Friend,

Donald Trump has been called out by Twitter for making vote-by-mail false claims, and he has even threatened to penalize Michigan for trying to make vote-by-mail more accessible to its citizens during a global pandemic. Vote-by-mail is a safe and legal technique that Trump has used to vote himself. This is about restricting who is able to cast a vote, and that fight is older than the republic itself.
 
The United States has a painful history of racism that reverberates to this day. And in order to fight for our future, we need to understand our past.
 
EPI economist Jhacova Williams, working on our Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy (PREE), is developing groundbreaking research on how past racial atrocities continue to have lasting impacts today. 
 
Williams has analyzed data on lynchings of blacks from 1882 to 1930—a time when there were more than 3,000 lynchings. And her research found a disturbing pattern: the more lynchings in a given county translates to lower black voter registration a century later.
 
Watch EPI’s video that details how lynchings were the original form of voter suppression, and then share this video on Facebook and Instagram.
Williams’ research explains how lynchings were intended, in part, to show black Americans what would happen to them if they participated in our democracy.
 
In Lafayette County, Florida, for example, which had eight lynchings between 1882 - 1930, there is currently a 15% black voter registration rate. If those eight people hadn’t been killed during those years, Williams determined, the voter registration rate would be around 55%.
 
Black voters play an incredibly important role in our democracy. And it’s only through understanding our country's painful, racist history that we can successfully fight for equality and justice today.
 
Now, in the midst of the pandemic, we’re seeing a worrying trend of states limiting voting options. Williams writes that Wisconsin’s election last month “highlighted two facts: 1) voter suppression extends beyond Southern states and 2) tools to limit voting are more powerful during this pandemic.”
 
Williams urges states to open up new voting options to increase voter turnout such as vote by mail or online voting, writing:
 
Imagine the kinds of policies lawmakers could enact, that would represent the views of all Americans, if we had higher voter turnout due to more voting options.
 
At EPI, we are exploring the role structural racism plays in labor markets, housing, criminal justice, higher education and voting rights. Each of these areas have a direct impact on the economic outcomes of working families. Donate to EPI today to power our research for racial equality and progressive economic change!
 
Together, we must fight for a racially and economically just society that works for all of us, not just the wealthy few.
 
In solidarity,
 
Valerie Wilson
Director, Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy, Economic Policy Institute
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