Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

House Democrats include $3.6 billion for elections in new stimulus

Postal Service

The Democrats' new relief bill includes money to cover vote-by-mail costs as well as bolster the cash-strapped Postal Service.

Scott Olson/Getty Images

House Democrats unveiled a sweeping new stimulus package Tuesday that would give states another $3.6 billion in election aid, to help make voting for president easier and safer no matter what the state of the coronavirus pandemic this fall.

The $3 trillion bill would be the most expensive economic recovery measure in American history. But its passage, probably along entirely party lines as soon as Friday, will set up a significant clash with the Republicans in charge of the Senate, who say another round of emergency aid is not yet warranted.

As a result, the fate of the new money to expand vote-by-mail, in-person early voting and other election accommodations remains totally up in the air — and advocates for the most generous federal assistance possible say the time is getting short to be able to spend the money in time to do maximum good.


The economic recovery package enacted in March provided $400 million in election grants, which state officials say is not nearly sufficient to hire people, print ballots, buy ballot-scanning machines and maybe provide postage for the record wave of absentee voting expected in November.

The new bill would bring the total spending on voting to $4 billion, the ambitious target set by democracy reform groups that have rallied around the cause of smoother elections as their singular pursuit during the Covid-19 outbreak. Lobbyists for those groups acknowledge they'll get only a share of that money, at most, from GOP senators who have fallen increasingly in line behind President Trump's oft-stated view that voting by mail promotes cheating and helps Democratic candidates the most by far.

The new Democratic measure in the House is focused on funding to prop up the treasuries of state and local governments, more direct payments to individuals, money to expand testing and contact tracing, food for the poor, and student loan relief.

It also includes $25 billion for the financially strapped Postal Service, which election administrators say is essential for the ocean of additional mailed ballots to get delivered to homes and returned to tabulation centers in time in November.

Trump has also sent strong signals he does not view the package as necessary — and he's been openly hostile to providing federal subsidies to the Postal Service, which he views as poorly run.

"Unless states get the $4 billion they require to secure our elections and create the infrastructure needed to implement vote-by-mail nationwide, the chaos we witnessed in Wisconsin will happen on a national scale," Sean Eldridge, who runs the progressive democracy reform group Stand Up America, said in one of several similarly worded statements reacting to the House bill. "Now the question is whether Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans will attempt to suppress the vote in the middle of a pandemic by refusing to give states the election assistance that they need."

Read More

U.S. President Barack Obama speaking on the phone in the Oval Office.

U.S. President Barack Obama talks President Barack Obama talks with President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan during a phone call from the Oval Office on November 2, 2009 in Washington, DC.

Getty Images, The White House

‘Obama, You're 15 Years Too Late!’

The mid-decade redistricting fight continues, while the word “hypocrisy” has become increasingly common in the media.

The origin of mid-decade redistricting dates back to the early history of the United States. However, its resurgence and legal acceptance primarily stem from the Texas redistricting effort in 2003, a controversial move by the Republican Party to redraw the state's congressional districts, and the 2006 U.S. Supreme Court decision in League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry. This decision, which confirmed that mid-decade redistricting is not prohibited by federal law, was a significant turning point in the acceptance of this practice.

Keep ReadingShow less
Hand of a person casting a ballot at a polling station during voting.

Gerrymandering silences communities and distorts elections. Proportional representation offers a proven path to fairer maps and real democracy.

Getty Images, bizoo_n

Gerrymandering Today, Gerrymandering Tomorrow, Gerrymandering Forever

In 1963, Alabama Governor George Wallace declared, "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever." (Watch the video of his speech.) As a politically aware high school senior, I was shocked by the venom and anger in his voice—the open, defiant embrace of systematic disenfranchisement, so different from the quieter racism I knew growing up outside Boston.

Today, watching politicians openly rig elections, I feel that same disbelief—especially seeing Republican leaders embrace that same systematic approach: gerrymandering now, gerrymandering tomorrow, gerrymandering forever.

Keep ReadingShow less
An oversized ballot box surrounded by people.

Young people worldwide form new parties to reshape politics—yet America’s two-party system blocks them.

Getty Images, J Studios

No Country for Young Politicians—and How To Fix That

In democracies around the world, young people have started new political parties whenever the establishment has sidelined their views or excluded them from policymaking. These parties have sometimes reinvigorated political competition, compelled established parties to take previously neglected issues seriously, or encouraged incumbent leaders to find better ways to include and reach out to young voters.

In Europe, a trio in their twenties started Volt in 2017 as a pan-European response to Brexit, and the party has managed to win seats in the European Parliament and in some national legislatures. In Germany, young people concerned about climate change created Klimaliste, a party committed to limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, as per the Paris Agreement. Although the party hasn’t won seats at the federal level, they have managed to win some municipal elections. In Chile, leaders of the 2011 student protests, who then won seats as independent candidates, created political parties like Revolución Democrática and Convergencia Social to institutionalize their movements. In 2022, one of these former student leaders, Gabriel Boric, became the president of Chile at 36 years old.

Keep ReadingShow less
How To Fix Gerrymandering: A Fair-Share Rule for Congressional Redistricting

Demonstrators gather outside of The United States Supreme Court during an oral arguments in Gill v. Whitford to call for an end to partisan gerrymandering on October 3, 2017 in Washington, DC

Getty Images, Olivier Douliery

How To Fix Gerrymandering: A Fair-Share Rule for Congressional Redistricting

The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground. ~ Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Col. Edward Carrington, Paris, 27 May 1788

The Problem We Face

The U.S. House of Representatives was designed as the chamber of Congress most directly tethered to the people. Article I of the Constitution mandates that seats be apportioned among the states according to population and that members face election every two years—design features meant to keep representatives responsive to shifting public sentiment. Unlike the Senate, which prioritizes state sovereignty and representation, the House translates raw population counts into political voice: each House district is to contain roughly the same number of residents, ensuring that every citizen’s vote carries comparable weight. In principle, then, the House serves as the nation’s demographic mirror, channeling the diverse preferences of the electorate into lawmaking and acting as a safeguard against unresponsive or oligarchic governance.

Nationally, the mismatch between the overall popular vote and the partisan split in House seats is small, with less than a 1% tilt. But state-level results tell a different story. Take Connecticut: Democrats hold all five seats despite Republicans winning over 40% of the statewide vote. In Oklahoma, the inverse occurs—Republicans control every seat even though Democrats consistently earn around 40% of the vote.

Keep ReadingShow less