thenation--2020-10-29--If You Can’t Speak English, Good Luck Voting in Trump’s America

Limary Ruiz Torres , a 51-year-old accountant in Lawrenceville , Ga. , was eager to vote in this year ’ s presidential primary .
But when Torres , who was raised in Puerto Rico and speaks limited English , received her mail-in ballot application in April , she felt shut out .
“ I can not read the absentee ballot request I received this week , ” she later told a federal court .
Ultimately , she and another plaintiff , Albert Mendez , sued the county and state .
This story was reported in partnership with Type Investigations .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ limited proficiency in English , and their rights are supposed to be protected by the Voting Rights Act , which requires local election officials to provide language accommodations whenever the population of those who need them reaches certain thresholds .
In many counties and cities , and increasingly states , those populations are big enough to swing elections , making language access all the more pressing this November .
There are more than 16,000 Spanish-speaking voters in Gwinnett County , Ga. , with limited English proficiency , more than enough to trigger the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Mendez fell into a gaping loophole .
Since this absentee ballot application came from the state , which unlike the county isn ’ t subject to the language-access portion of the Voting Rights Act , the state and county argued that no law was broken .
On October 5 , a Trump-appointed district judge agreed .
In the past , this would be the type of case in which the Department of Justice ’ s civil rights division might intervene .
“ Taking advantage of this apparent loophole cynically flouts the legislative @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that limited-English-proficient voters can cast a fully informed ballot , ” Susana Lorenzo-Giguere , who worked on language access cases for the Department of Justice ( DOJ ) and is now an attorney for the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund , told me in an e-mail .
But the DOJ is nowhere to be seen .
Since January 2017 , when President Donald Trump took office , the DOJ civil rights division has not launched a single lawsuit or consent agreement under these language provisions .
In that period , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ upholding the language protection provisions of the VRA .
In response to detailed questions about the lack of lawsuits and briefs filed under language access laws , a spokesperson for the Department of Justice said that the department has continued to send federal observers to monitor compliance .
“ The department is firmly committed to enforcing all laws , including the Voting Rights Act , ” said Alison Kjergaard , a spokesperson for the department , in an e-mail .
She did not point to any newly initiated litigation or briefs .
By @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the DOJ initiated 53 lawsuits and consent decrees to enforce the Voting Rights Act ’ s language protections according to its own data , suing jurisdictions from California to Massachusetts for failing to provide bilingual election materials or to allow voters assistance from people of their choosing .
Some advocates worry that this fall will see more voting rights violations , including language access violations , than in the past .
As the country ’ s Latino and Asian American populations grow and spread into formerly monolingual communities , jurisdictions that never before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have to accommodate non-English speaking voters .
Much of that growth is happening in the South , in states like Georgia and Florida that are part of the conservative US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit .
It ’ s there that new interpretations of language access law are being hashed out by recently appointed justices , according to Juan Cartegena , president of the legal advocacy group Latino Justice .
The confluence of migration into the South and a conservative judiciary there is “ a real damn kick in the ass @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Yang , president and executive director of the advocacy group Asian Americans Advancing Justice , has been negotiating with local jurisdictions to protect immigrants ’ right to vote in the absence of DOJ enforcement .
The Trump DOJ , he told me , “ has failed in its mission to protect the people ’ s right to vote.
” The right to vote in another language is a cornerstone of the Voting Rights Act , passed in 1965 and significantly amended a decade later .
In 1965 , the Department of Justice joined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ jurisdiction to abide by the VRA ’ s language-minority protections and , until Trump came to power , steadily fought for these rights .
For the most part , once a jurisdiction has more than 10,000 voting-age citizens of a single language minority—or more than 5 percent of its population , whichever comes first—all elections in that jurisdiction must be bilingual in that minority language .
This applies not only to ballots , but to nearly all aspects of the election process , including application forms , websites , signs , and official @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most recent round of Census Bureau determinations , 263 counties and county equivalents and three states were covered under such protections .
There are also special provisions in place for US citizens educated in American schools where the language of instruction isn ’ t English , like residents of Puerto Rico , who have the right to bilingual elections anywhere in the country .
Still , millions of Americans with limited proficiency in English fall outside these criteria .
Many languages , such as Arabic and Haitian Creole , do not qualify for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the population , because they were not included on the original list of language minorities written by Congress in 1975 .
Attempts to have Congress extend language protections to additional communities have been unsuccessful , despite the growing need .
For these voters , excluded from coverage , there is an additional catch-all protection : Any voter who can not use the ballot on their own , whether on account of disability , illiteracy , or limited English proficiency , can get help voting from anyone they want , as long as that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their employer or union .
It ’ s this last right , advocates say , that is most often trampled upon by poll workers who don ’ t understand voters ’ rights to assistance .
It ’ s also the only one to receive attention from the DOJ since Trump took office .
In 2014 , Mallika Das , a native Bengali speaker , tried to vote with the help of her son in Williamson county , Tex .
State law , contrary to the Voting Rights Act , stipulated that she could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t a registered voter in the same county , disqualifying her son .
The DOJ expressed an early interest in the case during the Obama era .
Then , after years of inaction , it filed a brief on February 6 , 2017—17 days after Trump ’ s inauguration—affirming that the state ’ s law violated the VRA .
“ All of a sudden it was just entered onto the docket , ” said Jerry Vattamala from the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund , who was the lead attorney for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It was in the very early , early stages of the Sessions DOJ so it seems like somebody was able to slip that in before other people were able to put a stop to it.
” It would be the last time the DOJ took a public stand on language access .
As the DOJ remains silent on the issue of language access in elections , problems are cropping up around the country , leaving private organizations to fill the gaps .
Election Protection , a coalition of advocacy organizations that provide a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it received language access complaints from voters in Florida , Texas , Pennsylvania , and California during the 2018 midterms .
According to an estimate from DOJ attorneys , the Civil Rights Division receives roughly 3,000 complaints per year regarding voting .
Though it does not release the breakdown of problems raised , advocates say that language access issues are common .
One of those complaints came from Dona Kim Murphey .
In 2018 , she and fellow Korean Americans tried to offer Korean-language interpretation in Harris County , Tex.
, but were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ too close to the polling place .
Though campaign volunteers typically need to stay outside of a 100-foot electioneering boundary , Murphey told me that she finds it “ laughable ” that interpreters are treated the same way .
“ The ADA folks , they ’ re there , they offer people help at the door , ” she said .
“ I feel like translators should have the same opportunity.
” Murphey said she called the DOJ ’ s hotline and was called back with a promise of an investigation , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ them .
The Department of Justice declined to comment on the case .
Since then , Murphey said , the community and the county have reached a mutual understanding—the volunteer interpreters will approach voters only outside the 100-foot boundary , and the county will not try to stop them from accompanying voters inside the polling sites to interpret .
The county has also hired two bilingual Korean-speaking poll workers .
“ We didn ’ t push it any further , ” she said , “ because at the time we were just glad @ @ @ @ @ @ @ easy to find .
Like thousands of other Puerto Ricans , Marta Valentina Rivera Madera , 69 , fled the damage from Hurricane Maria in October 2017 and relocated to Florida .
Her new home , Alachua County , conducted elections entirely in English , which worried her .
“ I want to be able to vote in the language I speak best because I take voting very seriously and have always educated myself about the candidates and issues before casting my ballot , ” she said in a statement to advocates at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ after arriving in Florida , she became the class representative in a lawsuit trying to force 32 Florida counties with large populations of Puerto Rican residents with limited English proficiency to conduct bilingual elections .
The judge in Rivera Madera ’ s case , an Obama appointee , was baffled .
“ It is remarkable that it takes a coalition of voting rights organizations and individuals to sue in federal court to seek minimal compliance with the plain language of a venerable 53-year-old law , ” he wrote in his scathing ruling .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ are accommodations in place , but private negotiations between plaintiffs and the counties over a permanent arrangement are ongoing .
Critics say private lawsuits like this have become the norm .
“ Since Trump was elected , the private voting rights bar has had to shoulder all the burdens of litigation , ” said Gerry Hebert , a voting rights attorney who worked for the DOJ for 21 years .
“ Previously you had the DOJ , which had more resources than any of us , would be out there enforcing the act.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ protect voters , the situation has become akin to a game of “ whack-a-mole , ” Vattamala told me .
“ It ’ s back to pre-VRA where you ’ re just constantly litigating these voter suppression tactics in a lot of the formerly covered jurisdictions.… It ’ s too little too late in a lot of places.
” Several former employees of the voting section as well as outside advocates who litigate voting rights cases attribute the slowdown to Trump ’ s political appointees at the department .
The voting section has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and is led by a career civil servant , Chris Herren , but it can bring cases only with the approval of the assistant attorney general for civil rights , a political appointee .
The current officeholder , Eric Dreiband , was a tendentious choice for the role , not least because of his track record defending corporations against employment discrimination claims brought , in some cases , by the federal government itself .
In 2016 he represented the University of North Carolina as a defendant in an Obama-era DOJ civil rights lawsuit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ use the bathroom corresponding with their gender identity .
Career attorneys conduct investigations and create memos detailing why the DOJ should intervene in a violation of someone ’ s voting rights , and those memos are reviewed by higher-level political appointees .
Historically , political appointees at the department have allowed civil servants to enforce voting rights largely as they see fit , even under Republican presidents .
During the Reagan administration , former employees say , career civil servants were able to bring cases .
Hebert , the former staffer , said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turned down a request for enforcement from the career staff .
What Amy Coney Barrett Means for the Future of Voting Rights The Voting Section became more politicized under President George W. Bush , whose administration staffed the Civil Rights Division with controversial lawyers such as Hans von Spakovsky and J. Christian Adams .
Von Spakovsky has since risen to prominence in Republican circles for promoting the discredited notion that voter fraud is a widespread problem in the United States .
At the time , many inside the department saw his appointment as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tenure , more than half of the members of the Voting Section quit in protest .
The partisan hiring practices of Bush-appointed civil rights head Bradley Schlozman sparked a highly critical 2008 report from the DOJ Office of the Inspector General that called him “ unsuitable for federal service.
” Schlozman ’ s lawyer at the time called the report “ inaccurate ” and “ biased.
” Still , even Bush ’ s DOJ continued enforcement of the language-minority provisions of the Voting Rights Act .
During the George W. Bush administration , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ language-minority rights .
“ That was done out of a political belief that Republicans could win Hispanic votes , ” said William Yeomans , who spent two decades at the Civil Rights Division , including as the former acting assistant attorney general for civil rights .
“ I don ’ t think that Republican push exists anymore.
” ( A 2013 Inspector General ’ s report was unable to substantiate the notion that Bush ’ s DOJ based its actions on political calculations ) .
Today , department veterans suspect , the political @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few , if any , cases can pass .
Advocates accustomed to working closely with the DOJ prior to 2016 say that under Trump , it ’ s been near-total radio silence .
Perhaps , some say , that ’ s better than the alternative , given the current administration .
They point to a Texas voter ID case , where the DOJ reversed the position it had held under the Obama administration that the voter ID law was racially discriminatory .
For the voting rights community , it was shocking .
When @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in ongoing cases , some advocates told me , remarkably , they ’ re not sure which side the DOJ would be on .
“ Do you welcome DOJ in general ?
” Cartegena mused .
“ First , I want to know what they ’ re going to say .
”

