TO HEAR Republicans tell it, a bill that the House passed late Wednesday night would spell the end of the republic. It is “unconstitutional, reckless, and anti-democratic,” former vice president Mike Pence proclaimed. The bill is “the most divisive, unconstitutional and destructive piece of legislation of my time in Congress,” Rep. Garland “Andy” Barr (R-Ky.) railed. “It would effectively make it legal to cheat.”
The bill that has these politicians frothing is H.R. 1, a long piece of legislation with a noble purpose: making it easier for Americans to vote and encouraging the government to be more responsive to the people. Republicans’ apocalyptic rhetoric is so wildly disproportionate to the contents of the bill, one must wonder what they are really worried about.
Conservatives complain that the bill would mandate early voting, no-excuse absentee voting, provisional ballots for people who accidentally vote out-of-precinct, same-day voter registration and automatic voter registration. So? There is nothing scary or even unusual about these reforms, which many states have embraced without seeing the pervasive fraud Republicans predict and claim falsely has occurred. Continue reading.