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Activists Want D.C. Statehood in Voting Rights Bill

March 27, 2021 at 11:54 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Democratic activists want the party to go all-in by including D.C. statehood in whatever voting rights bill they try to pass, the New York Times reports.

“Some backers of statehood say that they see the more comprehensive legislation as the most expedient route and that the current Democratic effort to protect minority voting rights would fall short if residents of the nation’s capital ultimately lacked representation.”

Big caveat: “The change in tactics is not endorsed by Senate backers of the legislation, who still see a separate statehood bill as the best approach for both statehood and the voting rights measure.”

Bonus Quote of the Day

March 27, 2021 at 11:52 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“It has nothing to do with fairness, nothing to do with decency. They passed the law saying you can’t provide water for people standing in line while they’re waiting to vote? You don’t need anything else to know that this is nothing but punitive, designed to keep people from voting. You can’t provide water for people about to vote? Give me a break.”

— President Joe Biden, quoted by Politico, on Georgia’s new voting law.

Manchin In the Middle

March 27, 2021 at 11:50 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“If Democrats eliminate the filibuster, there is one senator who would have an outsized impact in the 50-50 chamber on issues that could reshape the nation’s future: infrastructure, immigration, gun laws and voting rights. That senator is Joe Manchin III of West Virginia,” the New York Times reports.

“There is also a senator whose opposition to eliminating the filibuster is a significant reason it may never happen. That senator, too, is Mr. Manchin.”

Said Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE): “He should want to get rid of the filibuster because he suddenly becomes the most powerful person in this place — he’s the 50th vote on everything.”

North Korea Doubles Down on Nuclear Weapons Plan

March 27, 2021 at 8:55 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“North Korea repeated its intent to expand its nuclear weapons program, after President Biden this week said that the U.S. would respond accordingly if the regime escalated tensions,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Said a North Korea senior adviser: “If the U.S. continues with its thoughtless remarks without thinking of the consequences, it may be faced with something that is not good. We will continue to increase our most thoroughgoing and overwhelming military power.”

White Supremacy Hiding In Plain Sight

March 27, 2021 at 8:51 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Will Bunch notes that Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) signed the “hastily passed voter suppression law… surrounded by a half-dozen white men” and “in front of a painting of a plantation where more than 100 Black people had been enslaved.”

“The portrait of the plantation was the starkest reminder of Georgia’s history of white racism that spans slavery, Jim Crow segregation, the rebirth of the modern Ku Klux Klan, and today’s voter purges targeting Black and brown voters — but it wasn’t the only one.”

“At the very moment that Kemp was signing the law with his all-white posse, a Black female Georgia lawmaker — Rep. Park Cannon — who’d knocked on the governor’s door in the hopes of watching the bill signing was instead dragged away and arrested by state troopers, in a scene that probably had the Deep South’s racist sheriffs of yesteryear like Bull Connor or Jim Clark smiling in whatever fiery hellhole they now inhabit.”

Senator Pines for the Days of ‘Homegrown’ Meth

March 27, 2021 at 8:33 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) suggested he missed the days when Americans made their own methamphetamine.

Said Daniels: “There is a flood of Mexican meth, Mexican heroin, Mexican fentanyl. Twenty years ago in Montana, meth was homemade. It was homegrown. And you had purity levels less than 30 percent. Today the meth that is getting into Montana is Mexican cartel.”

Quote of the Day

March 27, 2021 at 8:29 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“Ma’am, other than assassination, I have no way of voting out, okay.”

— Michigan GOP chairman Ron Weiser, quoted by the Washington Post, when asked what the party can do about Rep. Peter Meier (R-MI) and Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI), who voted to impeach Donald Trump.

Small Gun Reforms Can Lead to Bigger Ones

March 27, 2021 at 7:00 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Adam Gopnik: “The truth of reform is that it can begin anywhere, on any scale, and, once begun, it tends to be self-renewing. And, as reformers well know, it does not always matter where the reform starts—if it starts at all, it magnetizes other reforms toward it.”

“The President’s proposed assault-weapons ban, for that reason, is a good place to start. It may not lasso all or even the most dangerous weapons, and it will certainly not immediately end gun massacres or the psychic costs they exact. But it is a start. The gun lobby opposes it so irrationally because it understands this, too.”

Republicans Being Too Loud on California Recall

March 27, 2021 at 6:45 am EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Mark Barabak: “In 2003, amid California’s tumultuous gubernatorial recall election, President George W. Bush visited the state and had this to say about the campaign: Nothing.”

“The Republican National Committee kept similarly mum throughout the campaign, which ended in Democrat Gray Davis’ ouster and replacement by Hollywood super-duper-star Arnold Schwarzenegger.”

