The Supreme Court's Latest Betrayal Should be It's Last
April 10,2020
Crooked
Written By:
Jamison Foser
Jamison Foser is a consultant and writer. He served as senior adviser at NextGen America for the 2016 and 2018 election cycles and was previously executive vice president of Media Matters for America and research director at the DCCC. His current clients include Take Back The Court, which supports Supreme Court reform. The views in this column are his own. Follow him on Twitter @JamisonFoser.
With their decision forcing Wisconsinites to choose between protecting their lives and exercising their right to vote, the Supreme Court’s conservative justices have fully revealed themselves as partisan operatives working hand-in-hand with the Republican Party and the Trump administration to dismantle democracy and entrench themselves as a permanent ruling minority. There can no longer be any doubt about their intentions. The only question remaining is what can be done to stop them.
For years, Republicans in all branches of government have understood that they represent athe Republican Party has no intention of competing within a democracy. Instead, it has moved aggressively to subvert democracy so that it can continue winning elections without popular-vote majorities, and limit Democrats’ ability to govern when the majority nevertheless prevails... From voter ID laws to gerrymandering—tools Republicans have acknowledged in moments of candor or hubris are intended to reduce the political power of racial minorities—to purging legitimate voters from voter rolls to changing the rules to prevent Democrats from governing when they take office, Republican politicians have tirelessly schemed to thwart the will of the people and seize and wield power as a political minority.
Along the way, they’ve had help from the activist conservatives on the Supreme Court—four of whom were appointed by Republican presidents who took office only after losing the popular vote. Despite having won the popular vote in only one of the last seven presidential elections, Republicans have appointed 15 of the last 19 justices, and seized control of the Court with an unprecedented power grab.... Across every branch of government, at both the state and federal level, Republicans are squeezing the life out of our democracy, like a boa constrictor crushing its prey. It’s not too late to restore democracy, but time is running out, and there is much to be done. We won’t be out of this mess until we restore the Voting Rights Act, guarantee all Americans equal access to the ballot, roll back gerrymandering and other structural flaws that enable candidates and parties to control our government despite winning fewer votes than their opponents, support the rights of workers to organize politically, end the ability of wealthy special interests to dominate our elections with unlimited spending. Carrying out any of those reforms will require overcoming a partisan Supreme Court majority bent on enabling minority rule. That means expanding the size of the Court to undo the GOP’s theft of it, and to make it representative of all Americans, not just a weapon to be wielded by a narrow political faction.
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https://crooked.com/articles/supreme-court-wisconsin/
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