Limary Ruiz Torres, a 51-year-old accountant in Lawrenceville, Ga., was eager to vote in this year’s presidential primary. But when Torres, who was raised in Puerto Rico and speaks limited English, received her mail-in ballot application in April, she felt shut out. “I cannot read the absentee ballot request I received this week,” she later told a federal court. Ultimately, she and another plaintiff, Albert Mendez, sued the county and state. This story was reported in partnership with Type Investigations with support from the Puffin Foundation.
Roughly 11.5 million voting age citizens have limited proficiency in English, and their rights are supposed to be protected by the Voting Rights Act, which requires local election officials to provide language accommodations whenever the population of those who need them reaches certain thresholds. In many counties and cities, and increasingly states, those populations are big enough to swing elections, making language access all the more pressing this November.
There are more than 16,000 Spanish-speaking voters in Gwinnett County, Ga., with limited English proficiency, more than enough to trigger the law’s protections. But Torres and Mendez fell into a gaping loophole. Since this absentee ballot application came from the state, which unlike the county isn’t subject to the language-access portion of the Voting Rights Act, the state and county argued that no law was broken. On October 5, a Trump-appointed district judge agreed.
In the past, this would be the type of case in which the Department of Justice’s civil rights division might intervene. “Taking advantage of this apparent loophole cynically flouts the legislative intent of the VRA language provisions—to ensure that limited-English-proficient voters can cast a fully informed ballot,” Susana Lorenzo-Giguere, who worked on language access cases for the Department of Justice (DOJ) and is now an attorney for the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, told me in an e-mail.
But the DOJ is nowhere to be seen. Since January 2017, when President Donald Trump took office, the DOJ civil rights division has not launched a single lawsuit or consent agreement under these language provisions. In that period, the DOJ has filed just one amicus brief upholding the language protection provisions of the VRA.
In response to detailed questions about the lack of lawsuits and briefs filed under language access laws, a spokesperson for the Department of Justice said that the department has continued to send federal observers to monitor compliance. “The department is firmly committed to enforcing all laws, including the Voting Rights Act,” said Alison Kjergaard, a spokesperson for the department, in an e-mail. She did not point to any newly initiated litigation or briefs.
By comparison, between 1975 and 2016, the DOJ initiated 53 lawsuits and consent decrees to enforce the Voting Rights Act’s language protections according to its own data, suing jurisdictions from California to Massachusetts for failing to provide bilingual election materials or to allow voters assistance from people of their choosing. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Current Issue View our current issue
Some advocates worry that this fall will see more voting rights violations, including language access violations, than in the past. As the country’s Latino and Asian American populations grow and spread into formerly monolingual communities, jurisdictions that never before had to think about this issue now have to accommodate non-English speaking voters.
Much of that growth is happening in the South, in states like Georgia and Florida that are part of the conservative US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. It’s there that new interpretations of language access law are being hashed out by recently appointed justices, according to Juan Cartagena, president of the legal advocacy group Latino Justice. The confluence of migration into the South and a conservative judiciary there is “a real damn kick in the ass,” he said.
John C. Yang, president and executive director of the advocacy group Asian Americans Advancing Justice, has been negotiating with local jurisdictions to protect immigrants’ right to vote in the absence of DOJ enforcement. The Trump DOJ, he told me, “has failed in its mission to protect the people’s right to vote.”
A well-established right
The right to vote in another language is a cornerstone of the Voting Rights Act, passed in 1965 and significantly amended a decade later. In 1965, the Department of Justice joined its first lawsuit to compel a local jurisdiction to abide by the VRA’s language-minority protections and, until Trump came to power, steadily fought for these rights.
For the most part, once a jurisdiction has more than 10,000 voting-age citizens of a single language minority—or more than 5 percent of its population, whichever comes first—all elections in that jurisdiction must be bilingual in that minority language. This applies not only to ballots, but to nearly all aspects of the election process, including application forms, websites, signs, and official communications.
As of 2016, the most recent round of Census Bureau determinations, 263 counties and county equivalents and three states were covered under such protections. There are also special provisions in place for US citizens educated in American schools where the language of instruction isn’t English, like residents of Puerto Rico, who have the right to bilingual elections anywhere in the country.
Still, millions of Americans with limited proficiency in English fall outside these criteria. Many languages, such as Arabic and Haitian Creole, do not qualify for protection, no matter the size of the population, because they were not included on the original list of language minorities written by Congress in 1975. Attempts to have Congress extend language protections to additional communities have been unsuccessful, despite the growing need.
For these voters, excluded from coverage, there is an additional catch-all protection: Any voter who cannot use the ballot on their own, whether on account of disability, illiteracy, or limited English proficiency, can get help voting from anyone they want, as long as that person isn’t a representative of their employer or union. It’s this last right, advocates say, that is most often trampled upon by poll workers who don’t understand voters’ rights to assistance. It’s also the only one to receive attention from the DOJ since Trump took office.
In 2014, Mallika Das, a native Bengali speaker, tried to vote with the help of her son in Williamson county, Tex. State law, contrary to the Voting Rights Act, stipulated that she could not receive interpretation from anyone who wasn’t a registered voter in the same county, disqualifying her son. The DOJ expressed an early interest in the case during the Obama era. Then, after years of inaction, it filed a brief on February 6, 2017—17 days after Trump’s inauguration—affirming that the state’s law violated the VRA. “All of a sudden it was just entered onto the docket,” said Jerry Vattamala from the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, who was the lead attorney for the plaintiffs on the case. “It was in the very early, early stages of the Sessions DOJ so it seems like somebody was able to slip that in before other people were able to put a stop to it.” It would be the last time the DOJ took a public stand on language access.
Missing in action
As the DOJ remains silent on the issue of language access in elections, problems are cropping up around the country, leaving private organizations to fill the gaps.
Election Protection, a coalition of advocacy organizations that provide a suite of voter assistance hotlines, says it received language access complaints from voters in Florida, Texas, Pennsylvania, and California during the 2018 midterms. According to an estimate from DOJ attorneys, the Civil Rights Division receives roughly 3,000 complaints per year regarding voting. Though it does not release the breakdown of problems raised, advocates say that language access issues are common.
One of those complaints came from Dona Kim Murphey. In 2018, she and fellow Korean Americans tried to offer Korean-language interpretation in Harris County, Tex., but were told by poll workers that they were too close to the polling place. Though campaign volunteers typically need to stay outside of a 100-foot electioneering boundary, Murphey told me that she finds it “laughable” that interpreters are treated the same way. “The ADA folks, they’re there, they offer people help at the door,” she said. “I feel like translators should have the same opportunity.”
Murphey said she called the DOJ’s hotline and was called back with a promise of an investigation, but that she had no further interactions with them. The Department of Justice declined to comment on the case.
Since then, Murphey said, the community and the county have reached a mutual understanding—the volunteer interpreters will approach voters only outside the 100-foot boundary, and the county will not try to stop them from accompanying voters inside the polling sites to interpret. The county has also hired two bilingual Korean-speaking poll workers. “We didn’t push it any further,” she said, “because at the time we were just glad to get that.”
Other examples are easy to find. Like thousands of other Puerto Ricans, Marta Valentina Rivera Madera, 69, fled the damage from Hurricane Maria in October 2017 and relocated to Florida. Her new home, Alachua County, conducted elections entirely in English, which worried her. “I want to be able to vote in the language I speak best because I take voting very seriously and have always educated myself about the candidates and issues before casting my ballot,” she said in a statement to advocates at the time.
Less than a year after arriving in Florida, she became the class representative in a lawsuit trying to force 32 Florida counties with large populations of Puerto Rican residents with limited English proficiency to conduct bilingual elections. The judge in Rivera Madera’s case, an Obama appointee, was baffled. “It is remarkable that it takes a coalition of voting rights organizations and individuals to sue in federal court to seek minimal compliance with the plain language of a venerable 53-year-old law,” he wrote in his scathing ruling. More than two years later, there are accommodations in place, but private negotiations between plaintiffs and the counties over a permanent arrangement are ongoing. Critics say private lawsuits like this have become the norm.
“Since Trump was elected, the private voting rights bar has had to shoulder all the burdens of litigation,” said Gerry Hebert, a voting rights attorney who worked for the DOJ for 21 years. “Previously you had the DOJ, which had more resources than any of us, would be out there enforcing the act.”
Without DOJ resources being deployed to protect voters, the situation has become akin to a game of “whack-a-mole,” Vattamala told me. “It’s back to pre-VRA where you’re just constantly litigating these voter suppression tactics in a lot of the formerly covered jurisdictions.… It’s too little too late in a lot of places.”
Inside the department
Several former employees of the voting section as well as outside advocates who litigate voting rights cases attribute the slowdown to Trump’s political appointees at the department. The voting section has a large staff of civil servants, and is led by a career civil servant, Chris Herren, but it can bring cases only with the approval of the assistant attorney general for civil rights, a political appointee. The current officeholder, Eric Dreiband, was a tendentious choice for the role, not least because of his track record defending corporations against employment discrimination claims brought, in some cases, by the federal government itself. In 2016 he represented the University of North Carolina as a defendant in an Obama-era DOJ civil rights lawsuit over the right of trans people to use the bathroom corresponding with their gender identity.
Career attorneys conduct investigations and create memos detailing why the DOJ should intervene in a violation of someone’s voting rights, and those memos are reviewed by higher-level political appointees. Historically, political appointees at the department have allowed civil servants to enforce voting rights largely as they see fit, even under Republican presidents. During the Reagan administration, former employees say, career civil servants were able to bring cases. Hebert, the former staffer, said Reagan appointees rarely, if ever, turned down a request for enforcement from the career staff. Related Article What Amy Coney Barrett Means for the Future of Voting Rights Mondaire Jones
The Voting Section became more politicized under President George W. Bush, whose administration staffed the Civil Rights Division with controversial lawyers such as Hans von Spakovsky and J. Christian Adams. Von Spakovsky has since risen to prominence in Republican circles for promoting the discredited notion that voter fraud is a widespread problem in the United States. At the time, many inside the department saw his appointment as a conservative power grab. During his tenure, more than half of the members of the Voting Section quit in protest. The partisan hiring practices of Bush-appointed civil rights head Bradley Schlozman sparked a highly critical 2008 report from the DOJ Office of the Inspector General that called him “unsuitable for federal service.” Schlozman’s lawyer at the time called the report “inaccurate” and “biased.”
Still, even Bush’s DOJ continued enforcement of the language-minority provisions of the Voting Rights Act. During the George W. Bush administration, the DOJ launched 31 actions to enforce language-minority rights. “That was done out of a political belief that Republicans could win Hispanic votes,” said William Yeomans, who spent two decades at the Civil Rights Division, including as the former acting assistant attorney general for civil rights. “I don’t think that Republican push exists anymore.” (A 2013 Inspector General’s report was unable to substantiate the notion that Bush’s DOJ based its actions on political calculations).
Today, department veterans suspect, the political appointees have created a bottleneck through which few, if any, cases can pass. Advocates accustomed to working closely with the DOJ prior to 2016 say that under Trump, it’s been near-total radio silence.
Perhaps, some say, that’s better than the alternative, given the current administration. They point to a Texas voter ID case, where the DOJ reversed the position it had held under the Obama administration that the voter ID law was racially discriminatory. For the voting rights community, it was shocking. When asked if they would welcome DOJ involvement in ongoing cases, some advocates told me, remarkably, they’re not sure which side the DOJ would be on. “Do you welcome DOJ in general?” Cartagena mused. “First, I want to know what they’re going to say.”


