The Republican SCOTUS is aiding and abetting at destroying our country by assisting a fascist executive branch. An overwelming win by democrats to have large majorities in the house and senate is the only way to slow down this train wreck. PLEASE VOTE BLUE IN EVERY RACE.
Thank you so much, Jay Kuo. This is a superb and concise legal history of the gutting of both Sections 5 & 2 of the VRA, as well as a strategy for how to move forward. Time for us all to pull out our copies of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War."
This is part of a longer running campaign by conservative think tanks like the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation.
Sometimes I wonder if they are happy with the way things are turning out. They made a deal with Trump. "You nominate the persons we want for judges and justices and out policies (“Project 2025”) and we will support you."
What do they think of Trump as a “loose cannon” now with tariffs and wars, high prices and ICE murders and detentions? Becoming the laughing stock of the world and becoming irrelevant in global politics? Did they think that they would have control of the levers of power and there would be no unintended consequences? As in Trump would piss off so many different groups of people that most of them would not vote for Republicans?
It occurs to me that it is rather vastly ironic that if Section V was still in place, THIS DOJ could simply approve whatever Landry and his ilk want to draw.
Has the Black Caucus figured in to its objections the probability that even if black representation is "diluted" in 2028, if DEMOCRATS win, there is likely to be support for a bill that simply forbids partisan gerrymandering? At that point, the states that acted to up the Dem districts could simply revert, as I believe CA's law does, to the pre-existing maps? Or would Callais keep them from doing so if the maps involved majority minority districts?
Jay, as always, you have clearly elucidated the situation. I had a vague understanding before I read this piece, but I learned a lot more in the course of reading it. For one thing, I was unaware of the long game John Roberts successfully played. UGH!
I make it a point in my life to strive not to hate people. I have to admit that I now am feeling a lot of hate for the Chief Justice and his co-conspirators. Such a despicable human being.
Thank you for this in-depth review of Robert's background, as it relates to the effective elimination of the VRA's protections of voter rights, and your analysis of where we are as supporters of democracy in our fight to return the country to a more fair and just recognition of individual rights.
Thanks for the much-needed historic explainer on Roberts. I don't have enough words of outrage and disgust to comment more on that bucket of slime in a suit and black robe.
I played around with an online redistricting mapping tool to show how easy it is to redraw a map if anyone wants to take a look. My example was Georgia, done by Republicans, and it's admittedly over the top and not scientific.
It's critical for us to get out there and take some of these state houses back. If Hungary can overthrow Orban at the ballot box, we can overthrow Trump the same way. How do we motivate voters? I'm still looking for answers there.
The malignancy of John Roberts is difficult to imagine. An entire career devoted to the destruction of human rights, and in the service of corporations. What must that be like?
Jay: The underlying far right agenda and organization is old news. Why on earth are there not liberal and moderate rich people willing and able to organize a similar deeply funded movement to counter this? And where are they now? You say it is not too late. But given that it is a world so obviously driven by vast wealth, if there is not a countervailing force by the wealthy, is it perhaps too late for the moment. Will we need another catastrophe at the level of WW2?
"Rucho v. Common Cause declared partisan gerrymandering beyond federal court review in 2019. Since then, any map that dilutes Black voting power can simply be defended as a partisan gerrymander rather than a racial one."
A decent Congress would have acted to negate this verdict in 2019 by passing a law against partisan gerrymandering. In any case, the idea that the Supreme Court can prevent gerrymandering to block a particular racial group's votes but that gerrymandering for *partisan* reasons is perfectly A-OK is absurd. Nobody who wants fair, one-person one-vote elections could allow partisan gerrymandering on the basis that "the Supreme Court mustn't get involved in politics!" To allow a majority party to trample the representation of minority-party voters IS getting involved in politics.
Thank you for laying all this ugliness out so clearly. I just wish it weren't necessary.
Read this twice and learned more from it than from anything else I’ve read on Callais. The Roberts-at-twenty-six thread, all the way through to the Yale pivot — sixty senators traded for five judges — is the spine of the whole story. Thank you for laying it bare.
Excellent synopsis of the Roberts history of anti-VRA, Jay. Absent in the discussion of how to remediate the current situation, however, is how to appeal to & win over Independents' sense of FAIR PLAY. In so many of the current issues (cultural & otherwise, national & statewide), the support of those who vote & who declare as "independent," is necessary to prevail. In what real world is racism still not a systemic problem in our America? And I am writing this as a White Democratic voter in a ruby red state.
Trump and his allies are corrupted. The work you do is vital.
Trump and his allies are corrupted. The work you do is vital.
