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Clarence Page: Why Black voting rights matter
When the 1965 Voting Rights Act was passed, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Clarence Page had just finished high school.
This legislation changed the lives of Black people in America because Jim Crow laws had virtually prevented Blacks from voting in the South with impossible poll questions and literacy tests, he said in an interview with Ian Bremmer on GZERO World.
But the Supreme Court gutted the law in 2013, allowing states to pass new voting legislation that progressives say restricts Black access to the ballot box.
The 2022 midterm elections will be the first major test of these laws — which Democrats in Congress are unlikely to be able to stop. How will this all affect Black turnout in November?
Page explains that if Trump loyalists win in key states, their legislatures — not voters — may end up deciding the next US presidential race.
What may happen in 2024 reminds him of 1876, when the end of Reconstruction after the Civil War, along with a disputed presidential election, ushered in the Jim Crow laws that ended ability to vote in Alabama.
Page asks, “Are we going to get rid of these last vestiges of discrimination from the Jim Crow era?"
Black voter suppression in 2022
Until the 1965 Voting Rights Act, Black people in America who wanted to vote faced impossible poll questions and literacy tests. But the Supreme Court gutted the law in 2013, allowing states to pass new voting legislation that progressives say restrict Black access to the ballot box.
The 2022 midterm elections will be the first major test of these laws — which Democrats in Congress are unlikely to be able to stop. How will this all affect Black turnout in November?
On this episode of GZERO World, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Clarence Page tells Ian Bremmer that if Trump loyalists win in key states, their legislatures — not voters — may end up deciding the next US presidential race.What may happen in 2024 reminds him of 1876, when Page says the end of Reconstruction after the Civil War, along with a disputed presidential election, ushered in the Jim Crow laws that ended his ancestors' ability to vote in Alabama.
What's driving all this? For Page, part of the problem is the grievance narrative around critical race theory, which has made some Americans confused between being a Democrat and being democratic.
Still, he says you can't deny that Republicans want to make it harder to vote, while Democrats try to make it easier. That's a big problem because "we're at loggerheads over who should be allowed to vote and, and who shouldn't."
Page also compares President Biden's pledge to nominate a Black woman to fill Justice Breyer's seat on the Supreme Court to Ronald Reagan's decision to pick Sandra Day O'Connor. And as a bonus, Ian looks back at the history of Black women judges in America.
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Podcast: It’s getting harder for Black Americans to vote, warns journalist Clarence Page
Listen: Voter suppression is a front and center issue. But it’s not always black and white…or red and blue. Black voters continue to turn out in smaller numbers than white voters. How much of that is due to conscious efforts to make voting harder? Pulitzer Prize-winning Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page joins Ian Bremmer on the GZERO World podcast to discuss the past and future of the struggle for Black voting rights in America. Page warns that if Trump loyalists win in key states, their legislatures — not voters — may end up deciding the next US presidential race.
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The history of Black voting rights in America
Until 1965, Black Americans who wanted to vote first faced faces unanswerable poll questions, and later equally tough literacy tests.
The Voting Rights Act banned these and other forms of overt voter suppression. But in 2013, the Supreme Court struck down a key provision of the law, requiring states to get prior federal approval to tweak their voting laws for racial discrimination.
The ruling has allowed dozens of states to pass increasingly restrictive voting laws targeting minority groups with measures like bolstering voter ID, eliminating polling places, and rolling back mail-in voting.
But things aren’t always so black and white, or blue and red, Ian Bremmer explains on GZERO World. Georgia is now ahead of New York on expanding early voting and no-excuse absentee ballots.
There are many reasons why Black voters turn out less than white Americans, and not all have to do with voter suppression. Still, progressive leaders worry restrictive laws will (further) widen the gap.
The upcoming 2022 midterm elections will be the first major test of these new voting laws. That is, unless Democrats pass new voting rights legislation — but the bill will die on the Senate floor.