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      Supreme Court Case Throws Abortion Into 2022 Election Picture

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      Supporters and opponents of abortion rights say a major ruling just before the midterm elections could upend political calculations for the two parties.WASHINGTON — Within hours of the Supreme Court accepting a case that could lead it to overturn or scale back a landmark abortion rights ruling, Senator Michael Bennet, a Colorado Democrat facing re-election next year, issued a dire warning to supporters: The fate of Roe v Wade is on the line.“We cannot move backwards,” Mr. Bennet said in a campaign statement. “Colorado was a leader in legalizing abortion — six years before Roe v Wade. I will always fight for reproductive justice and to ensure everyone has safe and legal access to the health care they need.”His declaration was among the first in a quickly intensifying clash over abortion, long a defining issue to many voters but one likely to gain additional prominence as the court weighs the possibility of rolling back the constitutional protections it provided to abortion rights in Roe 48 years ago.Motivated in part by a belief that the Supreme Court will give them new latitude to restrict access, Republican-dominated states continue to adopt strict new legislation, with Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas signing into law on Wednesday a prohibition on abortions after as early as six weeks. The law, sure to face legal challenges, is one of more than 60 new state-level restrictions enacted this year, with many more pending.With the Supreme Court ruling likely to come next year — less than six months before midterm elections that will determine control of Congress and the future of President Biden’s agenda — the court’s expanded conservative majority has injected new volatility into an already turbulent political atmosphere, leaving both parties to game out the potential consequences.Republicans had already shown that they intended to take aim at Democrats over social issues, and abortion will only amplify the culture wars.Nearly all agree that the latest fight over Roe, which has been building for years, is certain to have significant political repercussions. Conservative voters are traditionally more energized than liberals about the abortion debate, and for many of them it has been the single issue spurring voter turnout.But Democrats, likely to be on the defensive given their current hold on the White House and Congress, say a ruling broadly restricting abortion rights by a court whose ideological makeup has been altered by three Trump-era appointees could backfire on Republicans and galvanize women.“Outlawing Roe would create a backlash that would have critical unintended consequences for those who would like to repeal it,” said Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire and a leading voice in Congress for abortion rights. “The women of the country would be very upset, particularly young women, that there would be such a deliberate effort to limit women’s access to reproductive choices.”Those on the right, already anticipating a favorable ruling given the conservative tilt of the 6-3 court, say they expect liberals to seize on the issue to try to “scare” voters. But they believe they can make a case for “reasonable” abortion limits.“This is clearly going to invigorate people on both sides of the debate, but this is a winning issue for pro-life candidates,” said Mallory Quigley, a spokeswoman for Susan B. Anthony List, a conservative nonprofit.She said she did not expect conservative voting enthusiasm to ebb if the right triumphed at the Supreme Court, an outcome that would bring to fruition years of emphasis on electing anti-abortion lawmakers at the federal and state levels and working aggressively to confirm conservative judges.“What happened on Monday is evidence that elections have consequences,” Ms. Quigley said, referring to the Supreme Court’s decision to take a case about a Mississippi law that seeks to ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy — about two months earlier than Roe and subsequent decisions allow.Anti-abortion activists in the Texas State Capitol in Austin in March.  Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday signed into law one of the country’s most restrictive abortion measures.Jay Janner/Austin American-Statesman, via Associated PressThe Supreme Court action may have political ramifications before next year. The case is likely to be argued weeks before Virginia voters head to the polls in November to elect a new governor in a race often seen as a midterm bellwether. Terry McAuliffe, a former governor and most likely the Democratic nominee, is eager for another political battle over abortion rights, rattling off his record protecting clinics in the state and vetoing legislation that would impose restrictions.“This is going to be a huge motivator,” he said in an interview. “In 2013, I promised women I would be a brick wall to protect their rights. And I will be a brick wall again.”Senator Rick Scott of Florida, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, downplayed the potential effect of the court ruling, though he said that as an abortion opponent he welcomed the court taking up the case. But Mr. Scott said he believed voters would be more persuaded by what he described as the Biden administration’s failings on issues such as immigration, the economy, taxes, inflation and more.While the lines have always been starkly drawn on abortion into the pro and anti camps, public opinion has proved more nuanced, with a clear majority backing Roe but majorities also favoring some limits. How the Supreme Court comes down on the fine points of abortion law could determine how the issue plays in the elections.“Considering the decision will likely be made five months ahead of the election, and depending on the decision itself, it’s too early to measure its ultimate impact on the midterms,” said Nathan Gonzales, the editor of the nonpartisan Inside Elections. Mr. Gonazales said it could conceivably energize Republicans but also pay benefits for Democrats — a view shared by others.President Donald J. Trump helped inspire record turnout last year from Democratic voters, who were eager to reject his administration. With Mr. Trump no longer on the ballot, many Democrats say the Supreme Court case could provide crucial midterm motivation, particularly for suburban women in swing districts who were instrumental in Democratic wins last year.Katie Paris, the founder of Red, Wine and Blue, a group focused on organizing suburban female voters for Democrats across the country, said the Supreme Court news immediately touched off alarm on the Facebook groups and other social media channels run by her organization.“When the news came out that this was going to be taken up, it was like, ‘Everybody get ready. This is real,’” she said. “We know what this court could do, and if they do it, the backlash will be severe.”Tresa Undem, a pollster who specializes in surveys on gender issues, said that abortion rights would continue to be an effective cause for Democrats because voters link it to larger concerns about power and control that motivated female voters during the Trump administration.“Democrats and independents have felt a loss of control and power from people at the top,” said Ms. Undem, who has conducted polling for several abortion rights organizations. “Now you have six individuals who are going to make these decisions about your body in this personal area that will affect the rest of your life.”Mr. Bennet said he could not predict the political implications of the court taking on abortion, but he wanted to alert his supporters that something of consequence was at hand.“There are a lot of people who have worked for a long time to overturn Roe v. Wade, and that is what is at stake,” he said. “I think people needed to hear that in the wake of the Supreme Court taking this case from Mississippi.” More

