Mitch McConnell
You’d think making sure American citizens can vote wouldn’t be controversial, but this is the era of Republican opposition to democracy.
“The president’s rant yesterday was incoherent, incorrect and beneath his office,” McConnell said on the Senate floor today, referring to Biden’s speech in Atlanta yesterday appealing for voting-rights legislation. Read story here.
“McConnell accused the president of giving ‘deliberately divisive speech that was designed to pull our country further apart,'” Reuters reported.
I guess that’s what you say when your party is a major violator of voting rights, and its followers perpetrate election lies, conspiracies, and fraud.
Here’s what Republicans have done about voting rights: “Trump’s false claims that his 2020 election defeat was the result of fraud inspired a wave of new restrictions on voting in Republican-controlled states last year,” Reuters said. Actually, they did more than pass restrictions; they’re going after black voters with laws like this.
Here’s what McConnell accused Biden of, after his party spent a year stoking the fires of insurrection, “civil war,” and “coup” (those are their words): “Twelve months ago the president said that politics need not be a raging fire destroying everything in its path,” McConnell said. “But yesterday he poured a giant can of gasoline on the fire.”
Really? Is he going to blame the January 6 insurrection on Biden, too?
Of course, McConnell isn’t the most credible source to begin with. The guy isn’t what you’d call a statesman. He’s one of the most scheming, cynical, Machiavellian politicians our country has ever seen. Very few people stoke the fires of partisan division more than he does. And it’s very clear he doesn’t want any federal protection for the right to vote (see story here) — especially against the rampant abuses being perpetrated by his party in gerrymandered state legislatures.
So, when he calls Biden’s speaking out for protecting your right to vote a “rant,” consider the source.