October 23, 2017

Watch Ari Berman Explain How Voter Suppression Handed Wisconsin to Trump

He also breaks down Thomas Farr’s history of defending voter ID laws.

On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted along party lines to advance President Donald Trump’s pick for a lifetime seat on the Eastern District of North Carolina, Thomas Farr. The Republican lawyer has a history of defending voter suppression laws, including a 2013 law in North Carolina that the NAACP called a “monster” for restricting the right to vote.

Mother Jones senior reporter Ari Berman on Sunday sat down with MSNBC’s Joy Reid to discuss Farr’s controversial nomination, as well as Berman’s recent cover story examining how similar voter suppression measures effectively handed the crucial state of Wisconsin to Trump in the 2016 election.

“If we don’t learn this lesson, if we don’t learn the lesson that voter suppression works and you have to fight to protect the right to vote, history is going to repeat itself in 2018 and 2020,” he told Reid.

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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