HMG-CN OP-ED:  WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO THE REPUBLICAN PARTY?

All us procrastinators know that we can wait until April 15 to mail our taxes, but the Republican Party in many states is trying to change that when it comes to the most important thing you do as an American, vote.

And it can only be called voter-suppression.

In a 5-3 vote, yes three justices voted for voter suppression, the Supreme Court this week rejected GOP appeals in two swing states, N. Carolina and Pennsylvania.

It was a desperate last gasp effort by the GOP to suppress the vote in two key swing states.

The Supreme Court left in place rulings in N. Carolina that require the counting of late-arriving ballots as long as they were in the mail by election day.

Imagine that, the GOP fighting to exclude ballots that were postmarked on election day. During a pandemic.

This week the court also refused to hear an appeal from Pennsylvania’s GOP who were fighting to invalidate late-arriving mail ballots. Last week, the justices, on a tie vote, left in place the same state ruling.

In N. Carolina the vote was 5-3 with Roberts and beer-boy Kavanaugh siding with the liberals.

In Pennsylvania it was a tie, which upheld the lower court’s ruling, with beer-boy Kavanaugh having one too many this time, going against his ruling in N. Carolina and siding with the conservatives.

Undaunted and apparently unafraid to show their obvious voter suppression, a few days later GOP lawyers tried again, arguing the court should take up the entire case and issue a written ruling. That request was turned down unanimously.

The decisions are victories for Democrats, who fight for votes to be counted, and who argued for extending the deadlines for counting ballots that were postmarked by election day.

Imagine that, counting ballots that are lawfully postmarked.

In North Carolina, ballots may arrive as late as nine days and still be counted, in Pennsylvania it is three days after the election, here in Cerritos, it is ten.

Why not have a national mandate of ten days GOP? I am certain Democrats would agree, but the GOP is circling the drain due to Trumpism so the party attempts outright voter suppression.

The court has been hesitant to rule close to an election with the court’s conservatives arguing it is most important to maintain the procedures set in state election law prior to this year.

But in the North Carolina case, the state board of elections agreed to extend the deadline, approved by lower courts…because of the pandemic…. and the actions of indicted GOP crony Louis De Joy and his attempt to sabotage the U.S. Postal Service’s and delay the mail.

Lawyers for the state board used the DeJoy argument; they acted in response to warnings from the Postal Service that delays in mail delivery could result in legally cast ballots arriving too late to be counted.

In their appeal, the GOP leaders in N. Carolina ignored the USPS warnings and accused the state board of changing the state’s voting laws on the eve of the election.

And this is going on in many red states, the GOP resorting to voter suppression during a pandemic in attempt to keep the worst president ever in power.

Thank goodness people are noticing and voting; according to reports, those between 18-29 see the suppression and are voting in record numbers, Georgia is in play for Democrats, so is Texas and Arizona.

Seems like millions of voters are asking the same thing, what has happened to the GOP?

Editorial: GOP Wanted a Government Shutdown All Along(Opens in a new browser tab)