and his enablers and supporters the rest of us are just collateral damage. We, perhaps, can limit the damage, but we will never go back to when, with all our flaws, we were great and offered the world a safe harbor and that most precious commodity: hope.
This makes it all the more infuriating that the Dems refused to abolish the filibuster to pass voting rights. A terrible mistake and one that will have generational harm.
Oh, we can always count on the Democrats!
(Saying this I’m just so sure the Republicans will preserve the traditions of the Senate and keep the filibuster!)
Yes. Well, the law of unintended consequences always applies. Truly intelligent people of integrity aiways try to look ahead for such moments. Congress lacks both attributes……and has for years.
It wasn’t “Dems”, it was 2 Senators that really were Repubs. Manchin from WVa & Sinema from AZ have both changed their party affiliation.
1. They changed their affiliation later.
2. I'm sorry but when you're the Dem POTUS or Dem Senate Majority leader, you use your bully pulpit to get your team in line to fulfill the promises you made to do good for the American people.
We will soon be in a hitleresque hell. How do we get out of it? I feel doomed. My heart goes out to future generations who will be affected by social security changes, polio and measles possibilities, no more voting rights (already happened and will continue) or elections, civil liberties removed, women losing their lives because their bodies are not their own, religious freedom disappearing, and so much more. Now is the time for good men to come to the aid of the people. The current government needs to act and they won't. Over 85M created our disastrous future. I am sorry to say this, but I hope they suffer tremendously for there stupid voting decisions. Minorities (and I am one) who voted for that POS, convicted felon will soon start to feel their choice to put him back in office. He doesn't want to deport criminals. He wants to deport anyone who isn't a White Christian. Can you imagine what the world would be like if hitler was eliminated, before he became the fuhrer? trump is now, more than ever, an existential threat to our democracy and freedom and the entire world will feel it too.
Simple, focus on the 2026 midterms- try to take away Texas from the GOP, too, want to end the electoral college that’s how you do it (I hope Beto runs again, this time he won’t have the drag he had in 2022 if he does so and could actually win, vs Greg Abbott).
We *should* have a massive blue wave in the 2026 midterms but that seems like a lifetime away right now.
We will not have 2026 elections if Trump is president. If the current election is not challe ged and was scammed, then the 2026 election will be WORSE.
We must demand a challenge to the count. Even then Trump will be ready for a other insurrection whether he won or lost.
We must demand democracies a recount and involve our military now. So not rely on laws. None are safe.
But will only work if there is a massive movement to regenerate registered voter lists, starting now. And more efforts to get voters to the polls. Hire buses to transport to distant polling stations, more carpools, working through community organizations. 65% turnout is scandalous considering how important this election was.
I hope Beto runs again too. I don't live in Texas but I donated to his campaign the last run. I think we will have a problem with the midterms. The GOP and trump will try to end it, or more voting rights removed and purging, etc. And now there is no way the Electoral College will end. It has always been a GOP assist.
Where does the statistic come from that 36% of eligible voters chose not to vote in this election? I called people, first for Jamaal Bowman, and then for Rashida Tlaib. For Tlaib our job was to find out why voters who asked for primary ballots did not return them. One man said that he was voting for Trump. I asked why. "He put the US embassy in Jerusalem." "Didn't Biden sending thousands of tons of bombs to Israel equal or outweigh that?" "No." Others were so discouraged as to their choices--Gaza was doomed either way--that they voted down ballot but not top of ticket, or voted third party. Another discouragement for registered Dems: the Dem party ignores the working class. FDR was our last great president who worked for the working people. Now we are thrown scraps. Nobody can afford to pay a mortgage, even with $25,000 help from the government. And people were able.read through the bull of that one. Billionaires were cheered and celebrated at the DNC, like they were actually doing something for society, instead of for themselves. Yes, Pritzker is not a good look for people yearning for more equality. And then this "joy" garbage when people just wanted more security in their lives. (I apologize for being a wet blanket. But I am angry and disheartened with my party. Thank goodness Rashida Tlaib is going back to Congress.)
And what did campaigning with Cheney have to do with mortgages? My mortgage didn't jump after Liz Cheney walked on a stage with Kamala Harris.
Right. But people watching the embrace of the Cheneys felt that it represented the value placed on that relationship: pro-war, pro-weatlh, and pro-MIC, where Cheney made much of his wealth. It's a reminder of what Schumer said about gaining two votes from moderate Republicans and being OK losing one vote of the working poor. As if they said, "good riddance!" That doesn't feel great. As a leftie, I was shocked. Where was my party? As if they had buried it.
