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The Supreme Court’s Voting Rights Act Decision Will Fuel the “Disuniting” of the United States and the Unraveling of American Democracy

Trump’s Denaturalization Push and the Erosion of Legal Immigration

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Some MAGA loyalists have turned on Trump. Why the rest haven’t

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One in six Ohio youth are left out of voter registration drive

Young voters

Youth voters who don't have driver licenses or state IDs are left out of Ohio's youth voter registration drive.

Joshua Lott/Getty Images
The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumSep 10, 2019
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
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Ohio's campaign to boost youth voter registration, by mailing how-to postcards in August to 120,000 unregistered young adults with driver licenses or state IDs, is getting praise from voting rights activists.

But some of those advocates say the campaign has a serious flaw: Increasing numbers of young people, especially the poor and minorities, aren't getting their licenses or signing up for the IDs. At least 17 percent of Ohio's 18-year-olds don't have either, the Cleveland Plain Dealer calculated based on state records and census estimates.

The potential communications gap between the state and its young people extends to another issue involving voting: The easiest ways to update a registration is with an online form, but it's only available to people with a license or ID.

Several states offer voters online options that don't require such documents. Minnesota uses Social Security numbers to confirm IDs, for example, while Delaware and Missouri accept signatures from touch-screen devices.


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How the Voting Rights Act Reshaped Texas’ Electoral Maps

President Lyndon B. Johnson, Martin Luther King Jr., Clarence Mitchell Jr., Patricia Roberts Harris, and other guests at the signing of the Voting Rights Act on August 6, 1965.

Yoichi Okamoto - Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum

How the Voting Rights Act Reshaped Texas’ Electoral Maps

In 2002, U.S. Rep. Henry Bonilla, a Republican, nearly lost his South Texas seat to Democrat Henry Cuellar. So when the GOP used its newfound majority in the state Legislature to redraw the voting maps the next year, they sawed through Cuellar’s hometown of Laredo and scattered Latino voters, who tended to vote Democratic, into other districts.

Latino advocacy groups sued under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, the cornerstone provision of the law that prevents government bodies from diluting the voting power of specific groups. The Supreme Court found Texas lawmakers had taken away Latino voting power “because they were about to exercise it.”

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A group of people wait in line to get their ballots to vote in the election.

The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact could reshape presidential elections as Midwest states debate Electoral College reform, political polarization, and the future of winner-take-all voting in America.

Getty Images, SDI Productions

700+ Proposed Amendments Failed, Midwest Voters Can Succeed

The Midwest served as the vanguard and ideological heartland of the Progressive Era, acting as a crucial laboratory for political, social, and economic reforms that later adopted national significance. Midwestern states (the cradle of the movement) pioneered anti-monopoly efforts, democratic, and social improvements.

After 770+ failed proposed U.S. Constitutional Amendments (the most on record for one issue) to remedy the factionalism (21st century polarization) feared by the Framers of the U.S. Constitution.

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“We Can’t Afford It” Is Never an Acceptable Excuse To Deny Independents a Vote

DC voting rights advocate Lisa D.T. Rice criticized the DC City Council for failing to fund Initiative 83’s semi-open primary system, leaving 85,000 independent voters unable to participate in taxpayer-funded primaries despite overwhelming voter approval in 2024.

Photo by Getty Images on Unsplash.

“We Can’t Afford It” Is Never an Acceptable Excuse To Deny Independents a Vote

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Lisa D.T. Rice spoke before the DC City Council during a Budget Oversight Hearing on May 1 to talk about Initiative 83, the semi-open primary and ranked choice voting measure she proposed that was approved by 73% of voters in 2024.

- YouTube youtu.be

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The Supreme Court’s Voting Rights Decision Could Reshape Local Government Across Texas

A landmark Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Act could reshape Latino and Black political representation in Texas. Guillermo Ramos and other leaders warn the decision may weaken protections against discriminatory election systems in school boards and city councils.

The Supreme Court’s Voting Rights Decision Could Reshape Local Government Across Texas

Guillermo Ramos remembers seeing few elected leaders who looked like him while he was growing up in the 1980s in Farmers Branch, a fast-growing affluent suburb northwest of Dallas.

Over the years, Latino representation continued to lag, he said. In 2015, after he had become a lawyer, he decided to do something about it.

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