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      ‘We’re gonna win the second half’: the Texas Democrat eyeing 2022 victory

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      No football team ever lost a game, says Mike Collier. The players just ran out of time.In 2018, Collier tried to unseat the Republican incumbent, Dan Patrick, as Texas’s lieutenant governor, arguably the most powerful role in state government. He watched poll numbers trend closer and closer – until Patrick bested him by just under five points.But Collier – a Democrat – isn’t jaded enough to turn his back on what he thinks is a winnable fight. And to him, the game’s just getting started.“We came out of the first half down by a field goal,” he told the Guardian. “Now, we’re gonna go win the second half.”When Collier was a teenager, his family moved to a small town just north of Austin. Although he decried how racism pervaded (and still pervades) much of America, he’s nostalgic for the days when Texans were at least bound by civility and preparing for the future.“The Texas that I remember then was progressive,” Collier says. “But it was a Texas-progressive, in the sense that, you know, people could do their own thing.“They could be free.”An accountant, auditor and energy expert by trade, Collier is more sports analogist and goofball than political insider. His endearing drawl sounds like a habit rather than an act, and he seems happiest poking fun at his 27-year-old son or telling dad jokes.But, as he sets his sights on next year’s lieutenant governor race, Collier isn’t kidding around.“A Democrat beats Dan Patrick, and suddenly everybody behaves differently, particularly if that Democrat brings to it our Texas values – which I do – as a Democrat, and we roll up our sleeves and start solving problems honestly,” he says.“I think it’ll change everything.”He’s not wrong.As the second most populous state, Texas accounts for 38 electoral college votes and just added two more congressional seats after last year’s census. It’s home to one of the most powerful constituencies in the union, a bloc that’s handed Republicans control over every lever of state government – at least for now.But Texas’s demography is trending younger and more diverse, generating buzz over a potential uptick in more liberal voters. A Collier victory could represent the first ripple in a blue wave that Democrats have been promising for years now.That, in turn, would transform federal politics.Next year’s election could also lead to the ousting of a conservative firebrand whose political reign has further aligned Texas with xenophobia, conspiracy theories and Trumpism. Patrick, once an outsider himself, has spent years deeply entrenched in the highest rungs of state government, pushing its politics past even his own Tea Party inclinations.After chairing Donald Trump’s Texas campaigns, Patrick has already been endorsed by the former president ahead of 2022. Trump’s support earlier this month was a much-needed boost for the beleaguered state executive, whose approval ratings plummeted to a measly 35% in April, according to the Texas Politics Project.But while Patrick was focused on Trump, Collier worked hard to elect Joe Biden last year. He endorsed Biden early in the primary season, then took on a series of duties – including a senior adviser role – to help his campaign.Collier remembers watching Biden’s launch video in 2019, during a terrible day at an energy conference. The minutes-long clip described a battle for the soul of the nation, with footage of neo-Nazis marching through Charlottesville.“Tears came to my eyes,” Collier says. “I said, ‘this is exactly what’s happening in my America.’”Much like Biden, Collier readily admits that he’s old, has white hair and wears Ray-Bans – pure coincidence, he says. And much like Trump, Patrick is the consummate showman, with an eclectic life story that’s seen biblical highs and lows.Patrick, né Goeb, went from popular sportscaster to bankrupt businessman, then eventually garnered a following as a middle-aged talkshow host. But by the mid-2000s, he settled on a career in public service, eventually ascending to the lieutenant governorship after several terms in the state senate.Now, he relies on his flair for the dramatic – used in another life to get through an on-air vasectomy – to push his conservative agenda.Patrick proudly frequents Fox News segments, where he makes sensationalized claims about the US-Mexico border and spews vitriol about immigrants, one in six of all Texans. In the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, he raised eyebrows after making clear that he valued a healthy economy over human life – even his own.“No one reached out to me and said, ‘As a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?’” he told the Fox News host Tucker Carlson. “And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in.”At times, the bellicose Patrick appears to be waging war against himself. After eight students and two teachers were massacred in a mass shooting at Santa Fe high school outside of Houston in 2018, he personally offered to donate up to 10 metal detectors for the district.But this year, that empathy ran dry when he pushed the legislature to allow Texans to carry a gun with no permit, a policy opposed by the majority of voters.“Our politics reflects the point of view of a very, very small minority of Texans,” Collier says, and Patrick “panders over there to a small crowd that don’t represent our values”.Collier’s vision of Texas is much different. He imagines a state that leads the charge against a global climate crisis, where kids line up to get into the public schools instead of trying to find any way out of them.He knows that too many young, Black men are languishing behind bars. And he doesn’t think hospital closures in Texas’s rural communities should force pregnant people to drive an hour and a half just to find an OB-GYN.“We’re a wealthy nation. We’re a wealthy state. Everybody oughta have healthcare,” he says.When he talks policy, he doesn’t fearmonger, mince words or put on a show. In many ways, he’s the anti-Patrick – or is Patrick the anti-Collier?“I mean,” Collier says earnestly, “He’s just not one of us.” More

