Buying the votes of criminals to save Muh Precious Democracy.
Felons cleared to vote (and some not cleared) have long been a reliable bloc of voters for Democrats. A 2019 study by Ragnar Research Partners found that in Florida, for instance, "Currently incarcerated felons are more than three times as likely to be registered Democrats ... or unaffiliated ... than Republicans. Ex-felons are four times as likely to be Democrats ... or unaffiliated." In the swing states expected to determine the outcome of the rematch between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, getting felons and those facing felony charges to the polls could mean the difference between the left and the right guiding U.S. policy for the next four years.
Perhaps then it comes as little surprise that incumbent President Joe Biden is using his constitutionally suspect Executive Order 14019 to turn out the felon vote, using the full force of the federal government to do so. And the well-funded leftist groups working behind the scenes to register felons and would-be felons appear to be assisting in the effort to win an election for Biden and his soft-on-crime political allies in Congress, state legislatures, and prosecutor offices around the country.
"The left caters to the criminal caucus," said Parker Thayer, investigative researcher at the Capital Research Center, a Washington, D.C.-based charity and activist tracker that operates the InfluenceWatch database. "That was the purpose of the 'reforms' we saw in 2020. They have a voting base there."
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As the Daily Signal reported earlier this year, the Federal Bureau of Prisons is partnering with the League of Women Voters, the ACLU, the Campaign Legal Center, the Washington Lawyers' Committee, and other far-left groups to bolster felon voting this election year.
Prison officials did not return The Federalist's request for comment, but the the FBP's Emery Nelson did tell the Daily Signal that the agency "meets quarterly" with the leftist nonprofits as well as the Sentencing Project and Disability Rights D.C.
The partnerships are the outgrowth of Biden's fiat, Executive Order 14019, which deputizes federal agencies to work with states and administration-approved nonprofits to register voters -- especially dependable Democrats and traditionally left-leaning populations. A group of Pennsylvania lawmakers has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to weigh in on its lawsuit, which asserts Biden's executive order unconstitutionally uses the federal government to usurp the responsibility of the state legislative branch. The lawsuit also argues that Congress never approved funding for the Biden administration's unprecedented -- and costly -- GOTV campaign.
Read the whole thing.
Related:
Trump responds to unprecedented conviction with Trump Tower speech: "This is bigger than me"
Former President Donald Trump, in a historic response following his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records, delivered a speech at Trump Tower, stating, "This is bigger than me." The speech, which touched on various themes from his campaign rallies, included critiques of his general election opponent and the judge presiding over his case.
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Trump's speech at Trump Tower was a condensed version of his traditional rally speeches, with the former president launching into a critique of President Biden and the judge who presided over his case. He accused Biden and his supporters of failing to secure the U.S.-Mexico border and blamed Judge Merchan for a "nasty gag order" that prevented him from publicly criticizing witnesses and others affiliated with his case.
Trump also deviated from his vow to appeal the verdict, characterizing the trial as a "scam" and repeatedly criticizing Biden for failures on border security.
Despite the conviction, Trump maintains a strong base of support, raising $39 million in a 10-hour period following the verdict announcement. He thanked the "big crowd of people outside" Trump Tower for their support, stating, "The level of support has been incredible."
Another Rubicon has been crossed: a former president, the presumptive presidential nominee for a major political party, has been convicted of a felony. A Manhattan jury has found Donald Trump guilty on 34 felony counts.
When it was announced in April 2023, Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg's indictment was considered legally novel. Analysis at the left-leaning site Vox even termed it "dubious." Unlike some of the other indictments of Trump--for his efforts to challenge the 2020 election or allegations about his handling of classified documents after leaving office--this action turned on legal issues from many years earlier. They concerned bookkeeping arrangements for alleged "hush money" payments to Stormy Daniels, the porn-film actress who claims a sexual liaison with Trump in 2006.
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A new Marist poll of registered voters (taken before the verdict was announced) found that only 17 percent of respondents would be less likely to vote for Trump if he were convicted in the "hush money" case; 15 percent said they would be more inclined to vote for him. A supermajority said that a conviction would not affect their votes.
The trial exemplifies the larger dynamic of political escalation that has marked the Trump era. Many Trump opponents allege that the former president represents an existential threat to American democratic norms. This threat, they say, in turn justifies the overturning of longstanding political and legal norms. Trump's presidency faced a blizzard of innuendo and covert opposition from the federal bureaucracy. His most prominent foes denounced him and anathematized his supporters, tossing them into a "basket of deplorables." His election in 2016 mainstreamed numerous anti-Trump conspiracy theories (such as the charge that the election was "hacked") that still echo through the body politic. The unprecedented campaign of legal warfare against Trump and some of his aides risks consuming the federal government more broadly. One sign of the fevered political climate: in the New York Times, Maryland congressman Jamie Raskin, a noted Trump critic, called for the Biden administration to start deciding which cases specific Supreme Court justices can and cannot hear.
Congressman Raskin's essay highlights how the crusade to "break norms in order to save them" lacks a limiting principle. And such radical politics of opposition may, if anything, have strengthened Trump's position. Trump's "American carnage" vision for politics assumes a kind of existential struggle. By invoking an existential emergency, Trump's enemies sign on to the fundamental premises of his own political brand.
The article notes that many, including Ron DeSantis, sprang to attack the trial as a "debasement of our legal system."
The Democrats and the drunk-on-their-own-immorality liberals are removing every last safeguard that keeps us from just settling political disputes with the proven political tactic of simple violence.
They may well wind up wishing they hadn't.