While I was watching the 10 p.m. news last night on our local NBC affiliate, I couldn't help but notice the advertisement presented by Republican U.S. Senate candidate David Dewhurst.
In his ad, Dewhurst makes the usual Republican proclamations about being for low taxes (assumably for millionaires at the expense of everyone else) and for "balancing the budget." What he doesn't discuss in his ad but trumpets loudly about on his website is his support of our state's voter disenfranchisement (what he calls "voter ID") law that the Justice Department has righly contested.
How can Dewhurst or any other Republican claim to represent all Texas when he is working so hard to disenfranchise many who don't look, think, or talk like him?
More below.
Here's what Dewhurst says on his web site:
The United States Justice Department rejected the Texas Voter ID law based on the Justice Department’s partisan claim that protecting ballot integrity is discriminatory.
Sign our petition today and send a clear message to President Obama and Attorney General Holder that our rights are important to us and we will not allow them to tread on them anymore!
Yes, it is time to tell the Federal Government we won’t take it anymore:
Yes
I, the undersigned, oppose the Obama Administration’s blatant abuse of power usurps rights explicitly reserved by the States in the 10th Amendment. The Federal Justice Department has set itself on a collision course with Texas and our Voter ID law. This overreach of power by the Federal Government defies the Constitution and threatens the sacred principle of one U.S. Citizen, one vote. Under the guise of “protecting rights,” Holder is pushing the federal government farther into American’s lives.
Enough is enough.
Evidently, Dewhurst thinks it's OK for average folks who don't have a state-issued picture ID to be forced to take time off of work in order to stand in line for however long it takes just to get such an ID. Seemingly to Dewhurst, it matters not that many of these folks can't afford to take such time off and thus miss out on whatever wages they may earn just to get an ID.
My wife and I are fortunate that we have the state-issued voter IDs that Dewhurst and other Republicans want to require. But what about those who are otherwise qualified to vote but who don't have such IDs?
It's clear Dewhurst and other Republicans don't want these folks to participate in the democratic process. And the question this raises is this: How can Dewhurst and other Republicans aspire to represent what they say are all Texans while denying many of them the right to vote on elected offices?
That seems to be an issue Dewhurst and others don't want to address while hiding behind the false bravado about how the federal action against the Texas law "defies the constuitution" and is an "overreach of power"?
Anyone who seeks public office by denying qualified voters the right to cast ballots isn't worthy to hold any office in our state or anywhere else. David Dewhurst's values may qualify as prevailing value in one-party dictatorships like North Korea. In America and in Texas, Dewhurst's views have no place in our democracy.
I hope a strong Democrat is found who can defeat Dewhurst in November.