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Reminder: if conservatives can't win via democracy they will always resort to autocracy.
this post was submitted on 19 Aug 2024
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Also reminder: If Republicans are accusing someone of something, it's because they're already doing that something.
Bingo
You can just say "Bi-"
Oh, nevermind, that was correct. Carry on.
This strategy of challenging and removing voters in communities that are largely oppositional isn't unique to the Republican Party, but it is a favorite of theirs. And the argument always boils down to claims of "illegal voting" to swing the election, which they then leverage into claims that any Democrat advantage on voting day was won fraudulently.
This is why i register as Republican. Never voted R once, but strangely and unlike several family members, I've never been purged from voter rolls, either.
WEIRD.
That's more likely a function of your age and voting district than your registration. This kind of disenfranchisement is just a numbers game, so if you're living in Houston's Third Ward or you are trying to vote from the UT 40 Acres in Austin as a registered Republican you still run the risk of being purged or having your registration "lost", because you're in a community that's overwhelmingly liberal-leaning.
By contrast, if you're out in The Woodlands or Beaumont or Midland, you'll have local Republicans actively encouraging you to register. One of the savvier moves Abbott did after the nail-biter Senate race in 2018 was to get a bunch of organizers and registrars out to South and West Texas gun shows, signing up anyone with a passing interest in firearms. 2020 and 2022 have been much more favorable to Republicans, as a result.
You can get the same result by being unaffiliated but without the stain of being a registered republican.
The benefit to being registered R is that you get to vote in the republican primaries, which means your vote has a much larger impact in determining who will be the republican front runner. I generally don’t care who wins the general, as long as it’s a democrat. But if a republican wins, I care quite a bit. So voting in the primaries allows me to have a much larger sway in who is actually running against the democrat candidate I’ll be voting for in the general.
The reason republicans run crazies is because those crazies make it through the primaries. Being registered R allows me to vote for the least crazy crazy person.
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But, once again, thems the ones that get removed. I'll register as Sith if it lets me fuck with the Repubes.
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As bad as this is, it's only one small part of the MAGA cult's strategy to steal the election. They're not "just" trying to invalidate voter registrations or discourage people from casting ballots; they're also trying to stop the votes that do manage to be cast from being counted and validated.
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There are no less than 70 election deniers working as county election officials in key swing states.
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Georgia's MAGA-controlled elections board is about to approve a rule requiring that any discrepancy between the number of people who voted and a hand count of the number of ballots cast be "investigated" indefinitely -- which means a MAGA poll worker could singlehandedly sabotage the entire precinct's result reporting simply by "accidentally" miscounting.
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They're recruiting 100,000 poll "observers" to be in a position to disrupt and sabotage the vote counting nationwide.
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Preventing states from certifying their votes opens up all sorts of avenues for Trump to steal the Presidency, ranging from being declared the winner by SCOTUS a la Bush v. Gore in 2000, to prevent Congress from certifying the results a la Jan 6, to -- and this is the one I think they're going for this time -- keeping both candidates below 270 EC votes, which throws the decision to a House vote with one vote per state, which would obviously result in low-population MAGA states thwarting the will of the vast majority of the population.
There's a reason why Trump keeps telling his supporters that they won't have to vote anymore and the Project 2025 ghouls are saying that "we are in the process of a second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be": because they are 100% all-in on destroying free and fair elections in this country.
Voting is more essential than ever, but it also will not be enough. Even a landslide for Kamala isn't enough if the states refuse to acknowledge the reality of it! We (and by "we" I mean every American who isn't an outright democracy-hating traitor, regardless of how you feel about Kamala's policy platform) need to figure out some direct countermeasures to the MAGA fascists' schemes and mobilize to implement them -- fast. Otherwise, we're gonna win the popular vote and the Electoral College vote -- at least in factual reality, as confirmed long after the fact -- but Trump is gonna be coronated as a dictator anyway.
I really hope that there are at least some official or public figures who are tasked with the job of doing something about it
That's exactly the problem: the MAGA fascists have been spending 4+ years going all-in on inserting their people into exactly those positions, up to and including SCOTUS. (And I don't just mean SCOTUS' conservative majority in general; I mean three of them literally helped perpetrate Bush v. Gore.) Are there enough non-traitorous officials left to effectively oppose them? I don't know! It sure doesn't seem like it here in Georgia, even despite Raffensperger and Kemp not bending the knee to the cult leader.
