How Democrats Could Overhaul US Election System Without Passing the Voter Rights Bill
10:44 GMT 26.07.2021 (Updated: 13:21 GMT 06.08.2022)
© AP Photo / Patrick Semansky
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Joe Biden has urged the US Congress to pass H.R. 1, the For the People Act, and H.R. 4, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, calling the voting bills "a national imperative". Although the bills are now dead in the water, the Dems may try other ways to reach their goal, say CIA veteran Philip Giraldi and US economist Dr. Paul Craig Roberts.
In June the Democratic election legislation got stalled in the Senate after a procedural vote to open debate on the bill fell short of the 60 votes needed to succeed. All 50 Democratic senators supported the legislation while their 50 GOP counterparts unanimously opposed it.
H.R. 1 to 'Turn US Into One-Party Nation Ruled by Democrats'
The signature Democratic voting rights bill is mired in controversy. Back in 2019 the legislation was defeated by the Republicans in the upper chamber, with then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell denouncing it as a "one party power grab". After the 2020 elections, the Democrats once again brought the legislation to the congressional floor.
The Republicans see the For the People Act 2021 as an attempt to federalise US elections and eventually "turn America into a one-party nation ruled by Democrats", GOP politician Betsy McCaughey noted in her 7 March op-ed for the Boston Herald.
H.R. 1 is a disaster. Here's what it does:
— Congresswoman Kat Cammack (@RepKatCammack) March 3, 2021
- Allows 16 year olds to vote
- Gives $25 vouchers to citizens for candidates of their choosing
- Redefines free speech
- Triggers universal mail-in ballots
- Creates an election czar
- Strips voter ID requirements...and MORE. pic.twitter.com/j2zSJaFa07
The proposed bills would "eliminate the ability of the states to pass legislation that creates conditions on registering and voting," Philip Giraldi, a former CIA counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer, warned in his latest UNZ article, adding that the loosening of ID check barriers and enhanced mail-in voting would open the door to voter fraud.
He recalled that before the November 2020 election he and his wife received "four unsolicited mail-in ballots, all of which were sent to [them] anonymously":
"I examined the ballots carefully and noted that they bore no serial numbers or other forms of validation that could conceivably be used to limit the potential for fraud," Giraldi highlighted.
An official ballot drop box is seen Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2020, in Santa Clarita, Calif.
© AP Photo / Marcio Jose Sanchez
'Voting Rights Bill is Dead in the Senate'
While the Biden administration is signalling its determination to pass the bill, questions arise as to how it can do this in an evenly split Senate with the filibuster rule still in place.
The best way to honor John Lewis's legacy is to pass the For the People Act.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) July 19, 2021
Photo: Barb Kinney pic.twitter.com/rvkolrpQnd
It is most likely that the Democrats will turn the debate over the voting bill into a race issue, claiming that it is blacks that are being denied the ability to vote, according to the former CIA agent.
"I saw an article last week claiming that in states that might be requiring producing a document and going in person to vote, blacks will be most affected because they don't have documents and it is too difficult for them to go somewhere to vote," he says. "That is, of course, nonsense but it sounds plausible to those who want to believe that sort of thing."
The Democrats could probably pass both pieces of legislation if they retain their majority in the House and get at least ten additional seats in the Senate during the upcoming 2022 elections. However, observers from both sides of the political aisle argue that it would be hard for the Dems to extend their majority in the US Congress.
"Democrats would indeed need those extra votes to pass the Act but they are currently in serious trouble over the illegal immigration problems along the south border and the push for vaccination for all and further restrictions re COVID, so unless that changes they have no chance for a breakthrough," the CIA veteran remarked.
Furthermore, the Republican Party is expected to get up to eight seats in the House of Representatives due to decennial redistricting. This would potentially be enough to tip the balance in the GOP's favour, given that it currently needs to pick up just five seats to win back the lower chamber, according to The Cook Political Report observations. In addition to this, there is a long record of the president’s party performing poorly in the midterm election.
