Friend,
56 years ago today, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the Voting Rights Act.
A landmark piece of legislation that helped usher in a new era of democracy that strengthened voting rights and access to the ballot, it has shamefully been weakened through our federal courts and continues to face attacks from the Far Right to this day.
Now more than ever we must stand up to the forces that are working against us in one of the largest concerted efforts to prevent people from casting their vote and have that vote counted. We must stand up for our democracy and urge our elected officials in Congress to protect that sacred right.
The John Lewis Voting Rights Act – renamed as such after his passing – is designed to reestablish and strengthen the federal review requirements from the original VRA that were gutted by two troubling Supreme Court decisions, Shelby County v. Holder in 2013 and Brnovich v. DNC earlier this year. The John Lewis Voting Rights Act is crucial, specifically for preventing future state-enacted barriers to voting from taking effect.
And we’re now facing a historic wave of bills at the state level that seek to curb your right to vote. With more than 400 bills introduced in 49 states, the Far Right is out to make sure they never see election losses like they did in 2020 again. These bills seek to limit early voting, make it harder to vote by mail, impose harsh voter ID requirements, make it easier to purge voter rolls, and even make it illegal to provide snacks and water to voters waiting in line to cast their ballot.[1]
The Far Right’s legislative agenda this year is painfully clear: to make it harder for YOU to vote in order to make it easier for THEM to win elections.
We’re running out of time to prevent the worst of this new wave of state laws from taking effect before the 2022 midterm elections, not to mention the havoc they would create for the next presidential election.
Thank you for all that you do,
Ben Jealous, President
[1] “Voting Laws Roundup: July 2021” Brennan Center, 7/22/21
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