Rep. Demings Cosponsors the Voting Rights Advancement Act

ORLANDO, FL – Today, Rep. Val Demings (FL-10) joined Reps. Terri Sewell and John Lewis on H.R. 4, The Voting Rights Advancement Act. The bill will restore Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act, protecting the rights of all Americans in areas with a history of voting rights violations, including the state of Florida.

Said Rep. Demings, “Every American has the right to cast a vote, for that vote to be counted, and for that vote to matter. Voting is a foundational right, without which none of our other freedoms and liberties can survive.

“The first words of our constitution are ‘We the People.’ America has not always lived up to that aspiration, but today presents yet another opportunity to get it right. The rights we have today were hard-won. Men and women have fought and died to protect our rights. That is why it is deeply disturbing that since the gutting of the Voting Rights Act, new barriers are being built to keep American citizens from the polls.

“If America is to continue to be a great nation, our right to vote must be protected. We must restore the power of the Voting Rights Act and return the power of the polls to the American people.”

Background

Five years after the Supreme Court’s Shelby County v. Holder decision that gutted the Voting Rights Act, the VRAA creates a modern-day formula to determine which jurisdictions have had a recent history of voter discrimination. The VRAA addresses a wave of voter ID laws, racial gerrymandering, and other voter suppression tactics enacted at the state level.

The VRAA restores preclearance enforcement of jurisdictions that have had repeated voting rights violations within the last 25 years. Should the VRAA become law, 11 current states are expected to require the Justice Department to pre-clear changes to state voting laws: Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.

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