thenation--2020-10-29--Sherrod Brown: Covid Shows How Corporate ‘Free Trade’ Policies Threaten Public Health

Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown wears a pin of a canary in a cage , recalling the days when coal miners carried the birds underground to detect poisonous gases .
Brown has spent three decades warning Americans about the danger of trade policies that prioritize profits over workers and the public interest .
He continues to highlight the error of letting corporate interests and pliant politicians shape our trade and manufacturing policies , particularly in light of the supply shortages that have made fighting the coronavirus pandemic so challenging .
We talked about the need for policies that renew our sense @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : When Covid-19 hit , we suddenly had shortages—not enough ventilators or masks .
Governors cut deals to import personal protection equipment .
Is this a consequence of wrongheaded trade and tax policies ?
SB : There ’ s been a 30- , 35-year buildup of this .
We established an economic environment , in large part because of corporate lobbying , of a very compliant , wanting-to-please Congress and administrations…so that the most profitable business plan for lots of manufacturing companies could be to shut down production here—especially if it was a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ labor and weak environmental rules and worker safety rules , and sell the products back into the United States .
It became the business plan [ for ] manufacturing company after company after company… .
Republican presidents , Democratic presidents share some guilt in the trade regimen part of it .
When you had administration after administration , Congress after Congress layering [ bad trade and tax policies ] one on the other , you ended up , in a sense , with our disarmament when it came to public health .
JN @ @ @ @ @ @ @ failure to maintain public health infrastructure ?
SB : Until a decade ago , we had a strong public health system .
Then one of the most vicious attacks by the Tea Party was on the [ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ] and on public health generally .
That began the unraveling of our public health infrastructure .
With [ Donald ] Trump ’ s firing of Timothy Ziemer , the admiral that was head of the pandemic surveillance operation at the White House , things unraveled even more .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ our public health system was weakened .
But you ’ ve got to include in that the fact that the manufacturing [ of vital equipment ] was moved .
JN : Other countries have industrial policies that plan with an eye toward serving the public interest , as opposed to simply deferring to corporations .
Can the US strike a better balance ?
SB : I would start with anything that has “ public ” in front of it .
So what do you need for public transportation ?
What do you need @ @ @ @ @ @ @ need for public health ?
And that ’ s where our trade policy should begin .
That ’ s where you want to make it a priority to take away the incentives to move overseas—and to provide incentives to keep manufacturing here .
If it ’ s about public transit , we should be making public buses here , city buses here .
If it ’ s public education , we should be making school materials of all kinds here .
If it ’ s public health , we should make what we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mean we ’ ll never [ import ] our pharmacological drugs .
But we should be looking at how we can make what is needed in the US .
JN : If Democrats win in November , what needs to be done to make the kind of changes you ’ re talking about ?
SB : If the Democrats take over , I think you will see some adjustments for sure in tax law , in corporate taxes , because of the huge giveaway that Republican corporate interests did three years ago .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ then you also maybe need a domestic sort of peacetime Defense Production Act .
The Defense Production Act is for defending the country in times of peril , in times of an assault on our national security one way or the other .
It could be about war .
It could also [ be used to prepare for ] a pandemic .

