Democrats sound alarm on mail-in votes after Supreme Court's Wisconsin decision
27 October 2020
Democrats are calling a last-minute audible on mail-in voting after last night's Supreme Court ruling on Wisconsin.
Driving the news: Wisconsin Democrats and the Democratic attorney general of Michigan are urging voters to return absentee ballots to election clerks’ offices or drop boxes. They are warning that the USPS may not be able to deliver ballots by the Election Day deadline.
Why it matters: Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was part of a 5-3 majority against allowing Wisconsin to count mail-in ballots that arrive up to six days after Election Day (but were postmarked by Election Day).
- All ballots must now be received by 8 p.m. on Election Day.
- "Under the U.S. Constitution, the state courts do not have a blank check to rewrite state election laws for federal elections," Kavanaugh wrote.
The big picture: More than 66 million people have already voted — roughly 2/3 by mail — putting "this year’s election on pace for a historic rate of participation not seen since the early 1900s," the WashPost reports.
Early voting as a share of the total 2016 vote, per the N.Y. Times:
- Texas: 82%
- North Carolina: 67%
- Georgia: 66%
- Florida: 63%
- Arizona: 60%
- Wisconsin: 45%
- Michigan: 43%
- Minnesota: 40%
- Ohio: 39%
- Pennsylvania: 28%
The bottom line: "[T]urnout has surged ... in cities and rural America, in battlegrounds ... and in unexpected places that have not had competitive races in years," WashPost reports.
- "Election Day will feel substantially different from those in past years, with a smaller, more Republican turnout."
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.