Stacey Abrams on why the gutting of the Voting Rights Act is 'evil'
5/13/202635 min
The US supreme court demolished the 1965 Voting Rights Act when they ruled in Louisiana v Callais last month that states can’t consider race in redistricting. Southern states from Tennessee to Alabama have rushed to erase majority Black districts, sparking chaos for the midterm elections. Kai Wright talks with Stacey Abrams, voting rights activist and former Georgia house minority leader, about the fallout from the decision, and why, even now, she thinks the way forward is still through engaging more voters to participate in democracy: “They have fractured communities and said we’re going to scatter these seeds. Our job is to grow.”
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsStacey Abrams· Guest0:00
My nieces and nephews, they are the first generation to lose civil rights since reconstruction. This is evil, but it's also so pedestrian. They can't win on their ideas, and so their solution is to silence the other side. But this time what they have done is misread the moment, and that's the part that gives me not optimism, but determination. Optimism says I'm sure we'll win. Determination says I'm going to win.
Kai Wright· Host0:31
[upbeat music] I'm Kai Wright.
Carter Sherman· Host0:39
I'm Carter Sherman.
Kai Wright· Host0:40
And from The Guardian, this is Stateside. Carter, here we are. It is the first episode of Stateside.
Carter Sherman· Host0:48
I know. I'm so excited. I feel like over the last few years I have just felt so overwhelmed by the news.
Kai Wright· Host0:55
Yeah.
Carter Sherman· Host0:55
I- something happens and I have all these questions. Why is this happening? Who's responsible for it? Generally, I wanna know how we can make it stop.
Kai Wright· Host1:04
[laughs] Right.
Carter Sherman· Host1:04
And one of the things I've been doing to try to get those answers is I go to my colleagues at The Guardian and I ask them these questions, and they've been able to tell me what they think, but I see the show as an opportunity to bring their expertise to a broader audience to help other people get these answers. And frankly, for you and I to also go to some of the world's biggest thinkers and put questions to them.
Kai Wright· Host1:25
So that's what we're doing here, and, you know, I really wanna start