Rep. Justin Jones: It’s Sad That Today We Have Less Protections for Voting Rights Than We Did After 1965
RUSH EXCERPT:
JONES: "I mean, that’s what we need to see. We need, you know, and I want to lift up the south, because often the south, whether it’s Tennessee, where I am, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, it’s the tip of the spear, it’s the frontline of democracy. And so right now, we’re becoming a confederacy again without protections from the federal government. And so we must go to places where these battles are taking place. What we saw in Texas was reprehensible. It was immoral. And it’s sad that today we have less protections for voting rights than we did after 1965, because they dismantled the Voting Rights Act. And so what we must do is we must go to these places and not just mobilize on one day, but we need sustained, consistent, persistent agitation. You know, what we saw in the 60s was liberation through agitation. That’s what we must continue to see. We can’t just have a one day protest on the day that buildings are closed. We must go there when they’re open and let them know that if they if they suppress the voting of people, we’re going to find ways, as John Lewis said, to get in good trouble, to do things out of the ordinary. Sometimes our democracy requires disruption. We saw that in Tennessee. When they turned off my microphone, I had to pull a megaphone out of my pocket, amplify the voices of my constituents. That’s what we must do. We must do things out of the ordinary and push forward and force them to see these issues. Because what I’m fearful of my brother is that if we don’t act now, we may not have an election and democracy come the next election. We’re already seeing them saying they’re going to have ice agents deployed, mass agents trying to intimidate people outside of polls. We see the games they’re playing, you know, with with the electoral process and, and trying to close voting centers. We see what’s happening. And so we have to be proactive and not reactive after it happens, because then it will be too late. We must act now."
