David Brooks at Year’s End: The GOP ‘Has Slid Down the Toilet’ on Voting Rights

This panel will be held on the Friday evening of Week in Politics 2021. PBS NewsHour The Democrats chose once more the topic they want to discuss right now, new laws that restrict the huge COVID-era freedom on absentee and mail-in voting. The Republicans have proven yet again how horrible they are. New York Times columnist David Brooks — the alleged moderate Republican-leaning regular of this group — said the GOP is “a party that has slid down the toilet.”

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Washington PostJonathan Capehart, columnist for the New York Times, made panicked comments about Democracy Dying in Darkness. Brooks was then asked to take over.

A Happy New Year! PBS @NewsHourDavid Brooks declares that “moderate” the GOP is “slipping down the toilet” on voting rights in 2021.

PBS is not being funded by taxpayers. This is a misuse of democracy by forcing Republicans to spend money on bathroom abuses. pic.twitter.com/sOm0OUkkGl

— Tim Graham (@TimJGraham) January 1, 2022

AMNA NAWAZ (David, how about that?) You mean the big lie. The idea that the election was stolen has been promoted still by one of the most prominent members of the Republican Party. Donald Trump is the one who has made this possible. Many leaders are not forced to denounce it. If one party messages things that are detrimental to the foundational elements of democracy in a two-party system can it hold?

DAVID BROOKS: That’s a good question. They would be stunned if you went back and asked them in 2015 what Republicans were doing in 2021. So it is. This party has gone downhill.This is the only way I know to put it. (Capehart giggles.)

That is the real problem. My alarm is — I cut Jonathan’s alarm in half just on this voting rights issue. Republicans try to restrain voting. This is a terrible thing considering the country’s history. This is all it takes.

Brooks, the “moderate”, is recognizing what the media often overlooks: voter-ID laws. (Even though he doesn’t think it is sketchy that Democrats want to skip voter ID requirements.

BROOKS voter ID laws, are phenomenally popular. They are supported by eighty percent of Americans. The key point to remember about voting restrictions is that they don’t limit voting.

It has been researched. We have discussed this on the show before. Academics have repeatedly shown that voter turnout increases when voting restrictions are tightened in states. Turnout increases when voting restrictions are relaxed. Voters vote.

So I find that Jonathan’s second statement, about state legislatures taking control after votes have been counted, is less alarming than Jonathan’s first. It would need to take place in a purple state for it to become a problem. It would be necessary for a Republican-controlled state legislature to effectively politicize our system, in the same way Joe Biden would. We have a problem with our democracy if they do this.

Nawaz, as do all liberal partisans, turned to Brennan Center for the overall number of states that are studying how many new voting laws they can adopt. Left-wing media assume that every Republican proposal is racial and undemocratic. 

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