“That was then.”

“The attempt to recall current Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom — still in the qualifying stage, but almost certain to make the ballot — has turned into a nationwide Republican crusade, engaging partisans from the Arizona border to Washington, D.C.”

U.S. Worried China May Seize Control of Taiwan

March 26, 2021 at 11:06 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“The US is concerned that China is flirting with the idea of seizing control of Taiwan as President Xi Jinping becomes more willing to take risks to boost his legacy,” the Financial Times reports.

Said a senior U.S. official: “China appears to be moving from a period of being content with the status quo over Taiwan to a period in which they are more impatient and more prepared to test the limits and flirt with the idea of unification.”

Cuomo Aides Receive Subpoenas in Probe

March 26, 2021 at 11:01 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“The New York state attorney general’s office has subpoenaed dozens of officials in the Cuomo administration, including his top aide, requesting that they produce documents as part of an investigation of sexual-harassment accusations against the governor,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“Melissa DeRosa, whose title is secretary to the governor and who has been at the center of the state’s pandemic response, is among the officials to receive a subpoena earlier this month.”

What Does Georgia’s New Voting Law Do?

March 26, 2021 at 10:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Georgia’s new voting law is 98 pages and alters virtually every facet of the state’s elections. Georgia Public Broadcasting has a must-read explainer on everything it does, from controversial absentee ballot changes to a lot of things you’ve never heard of.

CNN: It’s now illegal in Georgia to give food and water to voters in line.

Where the GOP Hopes to Grow Its Base

March 26, 2021 at 9:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

GOP pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson in an interview with Ezra Klein:

“To the extent that these days, you see discussion about expanding the coalition and bringing in voters who might be more available to the GOP. There is not as much of an appetite these days for winning back, say, college educated suburbanites, I think in part because there is a belief that there may just be too great a divide on some of these sort of values and culture type issues.”

“Meanwhile, I think there is some more appetite you are seeing among Republicans for doing outreach to those in communities of color, who may not have college degrees.”

The GOP Edge In House Races

March 26, 2021 at 8:30 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Philip Bump: “1994 is a pretty clear demarcation. That year was a Republican wave that brought the party back to power in the House for the first time in four decades. Since that election, only once, in 2008, has the GOP had a lower percentage of the vote than seats. In every other election, it’s secured a greater percentage of seats than it has a percentage of votes.”

“The Republican Party, at least for now, has an institutional advantage in the House as it does in the Senate and in the electoral college. That’s been the case for about 30 years.”

GOP Candidate Adopts Entirely Different Persona

March 26, 2021 at 8:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

American Independent: “A Republican former professional wrestler is district hopping in the hopes of winning a U.S. House seat — and is totally changing his personality in the hopes of making his congressional dreams a reality.”

“In his Nevada race, Rodimer ran ads painting himself as a clean-cut, family man — wearing a collared shirt and seated on a couch with his wife and five children.”

“Now, Rodimer is back and running in a special election in Texas’ 6th District — a Dallas-based House seat left vacant after Rep. Ron Wright died following a COVID-19 diagnosis. And Rodimer looks like a totally different person, donning a cowboy hat and positioning himself as a rodeo bull rider with a Texas accent.”

Major League Baseball Players Consider Georgia Boycott

March 26, 2021 at 8:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Boston Globe: “The 91st MLB All-Star Game is scheduled to be played in Atlanta this July. But on Thursday, in the wake of voting-restriction legislation signed into law by the Georgia governor, the executive director of the MLB Players Association said the players are ready to discuss moving their annual midsummer exhibition out of Georgia.”

GOP Lawmaker Wants Rural Minnesota to Secede

March 26, 2021 at 7:56 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Minnesota Public Radio: “Minnesota saw a most unusual bill introduced Thursday at the Capitol: a constitutional amendment to let counties secede from the state.”

“Bill sponsor Rep. Jeremy Munson said he wanted to give western Minnesota a shot to leave the North Star state and join a new, larger South Dakota. In a tweet, Munson linked to his fundraising site and tagged South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem.”

Schumer Controls the Future of the Filibuster

March 26, 2021 at 7:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“Senate Republicans are adamant that Chuck Schumer is maneuvering toward one endgame: Killing the filibuster. But Schumer’s own Democratic colleagues aren’t as confident,” Politico reports.

“The reality is more complicated. Schumer is an expert at channeling the feelings of his caucus, and Democratic senators have no clear agreement on the topic. A source close to Schumer said that ‘when he says they’ll have a discussion as a caucus and everything is on the table, he means it.’”