This is relevant. You don't get to act like we're declaring places 'racist shitholes generations later', as if it was so very long ago that black people in the south were mauled by police dogs marching for their civil rights. There are people alive with direct connections to people who were born slaves. To act as if it was so long ago and people have moved past is to fail to understand just how recent this history is, and just how recent Jim Crow being struck down is. History matters, and the point of pre-clearance was to take into the account of the history of voter suppression in these states, whom promptly *returned* to the antics of voter suppression immediately afterwards, thus proving the point that pre-clearance was still needed. The thousands of closed polling places and drop off of minority representation in those states says so.The first argument is that these locations (Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, South Carolina, Virginia, handful of counties elsewhere including the Bronx) remain fundamentally racist generations later, and should be held to a higher level of scrutiny. In this case, the argument should be made openly. Anyone against the court's decision should say that Georgia, Arizona and Virginia are obviously racist shitholes, and should be recognized as such by John Roberts.
John Roberts, of course, knew this, but also knew that removing pre-clearance could be hidden behind 'lol we elected a black guy so obviously racism is over and this is SO unfair to target these states when these problems were just so OLD and no longer RELEVANT'. .
Of course, reality bore out the opposite: naked voter suppression has been engaged in, now, in an effort to further entrench hard-right minority rule.
Research shows that preclearance led to increases in minority congressional representation and minority turnout.[6][7] Five years after the ruling, nearly 1,000 U.S. polling places had closed, many of them in predominantly African-American counties. Research shows that changing and reducing voting locations can reduce voter turnout.[5] There were also cuts to early voting, purges of voter rolls and imposition of strict voter ID laws.[8][9] A 2020 study found that jurisdictions that had previously been covered by preclearance substantially increased their voter registration purges after the Shelby decision.[10] Virtually all restrictions on voting subsequent to the ruling were by Republicans.[11]Of course Mets would like to think so. Remind me again how many polling places have been closed and where they are predominantly located and how long black people have to stand in line to vote. Mets needs to a better job investigating the disparate impacts of voter suppression laws rather than turning a blind eye to it and pretending the threat is 'exaggerated', especially in the face of his party's overt authoritarian turn. It's weird how Republicans can pass laws that they have nakedly admitted think will benefit them but Mets reserves his tut-tuts for democrats wanting to make DC a state or people getting angry about it being made more difficult for people to vote.Mets is sure that some of the criticisms are overblown, so that the goal post of every passed law touching on elections being voter suppression is a very high bar.
And that you still trot out 'but the primary!' as a reason for federal eletions to not be a holiday remains effing hilarious, Mets. If it was easier to vote on election day, maybe some of these elections wouldn't be so easily decided within the party instead of outside of it. Why, parties might actually have to do a better job actually competing for votes instead of just making it harder to do so in a representative democracy.
Also, Republicans could always compete for the votes of the people living in DC and Puerto Rico. They might even have a shot there if they wanted to bother trying.