Presidential Politics and Voting Rights

Throughout her career, Vice President Harris has worked to combat the influx of corporate money into politics and to protect and expand voting rights. As Senator, she was a co-sponsor of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. She received an A+ from End Citizens United // Let America Vote Action Fund for her work fighting for our democracy.

Vice President Harris has led the Administration’s voting rights agenda, a role she herself requested. One of the Biden-Harris Administration’s first actions was an Executive Order that sought to provide access to voter registration and election information. It acknowledged the particular barriers faced by Black Americans and other people of color. The Executive Order directed federal agencies to:

• Find new ways to promote voter registration and participation, including by transitioning visitors from agencies’ websites to online voter registration systems and expanding multilingual voter registration information;
• Modernize Vote.gov, the government’s voter registration website;
• Ensure equal access for voters with disabilities;
• Improve access to voting for active duty military and Americans living overseas;
• Ensure access to voter registration for eligible individuals in federal custody and;
• Increase voter outreach, education, registration, and turnout in Native American communities.

VP Harris’ voting rights strategy also focuses on increasing student voter participation, establishing the Elections Threats Taskforce to protect election workers in the face of rising threats and fighting voter suppression laws through the Department of Justice’s challenges to anti-voter laws.

As Vice President, Harris repeatedly convened voting rights leaders and spoke at the 59th anniversary of Bloody Sunday here in Selma, once again urging Congress to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was “rigged” and “stolen” have destabilized the electoral system and sown mistrust among voters. Throughout his current presidential campaign, he has refused to state that he will respect the outcome of the election, regardless of who emerges as the winner. This month, the ACLU released a report predicting that a second Trump presidency would further erode faith in the fairness of our electoral system and disenfranchise millions.

Project 2025 and Anti-Voting Policies

You may have heard about Project 2025 Presidential Transition Project, a 920-page roadmap for a second Trump presidency, developed by the right-wing Heritage Foundation, together with some of Trump’s closest advisors and appointees.

Project 2025 is an authoritarian plan to concentrate power in the hands of the president and vastly curtail the rights of individuals, including by dismantling reproductive and LGBTQ+ rights, environmental protections and protections for child laborers. Project 2025 also outlines a plan to weaken the independence of federal agencies, including the FBI, by firing nonpartisan career civil servants, such as scientists, engineers and attorneys, and replacing them with political allies loyal to the president. Here are some of the ways Project 2025 plans to directly curtail voting rights:

• The Department of Justice would be stripped of its Civil Rights Division, which is responsible for enforcing parts of the federal laws that protect the right to vote, including the Voting Rights Act (VRA) and the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
• The US Census would include a citizenship question. The Census is a constitutional requirement conducted every ten years to to count the number of residents in the United States. The (intended) result of adding a citizenship question would be the intimidation and drastic undercounting of undocumented residents. Census data is used to allocate congressional representation, meaning that communities with large immigrant populations could lose representation in Congress. The Census also plays a central role in determining the allocation of funding and resources, which could dramatically impact the everyday lives and wellbeing of communities.

Finally, the New York Times has reported on covert efforts by right wing activists, allied with Donald Trump and calling themselves “election investigators,” to remove voters from the voting rolls in critical battleground states.

For the next four months, Foot Soldiers Park will continue its efforts to inform eligible voters of their rights, register new voters and encourage participation in the 2024 election. Our organization was founded to honor and continue the work of the Foot Soldiers of the Civil Rights Movement whose bravery and determination ensured the right to vote for all Americans. Once again, our civil rights are under threat. We urge every eligible American to register to vote, encourage their friends and families to do the same and get to the polls on Election Day or during the early voting period.