Well, Damn, It’s a Nakkid on the Back Porch Kind of Day!
The 5th Circuit just struck down Texas’ highly restrictive voter ID law. I am shocked. Thrilled, but shocked!
More to come.
Important: Texas has to fix it before the November election!
For those who didn’t know – the Fifth Circuit is the most conservative court in the nation.
Our friend Kyle says he’s betting on Abbott calling an immediate special session to remedy this by doubling down. Texas has already spent over $3 million in legal fee alone fighting this losing battle. Both Kyle and I imagine that Abbott will call the session during the Democratic convention.
Another alternative is secession.
Who-hoo!
Great timing – we really need some good news this week!
1And a federal court in Wisconsin struck down the WI restrictive “voter ID bill.” The equally restrictive bill in NC is still before the federal court.
2To hell with that! It’s a nakkid, run down the street, cheering kind of day! Seems a whole lotta people are messin’ with Texas! Thanks, RBG!
3And RWNJ heads explode in 3…2…1
4You’d think at some point that GOP lawmakers would get tired of having their heads handed to them in federal court. On the other hand, actually addressing the state’s problems is a lot like work. It’s much easier to just gin up and pass idiotic bills like this voter ID nonsense.
5How long until Dan “Please Punch My Face) Patrick appears on the TV decrying the sad state of the judicial system, which is the obvious work of liberal judges “legislating” from the bench and ignoring “states rights.”
Bonus points for getting “states rights” in there!
6Unfortunately I’m betting they will find a way to stall it until December.
7Capitol Dave – they don’t care what the federal court says, they’re only interested in creating the text for the election sound bite. “See, we did our best to ‘protect’ the vote, but those liberals on the federal bench stymied us.” (Of course they wouldn’t use the word – stymie – since their constituents would have no idea what it meant but you get the idea.)
8Maybe the slime-balls have been brought close enough to the surface that it is obvious (enough) to force the courts to act. I find it interesting that the court considered whether there was in fact ANY cause for the restrictions based on occurrence of fraud, and there wasn’t evidence thereto.
My, my, the world looks better through fact colored glasses!
9Well, this does sort of look like a fiery sword appeared from Heaven and now that court needs dry underpants. Can’t help but wonder if the backlash caused by Trump et al. have finally reached the high benches of the land and they see the light at the end of the election tunnel to be a mag-lev train. Some times it takes the damnedest stuff possible to work a spontaneous conversion, even if only for a little while and on one issue only.
10Hallelujiah! Just hope those bstrds don’t come up with another way to cheat voters.
11Damn it,- if God wanted you to vote he would have made you white. And repub.
12Texas just needs a better turnout than 34% to stop this stuff.
We are coming up on redistricting in the next 4 years. I hope ta hell the Ds get their heads out of their arses this time.
Sorry Momma. I’m just dreading a POTUS Trump.
13Hurrah for the court decision. But as others living in TX have already observed, count on the TX legislature to spend lots of time and $ trying to stall….anything to get beyond November without having to address the problem. It would be amusing to see if there would be some originality in the excuses that are created but I am sure it will be the same mindless and dull idiocy that we have all come to expect. Bah, one could wish they were anerobes and didn’t waste the oxygen in the atmosphere.
14Well, why shouldn’t they take it to court time and again and again? They’ve been doing that with abortion and Obamacare and …
They’ve got to do something to keep the rubes from noticing they’re as useless as tits on a bull.
15I join in with a WOOHOO from S. CO, as well!! OMG … things are happening in TX and it’s good things for a change … Let’s hope it does happen before November!!
16There’s an epidemic!
The Florida Supreme Court ordered the state to redraw 3 districts that had been so gerrymandered as to render them unconstitutional. And it only took them 6 years out of the 10-year census cycle to get around to it.
The Republican majority legislature dragged its feet so hard that, last spring, the Court told them to get it done by June or the redistricting would be handed over to a bipartisan committee. Well, they couldn’t have THAT – – so as of this summer, the districts have been redrawn and I live in one of those brand-spanking new districts!
We could have a Democrat in Congress come November! And that’ll give us a matched set. Our rep will be joining our mayor, the majority of our city council and our voter registrar who are all Dems. And how cool is that?
Now – we’ve got to get Democrats to the polls in off years. Our state elections are held in non-presidential years [when Dems don’t vote] and THAT explains Rick Scott — not to mention Jeb Bush.
Blues! GOTV in off years, dammit!
17Remonds me of the time . . . lordy, don’t I sound ancient . . . years ago when the courts swung on the side of the most marginalized of the people and there was some well founded concern that the state govt. would do everything in its power not to cooperate. Up pops a bunch of pro bono lawyers in teams going into enough states to make a point of forcing the state govt. to comply. It isn’t always the ACLU that does this though they certainly do their share. Keeping digits crossed that the spirit of those pro bono lawyers still hangs around where it is needed most.
18The Repubs are to blame for voter suppression. The Dems are to blame for self-suppression of voting in 2010.
19Hallelujah! Now, is everybody registered to vote?
20Remonds me of the time . . . lordy, don’t I sound ancient . .
Some call it wisdom, you get that from life and experience. 🙂
21Last night on Austin TV, some TX legislator from somewhere I forget was fulminating about how bad the decision was, and how even one fraudulent vote was one too many.
The program started by showing an elderly lady in Austin whose vote wasn’t counted because her driver’s license had expired shortly before the election. Legal resident, but not counted. How many others weren’t counted because of some technicality?
They also had a segment on the new! spiffy-wonderful!! mega driver’s license center in Pflugerville that’s supposed to be fast–only it can take 8 weeks to get an appointment to take your driving test if you make the appointment online, and this is the only walk-in center, with people lining up at 5 am and getting turned away. In other words, getting your required ID can take MONTHS if you need a driving test in addition. And multiple visits if you just need a state-issued ID to vote with: I watched this happen at the DL place in Georgetown when I was there last week. Elderly lady in nursing home was supposed to have a notarized letter from nursing home proving that was where she lived, but nursing home didn’t provide notary service. This was her *second* trip to the DL office (she didn’t drive; her daughter had to bring her) and she was almost turned away for not having the right papers again.)
Lege refuses to consider the cost of having to spend hours at a DL office to get the ID, when they have cut funds for these offices so that both hours and staffing have been cut, and it takes longer than ever to get through. And the cost and time to get a birth certificate if you don’t live near enough to Austin, plus the cost and time to get the state-issued-photo-ID…grrr.
And the only voter fraud I know of was done by Republicans anyway. (Well, OK, SINCE ballot-box-13 in Duval Co. when I was a young’un.
22Elizabeth gotta love those good Democrats who were so loyal they left the graveyard to vote!
23At least the dead had photos of their headstones as proof of residency.
Ms Elizabeth- if a wingnut isn’t personally inconvenienced, that inconvenience does not exist for anyone else. Explains why right wingers are ever so clueless about…..well….. everything.
24As I DPS employee who works in IT, let me just say that we would just LOVE to get rid of the EIC (voter certificates to the rest of you) from the Driver License system. I don’t know if it uses the same storage, but it uses the same data entry and the same data entry people. Those people come in on Saturdays before elections to help people get their EICs, bless them (no DL business allowed on Saturday).
We shouldn’t feel guilty when we go on vacation, but we look at those lines (or the software we are testing, in my case) and know people are going to be waiting longer when we do.
This was really good news, JJ. Thanks for sharing.
The other Susan.
25***I must point out that my views are not in any way, shape, or form official views of the DPS. Just my personal say so. But really folks, let the people vote.
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