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      Matthew McConaughey ‘making calls’ about run for Texas governor – report

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      The actor Matthew McConaughey appears to be seriously considering entering politics, according to a report on Sunday which said the Dallas Buyer’s Club star has been “quietly making calls to influential people in Texas political circles” as he mulls a run for governor.McConaughey, 51, was born in Uvalde, Texas, and lives in Austin, the state capital, with his wife and children. Last year he published an autobiography of sorts and in March he told a Texas podcast running for governor was “a true consideration”.“I’m looking into now again, what is my leadership role?” he said. “Because I do think I have some things to teach and share, and what is my role? What’s my category in my next chapter of life that I’m going into?”Brendan Steinhauser, an Austin-based Republican strategist, told Politico, which reported the McConaughey calls, he was “a little more surprised that people aren’t taking him more seriously, honestly.“Celebrity in this country counts for a lot … it’s not like some C-list actor no one likes. He has an appeal.”McConaughey’s other recent screen credits include The Wolf of Wall Street, for Martin Scorsese; The Gentlemen, directed by Guy Ritchie; and Free State of Jones, about a civil war deserter who led an uprising against the slave-owning Confederacy.He also has an impressive three entries – The Paperboy, The Wedding Planner and Serenity – in Hear Me Out, a Guardian series in which writers make a case for why widely loathed movies deserve to be re-examined.In the US, entertainment often bleeds into politics. Ronald Reagan was an actor before campaigning for rightwing causes, becoming governor of California and beating an incumbent, Jimmy Carter, for the White House. The bodybuilder and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor of California, the wrestler Jesse Ventura governor of Minnesota.And, of course, when Donald Trump ran for the White House in 2016, he owed his fame more to a reality TV hit, The Apprentice, than to his bankruptcy-flecked career in real estate.McConaughey is not alone in pondering a switch from Hollywood to a governor’s mansion. The reality TV star Caitlyn Jenner is in the early – if faltering – stages of a run in California, as Republicans seek to recall Gavin Newsom.The Republican governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, will seek a third term next year. He remains a formidable figure, despite controversy over his handling of a winter storm earlier this year which crippled the power grid, left 125 Texans dead and made state Republicans a national laughing stock.Reagan, Schwarzenegger, Trump and Jenner ran as Republicans. Ventura was the candidate of the Reform Party, his victory a major shock.McConaughey’s views are mostly a mystery. Karl Rove, a senior adviser to the last governor of Texas to become president, George W Bush, told Politico he found a McConaughey run “improbable, but not out of the question” and said “the question is: Would he run as a Republican? A Democrat? Independent? And where is he on the political scale?“He says he has a funny phrase about being a hardcore centrist, but what party would he run under?”Democratic hopes of turning Texas blue – or at least purple, away from its baked-in ruby red Republicanism – have continually come up short.In 2018, Beto O’Rourke, a congressman, made national headlines but failed to eject Ted Cruz from the US Senate. In 2020 the state’s other Republican senator, John Cornyn, also survived a much-hyped challenge.Earlier this month a long slate of Democratic candidates in a race for an open US House seat effectively cancelled each other out, two Republicans making the runoff.O’Rourke failed to parlay his fame into a successful presidential run and has yet to say if he will seek to challenge Abbott. Julián Castro, a former mayor of San Antonio, US housing secretary and candidate for the Democratic nomination, could also run.McConaughey’s star status is proving a considerable lure for progressives but many fear a run as an independent. Most observers reason that would only succeed in splitting the vote and ushering Abbott back into power.A leading Democratic strategist, Paul Begala, told Politico: “Texas doesn’t need a third party, Matthew! We need a second party.” More

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      G.O.P. Pursues Harsher Penalties for Poll Workers in Voting Crackdown