This article appears in the November 2/9, 2020 issue.
Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown wears a pin of a canary in a cage, recalling the days when coal miners carried the birds underground to detect poisonous gases.
Brown has spent three decades warning Americans about the danger of trade policies that prioritize profits over workers and the public interest. He continues to highlight the error of letting corporate interests and pliant politicians shape our trade and manufacturing policies, particularly in light of the supply shortages that have made fighting the coronavirus pandemic so challenging. We talked about the need for policies that renew our sense of public goods and necessities.
—John Nichols
JN: When Covid-19 hit, we suddenly had shortages—not enough ventilators or masks. Governors cut deals to import personal protection equipment. Is this a consequence of wrongheaded trade and tax policies? Current Issue View our current issue
SB: There’s been a 30-, 35-year buildup of this. We established an economic environment, in large part because of corporate lobbying, of a very compliant, wanting-to-please Congress and administrations…so that the most profitable business plan for lots of manufacturing companies could be to shut down production here—especially if it was a union plant—move it overseas, enjoy cheap labor and weak environmental rules and worker safety rules, and sell the products back into the United States. It became the business plan [for] manufacturing company after company after company…. Republican presidents, Democratic presidents share some guilt in the trade regimen part of it. When you had administration after administration, Congress after Congress layering [bad trade and tax policies] one on the other, you ended up, in a sense, with our disarmament when it came to public health.
JN: Is this part of a broader failure to maintain public health infrastructure?
SB: Until a decade ago, we had a strong public health system. Then one of the most vicious attacks by the Tea Party was on the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] and on public health generally. That began the unraveling of our public health infrastructure. With [Donald] Trump’s firing of Timothy Ziemer, the admiral that was head of the pandemic surveillance operation at the White House, things unraveled even more. The biggest lesson of what happened is that our public health system was weakened. But you’ve got to include in that the fact that the manufacturing [of vital equipment] was moved.
JN: Other countries have industrial policies that plan with an eye toward serving the public interest, as opposed to simply deferring to corporations. Can the US strike a better balance?
SB: I would start with anything that has “public” in front of it. So what do you need for public transportation? What do you need for public education? What do you need for public health? And that’s where our trade policy should begin. That’s where you want to make it a priority to take away the incentives to move overseas—and to provide incentives to keep manufacturing here.
If it’s about public transit, we should be making public buses here, city buses here. If it’s public education, we should be making school materials of all kinds here. If it’s public health, we should make what we need here. That doesn’t mean we’ll never [import] our pharmacological drugs. But we should be looking at how we can make what is needed in the US.
JN: If Democrats win in November, what needs to be done to make the kind of changes you’re talking about?
SB: If the Democrats take over, I think you will see some adjustments for sure in tax law, in corporate taxes, because of the huge giveaway that Republican corporate interests did three years ago. That’s the beginning. But then you also maybe need a domestic sort of peacetime Defense Production Act. The Defense Production Act is for defending the country in times of peril, in times of an assault on our national security one way or the other. It could be about war. It could also [be used to prepare for] a pandemic.


thenation--2020-10-29--The Far-Right Militias Supporting Trump

The Far-Right Militias Supporting Trump

It was July 2017 , a few weeks before the “ Unite the Right ” Charlottesville riots , when white men marched through the streets of that Virginia city protesting the planned takedown of a confederate statue and chanting , “ Jews will not replace us.
” I was sitting at a coffee shop in my quiet town of Poulsbo in Washington state .
I had set aside an hour away from my kids to do some necessary writing , while my husband , then second-in-command on a Navy ballistic missile submarine , sat suspended somewhere in the depths of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ infant were home with a babysitter , offering me a rare chance to write , peacefully , amid the stressors of my life .
I had a clinical social-work internship then , counseling war-traumatized veterans , and had spent months single-mothering while my spouse was at sea .
To my surprise , I was suddenly jolted from my daydreams by chanting men .
Glancing out the window at the usually placid waterfront of our town , I caught sight of a group of surprisingly large white men wearing animal skin loincloths , vests @ @ @ @ @ @ @ also holding torches and—I kid you not—spears .
They were loudly chanting , “ Poulsbo !
Poulsbo !
Poulsbo !
” And that was when I suddenly remembered that this was our annual Viking Fest in which groups of Washington residents from near and far celebrated the town ’ s Norwegian founders .
Cars parked more than a mile down our modest streets suggested that such gatherings were anything but local .
This would be my second Viking Fest and I would be struck once again by how little I learned about how @ @ @ @ @ @ @ values it stood for , and which of them might have survived to today .
Poulsbo , after all , now existed in a largely militarized area , including a local submarine base , with white , privileged officer families—those fortunate enough , at least , to be dual-income ones like mine or have trust funds—purchasing and reselling homes every few years as the U.S. military moved them around the country and the world .
Even in 2017 , longtime residents were starting to move away to escape the smoke that snaked into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wildfires in ever-longer fire seasons , part of our new climate-changed reality .
Meanwhile , Poulsbo ’ s picturesque gingerbread house-style buildings were being replaced by larger condo complexes , as developers moved ever deeper into the town ’ s hillside forests that would undoubtedly someday burn .
Viking Fest , with its spectacle of white men banging spears and shouting aggressively , set my heart racing with an unnamed fear .
It was , after all , a moment when the recently elected Donald Trump was already demonstrating that practically no behavior @ @ @ @ @ @ @ You had some very bad people in that group , but you also had people that were very fine people , on both sides ” ) , should be considered beyond bounds .
Later , talking with another military wife , a rare woman of color visiting that town , about the Viking shout-a-thon , amid an almost all-white crowd of officers and their families watching the event , she said , “ It ’ s like there ’ s no point .
It ’ s like a celebration of white people !
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ They Stand For ?
Looking back now , it ’ s hard not to see that evening ’ s loud and prideful display of white masculinity , which merely disturbed the peace for stressed-out moms like me , as a harbinger of more sinister things to come .
Shouting male nationalist groups like the Proud Boys that President Trump told to “ stand by ” at his first debate with Joe Biden and the Wolverine Watchmen , some of whom have allegedly been linked to a plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As a military wife who has made five different moves over the last 10 years , I ’ m particularly aware of how racially and ethnically diverse this country and its military actually are .
Under the circumstances , it ’ s remarkable that much of white America lacks any understanding of just how threatening displays like Viking Fest must look to the rare person of color who happens upon them .
It should certainly be obvious in October 2020 how destructive to our democracy fraternal , pro-Trump groups have become during @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those Proud Boys .
Among the founding principles their website offers are a vague set of notions that include “ reinstating a spirit of Western chauvinism , ” “ anti-political correctness , ” “ venerating the housewife , ” “ pro-gun rights ” ( in a pandemic-ridden country where , between March and July alone , an estimated three million more guns were purchased than usual ) , and—get this— “ anti-racism.
” For the Proud Boys to say that they reject racism and venerate housewives did little more than provide them with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as they planned armed counter-rallies in progressive cities like Providence and Portland with the explicit purpose of inciting violence among Black Lives Matter protesters and their allies .
Other influences , like the neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer , are even more direct .
For example , that site urged its followers to cyber-bully American University ’ s first black female student government president , Taylor Dumpson after nooses began appearing on that school ’ s campus in 2017 .
In April 2016 , its founder Andrew Anglin had written , “ Jews @ @ @ @ @ @ @ leaving America if Trump gets elected—and he ’ s happy about it .
This alone is enough reason to put your entire heart and soul into supporting this man.
