Discussion for article #241692
Mission accomplished. The voters have already been denied their chance to register. The cut off date to register is very near.
Well, I suppose he deserves something for recognizing this was losing proposition from the get go. They already took the PR hit, now he is merely trying to mitigate that and avoid the much most costly losing battle of trying to keep them closed.
Nah. What’ll happen is one of two things.
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He’ll make noise about reopening the DMVs due to “concern from voters” but ultimately do nothing (and not much noise will be made)
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He’ll reopen a good 10-20% of them. And say that he responded to concerns and that he’s done what he could.
Knock me over with a feather!
That might be cheaper than paying the legal costs defending the indefensible.
Here I thought the GOP wouldn’t give a damn about the uproar. I’d really like to know what happened to motivate the Alabama Guv to try to move in a different direction.
In Indiana, it was clear to me that Gov. Pence heard from business leaders to back down on his stupid “freedom to be a bigot” law.
A story about an Alabama resident who typifies the voter the governor wants to disenfranchise
“Banjos playing through the broken glass…” – Neil Young
The closing of the DMV offices is exactly the kind of move that cuts against CJ Roberts’ justification for gutting the VRA. especially when the concept of disparate impact survived SC review last term.
This is merely An attempt to appear as though its being fixed (likely too late for current registration deadlines) and avoid a lawsuit which could rise again to the SC.
Gutting of the VRA is the republican strategy to hold on as long as possible before collapse.
The one thing I’ve never understood in this story is how they expected an entire state to only have like four DMV offices. Forgetting the voter disenfranchisement for the moment, how did they expect people to drive?
Well, now, energize the black voters to register and to vote and let’s just see how many political GOP critters would face the music in upcoming elections. Not to mention lawsuits.
Whole lotta fancy lawyering going on among the good ole boys. They’ll git away with it anyways…
This Governor and their disgusting Republican lawmakers have awoken the sleeping giant.
Reopening the offices would be a good move. The GOP would give the impression that they’re listening to their constituents.
After all, there are always other ways to stop those people from voting…
DoctorA
Here I thought the GOP wouldn't give a damn about the
uproar. I’d really like to know what happened to motivate the Alabama
Guv to try to move in a different direction.
Is it a different direction or is it some fancy lawyering that ends up right where the GOP wants it: Disenfranchisement of many Democratic voters.
How about we help every disenfranchised voter recruit 5 people to vote for them? Make turnout a critical factor for victory in 2016. Of course, the GOP has a natural edge here, so the Dems have to work very hard on turnout to catch up.
Is it a political power thing or an unfunded mandate thing?
I know we only looked at this as a voting rights issue, but it was also a public safety issue. Alabama closed DMV offices. They do a lot more than issue voter id cards. I imagine the insurance industry was very upset. If they were closed down to stop black voting (which I they probably were) the tea party politicians who pulled the stunt were idiots…
That means the closures weren’t necessary in the first place. He just wanted to see if he could get away with it.