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      Heavy fines, felony charges and jail sentences: Republicans seeking to restrict voting are proposing strict punishments for election officials and workers who make errors or violate the rules.AUSTIN, Texas — Anita Phillips has been an election judge in Texas for 17 years, responsible for managing a precinct in Waco, a city of roughly 135,000 people. But over the last four years, the civic duty she prized has become arduous. Harassment by partisan poll watchers has grown increasingly caustic, she has found, and helping voters is ever more treacherous amid a thicket of new rules.Those regulations are likely to grow stricter: Republican lawmakers in Texas, following in the footsteps of their counterparts across the country, are pressing forward with a voting bill that could impose harsh penalties on election officials or poll workers who are thought to have committed errors or violations. And the nationwide effort may be pushing people like Ms. Phillips to reconsider serving their communities.“It’s just so taxing,” Ms. Phillips said. “And if me — I’m in my 40s, and I’m having this much stress — imagine every election worker and election judge that is 65 and over with severe health issues. This is supposed to be a way for them to give back. And it’s supposed to be something that makes them feel good about what they’re doing, but now they’re starting to feel like, ‘Are we going to be safe?’”Ms. Phillips is one of millions of citizens who act as foot soldiers of the American democratic system, working long hours for low pay to administer the country’s elections. Yet this often thankless task has quickly become a key target of Republicans who are propagating former President Donald J. Trump’s lies about the 2020 election. In their hunt for nonexistent fraud, they have turned on those who work the polls as somehow suspect.That attitude has seeped into new voting laws and bills put forward by Republican-controlled legislatures across the country. More than two dozen bills in nine states, either still making their way through legislatures or signed into law, have sought to establish a rash of harsh new penalties, elevated criminal classifications and five-figure fines for state and local election officials who are found to have made mistakes, errors, oversteps and other violations of election code, according to a review of voting legislation by The New York Times.The infractions that could draw more severe punishment run the gamut from seemingly minor lapses in attention or innocent mistakes to more clearly willful actions in defiance of regulations. In Texas, taking any action that “would make observation not reasonably effective” for a poll watcher would carry new penalties. In Florida, failing to have an election worker continuously supervise a drop box would result in major fines. Willfully flouting new laws, like ones in states including Iowa and Texas that ban sending absentee ballots to voters who have not requested them, would also lead to tougher penalties.“The default assumption that county election officials are bad actors is problematic,” said Chris Davis, the county election administrator in Williamson County, Texas, north of Austin. “There’s so many moving parts and things happening at a given polling place, and innocent mistakes, though infrequent, can happen. And to assign criminal liability or civil liability to some of these things is problematic. It’s a big-time issue that we have.”“These poll workers don’t ever, in our experience, intend to count invalid votes, or let somebody who’s not eligible vote, or prevent somebody who’s eligible from voting,” said Mr. Davis, whose role is nonpartisan. “Yet we’re seeing that as a baseline, kind of a fundamental principle in some of the bills that are being drafted. And I don’t know where it’s coming from, because it’s not based on reality.”With the threat of felonies, jail time and fines as large as $25,000 hanging over their heads, election officials, as well as voting rights groups, are growing increasingly worried that the new penalties will not only limit the work of election administrators but also have a chilling effect on their willingness to do the job.Part of why last year’s voting unfolded so smoothly, without any major hiccups or reports of significant fraud, was a huge effort to recruit more poll workers, who were needed to buttress an aging election work force that was more vulnerable to the coronavirus. Secretaries of state in major battlegrounds like Michigan pleaded for thousands of additional workers as the election drew near. Philadelphia offered a raise in daily pay. And celebrities like LeBron James carried out major poll worker recruitment campaigns.But with heavy fines or even time behind bars increasingly a possibility, election officials fear some of that work could be undone.“The nit-picking by poll watchers and the penalizing of even the smallest of innocent mistakes is going to, over time, drive our most experienced election workers away,” said Isabel Longoria, the nonpartisan election administrator for Harris County, which is home to Houston and the largest county in Texas. “And I think a better solution is to provide more resources for training and education to our election workers, rather than put more bullies in the polls.”Isabel Longoria, the nonpartisan election administrator for Harris County, at a warehouse for election equipment storage.Michael Starghill Jr. for The New York TimesRepublicans in the Texas Legislature say the new penalties are necessary to force prosecutors to punish those who break the law and to ensure that election law is known and followed.“There’s an indication that sometimes lower-level offenses do not get the attention that high-level offenses do,” said State Senator Bryan Hughes, who sponsored one of the Texas voting bills. “And so if there’s a crime, it’s a problem and it’s not being prosecuted, one approach is to raise the level of offense so that the prosecutors know this is a big deal and you should take this seriously.”Mr. Hughes added that he was trying to take into account election officials’ worries of overly harsh penalties. “It’s always going to be balanced,” he said. “But people have to follow the law, and if I’m going to work for the government and I’m going to promise to follow the law and to serve the people of Texas, I’ve got to follow the law.”Some of the penalties that could affect election workers have been wrapped up in other Republican priorities as they overhaul state election codes. In bills across the country, G.O.P.-controlled legislatures have sought to limit the use of drop boxes, which are secure locations where voters can drop off their absentee ballots, rather than relying on the Postal Service.In Florida, the Legislature has mandated that each drop box be continuously staffed and monitored by an election worker. Failure to monitor a box in person carries a $25,000 fine for the election supervisor. The bill met strong opposition from election administrators in Florida, who testified against it and issued a statement criticizing the effort when it became law.“I happen to be a Democrat, but an overwhelming majority of the supervisors of elections in Florida are Republicans, and everybody opposes this law,” said Joe Scott, the supervisor in Broward County. “Because, as an elections administrator, you see that there’s just provisions in this law that are not needed.” Mr. Scott noted that video surveillance of drop boxes in 2020 had been sufficient, with no problems arising, so “having to expand additional resources in order to staff those boxes just feels very unnecessary to us.”.css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c 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(min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-1rh1sk1{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-1rh1sk1 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-1rh1sk1 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1rh1sk1 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccc;text-decoration-color:#ccc;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Pat Gill, the county auditor in charge of elections in Woodbury County, Iowa, felt a similar pang. “Now you have 99 auditors that are being treated like potential criminals,” he said, referring to the number of counties in the state. “And that’s starting to feel very personal.”This year, Mr. Gill testified against Republicans’ voting bill in the state, which has since been signed into law. The legislation significantly limits the autonomy of auditors to run elections in their counties, particularly their ability to establish satellite in-person early voting centers and mail absentee ballot application forms to voters who haven’t requested them. It also adds new felony punishments for infringements of state law and creates fines of up to $10,000 for “technical infractions.”Part of the success of last year’s election was a huge effort to recruit more poll workers, who were needed to buttress an aging election work force that was more vulnerable to the coronavirus.Tamir Kalifa for The New York TimesThe new law, Mr. Gill said, has created tension between Paul Pate, the Republican secretary of state, and county auditors, a relationship that was once more harmonious and is important for election administration to function smoothly.And, Mr. Gill said, the law could make it harder to staff polling sites around the state.One of Mr. Gill’s poll workers is Richard Pope, who has been up early to work on Election Days in Iowa for “30 to 40 years,” most recently in Sloan, a rural town of about 1,200 people on the western border of Iowa.“I’ve never run into an experience where we haven’t had people all of the same mind, and that’s to apply the law equally and fairly,” Mr. Pope said. “I do not believe that there is major wide-scale fraud. If people make mistakes at the polls, they’re honest mistakes. If somebody comes in the wrong polling place, we direct them somewhere else.”Despite the new potential punishments he could face, Mr. Pope said he didn’t currently expect fellow poll workers to quit because of the law. But he added that all it would take was one publicized incident.“If we get in the news — somebody, somewhere gets punished for being a poll worker — then it’s off to the races,” he said.In Arizona, two bills that are stalled in the State Legislature would make it a felony for election officials to violate either of two existing laws. The first bill would bring felony charges against any official who sends early ballots to voters who had not requested them. (The Maricopa County recorder did so last year after the courts allowed an exception to be made because of the coronavirus pandemic.) The second bill would make it a felony to modify any deadline set by the state or federal government in the election calendar.As election officials and workers confront a future fraught with new legal exposure and doubts about their ability to oversee safe and secure voting, many continue to suspect the Republican motivation behind the bills, and the necessity for the measures.“My question as an election worker is, you know: Why?” Ms. Longoria said. “What is the problem that happened in Texas that would have led to that kind of response? And I can’t get an answer to that.”Jennifer Medina More

