Thread by @LemieuxLGM

This is a VERY good analysis of why the Georgia vote suppression law is, in fact, very bad nytimes.com/2021/04/02/us/…

The bill cuts the time frame for requesting absentee ballots in half. (Note -- and this will be a theme -- this is just pure vote suppression, with no even remotely colorable connection to fraud)

Compare how vote suppression apologist Rich Lowry poo-poos the dramatic cutback in ballot drop boxes with what the statute actually does. (Again, pure vote suppression -- there is zero evidence of fraud at drop boxes.)

The state made it illegal for local government to mail absentee ballot applications. Again, pure vote suppression, with no connection to claims of fraud whatsoever:

The law gratuitously bans the mobile voting centers used by Fulton County, not because of any evidence of fraud but because Georgia Republicans think Black people voting is bad in principle

The statute also makes it harder for people with 9-to-5 jobs to vote early

The purely cruel and gratuitous ban on bringing water to people waiting in deliberately long lines has already been widely noted. (And contrary to that the National Review will tell you, electioneering was already illegal.)

The law deliberately makes ballot counting slower, to allow for the cultivation of Trump-like conspiracy theories

And, critically, Georgia's undemocratic, gerrymandered Republican legislature has taken over election machinery and punished the officials who refused to go along with Trump's lies, making a stolen election more likely in the future

In short, this is an appalling statute, the comparisons with Jim Crow are perfectly appropriate, and Savvy takes that it's not that bad should go away now

Good on Major League Baseball. Vote suppression should entail costs: