July 07, 2021

Nicole Chavez, CNN

With two key voting rights bills stalled in the U.S. Senate, a July U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing voter restrictions in Arizona, and barriers to voting being passed in many other states, the right to vote in this country remains elusive. This, despite the fact that the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution was adopted more than 150 years ago. 

Fortunately, some activists take the long view, refusing to give up. In late June, twenty-one civil rights proponents, including Rev. Jesse Jackson and Rev. William Barber II, were arrested during a Capitol Hill protest over voting rights and the filibuster’s abolition. “When you start rolling back voter registration, rolling back early voting, undermining mail in balloting, putting limits on people even being able to get water, doing racist gerrymandering, class-based gerrymandering, you hurt Black people, you hurt White people, you hurt Asians, Natives, Latinos, young people and the disabled,” Barber [said].  

” … a group of civil rights groups [has] announced the August 28 “March On for Voting Rights,” which will mark the 58th anniversary of the historic March on Washington where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous ‘I Have a Dream’ speech. … Martin Luther King III, the eldest son of Martin Luther King Jr., will lead the march with his family’s organization the Drum Major Institute along with March On, Service Employees International Union and the National Action Network.”  Full CNN story here