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stand up america
'Dark Omen': Supreme Court Allows Virginia Voter Purge Just Days Before Election
Although eligible voters can still participate thanks to same-day registration, critics called the decision "outrageous."
Oct 30, 2024
Democracy defenders responded with alarm on Wednesday to a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court's right-wing majority allowing Virginia to resume its purge of state voter registration rolls while early voting is underway for next Tuesday's election.
Stand Up America managing director of policy and political affairs Brett Edkins framed the court's decision as a gift to former Republican President Donald Trump, who appointed half of the conservative justices and is facing Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in the November 5 contest for the White House.
"This eleventh-hour move by the Roberts Court to allow Virginia to purge registered voters from the voter rolls is a troubling attempt by the Supreme Court's MAGA majority to come to Trump's aid just days before the election," Edkins said. "This last-minute purge will impact American citizens, including newly-eligible voters, and undermine our democracy and the freedom to vote."
"Americans deserve a nonpartisan Supreme Court that will stand up for our rights and protect the will of the people—the Roberts Court is not it," he continued. "We must turn out in record numbers to keep Trump out of the Oval Office and prevent him from appointing even more MAGA justices who put partisan interests over Americans' freedom to vote."
The high court's right-wing majority did not explain the reasoning behind Wednesday's decision, which came after a federal judge determined that Virginia illegally booted 1,600 people from the rolls and an appellate court agreed.
Liberal Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor dissented, only saying they would deny the application from the administration of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who welcomed the high court's move.
Meanwhile, Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Stern explained that "the Supreme Court's decision is extremely worrisome because the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 *explicitly forbids* systematic purges of voter rolls shortly before an election. It now looks like the conservative supermajority will let states ignore that prohibition."
The Virginia program was purportedly intended to remove noncitizens—who already cannot legally vote—from the rolls.
CNNreported Wednesday that "Trump and other Republicans have seized on claims of illegal voting and that was part of the argument they made to explain the former president's loss in 2020. But documented cases of noncitizens voting are extremely rare. A recent Georgia audit of the 8.2 million people on its rolls found just 20 registered noncitizens—only nine of whom had voted."
In the case of Virginia, Stern noted, "we know this purge has targeted qualified citizens."
The Campaign Legal Center represented state groups that challenged the program. In a series of social media posts, Danielle Lang, the organization's senior director for voting rights, said that "many of the Virginia voters who have been kicked off the rolls are eligible citizens. These are eligible Virginians who deserve to have their voices heard."
"The Supreme Court allowing Virginia to engage in a last-minute purge that includes many known eligible citizens in the final days before an election is outrageous," Lang declared. "But the voters will decide this election, not the courts. Eligible Virginia voters should know that regardless of this purge they can register to vote on Election Day and cast their ballots."
"I am hopping mad. The Supreme Court issued an unreasoned order reinstating a purge in Virginia based on faulty evidence that was capturing known eligible U.S. voters," she added. "But folks need to channel their (correct) anger into action. These voters can vote by registering same-day in Virginia. And that's why reforms like same-day registration are so important."
The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law also criticized Wednesday's decision but emphasized that eligible Virginia voters can still participate in the upcoming election.
"By issuing a stay in the Virginia mass voter challenge case, the Supreme Court has injected confusion into the election. This stay will cause eligible Virginia citizens to be purged from voter rolls just before the election—all in service of a conspiracy theory," the Brennan Center said. "For any eligible voter in Virginia who may be impacted by the purge, please use same-day registration to cast a vote in this election. Or call (866)-OUR-VOTE if you need assistance."
This decision is just the latest in a long series of moves that have heightened concerns about the court's right-wing justices.
"In any election-related cases, we should question the impartiality of Clarence Thomas, whose wife tried to overturn the 2020 election, and Samuel Alito, who had two January 6-supporting flags flying at his homes," Revolving Door Project executive director Jeff Hauser said in a Wednesday statement, referring to the 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Hauser added that "this shadow docket decision is horrifying on the merits—but even more so if Thomas and Alito took part in it despite the fact that their impartiality can be reasonably questioned."
Take Back the Court Action Fund president Sarah Lipton-Lubet said that "when the right-wing court sees a law it doesn't like, it pretends it doesn't exist. And that's exactly what happened here: The partisan ideologues on Trump's Supreme Court pushed aside the clear language of the law to ensure fewer Americans can make their voices heard at the ballot box—all in service of supporting Donald Trump's bogus narrative about voter fraud. This is the Roberts Court's pattern: When in doubt, disenfranchise voters."
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Senate Dems Call Out 'Republican Bullsh*t' With IVF Vote
"By blocking access to IVF and trying to control how families grow, MAGA Republicans in the Senate are proving just how far they're willing to go to impose Trump's out-of-touch, authoritarian vision."
Sep 17, 2024
In another effort to call out Republicans in Congress for pushing deadly policies that restrict reproductive freedom, Senate Democrats on Tuesday held a vote to open debate on legislation that is intended "to protect and expand nationwide access to fertility treatment, including in vitro fertilization."
