Voting & Elections

Flight attendants use euphemistic doublespeak because, understandably, they want to avoid terms like “hijacking” and "September 11th.” For similar reasons, Jones spoke in broad terms, without directly invoking Trump or January 6th. (There were also other reasons for this, such as Common Cause’s nonpartisan status.) Even so, the implications were clear. At one point, an organizer sitting in the audience stood, using a cane, and gave an impromptu speech, urging listeners to imagine a Supreme Court opinion that enabled legislatures to rig elections at will. “There was a time when I used to think things like that couldn’t happen,” he said. “But then we had January 6th, Roe—these things can happen. They’re happening.”

Today, YouTube announced it will rescind its prohibition on content that espouses election denialism and disinformation about the 2020 elections. This move comes as more 2024 candidates (including former president Trump) engage in public events which may be hosted on the platform.

“It’s an attempt to fool voters into giving away their power,” said Mia Lewis of Common Cause Ohio, a pro-democracy group that opposes the amendment.

Katya Ehresman, voting rights program director with Common Cause Texas, said voters, county officials and election administrators should have been given the opportunity to testify about legislation set to directly impact them. Ehresman said that process was concerning and “against values of transparency and public input, which should be core parts of the legislative process.” “These bills do have a tangible effect on voter turnout, voter apathy, and on the ability for elections administrators to do their job free from threats and free from partisan pressures,” Ehresman said. “The discourse surrounding Texas election reform continues to be punitive and continues to be rooted in misinformation. And that will have a permanent damage on recruitment [of election workers] and election administration going forward.”

If we want a democracy that works for everyone, we should be making it harder for money to influence politics, and easier for eligible Floridians to exercise their freedom to vote.  But that’s the opposite of what’s happening in Florida, with state lawmakers erecting a slew of unnecessary and confusing barriers for Floridians looking to participate in our democracy.

“We would have no problem with the state setting up something that followed federal law and somehow getting a bunch of other states to go along with it,” said Julia Vaughn, the executive director of Common Cause Indiana, which brought the lawsuit against the state. “But good luck doing that with one individual state with no real expertise in this, and no reputation as some entity that other states should trust their voter registration lists with.”