GOPer Caught On Tape Explaining How She’ll Redistrict Black Democratic Colleague Out Of Office [View all]

For years now, people have been noticing that to win elections, Republicans haven’t just bent the rules, they seem to have abandoned the “democracy” game altogether. Apparently unable to win elections fair-and-square, conservatives have increasingly relied on “redistricting” areas that they would have no chance of winning into more favorable seats. And while the practice should be considered an affront to the very idea of an open democracy, it has apparently become so commonplace for lawmakers that one was just caught on tape dryly explaining how she planned to use the technique to defeat her African-American Democratic colleague.

Rep. Janet Adkins was at a private gathering during a meeting of the Republican Party of Florida. Rather than focus on things like plugging the numerous holes in the Republican sinking ship, Adkins was hatching a plan to steal the election instead. According to tapes secretly recorded and leaked to POLITICO, Adkins wanted to kick long-time liberal congresswoman Corrine Brown out of office by carefully redrawing her district to include as many prisons as possible. Prisoners, you may recall, cannot vote. But first, she made everyone swear that there were no reporters in the room that would rat on her.

“Let me give you inside ball game. Are there any reporters in here?” she said. “Any reporters? OK. So, inside ball game.”

Before saying:

“You draw [Brown’s seat] in such a fashion so perhaps, a majority, or maybe not a majority, but a number of them will live in the prisons, thereby not being able to vote,” said Adkins, a Nassau County Republican, referring to black residents.

Adkins concluded by saying the fact that so many minorities are in prisons where they are listed in the census but aren’t actually allowed to vote is the “perfect storm” to beating a Democrat if the district was redrawn just so.

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