The state of our union is … well, rather jacked up tbh.
The federal government is still shut down because Senate Republicans are too scared to defy Trump, major media organizations are laying off significant chunks of their reporting staff, and Weezer dropped covers of No Scrubs and Billie Jean for some reason.
Obviously these items vary greatly in terms of terribleness, but I think most reasonable people can agree that they are generally Not Good.
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So let’s just drop in to see what condition states are in.
Respect: The Equal Rights Amendment, which recently passed the Virginia state Senate with bipartisan support, is having a much harder time in the House.
- First, a subcommittee (chaired by a woman, by the by—and a Republican, of course) spiked the bill on a party-line vote early Tuesday morning.
- The meeting got pretty heated when the chair personally attacked a longtime ERA activist (and mom of U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger [VA-07]) who’d come to speak on the measure.
- Democrats went on to push for a floor vote on the ERA by the full House—a move rejected by the (barely) GOP-controlled chamber (you can watch one Democratic delegate eloquently clap back at Republican leadership here).
- Session’s not over, though, and pressure continues to build on House Republicans, but making Virginia the 38th state to ratify the ERA this year sure looks like a long shot at this point.
- But one thing putting a little extra pressure on Virginia House Republicans for sure this week is the announcement by a federal court that a new district map drawn by an independent expert (after lawmakers couldn’t agree on one that could both pass the GOP-controlled legislature and get the Democratic governor’s approval) is to be adopted forthwith.
- The new map is the result of the court’s ruling last year that 11 House of Delegates districts were unconstitutionally gerrymandered to diminish the power of black voters.
- The new map would change 26 of the House of Delegates’ 100 districts, and Daily Kos Elections’ analysis of the new lines reveals that those changes will likely benefit Democrats (who, by the by, are just one seat away from wresting majority control away from Republicans in the chamber).
- Under the old lines, Clinton won 51 House seats in 2016.
- Under the new ones, Clinton won 56, leaving Republicans with just 44 seats won by Trump.
- The new map puts seven Republican incumbents in seats won by Clinton (the current map has just three Republicans in Clinton seats). No Democrats would sit in Trump seats.
Virginia Republicans were already sweating their one-seat majority. This new map is the stuff of GOP nightmares.
(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction: An enterprising Republican lawmaker in Arizona has an … innovative idea for ending the government shutdown and funding Trump’s monument to racism along our southern border.
- GOP Rep. Gail Griffin has introduced legislation that would force anyone who wants to view porn on an electronic device to fork over $20.
- That cash would go into a fund that would be authorized to finance, among other things, construction of “a border wall between Mexico and this state.”
- Forcing distributors and manufacturers to install pretty obviously unconstitutional software on electronic devices to fund things actually isn’t so new.
- Just last year, strikingly similar bills surfaced in Virginia and Rhode Island, and they’ve popped up previously in Kentucky, Alabama, South Carolina, and Utah.
Mad World: Newly-appointed Florida Secretary of State Michael Ertel appeared in blackface and dressed as a “Hurricane Katrina victim” at a Halloween party 14 years ago.
- At the time, Ertel was Seminole County supervisor of elections.
- This week, a Florida newspaper obtained photos of Ertel in costume.
- The paper shared the photos with the governor’s office Thursday morning.
- Ertel resigned Thursday afternoon.
seriously though wtf is wrong with people
Last Kiss: Fear is a powerful motivator.
- Just look at Arizona House Republicans, who saw their majority whittled to just one seat last fall.
Their response?
- File a flurry of bills this session designed to make voting more difficult.
- One measure would boot voters from the rolls if they don’t vote in two consecutive primary and general elections.
- Another would prohibit the establishment of “emergency voting centers,” where voters can cast ballots before Election Day beginning the Friday immediately prior.
- Yet another would force voters on the Permanent Early Voting List who receive ballots by mail to only return them by mail, eliminating the current option to drop them off at an early voting center or at a polling place on Election Day.
Hallelujah: This week in States With Newly All-Democratic Governments Doing Cool Things, New York’s Democratic legislature passed—and Gov. Cuomo signed—the Reproductive Health Act, a series of measures codifying abortion protections and expanding reproductive health rights.
- The bill had been held up for years by the GOP-controlled state Senate.
Welp, that’s all for this week. My situation is that I’m tired and sore and sad that I won’t be able to deliver unto you this missive next week. In honor of that, you should totally knock off early and get started on your weekend—especially since you won’t be have this excuse to do so next Thursday. Just print this out and show it to your boss, I’m sure she won’t mind.