Two-Thirds Of Americans Want Vote By Mail-- Texas GOP Wants To See More Voters Infected Instead

Texas has a crackpot extremist as its Attorney General, Ken Paxton, a very far right and very partisan Republican. He somehow thinks preventing Democrats from voting is part of his job description. On Friday he sent a letter to all Texas county judges and election officials asserting that fear of contracting the coronavirus was an "emotional condition" and not a sufficient reason to request an absentee ballot." Paxton: "[A] reasonable fear of contracting the virus is a normal emotional reaction to the current pandemic and does not, by itself, amount to a 'sickness,' much less the type of sickness that qualifies a voter to receive a ballot by mail."

The Texas Republican Party, like the extreme right Wisconsin Republican Party. would rather see people die-- or not vote-- than make vote-by-mail easy. Over 50 voters and poll workers in Milwaukee alone came down with COVID-19 after primary day. Texas Republicans do not care. The city government of Milwaukee does and passed a new statute-- signed by the mayor-- which will result in the city mailing absentee ballot applications with prepaid return postage to roughly 300,000 registered voters.

I hope Democratic cities-- like Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin, El Paso-- and counties-- Bexar, Brooks, Cameron, Culberson, Dallas, Dimmit, Duval, El Paso, Ft. Bend, Frio, Harris, Hidalgo, Jim Hogg, Jim Wells, Kenedy, Kleberg, La Salle, Maverick, Presidio, Reeves, Starr, Travis, Webb, Willacy, Zapata and Zavala-- all do the same thing in Texas. They should-- and not just because there are 38 electoral votes and likely 9 House seats and control of the lower chamber of the state legislature all hanging in the balance. Even more important are the lives of voters that hang in the balance. And they know it.

Mike Siegel, the progressive candidate who plans to replace Trump crony Michael McCaul in November, worked as a city attorney for Austin. "The Texas Attorney General," he tildes this morning, "is lying and scheming to suppress the vote. Unfortunately, that's business as usual for the Texas GOP. Not only does his position undermine democracy and public health in one fell swoop, it also contradicts Texas law. A state court judge ruled three weeks ago that anyone in Texas can vote by mail. Paxton is trying to use his bully pulpit to confuse and intimidate voters. But the law, in Texas, as of right now, is that every voter in the state is 'disabled' under the law because we risk injury by voting in person. This shows the importance of our work to build a movement for political change in Texas. These folks are literally killing us to protect their corporate sponsors. The top law enforcement officer in the state is lying to everyone just to maintain the tenuous GOP grip on power. When we finally dislodge these corrupt morons, the floodgates will open. Not only will we empower millions and millions of Texans, opening doors to strong public schools and good healthcare and a living wage and more, but we will strike a mortal blow to rightwing movements nationwide. So if you are lucky enough to live in a region where you have reasonably competent elected officials, join our work here in Texas. The lives and rights of millions may depend on it."

Julie Oliver, the progressive Democrat who wonder primary with 70% of the vote and now faces Trumpist bootlicker Roger Williams agreed with Siegel. "Ken Paxton," she reminded us, "has been under federal indictment for defrauding his fellow Republican lawmakers and friends out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. He has led the attacks on DACA and the Affordable Care Act. He is a disgrace. Texas has a shameful history of trying to keep people from voting using intimidation that goes back to long before Jim Crow. The AG's recent threats against county election officials do not carry any legal weight. This is working its weigh through court right now, but as of today, Judge Tim Sulak's recent ruling in federal court-- that every Texan may apply to vote by mail by checking the box that denotes that coronavirus and the threat of contracting represents a disability that would prevent them from going to the polls-- carries the weight of law. Now the Secretary of State must weigh in, so that every county election official has clear guidelines on accepting vote by mail applications and getting those ballots to every Texan so that they aren't forced to choose between the possibility of getting sick and exercising their constitutional right to vote."

Texas has had a fairly easy pandemic so far. But the cases per million climbs every day. From Saturday to Sunday, cases grew from 31,993 (1,147 per million Texans) to 32,332 (1,159 cases per million Texans). With the Texas Republicans having decided to open the state up before any safety thresholds have been met, you can be sure that by summer, that ratio will be well over 2,000 per million.

The Suffolk Poll did a national survey for USA Today, released yesterday, showing that Americans, despite Fox and Trump propaganda vilifying it, overwhelming support vote-by-mail.