You may not be one of them, but most young people have no hope of owning a home unless their parents or grandparents are able to help out. And rents here where I live take up more than half most workers' salaries. According to Michael Hudson and Richard Wolff, it's just going to get worse.
No, no, I'm truly lucky, I was able to buy a home with the help of my parents. I otherwise would not have been able to for maybe another ten or fifteen years. My parents are maga folks now, btw. I honestly don't know if they would have helped me nowadays because I don't see how they could have voted for him when I'm their queer Asian daughter, and I told them so. But I guess a lot of people did that, I guess a lot of people experienced that.
It was everyone's choice to vote, but all I saw was a bridging of parties to recognize that whatever else they felt differently about, there was going to be no political DISCOURSE available to happen in the future if they didn't campaign together.
Yeah, but Republicans are corporatists, too.
And campaigning with Repubs like Cheney!
Why do you fault the democratic party for "nobody being able to pay their mortgage"? I don't see this particular problem as one that can be directly attributable to either party. I'm really curious to know, not trolling you.
Thank you for asking. Most people are on a steady salary. If they bought a house, giving themselves a mortgage, then, with inflation, their other costs are going to rise, making it harder to maintain the cost of their homes. Then, with medical bankruptcy, which happens to 500,000 people per year in this country, people are losing their homes. You may have noticed that dems are no longer calling for Medicare for All. It's a matter of tinkering around the edges with the ACA and Medicaid. I met plenty of homeless people when I used to work downtown. Now that I'm retired I no longer see the travesty that both Democrats and Republicans visit on the working poor.
Just so you know: in 2006 I called up the Dem county office and asked how I could help. I was given a list of people to call, consistent voters, who might agree to walk in their precincts. Approximately 4,000 calls later I had a cadre of 61 volunteers that I trained and kept track of. I have knocked on thousands of doors over the succeeding 18 years, talking to people. The last time it was for Bernie's campaign in the working-class part of town. And I learned an important lesson: registered dems don't vote because they feel that neither the dems nor repubs are willing to help them. You might argue with them, but it's their circumstances and their lives that you'd be arguing with. Bernie was my last and only hope. I couldn't even walk my own precicnt for the first time in 18 years. I am saddened and angered that the dem party embraces the Cheneys and the billionaires instead of being the party of the working class. They have no one to turn to. (I did make phone calls for Qasim Rashid's campaign four years ago. He was not elected, unfortunately.) Again, thank you for asking.
I figured that dems stopped talking about universal healthcare because there was no way they would get it through the house or senate.
I see how you can feel directly disappointed by the democratic party. You were actively involved. I know intellectually that canvassing on the ground is most effective and yet I never have because it's really scary to me.
But I have always voted since I became old enough, registered as a democrat but I have not always voted democrat. I have done what I considered due diligence on the candidates, and politicians records of bipartisan voting and legislating was always important to me.
Honestly, my view of our country and its electoral process is probably not popular. I did not graduate high school knowing the fundamental workings or structure of our government. Something that I think reflects a middling, somewhat floundering quality of public school education. I had to teach myself but after I did, I took to heart that the systems put in place were meant to prevent a lot of change from happening quickly or all at once. Laws were meant to be written, thought about, debated about, modified, compromised, amended, then voted on by congressional representatives and passed to the senate for more of the same, and then finally to the president who had veto power but whose veto power could be overridden if 2/3 of both the senate and the house voted to pass it. It was meant to be a slow and somewhat onerous process. I believe they understood that big changes introduce instability and possibly civil unrest. And EVERYONE, whether they agree with policies, is typically better under STABLE, steadily progressing governance. I believe there were times it was right to change things quickly, like with the civil rights act, because there could be no fundamental equality without it.
I am not pleased with the way things are, but I have always been a democrat and voted for the things that modern democrats typically put on the table, social support stuff, knowing that republicans typically call for and legislate fiscal conservancy, which has always meant not increasing spending on things that do not generate revenue. I've voted this way, knowing it was always countered yet also having faith that it was never wholly off the table, looking to a future where the incremental advancements through social justice amd social equity initiatives were made noticeably manifest.
