Abuse of Power

Recent headlines, from the January 6th Select Committee’s hearings to the Supreme Court rolling back the right to reproductive healthcare, profoundly implicate the freedom that many will celebrate this Independence Day. Opponents of democracy — a system that works best when it empowers people to have an equal say in decisions that affect their futures — have waged a well-coordinated attack on it. Freedom must be fortified, it must be protected at the ballot box, and it must never be taken for granted.

“This is part of a broader strategy to make voting harder and impose the will of state legislatures regardless of the will of the people,” said Suzanne Almeida, director of state operations for Common Cause, a nonpartisan pro-democracy group. “It is a significant change to the power of state courts to rein in state legislatures.” ... Voting rights advocates point to that decision, specifically a quote from Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., as evidence that the Supreme Court has previously believed state courts have an oversight role. “Provisions in state statutes and state constitutions can provide standards and guidance for state courts to apply” in policing partisan gerrymandering, Roberts wrote for the majority in Rucho v. Common Cause.

Then-President Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows were warned repeatedly of anticipated violence on January 6th yet did nothing. They were informed of semi-automatic rifles and pistols - AR-15s and Glocks - being carried by members of the audience on the Ellipse, hours before his speech, yet Trump incited the crowd and called on his heavily armed audience to march on the Capitol and ‘fight like hell.’

Kathay Feng, the national redistricting director at the good government group Common Cause, compared preclearance to the ability to prevent a repeat arson. “But unfortunately, with Shelby County, we have to allow a building to burn down before we can go and seek some kind of justice and by then the harm has already happened,” she said.

Today’s opinion overturning Roe v. Wade threatens the fundamental rights of every American. The ruling is the culmination of a decades-long strategy to take the Constitution, our Court, and our country backwards on issues of reproductive freedom, and it has profound implications for every other right that could be next on the chopping block. The ruling also exposes the disingenuous sworn testimony of conservative justices during their Senate confirmation hearings when they assured Senators that Roe was established precedent, leaving unsaid their agenda to reverse it.  

"It is clear from the evidence made public by the January 6th Committee that Rep. Perry does not respect the will of the voters. No elected official should remain in office, if they do not respect the voters who put them there. We must not continue down this path," said Khalif Ali, Common Cause Pennsylvania executive director.