Thread by @MondaireJones

Sen. Manchin’s op-ed on the #ForThePeopleAct is full of unsound, unserious arguments. 

Let’s unpack it.

Only Democrats are having a “debate about how to best protect our right to vote.” State Republicans are ramming through voter suppression laws along party lines. There’s no comparison.

The solution is not to unilaterally surrender. It is to undo the damage.

Not a single Democrat voted for the 15th Amendment. Did that destroy our republic?

Yes.

In any event, only 7 Senate Republicans voted to impeach Trump — not enough to overcome a filibuster.

If there aren’t 10 Republicans willing to investigate an insurrection that almost claimed their lives, there aren’t 10 Republicans willing to protect the right to vote.

Four years and one insurrection later, Democrats have learned that today’s Republican Party poses a mortal threat to our democracy.

The filibuster has nothing to do with the Founders. In fact, the Founders specifically rejected the idea of requiring supermajority support for passing laws.

We cannot let this Jim Crow relic cement the new Jim Crow.

That is exactly what we’re facing if we don’t pass the For the People Act: a generation of far-right minority rule by a party hostile to democracy itself.

The #ForThePeopleAct would simply give people the power to choose a better future.

If we introduced H.R.4 and brought it to a vote, it would receive no more than 51 votes — not enough to overcome a filibuster.

And the bill would do nothing about gerrymandering, Big Money in politics, or the damage the GOP has already done in the states.

Actually, we’re arguing that we should pass necessary civil rights legislation that is bipartisan *among the people*. Just not with GOP politicians and the billionaires who bankroll them.

By dooming our democracy in the name of bipartisanship, Senator Manchin is betraying both.

Senator Manchin is correct — democracy is special. 

But if he refuses to budge from his position, ours will continue to unravel.