Wednesday, July 21, 2021 | 2 a.m.
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I read with interest the July 15 letter “GOP will pay for racism,” in which the writer first recognized that it previously required federal help/laws to overcome systemic racism in the form of Jim Crow laws but that he believes recently proposed voter suppression laws in Republican-controlled states like Texas and Georgia will not work and the GOP will pay for their devious anti-democratic actions.
While I hope the writer’s optimism is rewarded, we must also fully support House Resolution 1, the For the People Act, to ensure what the late Rep.John Lewis, D-Ga., described as the precious and sacred right to vote by all Americans. We must exert all our might to preserve a right that former President Lyndon Johnson described as a basic right to have control over one’s destiny.
Texas’ proposed election laws include: (1) a ban on drive-thru voting as used in Harris County because of the COVID-19 pandemic; (2) regulating early voting to reduce the same; (3) a ban on sending unsolicited applications to request mail-in ballots and making such an act a felony; and (4) enhancing poll watcher protections by strengthening partisan poll watchers’ “free movement” within a polling place.
My parents told me that voting was a precious right and if I didn’t exercise it, I couldn’t blame anyone but myself. So we must double down and both support HR 1 and efforts of the Texas Democratic lawmakers to oppose the proposed election laws.
