It is good that Brnovich v. DNC was decided and the opinion issued by the Supreme Court in its recently-ended term. It is timely for dozens of states that are currently making or have already made changes to state law for “time, place and manner” of holding elections within the state. Two states that have already made such changes are Georgia and Arizona. The Justice Department filed suit against Georgia on June 25, but the suit has had no movement yet. Arizona completed its changes and was sued by the Democratic National Committee (“DNC”). The decision of the Supreme Court (“SCOTUS”) decided two issues. Both are subjects of changes being made or having been made in more than a few other states. They are: 1.) Votes cast at a wrong precinct on election day are invalid, and 2.) states that permit “harvesting ballots” by third-parties for delivery to the precinct or drop box are limited to only those persons related to, living with or are a fiduciary to the voter. Therefore, these two items may be removed from the battlefield involving Republican and Democrat state election officials. So may all other differences, if within each respective state were valid law in 1982 – the year in which Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1964 was amended.
The biggest problem for every Republican state making changes to their election laws is the media purposely mischaracterizes most changes as voter suppression. An example is a media response to the Brnovich decision is votes cast at the wrong precinct are thrown. The data is known, every state has records of the numbers of ballots [without personal identity, but always claimed as totally black voters only]. Arizona counts wrong precinct votes except only those cast on election day at the wrong precinct. This is a miniscule percent of the total. All precincts accept all votes during the pre-election day voting period. Another example of shameful reporting in the media is voter ID laws. Every state but one has some sort of voter ID requirement, and the majority permit all manner of alternatives that match the name and address of a voter on the registration roll, to the voter’s presentment of name and address on a utility bill, a payroll check, student enrollment card, and library card, etc. Vox writes, “The Case Against Voter ID Laws in one Chart!” Aug. 6, 2015. The chart shows 35 cases of actual fraud and 834,065,926 erroneous cases of alleged fraud. There is no data file or semblance of corroboration. Conversely, there is substantial acceptance by all manner of citizens that ID to vote is an acceptable practice. Black leaders support Voter ID Laws at 69% and blacks in general at 75%. 82% of other non-whites approve also. Voter ID protects the integrity of every voter’s ballot. Logically, voter ID has the effect of steering voter-impersonation away from the polls, just as police officers on the street protect citizens and business on the street. Yet, the media are loudly disagreeing that it is aimed specifically to suppress only black voters. Either it is stupidity or malicious.
Only one dissenting opinion was filed and it states only an opinion on the subject of the franchise, and not of the majority opinion. Justice Kagan writes, “If a single statute represents the best of America, it is the voting Rights Act. It marries two great ideals: democracy and racial equality.” That is a great sentiment, I agree, but it does not protect against political party fraud and collusion in the manner of voting. If a single ideal of democracy is corrupted by political parties and the biased media it comes down to elections as the most important object of power. A Harvard teacher of election law had his amicus brief published on the opinion page of The Washington Post on July 1, 2021: “The Supreme Court showcased its ‘textualist’ double standard on voting rights.” The majority opinion was not published until after the date briefs were submitted to the Court. Thus, the opinion author would have had to assume the opinion would allude to “textualism.” It is a giant leap in the dark by the author and of The Washington Post to publish it without catching the fact that the opinion of the Court does not rely upon “textualism” in its findings or conclusions. The Post says in self-satisfaction, “Democracy Dies in the Dark.” Just who is it that is in the dark?
Publiustoo.com July 13, 2021
