We must stop the Racist & Xenophobic Constitutional Amendment
On the ballot this November, Wisconsin voters will once again find themselves having to vote on yet another constitutional amendment. The surface level language of this new amendment seems to be straightforward and about the right to vote. But peeling back that thin layer on the surface reveals the sinister, xenophobic core at the heart of this bill. Before we even get into why this amendment must be stopped, we must first answer why we have yet another constitutional amendment on the ballot this cycle. While the language of these proposed amendments are never straightforward, the driving force behind them is. All of these amendments are attempted power-grabs by the Republican-controlled legislature. The governor of Wisconsin cannot veto constitutional amendments. Republicans are trying to bypass the democratic process and strip Governor Evers of his oversight by trying to repeatedly amend Wisconsin’s Constitution while they still have their gerrymandered supermajority. This should be reason enough to reject any constitutional amendment that comes from the current Congress.
If you want to know exactly why this specific amendment is bad, we can dive in further. The current amendment essentially changes one word, currently the constitution reads “Every United States citizen aged 18 or older who lives in an election district may vote” and the amendment wants to change it to “Only United States citizens aged 18 or older who live in an election district may vote.” This single word change is both bad policy and also feeding into Fascist Republicans’ xenophobic fear-mongering and election denying.
First, why it is a bad policy. Nowhere in Wisconsin can non-citizens vote. Period. Full-Stop. Despite what Republicans will have you believe, non-citizens voting is not widespread. In fact a study of the 2016 election found that of the 23.5 million ballots cast, there were only 30 suspected instances of non-citizens voting. That is 0.0001% percent for all you numbers people out there. Similar studies of other election years have found similar results. And in Wisconsin specifically, the Wisconsin Election Commission has only found 4 suspected (note, not proven) cases of non-citizens voting. There is simply no evidence that non-citizens are voting in elections in any significant way. But what this amendment will do is change the role of the state when it comes to elections. Currently the language of ‘Every’ is inclusive. The state’s duty becomes ensuring that every citizen is able to vote. If you change ‘Every’ to ‘Only’, the role of the state drastically shifts. Now instead of the state’s duty being to make sure that everyone can vote, it now must focus on policing voters and making sure only citizens can vote. Now every voter is viewed as a suspect in the eyes of the state. The state transforms from an empowerer to an enforcer. No one really knows what this amendment would mean on the ground, but without a doubt it would make voting more difficult. Every voter would now need to definitively prove that they are in fact a citizen. Once you realize that roughly 9% of US citizens do not have a physical document to prove their citizenship (this number is even higher for folks of color), the chilling effects of this amendment become apparent. Non-citizens are not voting so the only people this amendment would keep from voting are citizens who do not have the documentation or simply do not want to have to go through the process of proving their citizenship. This amendment will only disenfranchise more valid voters and most likely predominantly voters of color. Which of course, considering how the Republicans have rejected democracy and embraced white-supremecy, tracks for them, but this is why we must stop this amendment.
So why are Republicans so adamant about this amendment? Well for one, it plays into their false narrative that the 2020 election was stolen. But more sinisterly, it is part of their hate-filled campaign against immigrants. Immigrants have become their scapegoats for every issue they can imagine. Voting for this amendment just plays into their false, harmful lies about immigrants and about the election.
All of this hate and vitriol they spew has very real consequences for these communities, from the El Paso shooter specifically wanting to target ‘Mexicans’ to bomb and shooting threats against Haitians in Springfield Ohio. This hate breeds violence and we must reject this amendment to stand by our immigrant communities. They need it more than ever now. No one is standing up for immigrants right now and we need to change that.
Democrats have also abandoned immigrants and have let Trump and his fascists allies pull them further and further right on immigration. This rightward shift was on full display during the DNC where speaker after speaker proclaimed the need for more border security and more deportations. Even the subtle shift from describing these folks as migrants instead of immigrants furthers their dehumanization. Democrats have let Trump define the narrative and have thrown immigrants under the bus in the process. Not only does this further support the harmful scapegoating of immigrants, but it also is a bad political strategy. Policy-wise there is little that separates Trump and Democrats on immigration. Democrats will not be able to beat Trump on being ‘tough’ (read inhumane) on immigration and should stop trying. They are letting him define the narrative and the conversation. As we have previously argued at Milwaukee Beagle, trying to out fascist fascists never works. Instead they need to present a new narrative. Really, Democrats need to present the truth. Cities with a huge influx of immigrants arriving are struggling, but that is not immigrants' fault. What if instead of sending billions of dollars to support a genocide, we gave our cities the funding they need to serve all the folks that live there? The resources these cities need are there, we just need to send it to them instead of throwing it at the military. Or what if corporations, who are making record profits, needed to contribute more? Especially because these corporations often profit from abusing undocumented workers. Again immigrants are not our enemies and all this scapegoating serves to keep us from realizing that unchecked corporate profits and warmongering are the real reasons behind so many of the issues folks attribute to immigrants. What we need to be doing is ensuring that when immigrants arrive they are able to be fully documented instead of being forced to live in the shadows.
No one is defending immigrants now. Rejecting this amendment is one way we can stand in solidarity with immigrants and tell Republicans (and Democrats) we reject your fear mongering and scapegoating. We welcome newcomers to this country with open arms.
We will vote NO on November 5th.
