The day after the late Rep. John Lewis crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge one last time, his body in a horse-drawn carriage and the road strewn with red rose petals to evoke the blood shed by Lewis and other protesters in the fight for civil rights, he will lie in state in the U.S. Capitol. But before that, his funeral procession will go past civil rights sites in Washington, D.C.
At the Capitol, an invitation-only group will attend a ceremony under the Capitol Rotunda before Lewis’ casket is moved to the top of the steps of the East Front of the Capitol for socially distanced public viewing. Among those traveling to D.C. to honor Lewis are former Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill Biden.
The best way to honor Lewis, of course, would be to pass a restored Voting Rights Act. The House has already done that, and on Monday, Majority Whip Jim Clyburn will offer legislation to name that bill after Lewis. But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, despite his praise in memory of Lewis, remains committed to blocking any advance in voting rights.
McConnell even called reports of voter suppression "nonsense" recently, even after well-publicized problems in the Georgia primary. Black Voters Matter co-founder LaTosha Brown, who waited for three hours to vote in that election, had a message for McConnell. “McConnell should have come with me that night, because all I saw was evidence of attempts to suppress the Black vote,” she told USA Today. ”You can praise John Lewis, but do you respect his values? Voting shouldn’t be a partisan issue, it's a democracy issue.”
The thing is, McConnell is against democracy, too. Which will not stop him from pretending to honor Lewis—just from doing the real thing.