Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Follow Us:
Top Stories

A defiant Georgia county switches from touchscreens to paper

Paper ballots

Clarke County, Ga., elections officials vote to use paper ballots in the upcoming election rather than the new machines, due to privacy concerns.

Office of the Georgia Secretary of State

A Georgia county is defying a state law requiring every place in the state to use new voting equipment this year. Eyesight, not voter suppression, is the reason.

It's the latest twist in a debate over whether the touchscreens that are part of the new $100 million system are so big and bright that guaranteeing voter privacy is impossible.

By 3-2 this week, the Board of Elections in Clarke County accepted the privacy concerns. So instead of the machines deployed everywhere else across the state, paper ballots will be used in the Democratic presidential primary there.


Early voting ends March 20 and election day is March 24, the last big nominating contest in the South.

There are about 100,000 eligible voters in Clarke County, centered in Athens and about 70 miles east of Atlanta.

An advocacy group had filed a lawsuit in another Georgia county recently making the same argument about the lack of privacy created by the new tablet computers. But a state court judge rejected the request for an immediate order requiring all counties to use paper ballots.


Read More

The American Experiment at the Brink Due To  Minority Rule

Can America overcome minority rule? Examining the Electoral College, NPVIC, campaign finance, and democratic reform in the 21st century.

adamkaz / Getty Images

The American Experiment at the Brink Due To Minority Rule

The challenge for continuing the American Experiment is recovering from the "Second Gilded Age" (1980s to the present). As of early 2026, the U.S. national debt is 122% to 125% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This situation has been exacerbated since 2000, when the U.S. national debt as a percentage of GDP was 33% to 35%. Americans can attribute this worsening situation to two non-popular vote presidents, Bush-43 and Trump-45. Directly, during their terms, and indirectly, with the aftermath of the 2008 Great recession and the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. In 1894, toward the end of the 19th century “Gilded Age," the U.S. national debt was approximately 7% of gross domestic product GDP.

Minority rule occurs when a numerical or ideological minority holds the power to consistently thwart the will of the majority or govern over them. It thrives through the coordinated reinforcement of specific electoral, institutional, and legal mechanisms.

Keep ReadingShow less
Full frame shot of pins that say “vote” with red, white, and blue American flag theme.

An analysis of Project 2025, the Electoral College, and the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, examining democracy, representation, and presidential elections.

Adrienne Bresnahan / Getty Images

Spirit of 1776 – Rejected by Project 2025, Embraced by NPVIC

Project 2025 is a structural undoing of the "Spirit of 1776." It fundamentally undermines the foundational principles of the Declaration of Independence in the following areas: democratic representation, equality, liberty, and checks/balances. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) restores the founding ideals of civic equality.

Spirit of 1776 – Rejected by Project 2025, Embraced by NPVIC

Keep ReadingShow less
California Voters Don’t Like Either Party. Good Thing the Primary Doesn’t Belong to The Parties.

California voters increasingly distrust both major parties. Here's why the state's Top Two primary gives independent voters more power to shape elections.

Image: Duncan Shelby on Alamy.

California Voters Don’t Like Either Party. Good Thing the Primary Doesn’t Belong to The Parties.

SAN DIEGO, Calif. - California voters have already received ballots for the June 2 primary, and the message they have going into these elections may not be what the political class wants to hear: They are not thrilled with either major party.

A recent analysis from the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) found that majorities of likely voters have unfavorable views of both parties—61% unfavorable toward the Democratic Party and 70% unfavorable toward the Republican Party.

Keep ReadingShow less
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.”

Keep ReadingShow less