Senate Democrats to press ahead with voting rights bill despite likely GOP blockade

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The US Senate is preparing to schedule a vote on voting rights legislation intended as a “compromise” measure after Senate Republicans repeatedly blocked attempts to standardise ballot access and eliminate long-standing barriers to the right to vote.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced in a letter to senators on 14 October that he plans to begin procedural votes on the Freedom to Vote Act – a bill that effectively replaces the For the People Act with a more slimmed-down slate of voting rights proposals – on 20 October.

“This is consequential voting rights legislation,” he announced on Thursday. “It would establish [common sense] standards for our democracy and help fight suppressive voting laws.”

The Freedom to Vote Act follows months of debate to unite lawmakers behind an antidote to state-level, Republican-led restrictions on ballot access ahead of critical midterm elections and a redistricting cycle that could redraw political boundaries for the next decade.

But it is likely to face the same universal opposition from congressional Republicans, while their state-level counterparts wage a coordinated legislative campaign to make it more difficult to vote and consolidate election oversight into the hands of GOP-dominated state legislatures.

States also are beginning the once-a-decade redrawing of political maps for the first time since the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act in 1964 without federal oversight to prevent racial discrimination at the polls.

At least19 states have enacted 33 restrictive voting laws, as of September, according to an analysis from the Brennan Center for Justice.

The latest Senate measure builds on a framework from Democratic Senator Joe Manchin, who joined Republican opposition to the For The People Act, which was shot down by a GOP filibuster and rebuffed a second time in a last-ditch attempt during budget debates.

In order to move the latest bill forward, Senate Democrats will need the support of at least 10 Republicans to reach a 60-vote threshold to overcome a GOP filibuster.

The Freedom to Vote Act proposes nationwide standards for early and mail-in voting, safeguards against partisan gerrymandering, automatic voter registration, and the creation of Election Day as a public holiday, among other measures.

It also includes Senator Manchin’s demands for nationwide voter ID standards, allowing voters to “present a broad set of identification cards and documents in hard copy and digital form,” according to a statement from lawmakers.

“Senator Manchin has been engaged in conversations with our Republicans colleagues in hopes of advancing solutions on a bipartisan basis to ensure all Americans have their voice heard in our democracy,” Senator Schumer wrote on Thursday.

But asked during a call with reporters this month how those talks have progressed, Senator Angus King of Maine said “my sense is not well.”

“I’ve talked to Republicans myself,” he said, adding that he believes he is “not getting very far.”

“The Republican strategy now appears to be … to limit voter participation,” said Senator King, an Independent who joined Senate Democrats to help negotiate the bill. “I don’t think Republicans here are interested in short circuiting what their brothers and sisters are doing across the country.”

Senator King said he plans to introduce a measure, either as an amendment or separate bill, that would address how state legislatures handle electoral counts to prevent partisan interference.

“This is critical,” he said. “I’m worried about my country, and I’m worried about the undermining of the fundamental process by which we ensure the peaceful transfer of power.”