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      Could Matthew McConaughey Be All Right, All Right, All Right for Texas?

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      HOUSTON — When I first heard the rumors that Matthew McConaughey was considering a run for governor of Texas, my reaction was fury. Did he not recall Kinky Friedman, the musician-comedian-novelist-gadfly whose candidacy in 2006 helped blow up the Democratic vote and gave us Rick Perry as governor for 14 years?Did he not understand that being governor of the second largest state involves a lot more than cogitating, as Mr. McConaughey does in a commercial sitting at the wheel of a Lincoln MKC, how to get around Old Cyrus the bull, who blocks his path on a desolate West Texas highway? You can’t always back up, turn around and “take the long way,” mister.Just what, I wondered, has Mr. McConaughey been smoking?Celebrities turned politicians have a very mixed record. See: Davy Crockett, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jesse Ventura, Ronald Reagan and, of course, the 45th president. But in a state as dazed and confused as Texas, we don’t need David Wooderson sitting in the statehouse telling us everything is going to be all right, all right, all right.Or do we? Our previous and current governors, Mr. Perry and his successor, Greg Abbott, have done nothing while claiming just that. Maybe Mr. McConaughey could do better.It isn’t news to anyone that many Texans abhor government interference. Mr. Perry seems to think that extends to keeping warm when temperatures drop to record lows. After a cataclysmic storm knocked out the state’s power grid in February, he said, “Texans would be without electricity for longer than three days to keep the federal government out of their business” — a sentiment probably not shared by the friends and families of the 111 people (or more) who died of hypothermia and other storm-related causes.The current legislative session — with Republicans in full control — has been grim. You can’t say they mind government interference when things like women’s reproductive systems or voting rights are involved.What some Republicans call “election integrity” (and others call voter suppression) has been high on the agenda. Despite protests from once powerful conservatives in the business community, the Legislature is looking at proposals that would put new restrictions on early voting, empower partisan poll watchers and the like. And there are moves to make abortion even more difficult for women to obtain in a state that has already imposed severe limits on the procedure and to restrict the rights of Texas’ transgender children and their parents to make their own medical decisions.It was amid this bleak news that I started reconsidering my attitude toward a possible Governor Bongo (For the uninformed: Mr. McConaughey was once arrested at his home in Austin, stoned and naked, for an exuberant session of bongo drumming in the wee hours).Yes, thinking that things couldn’t possibly get worse is never a great way to choose a candidate. But I don’t seem to be alone in thinking that a man who has played a lawyer in the movies might be better for Texas than the lawyers who play at being leaders in the Capitol. An April poll from The Dallas Morning News and the University of Texas at Tyler, revealed that Mr. McConaughey would trounce Mr. Abbott, 45 percent to 33 percent, with 22 percent opting for “someone else” — let’s hope Willie Nelson keeps his hat out of the ring.Since last November, Mr. McConaughey has been hinting about a run. I didn’t consider his memoir, “Greenlights,” a campaign biography, but it could certainly serve that purpose. Some of his pals who interviewed him on the virtual book tour could even serve in his administration: Brené Brown, a self-help dynamo and research professor at the University of Houston, could bring shame awareness education to just about any regulatory board. The voluble Woody Harrelson could replace any Abbott toady remaining on the Public Utility Commission.Mr. Abbott has categorically refused to tap the bloated Rainy Day Fund to help Texans who suffered in the storm, while Mr. McConaughey’s “We’re Texas” virtual concert raised over $7 million in a matter of hours for freeze relief. (A headline in Texas Monthly declared that “Matthew McConaughey and Beyoncé Did More for Texas Than Ted Cruz.”) He can also be a lot more inspirational than his predecessors on his YouTube channel and Instagram; when he wears his glasses and slicks back those sable waves, he looks at least as gubernatorial as Mr. Perry.Mr. McConaughey’s politics are a bit of a mystery, though we can assume that marijuana legalization might get a boost if he were in charge. He’s been fairly vocal about gun control without going nuclear like Beto O’Rourke. But a recent review of Mr. McConaughey’s voting record by The Texas Tribune revealed he’s been a no-show for primary races since 2012.Of the tactics on both sides of the politician spectrum he has said that “it curdles my stomach, man — I have not appreciated it.” Would Mr. McConaughey run as a Democrat or a Republican? That’s as much a mystery as the meaning of his soliloquy at the end of “True Detective.”Texas may not be ready for a philosopher king as a candidate, much less governor, but it sure would be fun to watch Mr. McConaughey debate Mr. Abbott and ambush him with a sensible line like this one from “Greenlights”: “I’ve found that a good plan is to first recognize the problem, then stabilize the situation, organize the response, then respond.”Or this one, delivered with Mr. McConaughey’s interstellar spelling: “Knowin the truth, seein the truth and tellin the truth are all different experiences.”May the best man win, man.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      in US Politics

