Blacks Have Plenty To Lose From Donald Trump Presidency
BY SAM FIELDS
Donald Trump’s appeal to the Black community is that for the last 60 years the Democrats have done nothing for them so why not support him.
Trump’s tagline is, “What do you have to lose?”
The answer is plenty.
Consider one area: The Supreme Court and The Voting Rights Act.
In 1965, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act. The Act has repeatedly been renewed by Congress.
In 2005, it was renewed for 25 years by a unanimous Senate and only 33 nays in the House.
Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act contains what is known as the “Preclearance” provision. It requires areas with a history of voter discrimination to submit all election law changes to the Justice Department for pre-approval.
It is doubtful that Congress has passed any law that has had a greater positive impact on minorities. Since 1965, the number of Black state representatives has grown from two to 176. Black elected officials have increased from 1,469 to 4,912.
Needless to say White supremacists have done everything they can to eviscerate the law.
Joining that parade of pointed hats has been the U. S. Supreme Court justices appointed by Republicans. Appointed by Main Street Republicans like Presidents Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, not a loose cannon like Trump.
There was the late Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist.
In 1953, as a Supreme Court law clerk, Rehnquist wrote a memo against Brown v Board of Education and defending the segregationist Plessy v Ferguson.
Plessy v Ferguson is the 1898 Supreme Court decision that allowed separate but equal treatment of Blacks, formally approving segregationist Jim Crow laws.
Rehnquist’s first private practice job in the 1950’s was in Arizona working for an effort to suppress minority voting.
Appointed by Nixon to the Supreme Court and later named Chief Justice by Reagan, Rehnquist supported every weakening of the Voting Rights Act.
But he accomplished nothing compared to his former law clerk and successor Chief Justice John Roberts, who was appointed Chief Justice by the second President Bush.
Roberts had a long history of fighting to eviscerate the Voting Rights Act going back to his days in Reagan’s Justice Department.
In 2013, he authored the 5 to 4 majority opinion in Shelby v Holder that held that Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act was unconstitutional. Congress got it wrong, the justices wrote.
There is no longer racism in America and the states are not going to ever again restrict voting again, the Court stated.
“Ever again” turned out to be about a month.
Able to avoid Section 5 Preclearance, Republican state legislatures have repeatedly passed laws with ID requirements that fall more heavily on the poor and minorities. You can count on the fingers of one hand the times that people have shown up to the polls claiming to be some else.
Other laws have restricted voting at locations where Black voters are more likely to participate. All of a sudden Sunday early voting, known as Souls to the Polls because many Blacks go from church to the polls, was abolished in many states, although it is still allowed in Florida.
All this was made possible by the current Court justices , who are a legacy of past Republican presidents.
Until the death of Justice Antonin Scalia last year, it looked like these racist laws might continue to be upheld by the Supreme Court…which brings me back to Donald Trump.
Trump has made it clear he will fill that seat with a Scalia clone.
Add to that the elderly on the Court—think 83-year-old Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg—and a Trump Administration will end up with a Court looking like the segregationist Court of the 1890’s.
It was 1890’s Court that cleared the path for Jim Crow.
Only a fool would imagine that a President Trump couldn’t make it happen again.
And that’s only one-thing Blacks and other minorities have to lose — their rights.
August 29th, 2016 at 1:20 pm
The increasing voter turnout rate for minority voters makes this whole discrimination argument a moot point.
How is the minority vote being suppressed if their turnout rate is increasing after each election cycle?
August 29th, 2016 at 3:03 pm
Mr. Fields, perhaps I could believe every word in your article if I had not witnessed the shenanigans played in Dania Beach with absentee ballots coming from the “black community”. A city commission seat campaign run by a white person resulted in over 400 absentee ballots, some from dead people and felons being turned into the SOE’s office. Fraud ran rampant and people’s rights were exploited by devious means. You wrote about White supremacists acting to suppress black voters. An equal evil is white candidates abusing black voters by using them to accomplish their own personal goals.
And what is the problem with asking voters to show a photo ID? I have to show a photo ID to cash a check, use a credit card, board a plane, enter a school building to pick up a child, and to buy a bottle of wine in some states. Surely the act of voting is as important as any of those activities.
August 29th, 2016 at 3:57 pm
Really, you can count on the fingers of one hand how many times there has been voter fraud. You must have a lot of fingers Sam!
Enjoy these videos proving how easy it is to do so:
http://projectveritasaction.com/video/undercover-video-shows-it%E2%80%99s-still-very-easy-commit-voter-fraud-new-hampshire
http://projectveritas.com/2016/08/04/james-okeefe-obtains-eminems-ballot/
http://projectveritas.com/2016/05/04/voter-fraud-controversy-still-brewing-in-new-york-two-weeks-after-project-veritass-undercover-primary-day-investigation/
http://projectveritas.com/u-s-ag-eric-holders-ballot-offered-to-total-stranger/
If James O’Keefe can easily demonstrate how voter fraud can be done in these limited tests, how Sam can you believe it is not actually happening all over the country?
So why again is it wrong to ask for a photo ID to vote if an ID is needed to buy beer? I would think you would agree the sanctity of our democracy would be as important as preventing underage drinking?
August 29th, 2016 at 9:15 pm
In Texas, a state college issued university picture ID is not acceptable to vote.
Your Texas fishing license, with no picture, is though.
August 30th, 2016 at 3:00 pm
at West Davie
Only a blind true believer would ever believe anything from James O’Keefe. If you cannot see through the agenda these right wing phony journalists have then you must have a bag over your head and plugs in your ears. sheeeeesh
August 30th, 2016 at 8:09 pm
that’s because in Texas more folks fish then attend college…
August 31st, 2016 at 3:54 am
My US Constitution says nothing about photo IDs. When it does, then the country should follow suit!
September 2nd, 2016 at 3:26 pm
Dear Talks
I assume, if you witnessed “rampant fraud”,you reported it to the BSO, FDLE, State Attorney, FBI, etc.
I look forward to reading the story in the papers about this expose’.
September 3rd, 2016 at 9:36 am
#8 Sam Fields raises excellent points about GOP Tea Bagger #2 Talks who should be reporting vast amounts of voter fraud “to the the BSO, FDLE, State Attorney, FBI, etc.”that he witnesses yearly at the local polls.
Unfortunately, not known to so many readers here, #2 Mr Talks is incapable of writing…..!
September 3rd, 2016 at 9:36 am
Nice try.
Rednecks fish and vote for the GOP.
September 3rd, 2016 at 3:57 pm
@7 Constitution says powers not delegated to Federal Government are retained BY THE STATES AND PEOPLE.
That is why absent Constitutional violations found by Federal Courts THE STATES RETAIN JURISDICTION OVER VOTING AND MOST ELECTION ISSUES SUCH
AS HOW ELECTORAL VOTES ARE SPLIT WHEN PRIMARIES ARE HELD AND VOTER LISTS N REQUIREMENTS FOR REGISTRATION N VOTING HOURS PLACES ETC.
September 6th, 2016 at 4:55 pm
The funny thing about the law stated in 1965 zero democrats voted for it……As usual the dems still refuse to ever tell the truth. Its in there dna….