” One thing is certain : All that matters as markers of humanity to the man who inspires and , however implicitly , endorses such groups , President Donald Trump , is white skin and political support .
The other night at his town hall with NBC ’ s Savannah Guthrie , a would-be supporter presented herself as the granddaughter of immigrants who had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ She asked the president about his plans to protect DACA recipients from having to return to their countries .
The president responded : “ DACA is somewhat different from Dreamers .
You understand that… Where do you come from , by the way , originally ?
Where ?
” After the woman responded that her grandparents came from Russia and Poland , he stated , “ That ’ s very good.
” He then went on to discuss his border wall with Mexico ; that is , keeping the wrong kind of immigrants @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Ground for the Far Right If there is any concept that these groups threatening to disrupt our democracy stand for , it ’ s a version of individual freedom—like not wearing masks—that ’ s akin to driving drunk and without putting on a seat belt , rather than waiting for a sober friend to drive you home .
Yes , it ’ s more comfortable not to wear a mask or a seatbelt .
The short-term benefits , like physical comfort , are tangible , as is perhaps the exhilarating sense that you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ body .
( Ask most anti-maskers about abortion rights , however , and you ’ ll get quite a different perspective on the degree to which our bodies should be our own . )
Yet the most current scientific evidence is that if all Americans wore masks ( and social-distanced ) right now , it would potentially save tens of thousands of lives .
In the age of Covid-19 , however , concerns over public health restrictions to prevent the spread of the virus , including lockdowns of gyms , bars , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ firestorms .
Such mandated lockdowns were the main reason various gunmen collaborated with the Wolverine Watchmen in a plot—fortunately foiled—to kidnap the governor of Michigan and considered a similar plot against Governor Ralph Northam of Virginia .
Perhaps not coincidentally , people of color—Blacks and Latinos—die from Covid-19 at a rate about a third higher than their share of the population .
In other words , it couldn ’ t be clearer whose bodily freedoms are really considered at stake in these far-right struggles and whose are expendable .
Perhaps the most disturbing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ take a significant part of their manpower and know-how from the United States military with the tacit support of a Republican Senate .
As a military spouse as well as the co-founder of Brown University ’ s Costs of War Project , it ’ s been no secret to me that our military ’ s support for bigotry of all kinds is endemic .
Racist and sexist remarks are commonplace both on the boats where my husband has served and in gatherings with officer colleagues and their families .
Little more than brief @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out in return .
In a country where gun ownership and firearms training are seen by the far right as inalienable , all-American freedoms , the military is a ripe breeding ground for disaffected men looking for individual empowerment , a sense of belonging , and just such training .
In fact , a recent New York Times investigation claims that veterans and active-duty military members make up more than a fifth of the membership of America ’ s 300 anti-government , pro-Trump “ militia ” groups .
According to a 2019 survey @ @ @ @ @ @ @ quarter of active-duty service members reported witnessing signs of white nationalist ideology among their fellow soldiers , including racist and anti-Semitic slurs and homemade explosives shaped like swastikas .
Nothing is more disturbing , when it comes to white nationalist–style hate , than the way the Republicans in Congress have implicitly sanctioned it .
In 2019 , after the Democratic-controlled House introduced a clause into the Defense Authorization Act to have recruits screened for white nationalist ideology , the Republican Senate nixed the provision .
What more need be said ?
How did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the nation become a petri dish for people who stand for nothing of collective significance ?
Even one of the favorite and abiding principles of far-right actors ( and many Republicans in Congress ) , the right to bear arms , seems eerily decontextualized from history in a country that leads the world by far in armed citizens ( many with distinctly military-style weaponry ) .
Let ’ s remember that this right was grounded in the idea of organizing the revolutionary army against a colonial power that taxed people without representing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their homes .
The colonists , while rife with their own history of human-rights violations , were not a bunch of disaffected , irrationally angry individual crusaders with an urge to use weapons to threaten civilians .
Two and a half centuries later , the party that regularly signals its support for the far right ’ s armed tactics still controls the presidency , the upper chamber of Congress , and will soon control the Supreme Court as well .
And yet it and its right-wing supporters eternally act as if they were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from that position of victimization , are now threatening others ( and not just Gretchen Whitmer either . )
Many among them still see themselves as subjugated by this country ’ s ruling elite , which may represent a kind of projection or , psychologically speaking , seeing in others the thoughts and feelings one actually harbors in oneself .
And as a therapist who has worked with significant numbers of veterans and military service members , I can warn them : Don ’ t do it .
As I know from some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of their time in distant lands , when they used guns against civilians , it shook to the core their belief in the principle of service to country , leaving them distrustful of the homeland they had been fighting for .
Of course , an increasingly armed far right has responded by creating a world of symbols that are deeply comforting to them .
Yet do they really stand for anything ?
I was recently appalled by a bumper sticker on a minivan featuring two large guns and three smaller ones aligned together @ @ @ @ @ @ @ families .
Its tagline : “ My guns are my family.
” At the wheel was a young woman with several children .
I balk similarly at pictures on people ’ s lawns that feature Donald Trump ’ s “ Make America Great Again ” flag—how did he get a separate flag ?
—and the word “ Jesus ” in all-capital letters .
Guns and small children ?
A separate Trump state and Jesus ?
Never before has sociologist Émile Durkheim ’ s idea that religious groups are less in need of a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can all bow down in unison made more sense to me .
Amid such incoherence ( and symbolic violence ) , such an inability to justify their place in this democracy , it might be fairest to say that , as this election campaign heads toward its chaotic climax , Trump and the far right worship little more than one another .
“ At Least He Hasn ’ t Started Another War ” In October , the United States passed its 19-year mark in its second Afghan War of the last four decades @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and the dregs of the conflict in Iraq , which the United States invaded in the spring of 2003 , have become as empty as the war that far-right groups wage in this country .
The hundreds of thousands of dead civilians , the flourishing of terrorist groups far deadlier and angrier than those the United States originally sought to defeat , the degradation of basic human rights including the rights to life and health—the carnage has been significant indeed .
As these wars enter or near their third decade , I often @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ At least he hasn ’ t started another war.
” Oh , but he has !
This time , though , the war is at home .
Even the Wolverine Watchmen and their co-collaborators in recent kidnapping plots saw themselves as initiating a civil war , or a boogaloo ( to use far-right terminology ) .
Not since the Jim Crow South years have we had to worry about people ’ s physical safety as they approach the polls to cast their vote—and the “ Four More Years ” folks and other @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , just gotten started .
Never would it have been thinkable for a sitting president to overlook , or even implicitly endorse , plots to kidnap and possibly kill elected officials , but Trump has even gone so far as to respond to his supporters at a recent rally in Michigan chanting “ Lock her up !
” by saying “ Lock them all up !
” ( a play both on his Hillary Clinton chants in the last election and on Governor Whitmer ’ s pandemic lockdown orders ) .
Twenty years @ @ @ @ @ @ @ never sufficient ) are further depleted .
A pandemic is again spiking across the country .
Those who run for office and try to govern with dignity are being challenged in all too threatening ways .
Think of it , whether in political or health terms , as our new war zone .
I hope that those who appear to vote in person under pandemic conditions and increasing threats of voter intimidation will not come under attack next by far-right groups .
To anyone who is listening in elected office anywhere in America @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for a peaceful transition of power , since the “ law-and-order ” president is , of course , anything but that when it comes to sustaining our democracy , rather than his presidency .