      Texas house approves bill restricting voting rights after deal with Democrats

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      Texas Republicans passed their bill restricting voting rights on Friday afternoon, after cutting a deal with Democrats in backroom negotiations overnight.“Nobody deserves to wake up and find out that their rights have been further restricted. But time and time again during this legislative session, that’s what Texans have experienced,” said Wesley Story, communications manager for Progress Texas, a rapid response media organization for progressive messaging.The Texas house of representatives voted 78-64 to give Senate Bill 7 (SB7) final approval, setting up an opportunity for the Republican-controlled legislature to create a Frankenstein of voting restrictions behind closed doors.“This is really one of the last straws of … this nonstop attack – on communities of color, on immigrant communities, on communities that just don’t have as much of a voice – to try to prevent them from speaking out,” said Gene Wu, a state representative.“We’re just tired of our districts being told that they’re second-class citizens.”Armed with more than 100 amendments, opponents of Senate Bill 7 tore into the legislation on Thursday evening. Their long-winded debate was intended “to drive home the point and to really emphasize that there is no reason for this legislation”, Wu said.In response, the state house approved a series of amendments addressing some of SB7’s most controversial provisions. Those amendments, in part, target the bill’s severe criminal penalties, along with concerns over emboldening partisan poll watchers.The legislation will now probably go to a conference committee, where both legislative chambers can reconcile differences in the versions they passed.Because of maneuvering by the house, lawmakers will be able to pull language from both the senate’s version of SB7 and HB6 – Texas’s two most high-profile restrictive voting bills this cycle – during those negotiations.SB7 and HB6 were designed as sweeping reforms to Texas’s electoral apparatus, targeting innovations such as the proactive distribution of vote-by-mail applications, late-night voting hours and drive-through voting that became flashpoints during last year’s election.“At the end of the day, these bills discourage participation in the democratic process, and their overall goal is to keep voters from the polls,” Story said.“And we know that specifically people of color, folks with disabilities – those are the types of voters that are going to be impacted the most because of many of the restrictions that we’ve seen, that are staying within the bill.”Texas’s leaders have been pushing voting restrictions for months under the guise of “election integrity”, after many Texans were convinced by the “big lie” that widespread election fraud stole the 2020 presidential contest.Their opponents believe that Republicans – who, as of now, hold largely unchecked control over state government – are trying to pre-empt changing demographics that could eventually boot them from office.“This is the governor’s priority. This is the lieutenant governor’s priority. This is the speaker’s priority. This is the Republican party of Texas’s priority,” Wu said.“Whether they’re public about it or not, in the back hallways, this is their most important piece of legislation – because they need this to stay in power.” More

