Forced to disembark the bus taking them to cast early voting ballots, African American senior citizens from Jefferson County, Georgia were dismayed and shocked. \u00a0The director of the senior center reportedly prevented them based on the county commissioner\u2019s decision after a county clerk called and voiced concerns. Allegedly it was believed that the group that arranged the transportation, Black Voters Matter, could be construed as a \u201cpolitical activity\u201d. \u00a0Political activity is disallowed at events sponsored by the county. In the end, intimidation was utilized to enact voter suppression in 2018.<\/p>\n
Concerns of voter suppression have become a topic of national conversation not limited to any one state. \u00a0Political groups, universities, racial justice supporters, etc. are tackling this matter that has become increasingly concerning. \u00a0A survey completed by the Public Religion Research Institute and The Atlantic magazine, found that people of color (African American and Hispanic) face barriers at the polls as well as diminished political rights in comparison to Caucasian citizens. \u00a0Various aspects of voter suppression include structural and historical barriers like the after-effects of \u2018Jim Crow\u2019 racial discrimination, election laws that are restrictive, and the general hardships people of color face when it comes to voting; also included are voter ID requirements.<\/p>\n
Thus far, incidents of voter suppression appear to be advantageous for the Republican Party. \u00a0There is documentation of numerous Democrats unable to vote due to lack of proper ID, and general complaints that span across states such as \u00a0North Carolina, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, Indianapolis, Washington, Texas, Wisconsin – and the list goes on.<\/p>\n
The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture hosted Emory University\u2019s Professor of African American Studies, Dr. Carol Anderson, to discuss the history of voter suppression and continuous disenfranchisement of African Americans in this regard. \u00a0Dr. Anderson\u2019s teaching examines how race and equality in the United States links to our domestic policies. The nature of this highly important issue is exacerbated in current politics and continues to be an undeniable problem. It is incumbent on policy developers, educators and political organizations to devote time and energy to discuss and enact solutions that will disallow these anti-democratic incidents from occurring.<\/p>\n
The importance of this issue is marked by the recent NBC News \u2013 Wall Street Journal survey signifying Democrats leading in the polls against their Republican counterparts a mere 6 weeks before the election. \u00a0The current point margin of 12 percent has the ability to shift control of Congress and the Senate from Republican to Democrat. Opposition to voter suppression and Trump policies may have deteriorated Republican support beyond repair. \u00a0Additionally, there is increasing controversy of the Trump administration\u2019s support for Saudi Arabia after the Jamal Khashoggi murder in Turkey, and the war in Yemen that continues to create staggering numbers of civilian deaths, starvation, and cholera. \u00a0Thus, Democrats have signaled a desire to re-examine the controversial relationship between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n
America\u2019s quagmire of political issues and policies makes the upcoming midterm elections more than interesting. \u00a0Stakes are high, which makes voting of critical importance. Voter suppression will be challenged more than ever, and rightly so. \u00a0All Americans will be anxiously awaiting the election results to learn whether or not there will be major changes to the current Republican stronghold in Washington.<\/p>\n
Islamic Post Editorial<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Forced to disembark the bus taking them to cast early voting ballots, African American senior citizens from Jefferson County, Georgia were dismayed and shocked. \u00a0The director of the senior center reportedly prevented them based on the county commissioner\u2019s decision after a county clerk called and voiced concerns. Allegedly it was believed that the group that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2964,"featured_media":7347,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,14081],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7346"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2964"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7346\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.islamicpostonline.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}