Last June, Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Brett Kavanaugh shocked observers by joining the court’s three liberal justices to reject an Alabama congressional map aimed at diluting Black voters’ power. The ruling marked a (likely temporary) hiatus in the Roberts court’s systematic dismantling of the Voting Rights Act. It also invited a bevy of columnists to opine, See, this court isn’t so bad after all!
On the one hand, some fanfare was warranted. The Allen v. Milligan opinion was a genuine surprise, and as a recent lower court ruling in Georgia demonstrates, its effects will reverberate throughout the 2024 election cycle and beyond. A bad ruling would have been disastrous.
On the other hand, focusing on the decision obscures a disturbing reality: In the decade since it decimated the VRA with its notorious Shelby County v. Holder decision, the court’s right-wing majority has used its docket-setting power to tilt the playing field so sharply against democracy that even the rare “wins” simply preserve a degraded status quo.
A new study published on Thursday and led by my colleague Chelsey Davidson found that since the 2012–13 term, more than 80 percent of election-related cases on the Supreme Court’s hand-picked docket could move the law only in a direction that degraded fair elections.
In that time, the Supreme Court accepted 32 cases involving core democracy issues such as redistricting, ballot access, campaign finance, and VRA enforcement. In 26 of them, the lower court had issued a pro-democracy ruling. This means that the best-case scenario at the court was affirmation of the status quo, while a reversal of the lower court would restrict voter participation. By contrast, the justices picked just six cases where they might reverse anti-democracy rulings.
It’s not quite “Heads I win, tails democracy loses,” but it’s pretty damn close.Roberts and Kavanaugh are shrewd political operatives who have dedicated decades of their personal and professional lives to electing Republicans. They are not afraid to play the long game. Unlike some of their less patient colleagues, they recognize the power of cloaking their anti-democratic project in a veneer of moderation.
By rigging the docket, Roberts and Kavanaugh can have their cake and eat it too. They can win opinion page plaudits for their restraint, knowing that even their “good” decisions do nothing to expand voter access, while decisions like Shelby and Rucho devastate it.
If we want to give democracy a fighting chance, we have to stop taking the bait. Because what makes a dangerously radical court is not just how it decides the cases it hears but how it decides which cases to hear.
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Kerfuffle at the gas station at Costco
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From the Cranks and Crackpots Files: Adding to the growing list of third party candidates, Jill Stein announced that she is running for President in 2024 as a Green Party candidate. Stein ran in 2016, coming in fourth place with 1.07%.
Confirmed third-party candidates:
- Jill Stein (Green Party)
- RFK Jr (Independent)
- Cornel West (Independent)
- The No Labels Candidate (yet to be decided - possibilities include Bill Cassidy, Joe Manchin, Larry Hogan)
- The Libertarian Candidate (yet to be decided)
- Tulsi Gabbard
- Liz Cheney
- Jesse Ventura
- William H. McRaven
Republican candidates include:
- DJT
- Whoever else is still left in the race, but will probably drop out fairly soon
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Radical right authoritarians are ramping up their hate speech and normalizing it:
Hate speech: Trump came under fire Saturday for his post on Truth Social, in which he wrote, “In honor of our great Veterans on Veteran’s Day, we pledge to you that we will root out the Communists, Marxists, Fascists, and Radical Left Thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our Country, lie, steal, and cheat on Elections, and will do anything possible, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America, and the American Dream. .... The threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous, and grave, than the threat from within. Despite the hatred and anger of the Radical Left Lunatics who want to destroy our Country, we will MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”Normalization: Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel appeared to dodge questions over former President Trump’s Veteran’s Day social media post in which he pledged to “root out the Communist, Marxist, racist and radical left thugs.” McDaniel said she will not comment on candidates and their messaging. Asked by NBC “Meet the Press” anchor Kristen Welker if McDaniel is comfortable with the language being used by the former president, she said, “I am not going to comment on candidates and their campaign messaging. I will say this, I know President Trump supports the veterans, our whole party supports our veterans. And I do think we’re at a very serious moment in our country.”
That comment, we’re at a very serious moment in our country normalizes DJT's hate speech. Corrupt authoritarian radical right Rep elites are corrupt, shameless liars, thugs and hypocrites. That includes the morally rotted, dictator-loving Ronna McDaniel.
A DJT spokesman made it all better:
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung defended the former president’s comments with some reasonable language of his own.
“Those who try to make that ridiculous assertion are clearly snowflakes grasping for anything because they are suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome and their entire existence will be crushed when President Trump returns to the White House,” Cheung told The Washington Post on Monday.
Cheung later added that he meant to say their “sad, miserable existence” instead of their “entire existence.”
It's good to know that DJT isn't going to crush our entire existence, just our sad, miserable existence. I feel better already. But why wait? Avoid the rush. Let the crushing commence now! Obliterate the SNOWFLAKES!!
The GOP is alive but not very well
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