Today, End Citizens United // Let America Vote Action Fund President Tiffany Muller, National Democratic Redistricting Committee Chairman and former Attorney General Eric Holder, Congressman Colin Allred (TX-32), Congresswoman Sharice Davids (KS-03), and Congresswoman Kathy Manning (NC-06) held a press call to discuss the ramifications of extreme Republican-led partisan gerrymandering and the need for the U.S. Senate to quickly pass the Freedom to Vote Act to counter these partisan power grabs.
Key points from the call:
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Tiffany Muller, President of End Citizens United // Let America Vote Action Fund
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Right now, they’re rigging the system… We’ve seen it all across the country where they are passing bills that restrict the freedom to vote and are preparing to sabotage or overturn future election results. And it’s all being propped up and funded by dark money–tens of millions of dollars that are all working in coordination.
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In states across the country, Republicans are using extreme partisan gerrymandering to redraw Congressional districts that stack the deck and deny voters their voice and fair representation.
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[The Freedom to Vote Act] will ban partisan gerrymandering, so that voters pick their officials, rather than the other way around, it protects the freedom to vote, it sets national standards, so that no matter who you are or where you live, you can access the ballot box, and it gets rid of the dark money.
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National Democratic Redistricting Committee Chairman and former Attorney General Eric Holder
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Republicans in the states are gerrymandering the maps to artificially hold on to power and the Republicans in Congress are blocking the Freedom to Vote Act to enable their state counterparts.
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[The Freedom to Vote Act] contains really powerful protections against congressional gerrymandering, which would be a game-changer.
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Preventing states from adopting congressional maps where the outcomes of elections are predetermined by the lines… before a single vote is cast… is really critical to safeguarding the idea and decor of American democracy.
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Congresswoman Kathy Manning (NC-06)
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The Freedom to Vote Act is a comprehensive piece of legislation that aims at eliminating dark money from elections, it aims to end partisan gerrymandering, to crack down on voter suppression tactics, and to expand access to the ballot box.
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It’s critically important the Senate act now to pass the Freedom to Vote Act to protect the promise of democracy for all Americans.
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If you’re looking for an example of extreme partisan gerrymandering, the new map drawn in my district is a perfect example. This is an appalling political power grab, it is an example of why the Senate must pass the Freedom to Vote Act.
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Congressman Colin Allred (TX-32)
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Before the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, preclearance acted as a shield to protect Texans from having their votes diluted. Without those protections, we’re seeing communities cracked and packed to protect the political power of a party that’s increasingly out of touch with the needs of our state and doesn’t reflect our state.
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[We’ve seen] voting restrictions, like we’ve seen in Texas, that make it harder for certain Americans to cast their ballot, and more recently, congressional and legislative maps, like we’ve seen in Texas, that dilute the voting power of certain communities.
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We have an opportunity to end partisan gerrymandering to ensure that the redistricting process is not used for partisan, cynical political gain or to lock in minority rule.
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Congresswoman Sharice Davids (KS-03)
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It’s often partisan actors taking advantage of the process for personal, political gain, party political gain, and it is all at the expense of voters and the people and citizens of our country.
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Folks are saying the quiet part out loud. There are leaders in the Kansas legislature who have explicitly stated their motivation to gerrymander maps to their party’s political advantage.
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[The Freedom to Vote Act] is a compromise bill that is based on a number of bipartisan policies. It would do things like make election day a holiday, it would reduce the impact of dark money on our elections, ensure that voters are choosing their representatives and not the other way around.
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