Fighting for the Right to Vote

Floor Speech

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Mr. BISHOP of Georgia. Madam Speaker, this month marked the one-year anniversary of the passing of our dear friend and beloved colleague John Lewis. Sadly, while we reflect upon his legacy, there are efforts underway in State Houses across the nation to turn back the clock and erect barriers to voter participation in elections.

We all know that the premise behind these efforts is a lie--namely, that the 2020 election was stolen and that there was rampant voter fraud. In my home state of Georgia, these falsehoods led to the passage and ultimate enactment of Senate Bill 202, which was given the misleading name, ``the Georgia Civics Renewal Act.'' The lie also provided the impetus for the attack on the United States Capitol on January 6.

The measures being put forward in states like Georgia reduce voter access to the polls under the guise of protecting the vote. Georgia's SB 202 limits drop boxes, imposes ID requirements on absentee voting, restricts early voting on weekends, allows state officials to circumvent the work of election officials if they do not like the results they are seeing, and even makes it a crime to offer food and water to voters waiting in line.

It is a ruse that disproportionately impacts voters whose voices have too often been silenced. Why? Because those voices--African American voices in Georgia--made all the difference in 2020.

The integrity of our elections is enhanced by greater voter participation--not less. As Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, ``voting is the foundation stone of political action.''

Earlier this year, I co-sponsored H.R. 1, For the People Act, which is a voting and elections bill that protects access, promotes the creation of fairer districts, and supports public financing of campaigns. The legislation passed the House on March 3 by a vote of 220 to 210.

I also supported H.R. 4, the John Lewis Voting Rights Enhancement Act, which the House had approved last Congress.

H.R. 4 is intended to fix the enforcement provisions of the original Voting Rights Act that were gutted by the Supreme Court in the 2013 Shelby County v. Holder decision.

The Court's conservative majority held that the formula for determining whether jurisdictions were subject to the law's Justice Department pre-clearance procedure for voting and election changes by state and local governments were outdated. This mostly focused on southern states with a long history of racially discriminatory voter suppression.

Contrary to the court's opinion and since then, hundreds of bills across several state legislatures have been proposed that would make access to the ballot box increasingly difficult for many people--more so for communities of color, students, seniors, and disabled people. Some of these bills have become law.

In many cases, those who are rolling back access to the vote are also involved in the decennial redistricting process in which congressional and state legislative maps will be set until 2032.

These are precisely the kind of decisions the Justice Department was able to scrutinize under the pre-Shelby County Voting Rights Act.

The John Lewis Voting Rights Enhancement Act will rectify this wrong and fine-tune that formula so that the Supreme Court cannot strike it down again.

Madam Speaker, I know that John Lewis is looking down upon us now. If he were here with us today, I know that he would be on the House floor tonight and would be imploring us in that booming voice of his to continue the fight for voting rights to which he devoted his life and career.

It is the same fight for which he endured unspeakable brutality while attempting to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the march from Selma to Montgomery. We cannot turn back now.

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