Things Get Worse (Better) For Republicans (Democrats) In Wisconsin
Increased access to the ballot is almost always bad news for Republicans.
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There are three swing states Donald Trump absolutely cannot afford to lose: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. With just those three states, President Joe Biden reaches 270 electoral votes and it’s over.
Biden is re-elected. Trump goes to jail. Republicans face another four years of America not catering to the rich and licking Putin’s boots. Just awful. If you’re a MAGA Republican.
That’s why yesterday’s news out of Wisconsin must have sent a whole lot of MAGAts diving for the nearest fainting couch:
MADISON, Wis. — Liberals who control the Wisconsin Supreme Court signaled Monday that they were prepared to overturn a two-year-old decision that banned absentee ballot drop boxes and allow them for the 2024 election.
The justices’ comments during oral arguments offered the latest sign that the liberal majority is prepared to act boldly and swiftly to change policies the conservatives put in place during their 15 years controlling the court in one of the country’s most important swing states. In December, the court struck down a redistricting plan that had helped Republicans maintain their lock on the state legislature.
Elections have consequences, assholes. Ha. Ha. Ha.
It’s important to remember that Republicans abused their power for over a decade to strip Wisconsinites of a lot of their constitutional rights. In an almost 50/50 state, they gerrymandered themselves a majority. It was so lopsided, Republicans were within spitting distance of a veto-proof majority in 2022. In a state where they routinely lost the popular vote.
When the GOP had full control of the state, they crushed voting rights and restricted access to the ballot. When those tactics failed and Republicans could no longer directly control elections, they had the Republican-controlled state supreme court do their dirty work instead.
That is how ballot drop boxes magically became “dangerous” and “illegal” despite there not being a shred of evidence to back these claims up:
Drop boxes had been used in some Wisconsin communities for years, and they proliferated in 2020 as voters turned to absentee voting in unprecedented numbers because of the coronavirus pandemic. Both Republicans and Democrats in the state initially embraced their use. Republicans later turned against them and cheered on a lawsuit challenging their legality.
This is the exact same thing Republicans did with mail-in ballots. They invented stories about voter fraud and declared that any method other than in-person voting was suspect. Convicted felon Dinesh D’Souza made an entire movie around these fraudulent drop box claims called “2000 Mules” which was so laughably inaccurate and so quickly debunked that only the stupidest people still bring it up. In fact, it was so unbelievably fact-free, the book version was pulled from shelves and presumably, every copy the publisher could hide from the public was burned.
Naturally, “2000 Mules” is extremely popular with millions of Republicans which tells you everything you need to know about how fucking gullible/dumb they are.
Still, once Republicans failed to rig the election for an open state supreme court seat and the court tilted left, all that hard work turning Wisconsin into a proto-authoritarian paradise is going to waste. Gerrymandering? Toast. And now Democrats are running candidates in every single district. Republicans will almost certainly kiss their overwhelming majorities goodbye. Not for nothing, they haven’t had to actually campaign for real in almost 15 years. What are they going to run on? Give us power again so we can continue to strip your civil rights and give tax cuts to the rich?
Good fucking luck with that, buddy.
With drop boxes open for business again, more people will be able to vote and that’s rarely ever good news for Republicans. Increased voter participation doesn’t always guarantee a Democratic win but the trend is very much in our favor. Why do you think Republicans have spent decades and billions of dollars to limit the franchise in every way imaginable? Sure, they are ideologically opposed to democracy but they have practical reasons as well. Less voting helps Republicans. Believe me when I tell you that they are furious about this.
What’s happening in Wisconsin is why I keep telling people to pay such close attention to a state they would normally only care about during presidential elections. Wisconsin is a microcosm of what we will be able to do if (when) we take back the Supreme Court.
Gerrymandering? Gone. The Voting Rights Act? Restored. Voter ID laws? Struck down. Just those three things, by themselves, would cripple the Republican Party for decades, possibly dealing a fatal blow.
The best part about it is that no elections would be rigged. No rights would be taken away. No cheating is required. These would be free and fair elections and that, alone, is toxic to a party that can only thrive when the fix is in.
Wisconsin is showing us the future. All we have to do is watch and dream big.
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Color me clueless, but if the GQP thinks that only voting in person is the legal way to vote, how the fuck are Americans overseas supposed to vote? Are they (Repubs) really *that* stupid?
(wait, I need to stop. I'm making sense)
Now it’s time for Ohio to make the same changes - with a ballot initiative in November to take the redistricting out of the hands of the GOP. An evenly divided state is badly gerrymandered red. Enough!