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.
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It was July 2017, a few weeks before the “Unite the Right” Charlottesville riots, when white men marched through the streets of that Virginia city protesting the planned takedown of a confederate statue and chanting, “Jews will not replace us.” I was sitting at a coffee shop in my quiet town of Poulsbo in Washington state. I had set aside an hour away from my kids to do some necessary writing, while my husband, then second-in-command on a Navy ballistic missile submarine, sat suspended somewhere in the depths of the Pacific Ocean.
Our toddler and infant were home with a babysitter, offering me a rare chance to write, peacefully, amid the stressors of my life. I had a clinical social-work internship then, counseling war-traumatized veterans, and had spent months single-mothering while my spouse was at sea. To my surprise, I was suddenly jolted from my daydreams by chanting men. Glancing out the window at the usually placid waterfront of our town, I caught sight of a group of surprisingly large white men wearing animal skin loincloths, vests, and horned hats. They were also holding torches and—I kid you not—spears. They were loudly chanting, “Poulsbo! Poulsbo! Poulsbo!” And that was when I suddenly remembered that this was our annual Viking Fest in which groups of Washington residents from near and far celebrated the town’s Norwegian founders.
Cars parked more than a mile down our modest streets suggested that such gatherings were anything but local. This would be my second Viking Fest and I would be struck once again by how little I learned about how the town was actually founded, the values it stood for, and which of them might have survived to today. Poulsbo, after all, now existed in a largely militarized area, including a local submarine base, with white, privileged officer families—those fortunate enough, at least, to be dual-income ones like mine or have trust funds—purchasing and reselling homes every few years as the U.S. military moved them around the country and the world.
Even in 2017, longtime residents were starting to move away to escape the smoke that snaked into the community earlier each year from ever-fiercer wildfires in ever-longer fire seasons, part of our new climate-changed reality. Meanwhile, Poulsbo’s picturesque gingerbread house-style buildings were being replaced by larger condo complexes, as developers moved ever deeper into the town’s hillside forests that would undoubtedly someday burn.
Viking Fest, with its spectacle of white men banging spears and shouting aggressively, set my heart racing with an unnamed fear. It was, after all, a moment when the recently elected Donald Trump was already demonstrating that practically no behavior, including in Charlottesville soon (“You had some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides”), should be considered beyond bounds. Later, talking with another military wife, a rare woman of color visiting that town, about the Viking shout-a-thon, amid an almost all-white crowd of officers and their families watching the event, she said, “It’s like there’s no point. It’s like a celebration of white people!” Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann
Who Are They and What Do They Stand For?
Looking back now, it’s hard not to see that evening’s loud and prideful display of white masculinity, which merely disturbed the peace for stressed-out moms like me, as a harbinger of more sinister things to come. Shouting male nationalist groups like the Proud Boys that President Trump told to “stand by” at his first debate with Joe Biden and the Wolverine Watchmen, some of whom have allegedly been linked to a plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, are increasingly commonplace in the news.
As a military wife who has made five different moves over the last 10 years, I’m particularly aware of how racially and ethnically diverse this country and its military actually are. Under the circumstances, it’s remarkable that much of white America lacks any understanding of just how threatening displays like Viking Fest must look to the rare person of color who happens upon them. Current Issue View our current issue
It should certainly be obvious in October 2020 how destructive to our democracy fraternal, pro-Trump groups have become during Donald Trump’s presidency. Take those Proud Boys. Among the founding principles their website offers are a vague set of notions that include “reinstating a spirit of Western chauvinism,” “anti-political correctness,” “venerating the housewife,” “pro-gun rights” (in a pandemic-ridden country where, between March and July alone, an estimated three million more guns were purchased than usual), and—get this—“anti-racism.” For the Proud Boys to say that they reject racism and venerate housewives did little more than provide them with a veneer of social acceptability, even as they planned armed counter-rallies in progressive cities like Providence and Portland with the explicit purpose of inciting violence among Black Lives Matter protesters and their allies.
Other influences, like the neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer, are even more direct. For example, that site urged its followers to cyber-bully American University’s first black female student government president, Taylor Dumpson after nooses began appearing on that school’s campus in 2017. In April 2016, its founder Andrew Anglin had written, “Jews, Blacks, and lesbians will be leaving America if Trump gets elected—and he’s happy about it. This alone is enough reason to put your entire heart and soul into supporting this man.”
One thing is certain: All that matters as markers of humanity to the man who inspires and, however implicitly, endorses such groups, President Donald Trump, is white skin and political support. The other night at his town hall with NBC’s Savannah Guthrie, a would-be supporter presented herself as the granddaughter of immigrants who had fled religious persecution in Eastern Europe. She asked the president about his plans to protect DACA recipients from having to return to their countries. The president responded: “DACA is somewhat different from Dreamers. You understand that… Where do you come from, by the way, originally? Where?” After the woman responded that her grandparents came from Russia and Poland, he stated, “That’s very good.” He then went on to discuss his border wall with Mexico; that is, keeping the wrong kind of immigrants out.
The Military as a Recruiting Ground for the Far Right
If there is any concept that these groups threatening to disrupt our democracy stand for, it’s a version of individual freedom—like not wearing masks—that’s akin to driving drunk and without putting on a seat belt, rather than waiting for a sober friend to drive you home. Yes, it’s more comfortable not to wear a mask or a seatbelt. The short-term benefits, like physical comfort, are tangible, as is perhaps the exhilarating sense that you can do anything you want with your body. (Ask most anti-maskers about abortion rights, however, and you’ll get quite a different perspective on the degree to which our bodies should be our own.)
Yet the most current scientific evidence is that if all Americans wore masks (and social-distanced) right now, it would potentially save tens of thousands of lives. In the age of Covid-19, however, concerns over public health restrictions to prevent the spread of the virus, including lockdowns of gyms, bars, and other public facilities, have become political firestorms. Such mandated lockdowns were the main reason various gunmen collaborated with the Wolverine Watchmen in a plot—fortunately foiled—to kidnap the governor of Michigan and considered a similar plot against Governor Ralph Northam of Virginia.
Perhaps not coincidentally, people of color—Blacks and Latinos—die from Covid-19 at a rate about a third higher than their share of the population. In other words, it couldn’t be clearer whose bodily freedoms are really considered at stake in these far-right struggles and whose are expendable.
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of these groups is that they take a significant part of their manpower and know-how from the United States military with the tacit support of a Republican Senate. As a military spouse as well as the co-founder of Brown University’s Costs of War Project, it’s been no secret to me that our military’s support for bigotry of all kinds is endemic. Racist and sexist remarks are commonplace both on the boats where my husband has served and in gatherings with officer colleagues and their families. Little more than brief reprimands (if that) are handed out in return.
In a country where gun ownership and firearms training are seen by the far right as inalienable, all-American freedoms, the military is a ripe breeding ground for disaffected men looking for individual empowerment, a sense of belonging, and just such training. In fact, a recent New York Times investigation claims that veterans and active-duty military members make up more than a fifth of the membership of America’s 300 anti-government, pro-Trump “militia” groups. According to a 2019 survey by the Military Times, about a quarter of active-duty service members reported witnessing signs of white nationalist ideology among their fellow soldiers, including racist and anti-Semitic slurs and homemade explosives shaped like swastikas.
Nothing is more disturbing, when it comes to white nationalist–style hate, than the way the Republicans in Congress have implicitly sanctioned it. In 2019, after the Democratic-controlled House introduced a clause into the Defense Authorization Act to have recruits screened for white nationalist ideology, the Republican Senate nixed the provision. What more need be said?
How did an institution that should be about service to the nation become a petri dish for people who stand for nothing of collective significance? Even one of the favorite and abiding principles of far-right actors (and many Republicans in Congress), the right to bear arms, seems eerily decontextualized from history in a country that leads the world by far in armed citizens (many with distinctly military-style weaponry).
Let’s remember that this right was grounded in the idea of organizing the revolutionary army against a colonial power that taxed people without representing them and forcibly billeted its military in their homes. The colonists, while rife with their own history of human-rights violations, were not a bunch of disaffected, irrationally angry individual crusaders with an urge to use weapons to threaten civilians.
Two and a half centuries later, the party that regularly signals its support for the far right’s armed tactics still controls the presidency, the upper chamber of Congress, and will soon control the Supreme Court as well. And yet it and its right-wing supporters eternally act as if they were the victims in our world and, from that position of victimization, are now threatening others (and not just Gretchen Whitmer either.)
Many among them still see themselves as subjugated by this country’s ruling elite, which may represent a kind of projection or, psychologically speaking, seeing in others the thoughts and feelings one actually harbors in oneself. And as a therapist who has worked with significant numbers of veterans and military service members, I can warn them: Don’t do it. As I know from some military service members who have told me of their time in distant lands, when they used guns against civilians, it shook to the core their belief in the principle of service to country, leaving them distrustful of the homeland they had been fighting for.
Of course, an increasingly armed far right has responded by creating a world of symbols that are deeply comforting to them. Yet do they really stand for anything?
I was recently appalled by a bumper sticker on a minivan featuring two large guns and three smaller ones aligned together like those stickers that show heterosexual nuclear families. Its tagline: “My guns are my family.” At the wheel was a young woman with several children. I balk similarly at pictures on people’s lawns that feature Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” flag—how did he get a separate flag?—and the word “Jesus” in all-capital letters.
Guns and small children? A separate Trump state and Jesus? Never before has sociologist Émile Durkheim’s idea that religious groups are less in need of a cohesive ideology than symbols to which they can all bow down in unison made more sense to me. Amid such incoherence (and symbolic violence), such an inability to justify their place in this democracy, it might be fairest to say that, as this election campaign heads toward its chaotic climax, Trump and the far right worship little more than one another.
“At Least He Hasn’t Started Another War”
In October, the United States passed its 19-year mark in its second Afghan War of the last four decades. In many ways, that war and the dregs of the conflict in Iraq, which the United States invaded in the spring of 2003, have become as empty as the war that far-right groups wage in this country. The hundreds of thousands of dead civilians, the flourishing of terrorist groups far deadlier and angrier than those the United States originally sought to defeat, the degradation of basic human rights including the rights to life and health—the carnage has been significant indeed. As these wars enter or near their third decade, I often hear friends say about President Trump, “At least he hasn’t started another war.”
Oh, but he has! This time, though, the war is at home. Even the Wolverine Watchmen and their co-collaborators in recent kidnapping plots saw themselves as initiating a civil war, or a boogaloo (to use far-right terminology). Not since the Jim Crow South years have we had to worry about people’s physical safety as they approach the polls to cast their vote—and the “Four More Years” folks and other gun-toting Trump supporters have, I fear, just gotten started. Never would it have been thinkable for a sitting president to overlook, or even implicitly endorse, plots to kidnap and possibly kill elected officials, but Trump has even gone so far as to respond to his supporters at a recent rally in Michigan chanting “Lock her up!” by saying “Lock them all up!” (a play both on his Hillary Clinton chants in the last election and on Governor Whitmer’s pandemic lockdown orders).
Twenty years later, our health care resources (never sufficient) are further depleted. A pandemic is again spiking across the country. Those who run for office and try to govern with dignity are being challenged in all too threatening ways. Think of it, whether in political or health terms, as our new war zone. I hope that those who appear to vote in person under pandemic conditions and increasing threats of voter intimidation will not come under attack next by far-right groups. To anyone who is listening in elected office anywhere in America: I hope you have a plan for a peaceful transition of power, since the “law-and-order” president is, of course, anything but that when it comes to sustaining our democracy, rather than his presidency.