I'm also extremely worried that (a) we need to be a bunch of normal people to form an organized resistance that goes well beyond just voting (e.g. to become poll watchers as a counter-balance to the MAGA ones), but also (b) any such tactics (at least ones I can think of) to counter the MAGAs' election disruptions would themselves also be disruptive and thus play into the MAGAs' hands anyway.
In summary:
- If MAGA election officials refuse to certify enough votes, they win.
- If MAGA election observers successfully sabotage the count, they win.
- If MAGA election observers fail to sabotage the count but cause enough disruption to cast it into doubt/get courts involved (either slow-walking it with MAGA judges like Aileen Cannon, or appealing it up to SCOTUS), they win.
- If non-fascist election observers try to intervene to stop MAGA ones, it also causes enough disruption to cast it into doubt/get courts involved and the MAGAs win.
- If non-fascists try to remove MAGAs from being in positions to do these things in the first place, they cry fraud, kick it to the courts, and win.
There apparently are some new rules non-fascist politicians have passed to try to shore up the certification process, but I fear they'll be "too little, too late." (In fact, they're so few that I can't even find a news article to cite about them right now...) As for us regular citizens, there's fuck-all we can do (at least that I can think of) to actively oppose the blatant attempted theft of the election, and instead we can only vote as if nothing is wrong and just sort of hope the MAGAs don't have enough manpower (despite election denialism continuing to spread!) to pull it off even without any interference.
I don't know of any fascist movement in history that has successfully been resisted by acting like it's business as usual in a normal functioning democracy and hoping for the best. But as far as I can tell, that's what we're doing.
The MAGAs only win if the big blue states play along. I know that's tantamount to civil war, but in the event of blatant election interference they should just refuse to accept the "new" federal government. Peaceful transition of power is a lie if the process is illegitimate.
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This must be some more of that "you won't need to vote anymore" that the GOPs leaders are talking up.
Republicans have always objected to any kind of federal ID. Its wild to me they then use the lack of federal ID to justify their theoretical fears. The second moderates realize republicans have been gaslighting america for like 60 years the party is done:
They create humanitarian crises in venezuela then complain about immigrants.
They drive up the national debt with tax cuts for the worlds wealthiests morons and then complain about the debt.
It's all by design.
A federal id would mean that they can no longer pull this bullshit
Must be hard to be the party that is only competitive when as few as possible vote.
In Europe I get a voting pass sent in the mail for every election. To vote I have to show both this pass and a valid ID. The pass is kept by the polling station. Easy and quick.
How come it is so difficult in the USA to exert your democratic right? Why does one of the parties fight against people voting?
How come it is so difficult in the USA to exert your democratic right?
Because half of the population of the country (republicans) don't want the other half to have any rights at all. They no longer care about freedom or this country. They only care about screwing over those who don't agree with them. Yes, they're that stupid.
Its difficult to vote to keep people from voting. When people are allowed to vote Republicans lose elections.
"Why does one of the parties fight against people voting?"
In general, high voter turn out leans left.
And each state determines the rules for voting. I'm in Illinois, so when I register I'm assigned a polling place. When I go there to vote, I give them my name (no need for ID) they find it in a book, I sign a thing and they give me a ballot and tear off a receipt that I keep. I'm in a traditionally Democratic/blue State.
Republican/Red states tend to do what they can to make voting harder, like frequent purging of voter registration (and not notifying people that they're not registered anymore) or making it nearly impossible to vote by mail, then require voting in person and limiting the number of places you can vote to the point people stand in line for hours. Oh yeah, then make it illegal to offer people waiting in line a bottle of water.
Do you have to pay for your ID, and are there any barriers to getting one?
Republicans love to make it hard for poor minorities to have indentification. Hell, I am above the median age but we have to shuffle utilities around between the adults in the home just to renew our fucking driver's licenses here because of bullshit 'proof of address' requirements.
For NL:
Your ID costs money, but you are required to have one if you are not at home, so it's difficult to make obtaining one difficult. :) you need it 100%.
Also prices are in a set range, from 0 euros to 75,80 (2024), depending on what the local municipalities decide is fair (in that range).
Proof of address is obtained from the "basic person administration" (BRP), when you obtain your ID. That address is used to send you your Voting Pass and candidate list, so this is where the loop closes. If you have your ID and Voting Pass, your address checked out.
