Scott is a staff attorney at the Advancement Project, a civil rights advocacy organization .
Researchers heralded the 2020 presidential election as having record turnout, with two-thirds of eligible voters casting a ballot. Yet, people overlook how this calculation excluded 5.1 million potential voters.
Currently, 48 states deem some residents ineligible to vote if they have a felony conviction. No matter how long ago that conviction occurred, or how the person's life may have changed since, states restrict their right to participate in elections.
While there is a growing trend towards modifying state laws to make voting easier for those with felony convictions, other states remain committed to suppressing votes. Even where advocates and policymakers have tried to change antiquated laws and improve systems, the most egregious states refuse to improve. They continue to treat voting as a privilege instead of the right it actually is.
Where these states insist on acting against full democracy for their residents, Congress is in a unique position to assure the basic right for all to have a voice in our political process. By passing the For the People Act — which the House passed in March as HR 1 and is now awaiting debate in the Senate as S 1 — we can make history in expanding the franchise to millions.
Felony disenfranchisement has existed for centuries. But beginning in the 1890s it was strategically used in the United States to minimize the Black electorate, especially in Southern states. Legislatures created laws to permanently remove a person's right to vote — or to only restore that right if certain requirements were satisfied, many of which were unfair, confusing and burdensome to navigate. Today, these laws continue to lock millions out the electoral process, disproportionately affecting voters of color.
Advocates have worked to reform these laws, crafting bills to simplify criteria and pushing state constitutional amendments to expand access. In spite of several significant wins in the last decade, states including Mississippi, Tennessee, Florida and Wisconsin adamantly persist in denying millions a full place in society.
According to a new report from my organization, Mississippi is one of the worst violators. The state's highly punitive law disenfranchises 235,150 Mississippians — one out of every 10 people in the state's voting-age population. For Black Mississippians the number is even higher: one in seven. Residents can only restore their rights by obtaining an individual order from the governor or winning passage of an individual bill by the Legislature. That process in particular is inaccessible and arbitrary, with legislators passing a very small percentage of such proposed bills. In the decade ending in 2017, for example only 45 people had their voting rights restored through legislation. Every year, legislators deny thousands of tax-paying citizens the right to choose their representatives and support measures that impact their communities. Mississippi lawmakers send their residents a clear message: We refuse to give up our oppressive and discriminatory system.
Florida is another place where the Legislature is failing to act in the interest of its residents. In November 2018, more than 64 percent of Floridians voted to restore voting rights to more than 1.4 million people. The following spring, though, legislators reversed one of the largest expansions of voting rights in decades. It passed a bill requiring payment of legal fines and fees before a person could vote. These additional barriers drastically shrank the number of newly eligible voters and made a person's right to vote dependent on wealth. Florida lawmakers clearly chose suppression over the will of the people.
Congress has an opportunity to remedy state inaction and voter suppression by passing the For the People Act, which President Biden says he's eager to sign. The comprehensive legislation includes a provision that ensures everyone with a felony conviction may vote in federal elections if they are not currently incarcerated. The provision would supersede state felony disenfranchisement laws and expand the number of eligible voters for federal elections to millions across the country. Voting rights would no longer depend on geography or the whims of elected officials. All voters would be on equal footing.
The only way our democracy can thrive and truly represent the will of the people is if everyone has a voice in the trajectory of our country. People who live, work in and contribute to our communities deserve to have a voice in what happens to them and their families. Congress has the power and opportunity to give them this assurance by passing the For the People Act.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.