thenation--2020-10-29--The Supreme Court Has Never Been on the Side of Working People

The Senate ’ s obscene rush to confirm Amy Coney Barrett—in time to allow her , as Donald Trump has made clear , to assist his efforts to steal the election—should force even the most blinkered observer to acknowledge the deeply political nature of our judiciary .
Coming after the Senate ’ s refusal to even grant Barack Obama ’ s nominee Merrick Garland a hearing and its subsequent confirmation of Neil Gorsuch for that stolen seat , the latest Republican power play has done much to strip away the mystique that previously cloaked the deliberations of the Supreme Court @ @ @ @ @ @ @ black robes , ritual use of Latin , and lifetime appointments , they ’ re simply fallible mortals with the same prejudices and predilections as the rest of us.1 Unlike the blindfolded figure of Justice , the Supreme Court has a long history of blindness only on one side : the left .
Since 1794 , when Associate Justice James Wilson authorized the use of federal troops to terrorize western Pennsylvania farmers into paying a new tax on whiskey—which favored wealthy merchants and manufacturers—the court has been a reliable servant of money and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Dred Scott v. Sandford ( 1857 ) Black Americans “ had no rights the white man was bound to respect ” but that leaped to extend the protection of the 14th Amendment from people to corporations , that sanctioned the wholesale imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II , and that overturned any limit on corporate spending in elections while granting corporation owners the right to refuse to provide their employees with health coverage for birth control has hardly ever been on the side of working people .
Or swift to correct @ @ @ @ @ @ @ v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education kept Black Americans in a state of legalized racial oppression for over half a century.2 Joe Biden ’ s announcement on 60 Minutes that he would appoint a “ bipartisan commission of scholars ” to consider how best to reform the courts might have been tactically smart , depriving the Trump campaign of at least one weapon of mass distraction .
But Biden ’ s remark that “ the last thing we need to do is turn the Supreme Court into just a political football @ @ @ @ @ @ @ history and current political reality.3 The Nation has been in this fight a long time .
From James Bradley Thayer ’ s 1884 argument against the overweening tendency of federal judges to strike down laws they dislike to I.F .
Stone ’ s warning , in The Court Disposes ( serialized in these pages ) , that “ democracy must curb the Supreme Court or the Supreme Court , instrument of our great concentrations of economic power , will destroy democracy , ” this magazine has never been inclined to treat the judicial @ @ @ @ @ @ @ genuflect before the myth of impartial judges , detached from political passion or pecuniary interest.4 “ The Supreme Court has been ‘ packed ’ for years with safe , conservative majorities , ” Stone wrote in 1937 .
“ Those safe , conservative majorities have stood in the path of almost every major piece of social legislation enacted by the elected representatives of the American people.
” And if a Democratic president and Congress fail to act decisively and boldly , that ’ s exactly what they ’ ll do again .
As @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , there is simply no way for a Biden administration to make good on any of its promises on health care , racial or economic justice , the environment , or corporate monopolies without addressing the reactionary tilt of the courts.5 Unlike some Democrats , Mystal doesn ’ t shy away from the label or the idea of court packing—arguing that adding 20 justices to the Supreme Court would not only redress Republican court packing but also improve the court by making rigid majorities less likely and the justices more amenable to persuasion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ limits , court expansion requires no constitutional amendment.6 But there is nothing magical about the number of justices .
What matters more is the willingness to recognize the court for what it has always been : an unelected political body acting to restrain our democracy .
Republicans haven ’ t hesitated to use that restraint .
Unless Democrats show they are willing to face off to make America redeem its promise , the fight will remain one-sided.7

This article appears in the November 16/23, 2020 issue.
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The Senate’s obscene rush to confirm Amy Coney Barrett—in time to allow her, as Donald Trump has made clear, to assist his efforts to steal the election—should force even the most blinkered observer to acknowledge the deeply political nature of our judiciary. Coming after the Senate’s refusal to even grant Barack Obama’s nominee Merrick Garland a hearing and its subsequent confirmation of Neil Gorsuch for that stolen seat, the latest Republican power play has done much to strip away the mystique that previously cloaked the deliberations of the Supreme Court’s nine justices. Despite their black robes, ritual use of Latin, and lifetime appointments, they’re simply fallible mortals with the same prejudices and predilections as the rest of us.1
Unlike the blindfolded figure of Justice, the Supreme Court has a long history of blindness only on one side: the left. Since 1794, when Associate Justice James Wilson authorized the use of federal troops to terrorize western Pennsylvania farmers into paying a new tax on whiskey—which favored wealthy merchants and manufacturers—the court has been a reliable servant of money and power. The court that ruled in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) Black Americans “had no rights the white man was bound to respect” but that leaped to extend the protection of the 14th Amendment from people to corporations, that sanctioned the wholesale imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II, and that overturned any limit on corporate spending in elections while granting corporation owners the right to refuse to provide their employees with health coverage for birth control has hardly ever been on the side of working people. Or swift to correct its mistakes: The gap between Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education kept Black Americans in a state of legalized racial oppression for over half a century.2 Related Article Republicans Have Confirmed Amy Coney Barrett—and Officially Captured the Supreme Court Elie Mystal
Joe Biden’s announcement on 60 Minutes that he would appoint a “bipartisan commission of scholars” to consider how best to reform the courts might have been tactically smart, depriving the Trump campaign of at least one weapon of mass distraction. But Biden’s remark that “the last thing we need to do is turn the Supreme Court into just a political football” reveals remarkable ignorance of both court history and current political reality.3
The Nation has been in this fight a long time. From James Bradley Thayer’s 1884 argument against the overweening tendency of federal judges to strike down laws they dislike to I.F. Stone’s warning, in The Court Disposes (serialized in these pages), that “democracy must curb the Supreme Court or the Supreme Court, instrument of our great concentrations of economic power, will destroy democracy,” this magazine has never been inclined to treat the judicial branch with excessive deference. Or to genuflect before the myth of impartial judges, detached from political passion or pecuniary interest.4
“The Supreme Court has been ‘packed’ for years with safe, conservative majorities,” Stone wrote in 1937. “Those safe, conservative majorities have stood in the path of almost every major piece of social legislation enacted by the elected representatives of the American people.” And if a Democratic president and Congress fail to act decisively and boldly, that’s exactly what they’ll do again. As Nation justice correspondent Elie Mystal points out, there is simply no way for a Biden administration to make good on any of its promises on health care, racial or economic justice, the environment, or corporate monopolies without addressing the reactionary tilt of the courts.5 Related Article Make McConnell Pay for Amy Coney Barrett John Nichols
Unlike some Democrats, Mystal doesn’t shy away from the label or the idea of court packing—arguing that adding 20 justices to the Supreme Court would not only redress Republican court packing but also improve the court by making rigid majorities less likely and the justices more amenable to persuasion. And unlike proposals to impose term limits, court expansion requires no constitutional amendment.6
But there is nothing magical about the number of justices. What matters more is the willingness to recognize the court for what it has always been: an unelected political body acting to restrain our democracy. Republicans haven’t hesitated to use that restraint. Unless Democrats show they are willing to face off to make America redeem its promise, the fight will remain one-sided.7


thenation--2020-10-30--Here’s How to Ruin Tom Cotton’s Election Night

Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton is running for president .
The fiercely ambitious right-wing culture warrior who last summer described slavery as a “ necessary evil ” won ’ t admit it publicly yet , but there ’ s no doubt that Cotton is positioning himself to be the more-Trump-than-Trump successor to the Republican whose occupation of the Oval Office could be upended on November 3 .
In the past month , Cotton ’ s been on the campaign trail in the first presidential caucus state of Iowa and the first presidential primary state of New Hampshire .
While Cotton has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ positioning outside Arkansas , the senator who is up for reelection in 2020 couldn ’ t make time in his busy political schedule for the Arkansas US Senate debate .
That ’ s right , the Republican senator who has been campaigning all over the country skipped his own debate .
Cotton likes to pretend that he doesn ’ t face a race this year .
That ’ s by design .
His allies executed a sly strategy to upend the bid of his expected Democratic challenger , Joshua Mahony , who quit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reasons ) after the deadline expired for another Democrat to qualify .
When Cotton wrote a fascistic New York Times op-ed in June , media outlets dutifully ran articles with headlines like “ As Tom Cotton courts controversy , he runs unopposed in Arkansas.
” The Election Isn ’ t Over Until Trump ’ s Gone Which is not true .
Cotton has an opponent who is ready , willing , and able to debate .
So Arkansas PBS stations aired a mid-October “ debate ” featuring a moderator , three journalists , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jr. , a former prison chaplain who hopes to be Arkansas ’ s first Black senator .
Harrington acknowledged that he was frustrated by Cotton ’ s no-show .
“ He ’ s on Fox News , I don ’ t know how many times a week—two or three times a week ?
—but he can ’ t come here to address the people of Arkansas , ” the 34-year-old challenger explained .
“ Why would you want to support somebody that does that ?
” Cotton ’ s absence didn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ speak directly to the people of Arkansas ” on the issues .
And he concluded on an epic note : People of Arkansas , you know who you are , you know where you ’ ve come from .
Our country has been through a great many struggles .
We ’ ve been through the Revolutionary War , a Civil War , numerous conflicts , the Spanish flu , two world wars , the turmoil of the civil rights movement .
But I know one thing .
I know the people of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they never back down from a challenge .
During the 2008 mortgage crisis , we endured that .
And right now we are enduring turmoil in the streets as people try to protest police brutality .
We are dealing with a pandemic , but I know who you are .
You are resilient people .
You can overcome this just like we have overcome all the troubles in our past .
But we can only do it if we work together , if you remember that those who disagree with you are still @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have to agree on everything .
And if everyone is thinking alike , is there really much thinking going on .
Our differences make us stronger .
And I appeal to this great people that , even though we have failed , even though we are still continually striving for that great idea of justice , of liberty , and equality under the law , we can overcome anything .
I ask you right now to consider sending me to Washington to be your senator .
And I give you my word , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ debate and on the campaign trail , Harrington has embraced some standard Libertarian positions .
He ’ s for budget cuts and claims that “ the broken American health care system can not be fixed by government legislation or mandate.
” But his top issue is criminal justice reform , and he ’ s got a platform that argues for decriminalization of marijuana , eliminating mandatory minimum sentencing , and instituting police training in de-escalation and nonviolent crisis intervention .
He ’ s for cutting Pentagon spending , ending non-defensive military conflicts , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ military conflicts without a congressional declaration of war .
And he says , “ This country belongs to each and every citizen regardless of race , creed , national origin , sexual orientation , gender identity , religious preference… ” The response to Harrington ’ s sincere effort to make a campaign of it has been striking .
Polls have regularly shown him attracting 20 percent or more of the vote—sometimes substantially more .
One survey conducted in mid-October by the American Research Group registered 38 percent for Harrington to 49 percent for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ considering that when Cotton successfully challenged Democratic Senator Mark Pryor in 2014 , Pryor finished with just 39 percent of the vote .
This year , Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has struggled to get past the 40 percent mark in Arkansas .
If a third-party candidate who started the Senate race with no name recognition and almost no money finishes as well , or even better , than a sitting senator or this year ’ s Democratic presidential nominee , that could cast some shade on Cotton ’ s presidential ambitions .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Cotton is an admirable political goal .
Cotton ’ s outrageous June 3 New York Times opinion piece , which championed proposals to send the military into American cities to crack down on protests against police violence and systemic racism , led commentator Max Boot to observe that “ Republicans are increasingly flirting with fascism , ” while Times columnist Michelle Goldberg labeled the senator ’ s column “ Tom Cotton ’ s Fascist Op-Ed.
” Seth Meyers reminded the paper ’ s editors , “ You ’ re not legally obligated to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ your newspaper , ” and Times editorial page editor James Bennet quickly stepped down following what publisher A.G. Sulzberger referred to as “ a significant breakdown in our editing processes.
” But Cotton was just getting started .
In July , he attacked The New York Times Magazine ’ s groundbreaking 1619 Project and announced legislation to prevent federal funds and professional development grants from going to schools that develop curricula based on the project , which , the magazine explained , “ aims to reframe the country ’ s history by placing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of black Americans at the very center of our national narrative.
” Cotton dismissed the project as “ left-wing propaganda.
” He also said of slavery , “ As the founding fathers said , it was the necessary evil upon which the union was built , but the union was built in a way , as Lincoln said , to put slavery on the course to its ultimate extinction.
” Cotton later claimed he didn ’ t support the “ necessary evil ” position but was merely making note of the view of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ there doesn ’ t appear to be a record of [ the founders ] arguing slavery in the US was a ‘ necessary evil.
’ ” And Nikole Hannah-Jones explained to the senator : Harrington had a response of his own .
“ You will be facing Arkansas ’ first African American candidate for US Senate , ” wrote the challenger in July .
“ Let us debate on this issue now !
!
” Cotton refused .
But that didn ’ t change the fact that , as the Arkansas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ controversy , “ There is an alternative to Tom Cotton .
”

