by Fabiany Carbajal and Janielys Moya
New voting laws in Georgia were recently introduced and enforced shortly after President Biden won in order to “restore voters confidence” throughout the electoral process and “make elections more secure.” Instead, they have only created more barriers for minorities and non-white communities. Some of the major notable changes include and are not limited to: criminalizing volunteers offering food and water to voters waiting in line to cast their ballot, restrictions on ballot access for voters in prospering urban and suburban counties, strict new ID requirements for absentee ballots, essentially banning mobile voting centers, making it harder to vote if you go to the wrong polling place, and limiting drop boxes. Election officials also cannot accept third-party funding, and runoff elections happen faster, though it could easily become harder to manage; the G.O.P.-led legislature (G.O.P. stands for Grand Old Party, which is the Republican Party) is empowered to suspend county election officials and the secretary of state is removed as a voting member of the State Election Board. Stacey Abrams, an American politician, lawyer, voting rights activist, and author who served in the Georgia House of Representatives, mentioned in her interview with MSNBC, that the Republican party connived with others who were upset with the winner of the previous presidential election and created this cowardice to deprive those groups of people who finally realized the power they held with being able to vote and dictate their future. This stands correct in the fact that this has spread further than just Georgia, Florida is also currently attempting to limit the usage of mail in ballots after years of it working wonders for the GOP. Despite the evidence backing the notions that this is a voter suppression attempt against minorities, Republicans are still vouching that this too affects them. For years, the mail in ballots have helped Republicans win by landslides. This became such an accredited source of voting that over one-third (35 percent) of GOP voters in Florida voted by mail in 2020. It is also due to the fact that their mail in ballots are very well accredited that they are turning on that same method because minorities have identified how to work with the system to ensure that their votes count as well. These bills are the aftermath of a Supreme Court ruling in 2013: Shelby County v. Holder. This court case stated that state and local governments with a history of discrimination are no longer required to preclear amendments to voting laws and processes with the federal government. The rundown is that the Court invalidated a formula that was used to determine which states must clear changes in voting practices or laws with the Department of Justice. By invalidating said formula, states are now allowed to pass these types of laws as a result of the tenth amendment: state's rights. State’s are free to regulate as they please without prior approval or interference from the federal government. As of March 24, 2021, there have been 361 bills with restrictive provisions introduced by legislators in 47 states when in February it was originally 253 restrictive bills in 43 states. The only three states that haven’t gotten involved with these legislations are Ohio, Vermont, and Delaware. Every other state has at least one introduced bill. On the opposite hand being uninvolved, we have the biggest participants of these cases being Texas with 49 bills, Georgia with 25, and Arizona with 23. More than half of the 361 bills make it harder to vote absentee and by mail, since there was a record number of Americans who voted by mail in November. About one in four restrictive bills also look to impose stricter voter identification requirements. With all of these new introductions, there is a perspective that was masked by a majority: they do not want minorities to vote. Politicians and legislators saved face by providing opportunities for marginalized communities, and now seek to tighten the system as the response they sought from the public wasn’t what they received with the November elections. While these bills don’t specifically state that it’s targeting minority voters, the nature of the specifications of the prohibition would have a larger impact in those communities as well as the elderly and those with disabilities. Voter suppression has an extensive history in the United States and originally, it wasn’t located in just one party, but in the ideology of white supremacy. It should always be kept in mind that it is not only Republicans seeking this change, but the systems as a whole. Sources
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