The tally was 51-44, short of the 60 votes needed to start debate on the Right to IVF Act (S. 4555). Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) voted with every Democrat and Independent present to advance the bill, while Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Joe Manchin (I-W.Va.), Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), and JD Vance (R-Ohio) did not participate.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) previously held a vote on the legislation in July—part of a broader strategy in the lead-up to the November election that has also featured votes on the Right to Contraception Act and the Reproductive Freedom for Women Act. In all cases, Republican senators have blocked the bills from advancing to final votes.
In addition to deciding the makeup of Congress, U.S. voters are set to choose whether former Republican President Donald Trump or Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris returns to the White House. Throughout the contest, Harris has campaigned on expanding reproductive freedom at the federal level and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, has shared how his family was made possible through fertility treatments.
Harris said on social media after Tuesday's vote that Senate Republicans "made clear—again—that they will not protect access to the fertility treatments many couples need to fulfill their dream of having a child."
Meanwhile, Trump has both bragged about his role in reversing Roe v. Wade, which enabled a fresh wave of state-level abortion bans, but also attempted to distance himself from the most extreme laws and proposals. He also chose Vance as his running mate, heightening fears of what their election would mean for reproductive rights nationwide.
"By all accounts, a vote to protect something as basic and popular as IVF shouldn't be necessary. But sadly it is very necessary, thanks to attacks against reproductive care by Donald Trump and his Project 2025," Schumer said Tuesday, referring to the Heritage Foundation-led initiative designed for the next Republican president that Trump has tried to disavow.
"From the moment Donald Trump's MAGA Supreme Court reversed Roe, the hard-right made clear they would keep going. As we saw earlier this year in Alabama, IVF has become one of the hard-right's next targets," Schumer continued, recalling the state Supreme Court's February decision recognizing frozen embryos as children.
After the vote, the Democratic leader declared that "Senate Republicans just blocked the bill to protect IVF—AGAIN. They keep trying to tell everyone who will listen that they support IVF. But their actions speak louder."
Like Schumer and other critics, Christina Harvey, executive director of Stand Up America, pointed to Project 2025 on Thursday.
"Donald Trump can try to walk away from Project 2025, but his fingerprints are all over it. At least 140 former Trump administration and campaign officials helped craft this far-right agenda," she said in a statement. "Trump's public disavowal is nothing more than an attempt to deceive voters while his allies in Congress push the very policies he's pretending to distance himself from."
"Project 2025 isn't a distant, abstract threat—it's a real, extremist agenda that MAGA Republicans are eager to implement. By blocking access to IVF and trying to control how families grow, MAGA Republicans in the Senate are proving just how far they're willing to go to impose Trump's out-of-touch, authoritarian vision," Harvey added. "As more Americans learn about the policies in Project 2025, the stakes at the ballot box this November will become even clearer."
Democratic National Committee spokesperson Aida Ross targeted the Republican vice presidential candidate, saying that "JD Vance celebrated when Donald Trump 'proudly' overturned Roe v. Wade and paved the way for threats to IVF access for Americans who want to start or grow their family. Today, Vance couldn't be bothered to show up to vote on protecting IVF access, after voting against the same protections in June."
"Vance is showing us who he is and we should believe him," Ross added. "The American people will remember that Vance didn't show up for them, and they'll make that clear when they reject the Trump-Vance ticket's anti-choice Project 2025 agenda in November."
American Bridge 21st Century, a Democratic super political action committee, said the vote shows Republicans "are full of sh*t on protecting IVF," specifically calling out Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), and Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who are seeking reelection this November and have previously claimed to support access to fertility treatments.
"Sens. Rick Scott, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, and Deb Fischer's hypocrisy on IVF underscores the Republican Party's refusal to support and protect reproductive rights," said American Bridge Senate communications director Nico Delgado. "Voters already know the GOP's damaging stance on abortion—and each vote against protecting IVF only deepens their credibility crisis."
Indivisible's co-founder and co-executive Director Leah Greenberg similarly said in a statement that "Trump and the GOP have been scrambling to hide their unpopular, outdated views on reproductive rights, but they're not fooling anybody."
Greenberg continued:
When Republicans send mixed messages on TV and online, look at their voting records. They've consistently voted against protecting personal freedoms—from access to abortion and contraceptives to IVF. For decades, they've chipped away at reproductive rights, and it's only gotten worse since Trump entered politics.
"As attacks on reproductive rights intensify, including MAGA efforts against contraception, we can't let our guard down. Indivisible proudly supports Sen. Schumer and Democrats for not only standing up for these fundamental rights, but continuously calling out their Republican colleagues' blatant lies.
Millions rely on contraception and IVF to build their families and lives, including Gov. Walz who has shared his family's struggles with fertility. These rights are fundamental and widely supported, and Republicans are straight-up trying to take them away. It is not only weird—it's dangerous.
"We commend Senate Democrats for taking decisive and strategic action by bringing this bill for a vote," she added. "Between now and November, we'll make sure every single voter sees through Republican bullshit and knows they voted against IVF protections today."
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'Another Day, Another Undisclosed Trip Clarence Thomas Took on a Billionaire's Private Jet': Wyden
"The Supreme Court should be the gold standard for judicial ethics," said one reform advocate, "yet billionaires like Harlan Crow are buying the loyalty of justices one private jet flight at a time."
