Fair Elections Are Under Assault – Take Action Now

Republicans have long known that when more people vote, their chances of winning go down. So they have worked long and hard on both the state and national levels to limit and reduce the number of voters, particularly among demographic groups that lean Democratic such as people of color, urbanites, students, and seniors who rely on Social Security and Medicare. Since Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 but won the Electoral College by the thinnest of margins, Republican efforts to restrict voter-turnout have increased substantially. Altogether it amounts to breaking down the legitimacy and fairness of the election so they can rig it.

Contact your Members of Congress and tell them: take action NOW!

This list summarizes many of the methods and schemes they are now using to rig the election or win by barring or discouraging likely Democratic voters from casting ballots that actually get counted. 

Voter Suppression

Potential Democratic voters can be prevented from voting by making it difficult or impossible for them to register. This tactic became easier after the five Republican justices on the Supreme Court gutted a key provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that required regions with long histories of racially-motivated voting rights abuses to clear any change to election procedures with the DoJ. The Supreme Court ruling essentially allowed these regions to do whatever they wanted with their election procedures - including voter suppression - with impunity.

  • Voter-ID registration restrictions that target likely Dem voters

  • Racially targeted rules such as requiring street addresses on Indian reservations that can’t be met

  • Mass voting list “purges” that target people of color, students, and seniors 

  • Registration rules designed to hinder/block Dem constituencies and mounting voter-registration drives

  • Coordinated efforts to challenge Democratic voters at the polls (“caging”)

  • Rules requiring college students to vote in their home districts/states

  • Disenfranchising ex-convicts by law or by fines and court fees as a new kind of poll tax

  • Massive well-funded campaign of harassment lawsuits to block efforts to encourage voting

Vote-by-Mail (VBM)

Recent polls indicate that 78% of Democrats plan to vote by mail, while 63% of Republicans currently plan to vote in-person. Therefore, hindering VBM gives a significant partisan advantage to the GOP.

  • Blocking funds for USPS to prevent it from handling VBM ballots

  • Attempting to charge states higher postage for ballots (3x in some cases) to discourage VBM

  • Rule changes targeting VBM such as prohibiting rural postal workers from witnessing mail-in ballots

  • Degrading USPS capability, so that many ballots won’t be received for counting by deadline

    • Eliminating overtime to slow delivery and create massive backups

    • Firing 23 senior officials to centralize control by Postmaster General DeJoy

    • Removing/destroying mail sorting machines and other essential equipment

    • Rigid truck departure schedules that force postal workers to leave mail behind creating backlog

    • Removing mailboxes to make voting-by-mail slower and less convenient

    • Locking mailboxes, leaving them in place gives the impression they are open to accept mail

Voting Barriers

Long lines & wait times discourage voters, particularly the elderly, the ill, and the time-deprived.

  • Disallowing and restricting early & weekend voting to make it harder for working people to vote

  • Mandating early poll-closing deadlines that make it hard for workers to cast their ballots after work

  • Forcing in-person voting during a pandemic that’s dangerous for seniors & those with health problems

  • Closing/under-staffing/under-equipping polling places in Dem-leaning areas to create long lines

  • Requiring postage for mail ballots (a kind of poll tax)

Foreign Sabotage

  • Massive disinformation campaigns via Facebook & other social media to support GOP & divide Dems

  • Hacking into voter registrations & counting systems to disrupt or falsify

  • Dark money campaign contributions to GOP candidates and PACs

  • GOP Sens. Johnson, Grassley, Graham involvement with Rudy Guiliani & Russian operatives 

  • GOP Rep. Devin Nunes involvement with Rudy Giuliani & Russian operatives

Voter Intimidation

  • Prominent deployment of police around polling places with concentration of nonwhite voters

  • Armed militias, racists, & private security lurking at polling places where Democrats vote

  • Threats that ICE/CBP agents will target/intimidate legitimate voters because of their color or status

“Dirty Tricks”

  • Deliberately mailing/advertising misleading, and outright-false information to confuse voters

  • Misleading robocalls sowing misinformation and confusion as to polling locations and times

  • Sowing doubt by suggesting others are doing the tricks Republicans themselves plan to do

  • False public claims by Trump of “discovering” fake ballots

  • Voting machines with secret proprietary software from Republican-donor companies like Diebold

  • Resisting and opposing efforts to ensure a trackable trail of paper ballots to confirm count

  • Fake voter info & registration websites that gather personal info & trick voters 

Nullification

There is growing concern that if Trump takes an early lead in the Republican-heavy, in-person, vote-count, he will declare himself the winner on election night before all the mail ballots are counted. And then challenge the final results if they show him losing.

  • Lies to discredit vote-by-mail results in advance, because of alleged “voter fraud”

  • If enough states don't certify results, election thrown to House, where GOP has majority

  • Partisan rulings by Republican majority on Supreme Court re voting rights & election results

This list only focuses on voting and the election. It does not include other kinds of undemocratic Republican efforts, such as extreme partisan gerrymandering, to seize and hold power against the will of the majority of voters.

For more information:

Five Ways Trump And GOP Officials Are Undermining The Election Process, 538, 8/11/20

The GOP’s Plan to Suppress the Vote and Sabotage the Election, Rolling Stone, 7/16/20

Republicans are serious about voter suppression., Washington Post, 5/18/20

Freed by Court Ruling, Republicans Step Up Effort to Patrol Voting, New York Times, 5/18/20

Republicans devote $20m and 50,000 people to efforts to restrict voting, Guardian, 5/18/20

Republicans Now Just Admitting They Want Fewer Americans To Vote, Vanity Fair, 4/3/20

Block the Vote: Voter Suppression in 2020, ACLU, 2/3/20

The five ways Republicans will crack down on voting rights in 2020, Guardian, 11/13/19

Organizations:

Brennan Center for Justice

Rock the Vote

Fair Vote