Georgia Democrats and U.S. Senators are fighting to uphold the very work that late Georgia Rep. John Lewis dedicated his life to
(The Slice): Senate Rules Committee Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) led the first senate field meeting in 20 years in Georgia on Monday to examine voting rights, carrying on the spirit of Georgia's late Congressman John Lewis. The battle for voting rights in key states like Georgia is directly connected to national fight. Klobuchar is keenly aware of this and made an unconventional decision to leave DC and address the matter where the problems arose.
"This is absurd. This is not America. So what we need to do is make it easier for people to vote, not harder," told NBC News regarding disenfranchised voters.
An Air Force veteran expressed his voting experience in the 2020 general election. Klobuchar agreed that voting should be more convenient. He suggested that election day should be a holiday and people should be allowed to vote over the full weekend, both Saturday and Sunday.
Since the 2020 election Georgia has been the site of election controversies that involved copious claims of voter fraud and election meddling from bitter Republicans who believed former President Donald Trump was wrongfully denied a second term, although the determination of the courts did not find such claims to be true. This year alone 21 measures have been passed into law this year that empowered state lawmakers to control elections and to punish election officials. There are 216 provisions in 41 states that had been under consideration. This is indeed a fight for state and federal control.
A former presidential candidate, Klobuchar is coalescing with a legion of Democrats who are using everything within their power to push back on voter suppression. Pres. Joe Biden and Vice Pres. Kamala Harris, Civil Rights leader, voting advocates and the Department or Justice are aligned in preserving voting rights, the "cornerstone of democracy." Mrs. Klobuchar going to Georgia to "make good trouble" shows that Democrats are exhausting all options to make sure that both both the John Lewis Voting Rights Restoration Act and the For the People Act as well as demanding an end of the filibuster. Their efforts are meant to persuade the Congress to seal voting reform for good, which is being held up by Krysten Sinema (D-AZ) and Joe Manchin of West Virginia.
A reflection of just how crucial this issue is, last week Vice President Kamala Harris announced the Democratic Party will invest $25 million to fight voter suppression and educate voters and met with a group of Black women voting advocates at the White House.
Sen. Raphael Warnock who participated in the hearing in his home state, has been a staunch defender of the VRA, HR1 voting legislation at the national level. Warnock stated the current conflict around voting is a throw back to the Jim Crow Era and will result in pure "chaos" at the polls. "The house that Democracy built is on fire," Warnock added.