On Aug. 24, the U.S. Supreme Court handed Donald Trump an interim victory in his effort to have the federal government take control of mail-in voting. The high court’s justices voted 6-3 along partisan lines to temporarily lift a lower-court injunction that had blocked key portions of the president’s executive order. The U.S. Postal Service continues to be blocked from following Trump’s directives under a nationwide ruling released on Aug. 11 by U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston.
Trump’s executive order calls for the Department of Homeland Security to develop state lists of U.S. citizens and for the USPS to obtain lists of eligible mail-in voters from states. Trump wants the post office to only deliver mail-in ballots to people on those lists.
The Supreme Court majority said it was not ruling on the constitutionality of Trump’s order, but found that a lawsuit brought by 23 states and Washington, D.C. was filed prematurely. In a dissenting opinion, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson noted that the Supreme Court’s ruling “needlessly injects chaos and uncertainty into the upcoming midterm elections.” Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Greg Palast, an award-winning reporter and best-selling author who’s been investigating voter suppression for over 20 years. Here he takes a critical look at Trump’s scheme to control mail-in voting that he asserts is consciously designed to disenfranchise millions of eligible black and Latino voters.
GREG PALAST: The Supreme Court basically said if Donald Trump wants to eliminate elections, he can do so, but they’re not final on the ruling because there were two cases in front of them and they only ruled on one. So there’s still mail-in voting. So here’s the breakdown. Half the people in America vote by mail these days. Half the people in America vote by mail, especially since COVID and either put it in the mail or they get their mail-in ballot and put it in a drop box or they bring it to their station, but over half. In the black community, mail-in, drop box and early voting is 70 percent. Seventy percent of black people vote early for good reason. They know that if they don’t, they’re going to be waiting five hours in line in Georgia and fainting in the sun. So we know who they’re going after.
They’re trying to create citizenship lists. We’re not the Soviet Union. We’re not Red China. We do not have citizenship lists in the United States. In fact, it’s the right-wing which tried to prevent having a national citizenship ID card. And now Trump’s saying, well, he’s going to create these things. Now how’s he creating them? They’re starting with the Department of Homeland Security where they’re taking the list of people who’ve been deported. It’s called the “safe list.” It’s anything but safe. It’s a listing of people deported. As you can well imagine, there’s a lot of guys named Jose Garcia on that list and Lydia Rivera on that list. Now, why does that matter? Because it’s a list of people who’ve been deported who happen to have the same names, common names in the United States. They tried this once before. In the 2012 election, the state of Florida forced Obama to hand over the list, this safe list of people deported so they could remove any illegal aliens on the voter rolls of Florida.
They removed 176,000 voters on the voter rolls, a lot of Jose Garcias. 176,000. In the end, they found one single illegal alien voter, alien voter, a Republican from Austria. (chuckles) No, not Arnold.
One. Now you say, “Well, okay. All’s well that ends well.” No, no, no. Over a 100,000 people never got their vote back because to get your vote back, you had to go into court, prove you’re an American citizen to get your ballot back. Now, not many people knew how to do that, can do that, or are going to bother taking a day off of work to go to court to say, “I’ve been an American. I’ve been here four generations and now I’m asked to prove I’m an American?”
And that’s what they were doing. So they already know how this story ends. You use that safe list and no Hispanic voter is safe. Then, again, they start using similar lists not only of deportees and they’re looking at things like citizenship. I was surprised by this number, frankly, but 69 million women have taken on their husband’s last name. How do you prove you’re a citizen? Well, your birth certificate, and by the way, it can’t be a copy. It’s got to be certified or original. A birth certificate or a passport. Now, as you know, two out of three black people don’t have passports. Twenty-one million Americans don’t have passports or their original birth certificate. And we know who they are. The people that have passports are people who go skiing in Switzerland for their vacations. I don’t see the Supremes backing off on this one, but who knows?
I’m not in their heads except that they’ve really changed their black robes for white sheets. I’m very disappointed in people like Ketanji Brown and the three liberal justices because they were tiptoeing around saying, “Oh, this will create chaos and it’s the last minute and the federal government doesn’t really have authority over state voting.” Stop whining. That’s not the issue. They know exactly what they’re doing. They’re stopping black and brown people and poor people from voting. That’s what it is. It is Jim Crow racism of the worst order. And I want to remind people, since the 14th Amendment at the end of the Civil War, there’s been no law on any state books which says a black person can’t vote. Jim Crow was not laws that said you can’t vote if you’re black. There were tricks, tricks. For example, literacy tests where they ask you to recite the Constitution and ask a white guy to recite “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”
It’s tricks. They never say black people can’t vote. This is no different than the Jim Crow laws of 1890—the black laws as they called them. This is pure, solid, racial vote thievery and nothing less.
