One Federal Judge’s Primal Scream About The Dramatic Erosion Of Voting Rights – By Matt Shuham (Talking Points Memo) / April 1, 2022
When a judge writes nearly 300 pages in an order that may well be quickly overturned, they’re trying to send a message beyond the judicial action itself.
That’s what U.S. District Judge Mark E. Walker of the Northern District of Florida did on Thursday, with a ruling knocking down several new Republican restrictions on voter registration groups, ballot drop boxes, and “line-warming,” or giving food and water to people waiting in line to vote.
Throughout the searing ruling, the judge, an Obama appointee, also retold the history of racist terrorism and voter suppression in Florida and tied that history to the U.S. Supreme Court’s modern attacks on voting rights.
From the very start, Walker signaled that his ruling was about more than one state law: In blocking most of SB 90’s elements, he said, “this Court recognizes that the right to vote, and the [Voting Rights Act] particularly, are under siege.” Then, he quoted Martin Luther King Jr. comparing the right to vote to the right to prayer.