I think the passing of the ACA was a huge accomplishment, even though it's flawed, and even though I can't use it. My income has always been too high to make marketplace plans affordable to me, but I know it has helped many people and I had hoped it would be a stepping stone to universal healthcare. I fully believe it could have been, if there hadn't been such strong republican campaigning against it at a time when democrats lost the house or senate, or both, I don't recall. I mean, everything is off the table now. I've had to exert more effort to pay my mortgage, too. I still voted for Kamala because I did see THIS election as black and white.
We either elected someone who was going to maintain the established structures and protocols and deference to democratic process, or we were going to vote for someone who literally ran on a platform telling me he intended to steal my civil liberties and dismantle our 250 year old democratic processes.
I am still not convinced that mortgage payment increase is due to anything that the democratic party did, even though the perception is that they haven't done anything for working class people. I'm convinced that it is not party-specific. I know my concerns about inflation and increased cost of food came in second to not wanting donald dump and project 2025.
There is something else that is hard for me to explain. Michael Hudson and Richard Wolff explain it on various youtube videos: the wealthy buy up homes/real estate, and then sell at raised and high prices, which prevents average people from buying a home at a fair price. Interest rates are very high now. (I refinanced at a bit under 3% and will be paying for my home and cello until I'm 90.) Their rents raised, it's very hard for most people to save up to buy a home.
And yes to the scariness of walking and knocking on doors. I'm usually not afraid of dogs, but when I see a dog racing up to me with nothing between us but an overturned chair, that'll raise my adrenaline level! So it's got to be worth it. It was worth it for Bernie. Now, not so much.
I appreciate your personal disclosures.
It's not that their mortgage would increase. It's that they would need to move/sell because it was no longer affordable because of cost of healthcare, food, utilities, etc.
FDR brought us Social Security. Before that people worked til they dropped, or had help from family, who also had to work. This was earth-shattering. There was definitely push back also from the formation of unions. My grandfather was beaten up and put in jail for trying to form a union. Others were murdered. And Johnson brought us Medicare. Yes, he twisted some arms, but he got it through.
I'm tired of the dems saying, "We'll compromise with the Republicasn" and the Republicans saying, "No compromise with those Communists!" So rightward we went. Clinton with the GATT and GATS treaties, shipping jobs overseas, "the end of welfare as we know it." Might as well have talked about welfare queens. a term coined by Ronald Reagan. Right now the party is to the right of Eisenhower. I want to go back to FDR. I know that's not possible.
I will tell you what really depressed me: a conversation between Michael Hudson and Richard Wolff. They are predicting revolution. Thomas Piketty also predicted a bloody revolution if the wealth inequality index remained on its current (2012) trajectory. It's gotten worse. The Cheneys will be fine. The Biden and Harris families will be fine. And for sure the Clintons and Obamas. Do they care about us middle class and working class people? Do we donate millions to their campaigns or their non-profits?
I appreciate your sharing, too. I know the democratic party is currently to the right of Eisenhower policies, because they keep believing that the key to democracy with an obstinate party is to be the one that keeps compromising. I would also like to see the party embrace FDR-like stimulus initiatives. It's a true legacy.
And I do know that even the people saying they will be the agents of change don't have much to lose. Do I believe they care? Yes, but not so much that they will stand shoulder to shoulder with the people who are at risk of losing everything, who have no walls to shelter behind, literally and figuratively.
It seems there is a sense of personal abandonment by the democratic party, while it's just a sense of resignation about the old republican party. But again, yeah, I donated to the Harris Walz campaign for two reasons. I did want them to win. I did want establishmentarians to remain and not a crackpot dictator. I felt that establishmentarians left us the possibility to work for slow change and that dump would leave no one anything to work with. The second reason I donated to Harris Walz was because they actually sent some of their funds to downballot election contests that needed it. I was ever hopeful in the preservation of the institution of democracy, for what it's worth.
Probably because most Dems are really corporatists who don’t do much for the working people.
No I would disagree. I had lots of help from Democrats from 1960s to now, more than what Reoublicans offered.
You are ignorant. Everyone in the convict’s inner circle (including him)are billionaires and corporate shills. Get your fricken story straight.
In my opinion, no voter should be removed from the voter rolls without proof that the have died, or proof that they have moved out of the district.
Agreed. These arbitrary lists are openly discriminatory and oppressive.
The Supreme Court broke with precedent (Purcell Doctrine) and allowed Glenn Youngkin run his purge on over 1600 voters in Virginia within weeks of the election. SCOTUS is complicit in voter suppression since gutting the Voting Rights Act in 2013.
SCOTUS is stacked with Trump loyalists whom he appointed.