In Europe I get a voting pass sent in the mail for every election. To vote I have to show both this pass and a valid ID.
In the Netherlands it doesn't even have to be a valid ID. If it hasn't been expired for more than 5 years it's fine for voting purposes.
Many European countries (at least the one I live in) have mandatory registration of residences which doubles as voter registration. In my country only homeless people and I think citizens living abroad have to explicitly register to vote.
My understanding is that this is not so in the US, the government doesn't reliably know where people currently live and whether they are entitled to vote, so most people have to register to vote.
In South Africa it's even easier.
There are multiple voter registration weekends 2 times a year. Or you can register any time at an election commission office.
You go with your ID document and register to vote in the district, DONE. You never need to do it again, unless you move to another district.
Come voting day, you pitch up with your ID document and you vote.
As with many American "problems" they just want to solve because it's "too hard"
"Too hard" stopped being a valid excuse in Kindergarten.
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In the UK we didn't even need that until recently.
You just turned up, told them your name and address, they tick you off on their form and you vote.
Now you need to show ID as well, which is just not needed. There was no evidence of fraud to start with, and almost all the ID checks are pure theatre. The woman who checked mine at the polling station was about 80. She barely glanced at the passport, but then spent ages squinting at the paper form which was right in front of her. They had a woman who couldn't see checking the IDs. I sincerely hope she wasn't driving home.
this sort of bullshit cheating is only going to perpetually increase all the way up to the election and beyond.
Texas is really fucky. My wife needs a new ID and has to go in in person. Ever since the pandemic the DMV has been by appointment only. When I went to make one the soonest I could get was almost February of 2025 and that was something like 40 miles away. I decided to check Austin and San Antonio as I'm between both. Neither had any availability for the foreseeable future.
Texas requires that you present you driver's license or state ID to vote. If you need either and can't renew by mail, you either have to travel a hundred or more miles to a DMV in the middle of no where or not be able to vote. Maybe it's the tin hat wearing part of me talking but this all seems awful coincidental.
Maybe it’s the tin hat wearing part of me talking but this all seems awful coincidental.
it's not a "conspiracy theory" in that there's nothing "theory" about it. GOP isn't even trying to hide the fact that they're working to keep as many people from voting as possible, especially people who may not have the means to travel 100 miles and jump through hoops within hoops just to be able to vote. GOP has been working on suppressing votes for many years.
Not just this sort; many other sorts of bullshit cheating as well. At this rate, we will be incredibly lucky if the election is actually decided by normal means (Electors chosen by popular vote) at all, as opposed to the winner being decreed by SCOTUS or the decision being thrown to a "one state, one vote" poll in the House because the MAGAs caused enough states to refuse to certify that nobody got to 270 EC votes.
Fuck all the idiots who voted in these unamerican people into positions of American leadership.
Is there any particular reason to believe these voters are even primarily Democrats? Or are they just happy with the demographics of the last election and don't care whose vote gets tossed as long as the needle doesn't move?
The prime Republican demographic is rich white christian men.
Voters that don't provide proof of citizenship are very likely to be poor. It's a hoop to jump through that's a lot harder when you don't have money, time, and a car.
I'll also point out that it's completely unnecessary as the great state of AZ has all the resources they'd need to go name by name and verify that these people are indeed citizens. Making them provide it during registration is a filler for the poor.
Much like literacy tests were there to filter out black people.
At this point, the prime republican demographic is uneducated white men. There are a lot more of them than the rich ones. And they vote for Trump even if they don't usually vote.
Is this a joke?
Nope. Nothing in the article states any demographic bias among these voters. But perhaps I'm just not understanding the identification being used. I assume by federal documentation it means like passport or military ID.
Actually I guess passport would be proof of citizenship so I'm just OOTL why these people would be targeted.
And I guess it says federal form not federal form of identification so I'm illiterate as well as confused.
Last edit: So if I understand correctly there is a state form that requires proof of citizenship, and a federal form which does not. So if you don't have ID, which is more likely for poor people, your only choice to register is using the federal form which would make them skew poorer and more likely minority, meaning Democrat. Is that right? That all makes perfect sense but I feel like it took a lot of extra work to get there.
I must be having an autistic day because this is like the third time I just couldn't get what someone was saying when it was clear to everyone else.
The dispute being "they want to move for the other guy, so please stop them, we van only win by cheating!"
At this point Republicans just need to move to Venezuela so they can feel at home.
The SCOTUS abides
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