Glenn Youngkin shows his true colors again
The man in the red fleece vest who dazzled the entire DC press corps with his alleged post-Trump moderate strategy strikes again. Bolts magazine has the details:
Going forward, Virginians will no longer regain their rights when released from prison—the most recent policy announced by Virginia officials in 2021—nor at any later point, unless Youngkin deems them to be worthy on an individual basis.
His decision, which a future governor could alter, sidelines many residents who expected they would get to vote in Virginia elections.
“I’ve never voted in my life. I was looking forward to voting this year,” Sincere Allah, who was released from prison the week Youngkin was inaugurated in 2022 and who has since waited to learn if his rights will be restored, told Bolts, in reference to the state’s upcoming legislative and prosecutorial elections. “I can pay taxes, I can be held to the same standard as everyone else when it comes to laws and rules and regulations, but I have no say-so or representation.”
Youngkin’s announcement also puts Virginia in a category all its own: It is the only state where someone who is convicted today over any felony is presumed to be barred from voting for life, with no remedy other than receiving a discretionary act of clemency from the governor.
Virginia’s constitution permanently disenfranchises people with a felony conviction. Only Iowa and Kentucky have such a harsh rule on the books—other states with a lifetime ban, like Mississippi, do not apply it to all felonies—but their sitting governors have each issued executive orders that automatically restore at least some people’s voting rights upon completion of their sentences.
For much of the last decade, Virginia governors adopted a similar approach, enabling hundreds of thousands of people to regain the franchise. Anyone whose rights have already been restored will retain the ability to vote. But for others, Youngkin has now rolled back those reforms.
“We are back to 1902-era policy,” Democratic state Senator Scott Surovell tweeted last week after Youngkin’s administration notified him of the change, in reference to the 1902 convention that designed Virginia’s disenfranchisement system with the explicit goal of disenfranchising Black residents: “discrimination within the letter of the law,” as one delegate termed it. That legacy lived on; as recently as 2016, 22 percent of Black Virginians were barred from voting.
“This language in our constitution is from extraordinarily dark origins,” Surovell told Bolts in a follow-up. “I thought we’d settled this debate over the past twelve years of reform, but apparently… anything’s on the table.”
In 2013, Republican Governor Bob McDonnell took a first step in the final months of his administration by announcing he would restore the voting rights of people convicted of nonviolent offenses after they complete their sentences. His Democratic successor, Terry McAuliffe, dramatically expanded the process in 2016 when he issued a blanket order that restored the voting rights of any Virginian once they completed their sentence; after Republicans sued, the state supreme court said the governor did not have the authority to issue a blanket order, but McAuliffe circumvented that limit by issuing individual orders to all those who’d have been affected by his original policy.
Democrat Ralph Northam maintained that approach once in office, and in 2021 he extended it by scrapping McAuliffe’s requirement that people first complete their full sentences, including any terms of probation or parole. Instead, Northam began restoring people’s voting rights upon release from incarceration.
Under McDonnell, 8,000 people regained their voting rights. The number then exploded to more than 170,000 under McAuliffe and 126,000 under Northam.
Democrats tried and failed for years to refer a ballot measure to voters that would amend the state constitution to make rights restoration automatic. Absent that change, the future of the reforms implemented from McDonnell through Northam hinged entirely on the result of the 2021 governor’s race, which was won by Youngkin. During the election, Youngkin criticized McAuliffe, his Democratic opponent who was attempting a comeback, for his 2016 policy but he also remained vague as to what he’d do as governor.
Even after he won, Youngkin adopted no public policy stance on rights restoration until this month. He restored the rights of roughly 5,000 people in 2022 but that alarmed observers because it was a far lower yearly number than his predecessors. About 12,000 people are released from prison annually in Virginia.
Senator Lionell Spruill, a Democrat, sent Youngkin a letter earlier this month asking him to clarify what his administration was doing. The secretary of the commonwealth, a Republican appointed by the governor, replied last week that the governor’s office has a new approach: It is now evaluating whether to restore people’s voting rights on a case-by-case basis. This eliminates from state policy the notion that everyone can expect to have their rights restored at some point.
Instead, Youngkin will be reviewing applications to decide who should have the right to vote. His office has shared no criteria as to how he’s deeming some people more deserving than others.
Youngkin’s spokesperson, Macaulay Porter, said in a statement, “Restoration of rights are assessed on an individual basis according to the law and take into consideration the unique elements of each situation, practicing grace for those who need it and ensuring public safety for our community and families.”
It’s just another GOP establishment assault on democracy, that’s all. They know they are a minroity so they have to find ways to keep Democrats from voting. They assume that most of the felons they are now going to “evaluate” are Black Democrats so this is one easy way to shave off a few votes every year.
Youngkin is a snake and his ugly vest doesn’t hide his scales.