What next?
Calling the law “Jim Crow on steroids,” as President Biden did, “certainly overstates the case,” said Zack Beauchamp in Vox.com. But it really does enable Republican legislators “to handpick the people in charge of disqualifying ballots in Democratic-leaning places like Atlanta.” Moreover, the law’s “very existence” is “predicated on a lie about voter fraud that is corroding American democracy”—one that has 60 percent of Republicans wrongly believing Donald Trump was robbed of the presidency.
Texas is shaping up as the next voting rights battleground, said Sam Levine in TheGuardian.com. Last week, Texas Republicans advanced legislation that would limit early voting hours and prohibit drive-through and 24-hour voting, among other new restrictions. Texas-based American Airlines and Dell Technologies have lined up against the measure. “Governments should ensure citizens have their voices heard,” tweeted Dell CEO Michael Dell. Battles over new voting laws loom in Arizona and Florida as well, said Adam Brewster and Caitlin Huey-Burns in CBSNews.com. Bills moving forward in Arizona would add ID requirements for absentee voters and shrink the number of voters who automatically get sent ballots. In Florida, Republicans are pushing measures to tighten absentee voting by eliminating drop boxes, adding ID requirements, and prohibiting “anyone but an immediate family member” from returning a ballot. Nationwide, at least 55 bills to restrict voting access “are currently moving through the legislature in 24 states.”
As the debate over voting rules rages, corporate leaders find themselves in “a head-spinning new landscape,” said David Gelles in The New York Times. On one side are Democrats and activists “focused on social justice,” who demand they take a stand. On the other are “populist Republicans who are suddenly unafraid to break ties with business”—and retaliate against “companies that cross them politically.” Caught in between, companies like Coca-Cola and Delta “face steep political consequences no matter what they do.”