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      in Elections

      Florida and Texas Join the March to Restrict Voting Access

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      The efforts in two critical battleground states with booming populations and 70 Electoral College votes between them represent the apex of the Republican effort to roll back access to voting.Hours after Florida installed a rash of new voting restrictions, the Republican-led Legislature in Texas pressed ahead on Thursday with its own far-reaching bill that would make it one of the most difficult states in the nation in which to cast a ballot.The Texas bill would, among other restrictions, greatly empower partisan poll watchers, prohibit election officials from mailing out absentee ballot applications and impose strict punishments for those who provide assistance outside the lines of what is permissible. The State House of Representatives was scheduled to debate the measure late into the evening with the possibility that it would pass it and send it to the Senate.Gov. Greg Abbott is widely expected to sign the bill into law.Briscoe Cain, the Republican sponsor of the bill, said he had filed it “to ensure that we have an equal and uniform application of our election code and to protect people from being taken advantage of.”He was quickly challenged by Jessica González, a Democratic representative and vice chair of the House Election Committee, who argued that the bill was a solution in search of problem. She cited testimony in which the Texas secretary of state said that the 2020 election had been found to be “free, fair and secure.”Florida and Texas are critical Republican-led battleground states with booming populations and 70 Electoral College votes between them. The new measures the legislatures are putting in place represent the apex of the current Republican effort to roll back access to voting across the country following the loss of the White House amid historic turnout in the 2020 election.Earlier on Thursday, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, with great fanfare, signed his state’s new voting bill, which passed last week. Held at a Palm Beach hotel with cheering supporters in the background, the ceremony showcased Mr. DeSantis’s brash style; the governor’s office barred most journalists and provided exclusive access to Fox News, a nose-thumbing gesture of contempt toward a news media he viewed as overly critical of the bill.“Right now, I have what we think is the strongest election integrity measures in the country,” Mr. DeSantis said, though he has praised Florida’s handling of last November’s elections.Ohio, another state under complete Republican control, introduced a new omnibus voting bill on Thursday that would further limit drop boxes in the state, limit ballot collection processes and reduce early in-person voting by one day, while also making improvements to access such as an online absentee ballot request portal and automatic registration at motor vehicle offices.Iowa and Georgia have already passed bills that not only impose new restrictions but grant those states’ legislatures greater control over the electoral process.Republicans have pressed forward with these bills over the protests of countless Democrats, civil rights groups, faith leaders, voting rights groups and multinational corporations, displaying an increasing no-apologies aggressiveness in rolling back access to voting.The efforts come as Republicans in Washington are seeking to oust Representative Liz Cheney from her leadership position in the House Republican caucus for her continued rejection of former President Donald J. Trump’s lies about the 2020 election, and as Republicans at a party convention in Utah booed Senator Mitt Romney for his criticism of the former president.Together, the Republican actions reflect how deeply the party has embraced the so-called Big Lie espoused by Mr. Trump through his claims that the 2020 election was stolen.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida after he signed a new voting bill into law during an event closed to all news outlets except Fox News.Joe Cavaretta/South Florida Sun-Sentinel, via Associated PressDemocrats, gerrymandered into statehouse minorities and having drastically underperformed expectations in recent state legislative elections, have few options for resisting the Republican efforts to make voting harder.In Georgia and Texas, progressive groups applied pressure on local businesses to speak out against the voting measures. But Republican legislators have been conditioned during the Trump era to pay less attention to their traditional benefactors in chambers of commerce and more attention to the party’s grass roots, who are aligned with the former president and adhere to his lies about the 2020 election.And in Florida, Democrats didn’t even manage to organize major local companies to weigh in on the voting law.“Elections have consequences both ways, and we are living in the consequences of the Trumpiest governor in America here in Florida,” said Sean Shaw, a former state representative who was the 2018 Democratic nominee for Florida attorney general. “The ultimate strategy is, what are we going to do in 2022? How are we going to beat the dude?”Mr. Shaw, who offered an extended laugh when first asked what his party’s strategy was for combating Florida’s new voting law, said he was planning to start a campaign this month to place referendums on the state’s 2022 ballots for constitutional amendments that would make voting easier.“We are not Mississippi or Alabama,” he said. “We are not that kind of conservative state, but we are governed by this mini-Trump person. All we can do as Democrats is let the people know what they’ve got.”Marc Elias, a Democratic lawyer, filed a lawsuit nine minutes after Mr. DeSantis had signed the legislation, saying that the new Florida law violated the First and 14th amendments to the U.S. Constitution.“It’s not true that states could not change their voting laws whenever they want,” Mr. Elias said in an interview Thursday. “You have to weigh the burden on the voter with the interest of the state.”.css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 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(min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-1rh1sk1{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-1rh1sk1 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-1rh1sk1 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1rh1sk1 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccc;text-decoration-color:#ccc;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Tom Perez, the former Democratic National Committee chairman, said a case could be made that the new voting laws would improperly make it harder for Black and Hispanic people to vote, and he called on the U.S. Justice Department to take the lead in the legal battle against the Republican-passed laws.“Ten years ago when I was running the Civil Rights Division, the Georgia law would never have seen the light of day,” Mr. Perez said Thursday. “The Justice Department needs to get involved, and having the imprimatur of the Justice Department sends a really important message about our values.”A protest against new voting restrictions at the Texas Capitol in Austin on Thursday.Eric Gay/Associated PressMr. Biden’s nominee to lead the Civil Rights Division, Kristen Clarke, had a Senate hearing last month but has not yet been confirmed. Mr. Biden said in March, after the Georgia law had been signed by Gov. Brian Kemp, that the Justice Department was “taking a look” at how best to protect voting rights. A White House official said that the president, in his comments, had been assuming the issue was one the department would review.Democrats argued on Thursday that the Republican crackdowns on voting in Florida and Texas had made it more urgent for the Senate to pass the For the People Act, which would radically reshape the way elections are run, make far-reaching changes to campaign finance laws and redistricting and mitigate the new state laws.“We are witnessing a concerted effort across this country to spread voter suppression,” Jena Griswald, the Colorado secretary of state, said Thursday on a call with progressive groups in which the new Florida law was condemned. “The For the People Act levels the playing field and provides clear guidance, a floor of what is expected throughout the nation.”The scene in Austin on Thursday was tense, as Republicans in the House decided to replace the language of a bill that passed the senate, known as SB 7, with the language of a House voting bill, known as HB 6. The swap removed some of the more onerous restrictions that had originally been proposed, like banning drive-through voting, banning 24-hour voting and adding limitations on voting machine allocation that could have led to a reduction of polling locations in densely populated areas.But the bill before the House included a host of new restrictions. It bans election officials from proactively mailing out absentee ballot applications or absentee ballots; sets strict new rules for assisting voters and greatly raises the punishment for running afoul of those rules; greatly empowers partisan poll watchers; and makes it much harder to remove a partisan poll watcher for bad behavior. The expansion of the authority and autonomy of partisan poll watchers has raised voter intimidation concerns among civil rights groups.In the debate Thursday evening, Mr. Cain, the sponsor of the House bill, was unable to cite a single instance of voter fraud in Texas. (The attorney general found 16 instances of minor voting fraud after 22,000 hours of investigation.)Democratic lawmakers also seized on Texas’ history of discriminatory voting legislation and likened the current bill to the some of the state’s racist electoral practices of the past.“In light of that history, can you tell me if or why you did not do a racial impact analysis on how this legislation would affect people of color?” said Rafael Anchía, a Democratic representative from Dallas County.Mr. Cain admitted that he had not consulted with the attorney general’s office or conducted a study of how the bill might affect people of color, but he defended the bill and said it would not have a discriminatory impact.Patricia Mazzei More

