The Party of Lincoln Is Now the Party of Jim Crow

[AZProgressive]

Not a single House Republican voted for the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

By John Nichols

“Old battles have become new again,” said US Representative Terri Sewell, of Alabama, as she introduced the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act for Tuesday’s essential vote in the House. And even as the old battles are being fought anew, the old battle lines have changed as well. The Republican Party, which was once a more energetic and consistent supporter of civil rights in general and voting rights in particular than the Democrat Party, has united in grotesquely self-serving and destructive opposition to principles it historically championed.

When the House approved the voting rights measure named for civil rights icon John Lewis, every one of the 219 “yes” votes was cast by a Democrat. All 212 “no” votes came from Republicans.

Like their colleagues in the Senate, House Republicans sought to block the restoration and extension of vital sections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which were weakened by rulings from a US Supreme Court dominated by right-wing judicial activists. The recalcitrance of House Republicans was all the more jarring because the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act is so clearly needed—along with the proposed For the People Act—to counter a new wave of voter suppression.

https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/voting-rights-congress-republicans/tnamp/?__twitter_impression=true

[sop]

1. The most despicable bit of Republican sophistry over the last few decades has been declaring

themselves to be "the Party of Lincoln," while conflating modern-day Democrats with with old time Southern racists and Dixiecrats. It's the sort of demagoguery that convinces their imbecilic followers to overlook the true ideology of today's GOP.