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Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton is running for president. The fiercely ambitious right-wing culture warrior who last summer described slavery as a “necessary evil” won’t admit it publicly yet, but there’s no doubt that Cotton is positioning himself to be the more-Trump-than-Trump successor to the Republican whose occupation of the Oval Office could be upended on November 3.
In the past month, Cotton’s been on the campaign trail in the first presidential caucus state of Iowa and the first presidential primary state of New Hampshire.
While Cotton has found plenty of time this fall for positioning outside Arkansas, the senator who is up for reelection in 2020 couldn’t make time in his busy political schedule for the Arkansas US Senate debate. That’s right, the Republican senator who has been campaigning all over the country skipped his own debate.
Cotton likes to pretend that he doesn’t face a race this year. That’s by design. His allies executed a sly strategy to upend the bid of his expected Democratic challenger, Joshua Mahony, who quit the contest (ostensibly for family health reasons) after the deadline expired for another Democrat to qualify. When Cotton wrote a fascistic New York Times op-ed in June, media outlets dutifully ran articles with headlines like “As Tom Cotton courts controversy, he runs unopposed in Arkansas.” More From John Nichols A GOP Debate Without Trump Is the Definition of Pointlessness August 11, 2023 A Win for Abortion Rights, a Win for Democracy: Ohio Voters Reject Issue 1 August 9, 2023 The Biggest Threat to Donald Trump Could Be the Constitution Itself August 4, 2023
Which is not true. Cotton has an opponent who is ready, willing, and able to debate. So Arkansas PBS stations aired a mid-October “debate” featuring a moderator, three journalists, and Libertarian Party candidate Ricky Dale Harrington Jr., a former prison chaplain who hopes to be Arkansas’s first Black senator.
Harrington acknowledged that he was frustrated by Cotton’s no-show. “He’s on Fox News, I don’t know how many times a week—two or three times a week?—but he can’t come here to address the people of Arkansas,” the 34-year-old challenger explained. “Why would you want to support somebody that does that?” Cotton’s absence didn’t stop Harrington from seizing the opportunity to “speak directly to the people of Arkansas” on the issues. And he concluded on an epic note: Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann
People of Arkansas, you know who you are, you know where you’ve come from. Our country has been through a great many struggles. We’ve been through the Revolutionary War, a Civil War, numerous conflicts, the Spanish flu, two world wars, the turmoil of the civil rights movement. But I know one thing. I know the people of America are resilient. I know that they never back down from a challenge. During the 2008 mortgage crisis, we endured that. And right now we are enduring turmoil in the streets as people try to protest police brutality. We are dealing with a pandemic, but I know who you are. You are resilient people. You can overcome this just like we have overcome all the troubles in our past. But we can only do it if we work together, if you remember that those who disagree with you are still human beings. We don’t have to agree on everything. And if everyone is thinking alike, is there really much thinking going on. Our differences make us stronger. And I appeal to this great people that, even though we have failed, even though we are still continually striving for that great idea of justice, of liberty, and equality under the law, we can overcome anything. I ask you right now to consider sending me to Washington to be your senator. And I give you my word, I will represent you.
In the debate and on the campaign trail, Harrington has embraced some standard Libertarian positions. He’s for budget cuts and claims that “the broken American health care system cannot be fixed by government legislation or mandate.” But his top issue is criminal justice reform, and he’s got a platform that argues for decriminalization of marijuana, eliminating mandatory minimum sentencing, and instituting police training in de-escalation and nonviolent crisis intervention. He’s for cutting Pentagon spending, ending non-defensive military conflicts, and holding presidents accountable for engaging in military conflicts without a congressional declaration of war. And he says, “This country belongs to each and every citizen regardless of race, creed, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, religious preference…” Current Issue View our current issue
The response to Harrington’s sincere effort to make a campaign of it has been striking. Polls have regularly shown him attracting 20 percent or more of the vote—sometimes substantially more. One survey conducted in mid-October by the American Research Group registered 38 percent for Harrington to 49 percent for Cotton. That’s notable, considering that when Cotton successfully challenged Democratic Senator Mark Pryor in 2014, Pryor finished with just 39 percent of the vote. This year, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has struggled to get past the 40 percent mark in Arkansas.
If a third-party candidate who started the Senate race with no name recognition and almost no money finishes as well, or even better, than a sitting senator or this year’s Democratic presidential nominee, that could cast some shade on Cotton’s presidential ambitions.
And, make no mistake, embarrassing Cotton is an admirable political goal.
Cotton’s outrageous June 3 New York Times opinion piece, which championed proposals to send the military into American cities to crack down on protests against police violence and systemic racism, led commentator Max Boot to observe that “Republicans are increasingly flirting with fascism,” while Times columnist Michelle Goldberg labeled the senator’s column “Tom Cotton’s Fascist Op-Ed.” Seth Meyers reminded the paper’s editors, “You’re not legally obligated to run fascist calls for military occupation in your newspaper,” and Times editorial page editor James Bennet quickly stepped down following what publisher A.G. Sulzberger referred to as “a significant breakdown in our editing processes.”
But Cotton was just getting started. In July, he attacked The New York Times Magazine’s groundbreaking 1619 Project and announced legislation to prevent federal funds and professional development grants from going to schools that develop curricula based on the project, which, the magazine explained, “aims to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of our national narrative.” Cotton dismissed the project as “left-wing propaganda.” He also said of slavery, “As the founding fathers said, it was the necessary evil upon which the union was built, but the union was built in a way, as Lincoln said, to put slavery on the course to its ultimate extinction.”
Cotton later claimed he didn’t support the “necessary evil” position but was merely making note of the view of the founders. However, CNN reported, “there doesn’t appear to be a record of [the founders] arguing slavery in the US was a ‘necessary evil.’” And Nikole Hannah-Jones explained to the senator:
You said, quote: “As the Founding Fathers said, it was the necessary evil upon which the union was built.” That “as” denotes agreement. Further, if by path to extinction you mean growing the enslaved [population] from 500k to 4 million at Civil War, a war fought over slavery, then, ok.
Harrington had a response of his own. “You will be facing Arkansas’ first African American candidate for US Senate,” wrote the challenger in July. “Let us debate on this issue now!!”
Cotton refused. But that didn’t change the fact that, as the Arkansas Times noted in a report on the controversy, “There is an alternative to Tom Cotton.”