The Republican SCOTUS is aiding and abetting at destroying our country by assisting a fascist executive branch. An overwelming win by democrats to have large majorities in the house and senate is the only way to slow down this train wreck. PLEASE VOTE BLUE IN EVERY RACE.
Thank you so much, Jay Kuo. This is a superb and concise legal history of the gutting of both Sections 5 & 2 of the VRA, as well as a strategy for how to move forward. Time for us all to pull out our copies of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War."
This is part of a longer running campaign by conservative think tanks like the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation.
Sometimes I wonder if they are happy with the way things are turning out. They made a deal with Trump. "You nominate the persons we want for judges and justices and out policies (“Project 2025”) and we will support you."
What do they think of Trump as a “loose cannon” now with tariffs and wars, high prices and ICE murders and detentions? Becoming the laughing stock of the world and becoming irrelevant in global politics? Did they think that they would have control of the levers of power and there would be no unintended consequences? As in Trump would piss off so many different groups of people that most of them would not vote for Republicans?
If Progressive candidates are not running on stack the SCOTUS, I'm not trying to hear from you.
It occurs to me that it is rather vastly ironic that if Section V was still in place, THIS DOJ could simply approve whatever Landry and his ilk want to draw.
Has the Black Caucus figured in to its objections the probability that even if black representation is "diluted" in 2028, if DEMOCRATS win, there is likely to be support for a bill that simply forbids partisan gerrymandering? At that point, the states that acted to up the Dem districts could simply revert, as I believe CA's law does, to the pre-existing maps? Or would Callais keep them from doing so if the maps involved majority minority districts?
Jay, as always, you have clearly elucidated the situation. I had a vague understanding before I read this piece, but I learned a lot more in the course of reading it. For one thing, I was unaware of the long game John Roberts successfully played. UGH!
I make it a point in my life to strive not to hate people. I have to admit that I now am feeling a lot of hate for the Chief Justice and his co-conspirators. Such a despicable human being.
Thank you for this in-depth review of Robert's background, as it relates to the effective elimination of the VRA's protections of voter rights, and your analysis of where we are as supporters of democracy in our fight to return the country to a more fair and just recognition of individual rights.
Thanks for the much-needed historic explainer on Roberts. I don't have enough words of outrage and disgust to comment more on that bucket of slime in a suit and black robe.
I played around with an online redistricting mapping tool to show how easy it is to redraw a map if anyone wants to take a look. My example was Georgia, done by Republicans, and it's admittedly over the top and not scientific.
https://www.ruminato.com/p/how-i-eliminated-the-black-vote-in
It's critical for us to get out there and take some of these state houses back. If Hungary can overthrow Orban at the ballot box, we can overthrow Trump the same way. How do we motivate voters? I'm still looking for answers there.
Trump is doing an excellent job himself of motivating voters to voter Democrat.
The malignancy of John Roberts is difficult to imagine. An entire career devoted to the destruction of human rights, and in the service of corporations. What must that be like?
Jay: The underlying far right agenda and organization is old news. Why on earth are there not liberal and moderate rich people willing and able to organize a similar deeply funded movement to counter this? And where are they now? You say it is not too late. But given that it is a world so obviously driven by vast wealth, if there is not a countervailing force by the wealthy, is it perhaps too late for the moment. Will we need another catastrophe at the level of WW2?
Democrats? Action decisively!? ROFLMAO
"Rucho v. Common Cause declared partisan gerrymandering beyond federal court review in 2019. Since then, any map that dilutes Black voting power can simply be defended as a partisan gerrymander rather than a racial one."
A decent Congress would have acted to negate this verdict in 2019 by passing a law against partisan gerrymandering. In any case, the idea that the Supreme Court can prevent gerrymandering to block a particular racial group's votes but that gerrymandering for *partisan* reasons is perfectly A-OK is absurd. Nobody who wants fair, one-person one-vote elections could allow partisan gerrymandering on the basis that "the Supreme Court mustn't get involved in politics!" To allow a majority party to trample the representation of minority-party voters IS getting involved in politics.
Thank you for laying all this ugliness out so clearly. I just wish it weren't necessary.
Thank you.
Read this twice and learned more from it than from anything else I’ve read on Callais. The Roberts-at-twenty-six thread, all the way through to the Yale pivot — sixty senators traded for five judges — is the spine of the whole story. Thank you for laying it bare.
Excellent synopsis of the Roberts history of anti-VRA, Jay. Absent in the discussion of how to remediate the current situation, however, is how to appeal to & win over Independents' sense of FAIR PLAY. In so many of the current issues (cultural & otherwise, national & statewide), the support of those who vote & who declare as "independent," is necessary to prevail. In what real world is racism still not a systemic problem in our America? And I am writing this as a White Democratic voter in a ruby red state.