Georgia enacted a law that changed voting in the state. It’s got some serious (and less serious) flaws. It’s got some fair points which are fairly common in other state’s voting laws. It’s got some good things buried in there too. It’s entirely fair, if not our duty, to be critical of laws when and to the extent we disagree with them and believe them to be bad law.
Calling it “Jim Crow on steroids,” on the other hand, is bizarrely inflammatory and illuminates nothing. Yet it worked.
Many Georgians will suffer for this choice, a problem recognized by those pushing the “Jim Crow” aspect of this relatively banal legislation, who are now constrained to try to thread the needle, recognizing that their attacks on a law are exacting a price from people who had nothing to do with it.
Abrams, a former Georgia state representative, wrote in a statement shared on Twitter that “others in positions of leadership” should join the MLB in condemning the law, which includes several voting restrictions such as requiring photo ID to vote by mail and limiting access to ballot drop boxes.
“Like many Georgians, I am disappointed that the MLB is relocating the All-Star game; however, I commend the players, owners and the League commissioner for speaking out,” Abrams wrote.
Can you have it both ways? Can you take the position that a state has just enacted “Jim Crow on steroids” while claiming to be disappointed that Major League Baseball acted upon this cry? What was MLB to do?
Major League Baseball sent a warning shot on Friday to Republicans considering new laws to restrict voting, pulling its summer All-Star game out of suburban Atlanta in a rebuke to Georgia’s new election rules that will make it harder to vote in the state’s urban areas.
The announcement by the baseball commissioner, Rob Manfred, came after days of lobbying from civil rights groups and discussions with stakeholders like the Major League Baseball Players Association. The action is likely to put additional pressure on other organizations and corporations to consider pulling business out of Georgia, a move that both Republicans and Democrats in the state oppose despite fiercely disagreeing about the new voting law.
The rhetoric is that the Republican majority Georgia legislature enacted this law to suppress black voting in “urban areas,” which used to be called cities before two words took the place of one. The law, it’s argued, “fixes” non-existent problems based on lies perpetrated by Trump in his claims that the election was rigged. The alternative view is that the law codifies transitory changes arising from an election held during a pandemic, together with adoption of some “ease of use” methods that have become absolutely necessary to facilitate voting by people who either found it burdensome before or just couldn’t be bothered to put in the effort.
Under the new Georgia law, it will be easier to mail in your vote by mail than it is in New York. Voters will have a far longer window to vote than in New Jersey. In New York, gifts on line under a dollar are exempt from criminalization, but you can still hand out free stuff in Georgia as long as it’s 150 feet away from the polling place. There will be too many drop boxes in the sticks and not enough in cities. Then again, how many states had drop boxes before the pandemic?
Yet, businesses like Delta, Coke and Dell, are now under pressure to leave Georgia. MLB has made its choice to pull the All-Star Game from the state. Governor Kemp, no longer atop his pedestal from resisting the demands of Trump, is left scrambling.
“Today, Major League Baseball caved to fear, political opportunism, and liberal lies,” Mr. Kemp said in a statement, calling out Mr. Biden and Stacey Abrams, the titular head of the state’s Democrats. He continued: “I will not back down. Georgians will not be bullied. We will continue to stand up for secure, accessible, fair elections.”
Do these entities have the right to decide that Georgia isn’t where they want to be, that the law is evil and they need to take a stand against it by pulling their resources from the state in protest? Of course they do, even if you hated Citizens United until it served your purpose. But this raises the question not of whether they have the right to do so, but why they have decided to take this course as opposed to either staying out of politics or staying put.
Major League Baseball has made its choice, and it has chosen to leave Georgia. You may agree with the choice or disagree with the choice, but ignore the fact that it chose to turn off the lights at your peril.
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