Tell Senator Feinstein: You Must Defend Democracy!
Call Senator Feinstein
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Call Script
Hi, my name is _____ and I live in ZIP code _____ and I’m a member of Indivisible SF.
Senator Feinstein, I disagree with you – democracy IS in jeopardy. To further their Big Lie that Trump won the election, Republicans tried to subvert the vote count. When that failed, they incited a violent mob attack on Congress to prevent you and your colleagues from certifying the results. And in state legislatures across the nation they are ramming through a wave of highly partisan voter-suppression and anti-democracy laws. So, YES, democracy is under attack. While I applaud your vote on Tuesday, June 22, to allow Senate debate on the For the People Act, the result of that vote confirms that the only way to defend democracy is to pass meaningful national voting rights protections, and the only way to do that is to end or reform the filibuster system.
Senator Feinstein, the time has come – it's either democracy or the filibuster, we can't have both.
Furthermore, with democracy in danger and with our nation still suffering from the health and economic shocks of the COVID pandemic, this is no time for Congress to take August off. If meaningful voting rights legislation and the two infrastructure bills have not been passed by the end of July, I call on you to continue working for your constituents through August into September.
Background & References
Voter suppression and election rigging. Motivated by the Big Lie, a wave of anti-democracy laws are being rammed through Republican-controlled state governments across the country. These include strategically targeted, partisan voter-ID and voter-registration laws; rules and regulations that make it harder for urban voters to cast ballots, voter purges aimed at disenfranchising nonwhite, young, and senior voters who lean Democratic, structural changes that empower highly-partisan elected officials to dominate and overrule local voting officials, and authority for state legislatures to set aside and overturn results they don't like. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-may-2021
Feinstein's statement. In response to a reporter's question, Feinstein responded: “If democracy were in jeopardy, I would want to protect it,” but “I don’t see it being in jeopardy right now." https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/06/10/have-a-little-bit-of-faith-manchin-says-senate-going-in-right-direction-without-nuking-filibuster/
Indivisibles' Letter to Feinstein. On Monday, June 21st, a letter asking Feinstein's to acknowledge that democracy is in danger and urging her to abolish or reform the filibuster was sent to her by more than 100 California Indivisible chapters and progressive organizations. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1JYfA1MyX6ozjL3aboqBbVmGYqCNVaZF_BFj0P99sL1k/edit
Manchin's compromise proposal. On June 16, Senator Manchin offered a set of proposals that he hoped would evolve through negotiation into a bipartisan alternative to the For The People and John Lewis Voting Rights acts. His compromise included some significant provisions from the two Democratic bills plus some provisions, such as a national voter-ID requirement, that Republicans desired. https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/politics/list-manchin-elections-bill-proposed-changes/index.html
Republican opposition to all national voting rights legislation. McConnell and other Republican leaders instantly expressed total and absolute opposition not only to Manchin's compromise proposal but to any national voting rights protections. “It would usurp the rights of the states,” explained Steve Daines (R-MT) echoing what is now the GOP position that only states have the right to enact voting laws despite the fact that Congress has enacted many national voting rights laws in the past. https://www.politico.com/news/2021/06/17/gop-manchin-election-compromise-495023
(Note that in 1965, “states rights” was the main argument used by segregationists in their futile attempt to block the original Voting Rights Act. Had the Senate at that time not rejected their position, we would still have literacy tests, poll taxes, grandfather clauses, and all the other schemes and tricks used to deny nonwhite citizens the vote.)
Filibuster Explained (simplified). The filibuster is a Senate rule that allows any single senator to unilaterally require that most legislation receive a 60-vote supermajority in order to be passed rather than a simple majority vote. The filibuster is not in the Constitution; it's an internal rule that can be changed by the senators themselves whenever they wish, as they have done many times in the past. https://indivisiblesf.org/blog/2021/6/22/the-filibuster-explained-simplified
It's either democracy or the filibuster. The filibuster was imposed in the early 1800s and used by slave-state senators to prevent federal actions that might restrict their “peculiar institution.” After the Civil War it was used for decades to block civil rights legislation and anti-lynching laws. In recent times it's been used by Republicans to prevent passage of a wide range of broadly popular progressive measures supported by the great majority of Americans. https://indivisible.org/resource/congress-101-filibuster
No August recess if voting rights and infrastructure have not been enacted. Republicans believe they can take back the Senate and perhaps the House in 2022 if they are able to stymie the Democratic legislative agenda. So they are delaying and obstructing legislation and executive appointments in every way they can. Democrats need to fight back. In 2018, when McConnell wanted to jam even more right-wing judges into the federal courts against Democratic resistance, he canceled the Senate's August recess. Now Democrats can use the same tactic to push for voting rights and economic relief. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-06-07/congress-should-cancel-its-summer-recess