How to end voter suppression once and for all

It's time for a voting rights amendment

A New Hampshire man exits a voting booth during the presidential primaries.
(Image credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

One of the many dark ironies of the 2016 election has been the endless parade of Republicans alleging a Democratic conspiracy to steal the election, while simultaneously using their control of state governments to prevent as many Democratic Party voters from being able to exercise the franchise as possible.

The Nation's Ari Berman has been doggedly covering the GOP's voter suppression tricks. The main strategy is throwing up obstacles to voting which will be harder for Democratic-leaning demographics, especially African-Americans, to overcome. A Fourth Circuit panel ruled a few months ago that North Carolina's voter ID law violated the Constitution because it targeted "African-Americans with almost surgical precision...the asserted justifications cannot and do not conceal the state's true motivation." More recently, Berman discovered an email from a Wisconsin Republican official refusing to put up an early voting station at the University of Wisconsin – Green Bay because "students lean more towards the Democrats."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.