Thread by @JoshuaBHoe

Picking and choosing who gets to vote is anti-Democratic

Even the statement, "I don't think our Democracy is made better by letting _____ vote" is internally contradictory and self-defeating.

Democracy is not, and should not be, about elites choosing preferred voters Ted Cruz.

Side note: Oddly enough, in the state Mr. Cruz represents, people who did time for murder can vote...and yet, Mr. Cruz was elected. Is Texas' not an acceptable Democratic state?

Political grandstanding by putting real people's vote on the line is UGLY

He was also FLAT wrong...there is actual research that shows that VOTING by incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people actually does make our communities safer and our democracy stronger

Ironically, every single person who threw tea overboard on the Dartmouth during the actual Tea Party would not have been allowed to vote under Mr. Cruz's formulation of 'optimal' Democracy

<Ted Cruz was a tea party candidate>

Joe Loya had it exactly right....

If we want people to invest in our society, there HAS to be a place for each of them IN our DEMOCRACY. Otherwise, you leave people with no incentive to participate in Democracy, the legal economy, and in communities that EXCLUDE them BY LAW

"Citizenship is not a right that expires upon misbehavior"

Democracy is NOT about CHOOSING who gets to vote and who does not get to vote

Disenfranchisement is NOT part of punishment, NO judge sentenced people to lose their right to vote...this is extra-judicial punishment, not part of a sentence

It is also a misreading of the 14th exception. The 14th only says states can disenfranchise, not that they should. In addition, the 13th and 14th were compromises with Southern states after the Civil War....not exactly shining statements of Democracy IMHO

And the IMPACT is MASSIVELY disparate, when people are disenfranchised the balance is overwhelmingly paid by black and brown people (not a boon to Democracy at any level)

It also springs from a long history of racially disparate disenfranchisement

The amount of people disenfranchised across the country is MASSIVE and represents a significant sample of the entire voting population in a country where "TOUGH ON CRIME" has been the rule for at least four decades

sentencingproject.org/publications/l…

We can't have it both ways.

Either we are a truly Democratic country where EVERYONE has a say in their own governance OR we are NOT a Democratic country, and we allow elites to pick and choose who has a say in governance.

Apparently, Ted Cruz is on the side of the latter

In addition, there are states where formerly incarcerated people CAN vote, in Michigan, for instance, we have a GOP led House and Senate and everyone can vote the minute they are released regardless of crime category

In two states, and in DC, every person can vote, even if they are currently incarcerated...those states do not seem to have shut down...and even if you believed that was disadvantageous, this would be odd given the actual facts

Most important, when someone who has MASSIVE power picks on people who are literally stripped of all democratic power....you should be really suspicious.

Mr. Cruz should be ashamed of himself for a political stunt attacking people who often cannot respond...SAD!

Also, what Mr. Cruz did was repeat a trope we in criminal justice reform work call the "what about Hannibal Lechter?"

Mass incarceration was built by responding to every law or practice by testing it using the absolute most atypical counter-example possible.