I’ve been saying it since before the last election: Democrats had better get everything they can through Congress between now and January 3, 2023, because Republicans are going to win the midterms. The “out” party almost always does. It’s like clockwork. https://t.co/8fVn8DgBs7
— Cliston Brown (@ClistonBrown) July 21, 2021
Still, Giraldi does not rule out that the Democrats and their supporters would try to adhere to the last election's playbook. Last November, Hans von Spakovsky, American attorney and a former member of the Federal Election Commission, drew attention to the fact that ahead of Election Day Democrats and their surrogates filed hundreds of lawsuits all over the country, seeking to get rid of security protocols and measures put in place by states to prevent fraud in the use of absentee and mail-in ballots.
"Definitely enhanced use of existing mail-in voting will be on their agenda," Giraldi says. "If COVID worsens they might try to call for restrictions that would make it harder to count and validate votes but that would be hard to do plausibly."
U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi walks on stage before her remarks during a weekly news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., June 24, 2021
© REUTERS / TOM BRENNER
'The Voting Rights Bill is a Statement of Intention'
It does not matter whether the Democrats pass their voting rights bill – they will try to implement their voting agenda in the states nevertheless, deems Dr. Paul Craig Roberts, an American economist and former assistant secretary of the Treasury for economic policy under President Ronald Reagan.
"I would view the Voting Rights Bill as an indication of the Democrats intentions," Dr. Roberts says. "They can achieve these intentions without the bill passing. Elections turn on a few swing states that can go either way. In the 2020 election the irregularities were associated with about six states. It was in these states where all the strange reverses of Trump’s lead occurred. Red states don’t flip blue and vice versa. Georgia, a red state, was the exception. The Democrat’s theft of a known red state is what gave convincing evidence that the election was stolen."
The 2020 elections caused a lot of controversy, prompting a number of states to seek audits of ballots and voting machines and/or strengthen ID laws to ensure election integrity. The authorities of the aforementioned states have been subjected to harsh criticism by Biden, who accused them of promoting the "big lie" that did not fairly win in 2020 and adopting Jim Crow-era style laws.
Moreover, on 25 June the US Justice Department sued Georgia over its new election laws, with Attorney General Merrick Garland claiming that they were "enacted with the purpose of denying or abridging the right of black Georgians to vote".
The Justice Department’s politicized lawsuit against Georgia’s election integrity law is based on lies and misinformation. I will meet them, and beat them, in court. https://t.co/ZzF3Oy2Qx2
— GA Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (@GaSecofState) July 23, 2021
Earlier, the DoJ issued a warning to the Arizona state Senate over its audit of 2.1 million ballots cast in Maricopa County in November 2020 following the failure of the state's Democratic Party to stop the recount.
"To vote, you are supposed to be registered, but Democrats have succeeded in bypassing this requirement," Dr. Roberts explains. "The Republican effort to reinstate it is being challenged by the US Department of Justice and by Democrat state attorney generals such as the one in Michigan as attempts to keep blacks from voting, thus making the effort a federal civil rights issue."
Do strict ID requirements prevent blacks from going to the doctor or the bank or flying on a plane? No. Why then would #VoterID laws prevent blacks from voting? They wouldn’t. The real reason Democrats oppose such laws is because they would limit voter fraud
— Dinesh D'Souza (@DineshDSouza) July 23, 2021
But that is not all, according to the economist. Simultaneously, Democrat state prosecutors in swing states are trying to concoct cases against Republicans who challenged the vote in those states. Punishments are already being handed out, according to him. To illustrate his point Dr. Roberts cites the case of Rudy Giuliani who had his law license revoked by the Democrats who control New York. "The purpose of this is intimidation so that Republicans are afraid to challenge electoral fraud", the former official stresses.
"What the Democrats are doing is having the Department of Justice use the 1964 Civil Rights Act to over-rule Republican efforts in the swing states to fraud-proof elections by requiring IDs, curtailing mail in voting, and remove dead people and people who have moved out of state from the voting rolls," Dr. Roberts notes. "So, the way to see this is that the Voting Rights Bill is a statement of intention. The intention is to be achieved by blocking the Republican reform efforts in the swing states."
