We begin today’s roundup with Eugene Robinson’s analysis at The Washington Post on the latest poll numbers, how Democrats must be able to accept that yes, Donald Trump is at a low point in his presidency, and how fighting voter suppression must be priority:
I must insert the standard warning against taking anything for granted — not that anyone possibly could, after 2016. There will be constant worrying, fretting, handwringing and second-guessing until Election Day, because that’s what Democrats do. But the objective reality, near as anyone can tell, is that Trump looks very likely to lose to Joe Biden and that Republicans may well lose the Senate as well. Polling out this weekend was uniformly alarming for the president. An NBC News-Wall Street Journal national poll showed Biden beating Trump by seven points, 49 percent to 42 percent. A CNN poll showed nothing less than a blowout, with Biden ahead nationally by 14 points, 55 percent to 41 percent. The RealClearPolitics average of all recent polls has Biden up by 8 points — a massive lead given the closeness of our recent elections. [...]
Trump is not an adroit politician; he is a human cleaver who knows only how to inflame and divide. He apparently sees his only play as whipping his loyal base into a frenzy while trying his best to discourage — or actually prevent — those who oppose him from casting ballots. [...]
Even more important, perhaps, is ensuring the right to vote. This is a battle that Democrats must fight at every level — defending the right to cast mail-in ballots, ensuring there are enough safe polling places for same-day voting, using the federal courts to ensure that state-level and local efforts to suppress voters fail.
This is good news:
Voter registrations, volunteer activity and donations for groups linked to Democratic causes are surging in the midst of protests following the death of George Floyd, according to voting advocacy groups.
This surge in registrations could end up being one of the factors that helps tip the election between apparent Democratic nominee Joe Biden and President Donald Trump. The efforts are by groups including Latino voter registration organizations, Rock the Vote and one co-chaired by former first lady Michelle Obama.
But Republicans across the country are still trying to suppress the vote. The latest move is in Iowa, where Republicans are taking on the Republican Secretary of State over vote by mail applications. The Des Moines Register editorial board calls it what it is:
The goal is voter suppression.
The bill, among other things, prohibits the secretary of state from mailing absentee ballot requests to Iowans without a written voter request.
In other words, it would prevent the current secretary, Republican Paul Pate, from doing exactly what he recently did. To promote voting by mail during the coronavirus pandemic, he sent mail-in ballot request forms for the June 2 primary to all registered voters in the state.
The result was record voter turnout, largely due to absentee voting.
And Ari Berman at Mother Jones has a deep dive into how the coronavirus pandemic is helping Republicans quash the vote:
The coronavirus has heightened the already considerable obstacles blocking citizens from exercising their right to vote. In the last decade, Republicans have enacted new voting restrictions in 25 states. The Supreme Court has gutted the Voting Rights Act, unleashing new efforts in states with long histories of voting discrimination to make it harder for voters of color to cast ballots. And then there are the Russians, who attempted to access election infrastructure in all 50 states in 2016, and could try again. “What you’ve done with coronavirus,” said Marc Elias, the leading Democratic voting rights lawyer, “is you’ve added one more huge stressor to a system that was already at the breaking point.” The risk of mass voter disenfranchisement is greater in 2020 than at any time since the era before the abolition of poll taxes and literacy tests in the 1960s.
At The New Yorker, David Rohde dives into the acts of Attorney General William Barr, Trump’s enabler:
The character and the breadth of Barr’s effort are no surprise. For decades, he has been a law-and-order hard-liner who backed the use of overwhelming police force. [...] In the course of the week, Barr, more than any other member of Trump’s Cabinet, fulsomely defended a President whose response to the demonstrations is being harshly criticized by current and former Administration officials. He enabled and amplified Trump’s use of conspiracy theories for political gain. When asked about Trump’s borrowed-Bible photo op, Barr said that the President’s actions had nothing to do with winning reëlection. “I don’t necessarily view that as a political act,” Barr said. “I think it was entirely appropriate.”
By the way, you can’t tell from the administration’s actions, but there’s still a pandemic going on. Alexis Madrigal and Robinson Meyer at The Atlantic explain how America is giving up on battling the coronavirus as a nation:
Many of the potential drivers of coronavirus transmission this week do not involve protester tactics: Dozens of police forces have used security measures that could allow the virus to spread more easily. In Washington, D.C., for instance, federal officers used tear gas or another chemical irritant on hundreds of peaceful protesters gathered in front of the White House on Monday so that President Donald Trump could pose for a photograph. Tear gas and chemicals like it force people to cough and gag, a fertile mode of transmission for the virus. Later that night, city police crowded protesters together before arresting them one by one, an aggressive crowd-control technique known as “kettling.” Hundreds of protesters who were arrested this week were sent—even if briefly—to the city’s jails, which have so many coronavirus cases that the District government has separated that number out from the citywide total.
On a final note, don’t miss this piece by Zak Cheney-Rice at New York magazine on the legend that is Rep. John Lewis:
I’m curious, watching what’s happened this past week or so, what has stood out to you?
This determination of the young people, even not so young. Not just in America, but all around the world. I’ve come in contact with people who feel inspired. They’re moved. They’ve just never been along in a protest — they’ve never been in a march before — they decided to march with their children and their grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and to walk with them. They’re helping to educate and inspire another generation of activists. It’s seeing an effect. There can be no turning back; there can be no giving up.