The Supreme Court basically said if Donald Trump wants to eliminate elections, he can do so, but they’re not final on the ruling because there were two cases in front of them and they only ruled on one. So there’s still mail-in voting. So here’s the breakdown. Half the people in America vote by mail these days. Half the people in America vote by mail, especially since COVID and either put it in the mail or they get their mail-in ballot and put it in a drop box or they bring it to their station, but over half. In the black community, mail-in, drop box and early voting is 70 percent. Seventy percent of black people vote early for good reason. They know that if they don’t, they’re going to be waiting five hours in line in Georgia and fainting in the sun. So we know who they’re going after.
They’re trying to create citizenship lists. We’re not the Soviet Union. We’re not Red China. We do not have citizenship lists in the United States. In fact, it’s the right-wing which tried to prevent having a national citizenship ID card. And now Trump’s saying, well, he’s going to create these things. Now how’s he creating them? They’re starting with the Department of Homeland Security where they’re taking the list of people who’ve been deported. It’s called the “safe list.” It’s anything but safe. It’s a listing of people deported. As you can well imagine, there’s a lot of guys named Jose Garcia on that list and Lydia Rivera on that list. Now, why does that matter? Because it’s a list of people who’ve been deported who happen to have the same names, common names in the United States. They tried this once before. In the 2012 election, the state of Florida forced Obama to hand over the list, this safe list of people deported so they could remove any illegal aliens on the voter rolls of Florida.
They removed 176,000 voters on the voter rolls, a lot of Jose Garcias. One hundred seventy-six thousand. In the end, they found one single illegal alien voter, alien voter, a Republican from Austria. (chuckles) No, not Arnold.
One. Now you say, “Well, okay. All’s well that ends well.” No, no, no. Over a 100,000 people never got their vote back because to get your vote back, you had to go into court, prove you’re an American citizen to get your ballot back. Now, not many people knew how to do that, can do that, or are going to bother taking a day off of work to go to court to say, “I’ve been an American. I’ve been here four generations and now I’m asked to prove I’m an American?”
And that’s what they were doing. So they already know how this story ends. You use that safe list and no Hispanic voter is safe. Then, again, they start using similar lists not only of deportees and they’re looking at things like citizenship. I was surprised by this number, frankly, but 69 million women have taken on their husband’s last name. How do you prove you’re a citizen? Well, your birth certificate, and by the way, it can’t be a copy. It’s got to be certified or original. A birth certificate or a passport. Now, as you know, two out of three black people don’t have passports. Twenty-one million Americans don’t have passports or their original birth certificate. And we know who they are. The people that have passports are people who go skiing in Switzerland for their vacations. I don’t see the Supremes backing off on this one, but who knows?
I’m not in their heads except that they’ve really changed their black robes for white sheets. I’m very disappointed in people like Ketanji Brown and the three liberal justices because they were tiptoeing around saying, “Oh, this will create chaos and it’s the last minute and the federal government doesn’t really have authority over state voting.” Stop whining. That’s not the issue. They know exactly what they’re doing. They’re stopping black and brown people and poor people from voting. That’s what it is. It is Jim Crow racism of the worst order. And I want to remind people, since the 14th Amendment at the end of the Civil War, there’s been no law on any state books which says a Black person can’t vote. Jim Crow was not laws that said you can’t vote if you’re black. There were tricks, tricks. For example, literacy tests where they ask you to recite the Constitution and ask a white guy to recite “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”
It’s tricks. They never say black people can’t vote. This is no different than the Jim Crow laws of 1890, the black laws as they called them. This is pure, solid, racial vote thievery and nothing less.
For more information, see Greg Palast’s eight-part series of short video reels on voter suppression schemes called, “Jim Crow Reloaded” at GregPalast.com.
Producer’s note: On Wednesday, Aug. 26, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston lifted her injunction on Trump’s directive to the U.S. Postal Service requiring states to follow a uniform style for the envelopes used for mail ballots and give the Postal Service a list of voters eligible to receive them. Talwani said the Supreme Court’s Monday decision “compelled” her to toss out the injunction. She nevertheless said the executive order could unleash “chaos” and referred to it as “likely unconstitutional.”
Listen to Scott Harris’ in-depth interview with Greg Palast (18:02) and see more articles and opinion pieces in the related links section of this page. To subscribe to our podcasts, email newsletters, our Between The Lines Radio Newsmagazine Substack or social media, subscribe here.