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      in US Politics

      Texas lawmakers race against the clock to push through new voting restrictions

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      Texas lawmakers are racing against the clock this month to ram through legislation that would further restrict voting access, leaning on procedural moves to avoid public testimony and keep 11th-hour negotiations behind closed doors.“No rules are going to contain them. No norms are going to protect us. They’re gonna do whatever they want to, and whatever they can, to get these bills through,” said Emily Eby, staff attorney at the Texas Civil Rights Project.Specious talking points about whether last year’s presidential contest was stolen – propagated and disseminated by Texas’s top Republicans –have created an army of voters who falsely believe that widespread election fraud is a real issue.That, in turn, has ostensibly given politicians a pretext for trumped up reforms at the ballot box, in a state already infamous for being the hardest place to vote nationwide.“There’s not really a big problem with election fraud, right? That’s not actually a huge problem that we need to solve. But the public thinks it is, because they’ve been told that it is,” said Clare Brock, an assistant professor of political science at Texas Woman’s University.Texas legislators have used the lightning rod of “election integrity” this year to introduce at least 49 bills with restrictive voting provisions – the most anywhere in the United States, the Brennan Center for Justice reported.Twenty-nine bills “seek to create new barriers to voting while also creating or enhancing criminal penalties attached to them”, according to data compiled by Progress Texas. Among those, more than three-fourths of the penalties are felonies.When Texas businesses and voters pushed back against the hard-line legislation last month, the state representative Kyle Kacal wouldn’t go so far as to explicitly come out against Senate Bill 7 (SB7), one of the two omnibus bills that have taken center stage this cycle.But he did express skepticism about its provisions, seemingly endorsing practices – like extended voting hours during the pandemic – that his colleagues were actively trying to curb.“I don’t know if the measures that are being talked about are necessary,” Kacal admitted. “I don’t know how much fraud there really is, but people need the opportunity to vote.”Both SB7 and the other high-profile, sweeping proposal, House Bill 6 (HB6), spell a harder and scarier voting process for the state’s most vulnerable residents, while outlawing common sense innovations that Houston’s Harris county tried to implement last year.From broadly silencing public officials who want to proactively solicit or distribute vote-by-mail applications to doing away with drive-thru voting and limiting early voting hours, the suggested changes could disproportionately affect elderly and differently abled Texans, as well as voters of color and city dwellers. The new policies would also embolden partisan poll watchers to police voters, stoking concerns over intimidation tactics after a history of vigilantism.“This is targeted legislation at restricting specific voting practices that occurred in specific places, and a lot of those places are places that leaned Democrat,” Brock said. “Which then makes it feel a lot more like voter suppression and a lot less like voter integrity.”After SB7 advanced through the senate while HB6 dragged, house Republicans used a routine elections committee hearing last week to link the two, circumventing outside input from citizens in the process.Democratic lawmakers and voting rights advocates excoriated the move, which they noted was unwontedly sneaky for legislators who supposedly had a mandate from their constituents.“This is a massive overhaul of the election system in Texas, affecting almost every area of our election code,” said Charlie Bonner, communications director at civic engagement nonprofit Move Texas.“That is something that should be well-considered, and that is something that should go through the full process, and the public have every opportunity to speak out.”Instead, the committee gutted the senate’s text for SB7 and replaced it with a copy of HB6, effectively turning one bill into the other.But, if the House passes that version, any differences between the two chambers’ priorities will likely be reconciled in a conference committee. There, appointees could splice the proposals together for one behemoth, rife with restrictions.Voting rights proponents are already alarmed by the mystery that would shroud those talks, where, they explain, the Republican-controlled legislature could check off their wishlist with no accountability.“I think it is extremely undemocratic. It completely lacks transparency. This is not how democracy and open government are supposed to work,” said Carisa Lopez, political director of the Texas Freedom Network.Critics of SB7 are still holding out hope for errors that could make it procedurally dead by the end of the legislative session later this month. But they’re outraged that stakeholders – who had anticipated another platform to voice their opposition before the bill became law – will no longer get that opportunity.For weeks, impassioned outcry from state residents and Texas-based corporations has already bogged down the controversial reforms, stalling their passage longer than some voting rights advocates originally expected. The public provided more than 17 hours of divided testimony on HB6 alone, according to the Texas Tribune.Meanwhile, local businesses, chambers of commerce and major national companies – including Etsy, American Airlines, Warby Parker, Microsoft and many others – have called on Texas’s elected leaders to oppose any changes that would make it harder to vote.“This is a state in which these lawmakers run every lever of government,” Bonner said.“The fact that we’ve been able to delay – and the fact that we have seen amendments that have reduced the harm of these pieces of legislation – is a testament to the work and the people speaking out.” More