Could shutting down the government somehow be an election stealing tactic by Republicons? How would that impact the government's ability to ensure fair elections.
The elections are run by the states, not the federal government. Congress keeps working during a shutdown. I can’t see how it would hinder the election.
It would have unpredictable effects on the election though, so I can’t imagine they really want to risk it.
On January 6, yes, but they don’t stop working. The shutdown only affects the rank and file government employees that do things like run the government agencies, air traffic control*, Smithsonians, etc.
*Air traffic controllers would be considered an essential function, so they would actually get the joy of continuing to work without pay, until a budget is passed, then they would get back pay. (There’s also a possibility of some agencies having money, for various reasons, to continue to pay essential employees.)
When the “government shuts down” the elected officials still all work.
Even some federal employees still work. There are core essential functions that have to continue or people may die, government property may be destroyed, etc. Those people all work–without any support staff.
They just won’t receive a paycheck until the shutdown is over.
The military continues to work. Federal law enforcement continues to work.
The reality of a government shutdown is that it’s actually very expensive and almost entirely performative (from the politicians perspective). Nothing good comes from it. It’s literally one of congress’s only jobs-- so they just look more incompetent than usual.
The federal agencies spend a lot of time and effort preparing for possible shutdowns that usually get averted at the 11th hour. When they don’t it’s incredibly expensive to deal with the impacts of delayed programs and contract issues, handling leave/time off during that timeframe etc.
Another impact is that it can drive top talent away from the government (potentially by design from certain political dispositions). Would you work somewhere that doesn’t pay you or delays paychecks?
That said, I don’t thing government employees have officially missed a pay check yet though. Like I said it’s all bullshit. They get to the brink then “figure it out”. The one a few years ago was the closest people got to missing paychecks. The solved it the day before the official pay date.
Another impact is that it can drive top talent away from the government (potentially by design from certain political dispositions). Would you work somewhere that doesn’t pay you or delays paychecks?
Of all the reasons I avoid working for the government this is pretty far down the list.
Perhaps it’s because a) it works, and b) they know republican policy is less popular. They could lie about policy (well, more than they already have), but I think they’re going to save that for after the first debate, personally.
You mean like they could try to get leftists to vote for Jill Stein or write in Che Gueverra instead? I think they already do that, but not through right wing influencers, if you know what I mean.
Johnson plans to pair a bill funding the government for six months with a Republican bill called the “Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act” or “SAVE Act,” that would require new voters to submit “documentary proof of United States citizenship,” such as a passport or a birth certificate, in order to register to vote.
That doesn’t seem like an outrageous ask but then access to such documents should also be safeguarded, that is if the actual reason was just to prevent voter fraud/illegally voting
What issue is it trying to solve? To my knowledge electoral fraud is so extremely rare in general (article cites figures in the double digits since 2000) let alone non-citizen voting, what this is though is anti-voter legislation, part of their election denial bullshit
Having such safeguards in place to make sure it doesn’t become an issue does seem alright to me. But they seem to be doing this as a form of voter suppression.
That’s the game, if dems were as unscrupulous they could do this too:
Election Security is our #1 priority. That’s why we’re creating secure polling stations located throughout every major city in every state. Rural polling stations will be closed as they are not secure enough to guarantee the integrity of our elections. Rural Americans frequently go into cities for sporting events and concerts so there will be no issue of disenfranchisement when their local polling stations close.
Republicans and Democrats going all out like this (or I guess Democrats retaliating in kind) would make for some interesting times for the US. Even more so than they are having now.
Votes for Democrats. The Republicans have been using voter suppression tactics to get elected for decades. At this point it’s the only way they can cling onto power.
2016 GE poll worker, inspector. I watched an elderly couple look at the polling results from the machines then write down a different result on their submission to the county. Their problem was that they also needed my signature. When I refused they signed for me. When I objected to the Secretary of State nothing happened.
There’s all sorts of voter fraud. But, it’s not being effected by the voters.
This usually places undue burden on women, poor and generally anybody not a white dude.
Say you are a woman, okay you’ve got your a certified copy of your birth certificate $10-but wait the name doesn’t match because you got married.
Now you need a marriage certificate, thats another $10 and the trouble of contacting another municipal office.
Oh were you married twice? Thats tracking down another 2 municipal offices, another $10 marriage cert and now a certified judgement of divorce which will cost-ooh was your children’s custody agreement a part of that? $40. Did you not remember your divorce file number from 30 years ago? It’ll be an additional $5 per name per every 2 years searched.
I’ve seen women spend like $200 just on certified copies to get a realID driver’s license. Has a chilling effect on registering, to solve a problem of voter fraud that doesn’t really exist.
If the intention was to actually fight current or future voter fraud then they should really have an easy way of submitting that documentary proof. I don’t know what form that would take in the US and how expensive it would get, considering you’d want some stipulation that it shouldn’t have much cost to acquiring such documents, shouldn’t be too difficult and whatnot. Assuming you’d want to do that right. Not that I think that’s their genuine intention.
Where I live in Finland we don’t have voter registering. We do check IDs when you vote, that part just seems sensible, but there isn’t an actual ID requirement. You just need to be identified without a doubt, but the form isn’t set. In specific circumstances it could even be that the officials there know you and guarantee who you are. But if you don’t have a passport (rare not to have it here), you don’t have driver’s license or ID card, you can get a temporary ID for free from the police station just for voting. But then you need to be also somehow identified there, so sorta the same problem again, but at least you have more time there than in the voting place.
The intention is to make it hard to register to vote. Imagine if you are going through a hard time in your life and you forget to check your mail or forget to register, then you just can’t vote.
It’s hard for me to believe that there are a lot of illegal voters. If you illegally voted you will not be granted a citizenship so anyone with the intention to be a citizen will not vote illegally.
The solution is to auto-enroll citizens. The government can easily check my citizenship if they wanted to. They can send a ID letter stating take this to the voting booth if you don’t have an ID, but this bill is not going to get passed because the main intent is not to prevent fraud.
I would have to figure out how the NYC birth certificate system works and I live halfway across the country. It’s too close to the election to do that, and getting a passport can take months and hundreds of dollars.
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