Aug 05, 2024
New reporting on Monday that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas failed to report even more private travel gifted by a Republican mega-donor sparked renewed calls for reforms including a binding code of ethics for members of the nation's highest court.
The New York Timesreported that Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) detailed in a letter to Michael Bopp, an attorney representing billionaire businessman Harlan Crow, how Thomas "has never disclosed" round-trip travel by Thomas and his wife, conservative activist Virginia Thomas, between Hawaii and New Zealand in November 2010 on Crow's private jet.
"Furthermore, it was revealed just a few weeks ago that Justice Thomas enjoyed complimentary use of private jets paid for by Mr. Crow on 17 different occasions since 2016, with nine of those flights coming in the last three years," Wyden wrote.
"While Justice Thomas has only recently updated his financial disclosures to include an eight-day voyage aboard the Michaela Rose in Indonesia in 2019, Justice Thomas still has not disclosed other trips on the Michaela Rose," the senator continued, referring to Crow's yacht. "Public reports show evidence that Justice Thomas was a passenger aboard the Michaela Rose in Greece, New Zealand, and elsewhere."
Thomas' 2023 disclosure, which was published in June, includes food and lodging during 2019 trips to Bali and Bohemian Grove—a secretive, men-only retreat in Sonoma County, California—paid for by Crow. The trips and other gifts for Thomas—including yacht excursions, flights on private jets, and private school tuition for the justice's grandnephew—were first revealed by ProPublica last year. Thomas claimed key disclosures were "inadvertently omitted at the time of filing."
Also in June, the advocacy group Fix the Court published a database listing 546 total gifts valued at over $4.7 million given to 18 current and former justices mostly between 2004 and 2023, as identified by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The database also lists "likely" gifts received by the justices and their estimated values, bringing the grand total to 672 gifts valued at nearly $6.6 million.
Thomas led the pack with 193 FTC-identified gifts collectively valued at over $4 million. Of these, he listed only 27 in financial disclosure reports.
Wyden wrote:
I seek to understand the means and scale of Mr. Crow's undisclosed largesse to Justice Thomas to inform several pieces of legislation that the committee is drafting, including but not limited to: reforms to the tax code concerning filing requirements for gift tax returns, audit requirements for Supreme Court justices, and comprehensive ethics reform that would strengthen the Ethics in Government Act and other laws related to the disclosure of complimentary private jet and yacht travel by Supreme Court justices...
Unfortunately, your prior responses to the committee have done nothing to address concerns that personal trips aboard Mr. Crow's superyacht and private jets for lavish vacations, including complimentary private jet travel for Justice Thomas, may have been used to help Mr. Crow avoid or evade paying federal taxes. This is not a particularly complicated matter. Mr. Crow could easily clarify for the committee whether tax deductions were claimed on superyacht and private jet use by Justice Thomas, but he refuses to do so.
This is particularly troubling in light of the committee's discovery of additional lavish international travel by Justice Thomas at Mr. Crow's expense that Justice Thomas has failed to properly disclose.
Wyden's letter asks Bopp to provide financial statements for Rochelle Charter, the holding company for the Michaela Rose, and to answer questions including whether Thomas ever reimbursed Crow for the private jet trip from Hawaii to New Zealand and other travel.
Last month, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), who chairs a Senate Judiciary subcommittee on the federal courts and oversight, and Wyden asked the Biden administration to appoint a special counsel to investigate Thomas for alleged ethics violations.
Government ethics advocates weighed in on the new revelations.
"These new reports are as appalling as they are unsurprising," Demand Justice managing director Maggie Jo Buchanan said in a statement. "Justice Thomas' actions and—critically—[Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts'] refusal to assure the public that the court takes these never-ending revelations seriously, shows the necessity of meaningful and immediate reform."
"Trust for the Supreme Court remains at historic lows in part because the MAGA justices openly display their allegiances to wealthy billionaires and partisan interests instead of the public, whom they are meant to serve," Buchanan added. "We call on Congress to urgently pass full-scale reform, including an enforceable code of ethics as President [Joe] Biden proposed last week."
Biden called for, and Vice President Kamala Harris—who is replacing the incumbent atop the Democratic presidential ticket— endorsed reforms including term limits for Supreme Court justices, an enforceable code of ethics, and a constitutional amendment reversing the court's decision to grant presidents broad immunity for official acts.
Last year, the Supreme Court formally announced a new 14-page
code of conduct that watchdog groups dismissed as what the Revolving Door Project called a "toothless PR stunt."
Brett Edkins, managing director of policy and political affairs for the advocacy group Stand Up America, said Monday that "the Supreme Court should be the gold standard for judicial ethics, yet billionaires like Harlan Crow are buying the loyalty of justices one private jet flight at a time."
"Our nation's highest court has become a political plaything for the ultra-wealthy and well-connected," Edkins added. "Congress must step up as a co-equal branch of government and tackle the corruption plaguing the court. It's time for our leaders to restore integrity and transparency to the Supreme Court by passing a binding code of ethics and term limits."
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