Two-thirds of Americans support voting by mail as an alternative to voting in person on Election Day during the coronavirus pandemic.

But while Democrats and independent voters overwhelmingly back vote-by-mail, the majority of Republican voters oppose it.

The poll found 65% of Americans support vote-by-mail as an alternative, a greater than 2-to-1 margin over the 32% of Americans who oppose the option. Three percent said they were undecided.

Findings differ dramatically by party. Eighty-four percent of Democratic voters said they support voting by mail and just 14% said they oppose it. Less than half of Republicans polled, 43%, said they support vote-by-mail as an alternative while more than half, 53%, were opposed.

Self-identified independent voters said they back vote-by-mail during the pandemic by a 66%-31% margin.

...Trump has said he opposes vote-by-mail expansion, alleging it leads to voter fraud and favors Democratic candidates. Vote-by-mail advocates dispute both claims. Although some Republican governors and secretaries of state favor more absentee voting, others have said a large-scale expansion in six months is unrealistic.

"Because Trump is in power, his M.O. has to be, let's replicate as closely as possible the conditions under which he was elected. That stands by the methods by which people will cast ballots," Paleologos said. "Anything that varies from that template, he's going to oppose vehemently.

He added: "The question is whether or not people who understand how widespread this problem is and how it's impacting so many different aspects of people's lives, are they willing to be flexible so that democracy isn't impacted adversely in any way?"

Thirty-four states already have "no-excuse" absentee voting laws under which citizens either automatically receive ballots at home or can get them upon request.

Voting by mail is most prevalent in the West. Five states-- Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Utah and Washington-- hold all-mail elections in which all registered voters are mailed ballots. More than two-thirds of voting in three other states-- Arizona, California and Montana-- is conducted by mail.

In 16 states, voters can receive mail ballots but only if they meet certain exceptions such as being 65 years or older, having a disability, or being out of the county on Election Day and during the early voting period.

Leaders in some of these 16 states, including Delaware and Connecticut, have taken steps toward expanded vote-by-mail or pledged support. But other states led by Republicans, particularly in the South, have expressed concerns about changes.

The state of Tennessee was sued on Friday by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and Campaign Legal Center-- on behalf of two voters and five organizations, including Tennessee’s NAACP chapter-- over its absentee voting law, which the plaintiffs said is among the nation's most restrictive.

The groups argue the U.S. Constitution does not allow Tennessee to require voters to "jeopardize their health and safety" in order to exercise their fundamental right to vote.

...Voting rights advocates, including the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York School of Law, have sounded the alarm about the urgency for quick action to build the necessary infrastructure for vote-by-mail on a national scale.

Their fear is a nationwide repeat of last month's Wisconsin primary when voters were forced to weigh safety with exercising their democratic rights. Many stood in line for hours wearing face masks to brave their way to the polls, particularly in the state's largest city, Milwaukee.

But the estimated price-tag needed to pay for everything from postage stamps to signature-identification software is at least $2 billion The CARES Act, approved by Congress last month, allocated $400 million to election security amid the pandemic, but states aren't required to use the money on vote-by-mail.

Senate Democrats, led by Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Ron Wyden of Oregon, introduced the Natural Disaster and Emergency Ballot Act in March that seeks to ensure all voters nationwide can vote absentee and at least 20 days of early voting. The bill, which lacks any Republican co-sponsors, is a long shot to pass in the GOP-led Senate.

"Politicians follow all of the polls very closely," Paleologos said. "It's not the pollsters talking here. It's people. And people are sending a clear message about how willing they are to expand the opportunities to vote such that they don't jeopardize their own health or well-being or their family's health and well-being."

And it isn't just Tennessee being sued over attempts of the GOP to prevent easier access to vote by mail. Yesterday the Raleigh News and Observer reported that "A group of voters backed by Democratic legal groups sued North Carolina on Monday seeking to loosen rules around absentee mail-in ballots amid predictions that the coronavirus pandemic will make voting by mail a widespread practice. They want the state to provide prepaid postage on all absentee ballots, change a requirement for two witnesses to sign a ballot, extend the deadline for receipt of ballots until nine days after Election Day and give voters a chance to fix signature discrepancies before election officials reject those ballots." The Republicans in the state legislature are rushing around for their smelling salts.