I recently read a story that matched what I have been thinking for quite a while now, and it is finally coming to a head. The President and most of his White liberal allies, have no intention to truly protect the right to vote. In order words, they used the message of true voting equality and working to secure the free and fair right of every Black vote to be cast and counted, in order to secure their place in power in this country, while leaving us behind. The summary of the article I read essentially comes down to these points: when the Republican Party was still a party that courted the Black vote, resulting from Lincoln being responsible for bringing the formal end of slavery and hundreds of years of Republicans advocating for Black people, decided they wanted to make change they abandoned the Black community and made way for the decades long Jim Crow era in American history. The abdication of their responsibility and the still reeling Southern, White South allowed for some of the most restricting voting laws to be enacted until activists grew tired and the Civil Right Movement ushered in the current voting situation that we see today.

Now here we are all these years later and the roles have flipped but the actions are still the same and it appears that the results could be too, just in a slightly different manner. In today’s political world, Democrats are the party of support for the Black cause. They have spent decades relying on our support to usher candidates into office and keep others in there. We have made sure that White people of all ages and backgrounds have gotten into office in places they didn’t necessarily think possible. We made way for the first Black President in this country. We, in part, kept the country from having the first Woman President ever, because partly we didn’t believe she truly cared about the regular guy. We decided to revive the political career of the current President and in turn, bring more history with Kamala Harris, the nations First Black Woman Vice President, being elected. We delivered the U.S. Senate to Democrats as turned out in droves in Georgia to bring home both of those U.S. Senate seats in the Democrats column. Time and again, when needed to deliver political victory Black people are expected to help Democrats and the White liberal left get that victory.

So once again we follow through on our task. We delivered the White House and the both Chambers of Congress. Now, those Republicans that we spent days and hours voting to defeat, have finished licking their wounds and are setting their sights on ways to make voting more difficult. More importantly, they are figuring out ways to take control of the rooms where the votes go to get counted. They are taking control of the elections process, so they can change votes if they don’t like the outcome, and President Biden and most of his allies aren’t doing a fucking thing about it. It was a concern I’ve been thinking about for quite a while and one that in private conversations I’ve talked about plenty. He isn’t truly a liberal politician. He has some liberal beliefs and policies, but he at his core a moderate who believes in Institutional process. Those beliefs have led us to a crossroads of sorts and it appears the same trend is following. All those years back when Republicans could have strengthened voting rights for Black people, they shifted to focusing on Infrastructure. Something they could build “bipartisan” support for. They would improve American bridges and trails and roads. Make things better for everyday people, which would in turn make the voting rights issue less critical.

The truth is it just allowed for the ball to be dropped and draconian laws to be made that disenfranchised Black people and made it so hard for us to vote. Well, enter 2021 and we’re seeing the rise of Jim Crow style voting laws again. And the response from the leaders inside the White House, and some on Capitol Hill, seems to be that they would rather try for the money win on “bipartisan” legislation rather than fully support the two bills that are already passed in the House of Representatives, awaiting Senate approval. Not only have they not provided any alternate options that could garner support, they just speak of the importance for their to be voting security, but never going the lengths needed to get there. Biden, the ever practical politician, doesn’t want to carve up the filibuster to achieve the goal. The same way he did in order to get that last stimulus package passed. Instead, he gives this bullshit answer that removing it would throw the Senate into chaos. Let’s be honest, the fucking Senate has been in chaos since the Democrats lost control during the midterms when Obama was in office. It hasn’t been truly decent and in order since then.

McConnell and the rest of the Senate Republicans have bent the rules, changed the rules and played legislative hard ball to make sure that only what they want gets done and Democrats have to fight like hell just to get a seat to the table. And now, even though the Senate has a 50-50 split, Democrats have control and will not wield the power they command. Because if we’re being honest, if the Republicans had full control of the White House and Senate, shit would be totally different. They would be using whatever tools possible to get their agenda through that they cared about. This was my fear when we voted in November and it is coming to light as we speak. That Joe Biden, the elder statesman, would try to prove that he could govern the nation. Moving from a Center left position and that the critical issues that ailed us would be tackled from a joint effort. That type of dumb ass thinking is why we sit here with all these Republican controlled states passing laws that allow them to take control of the elections process if they don’t like the results. It allows them to remove early voting areas and make it harder to have absentee ballot voting. We are watching as state after state make surgical cuts at voting rights and voting equality in this country. And Biden is choosing to avert attention from that in a ways that could turn the tide.

Yes, he gave one speech in Philly about the importance of passing those two critical bills that would bring back some concrete support and give some uniformity to the elections process. Things we desperately need in this country, but that Biden is refusing to fully support. And those White, liberal allies are going lock step with Biden as we speak. They don’t see how urgent it is to get this situation resolved so they want the thing to get Republicans on their side for this fleeting moment. I always wondered why we as a people, choose to continue to support the Old White establishment guard in this country, instead of the diverse coalition that we are, that makes up the Democratic party. Why don’t we have more U.S. Senators men and women of color? Why aren’t there more Black Women US Senators? Out of 100 Senators only 3 are black and none of them are women. Just let that sink in for a moment. And you wonder why Black people are so hesitant to really support politicians. Even when they heavily court our vote and make promises that they will finally tackle Prison Reform, Criminal Justice Reform, Education Reform, Voting Rights Reform, we rarely get the full throated changes they profess. Usually it’s not done at all, or what is done, really doesn’t address the root issue. It’s some small surface level achievement that looks like shit, but disguised as major.

So here we are again and it appears that we are going to have to deal with the same shit as usual. White men sticking together truly for White men. If we really want change, we’re going to have to take it. We’re going to have to vote for some new blood, that truly wants to advance an agenda that helps the every day person, and most specifically, the every day black man. Hold these people accountable, make them honor their words or vote there asses out.