voting rights will be center of
attention today when president biden and
vice president harris travel to atlanta
in something of a shift here the
president is expected to say in his
remarks that he supports a filibuster
car route which would be a change in
senate rules when it comes to voting
rights legislation congressional
correspondent stephanie living joins us
now live stephanie what will be the
reaction to the president's support of a
filibuster carve out and can you quickly
walk our viewers through what exactly
that means
absolutely so i would expect um the
reaction to the president's speech today
to be as partisan as you would
anticipate some democrats especially
those who have long wanted to change or
eliminate the filibuster are going to be
thrilled that they have the president on
their side while republicans are likely
to be very vocal about disagreeing and
opposing they might even accuse the
president of flip-flopping i wouldn't be
surprised if i see republicans share
some old sound bites or interview
snippets of the president where he might
talk about
his you know previous support for
keeping the filibuster as it is now what
we're talking about the filibuster this
is that 60 vote threshold that most
pieces of legislation need to get
through in order to get through the
senate now what we don't know is exactly
what changes are still on the table
there are a slew of ideas that democrats
especially have been talking about from
a one-time exception like we saw with
the debt ceiling at the end of last year
maybe a perpetual exception for
democracy or voting rights legislation
there's also been talk of a talking
filibuster requiring
lawmakers to stand on the senate floor
in order to try to block bill maybe
lowering the threshold from 60 to a
lower number a lot of options on the
table so we'll just have to wait and see
exactly what the president throws his
weight behind today and how democrats
take you know take the baton from there
and move forward very interesting so
what current federal bills are lined up
in congress to expand voting rights and
election reform laws
so there are two pieces of legislation
that democrats are focused on this is
the freedom to vote act and the john
lewis voting rights advancement act the
freedom to vote act that is your more
wide-ranging election reform bill
touches on
dozens of way dozens and parts of
election administration voting by mail
early in-person voting drop boxes voter
registration partisan gerrymandering
campaign finance reform all sorts of you
know impact for elections and voting
that would set a new nationwide standard
then you also have the john lewis voting
rights advancement act that would
basically re-establish a pre-approval
process for states to change their
election laws now this is something that
democrats have been trying to get back
into place after the supreme court
decision back i think it was in 2013
that you know took out a portion of the
voting rights act from the 1960s
basically this would require states with
a history of racial gerrymandering to
get any election changes pre-approved
with the federal government or with the
department of justice now both of these
bills almost universally opposed by
republicans which is why democrats are
talking about changing that filibuster
because there is that 50 50 split in the
senate so if you know they want to keep
the filibuster in place they would need
republican support which they just don't
have right now all right stephanie
lieberman reporting for us this morning
thank you
all right for more context
we're joined by senior fellow at the
center for american progress michael
sosan michael welcome to morning rush
good morning to you so the president
just miles from here this afternoon will
say this marks a turning point in this
country he will ask the american people
will we choose democracy over autocracy
light overshadow justice over injustice
how will it be received that he is
trying to carve out a one-time exception
of the filibuster rule to get voting
rights through
i think it's going to be received very
positively there are a lot of americans
who have been kind of demanding and
asking and pleading for the senator
excuse me for the president to really
stand up and use his bully pulpit to
fight for democracy to fight for free
and fair elections it's something he's
talked about for a while he talked about
it certainly when he was running for
president and i think now he's moving
into a more aggressive stage because he
sees that there are really high stakes
for our democracy right now the the
right to vote the uh uh free and fair
elections are basically under attack in
many states including in georgia
so we spoke with a
voting rights activist last hour in the
seven o'clock hour and he was saying you
know activists and coalition groups they
say okay president and vice president if
you're going to come to atlanta come
with a plan a plan of action how
symbolic is it that the president the
vice president are coming to georgia
specifically to talk about these voting
rights
i think it's very symbolic georgia for
better or worse is near the top of the
radar right now across the nation in
terms of elections right i mean it was
historic in georgia uh recently when
they elected a democratic president they
also voted for two uh democratic
senators so it was it was a change for
georgia a big step and i think that in
many ways it reflects georgia's growing
diversity and move towards a more you
know multicultural multi-racial society
which is happening across the nation but
there's a lot of push back to that um
and sadly in georgia
as you know the state legislature and
the governor signed into law
a series of provisions that would really
suppress the vote that was real would
really hurt minorities and their ability
to vote and really is a step back in our
nation's history 16 other states have
done the same thing and a lot of these
laws that have been pushed through on
party lines across these states have
been built on the big lie which was that
there was a uh tremendous voter fraud in
the presidential election which led to
an improper result and we know that that
is just not true but sadly uh georgia
legisl legislators and a number of other
states have moved forward based on that
big lie to try to suppress votes i
mentioned the headline which is the
carve out of the
filibuster rules but the other headline
here is stacey abrams the most powerful
democrat in the state arguably who will
run for governor won't attend raphael
warnock the senator from georgia those
are the two most powerful black leaders
in the state of georgia won't attend
either remarks today that's from biden
or harris how does that undercut the
message
well it definitely shows the challenges
that the the president and the vice
president are facing here
um for months people have really
encouraged them have pleaded with them
to become more active on this issue and
and to their credit they have and they
have been speaking out about it more the
need to pass the federal legislation to
set baseline standards across the
country so that people have a right to
vote and that elections cannot be
sabotaged but a lot of
people also wish that the president
would lay out more of a specific plan
that's what they've been asking they've
been asking for him to call for a reform
to the senate filibuster and the plan so
that these bills can actually pass so i
think that's what you're seeing is a
little bit of frustration but let's wait
and see what his remarks are today the
remarks from the president and the vice
president um i believe that they do plan
to be much more specific this time and i
think that a lot of people who have been
frustrated up until now with a little
bit of inaction might be uh pleasantly
surprised so for our viewers who may not
live in georgia or one of those states
where there have been a restrictive
voting laws passed
let's walk our viewers through
what restrictions are already there and
why is it so restrictive
sure so what we see from a lot of the
bills that were passed in these 17
states across the country is a real
scaling back on options for people to
look safely and securely vote to have
access to the ballot box so there's a
lot of scaling back and this includes in
georgia too scaling back on the
ability to vote by mail
the ability to deposit to drop off your
mail ballot in a secure drop box um the
ability to vote early in the days
leading up to the elections you're not
the vote on election day and that there
be enough sufficient hours
and also there are you know troubling
provisions for example in the georgia
law that allow partisan lawmakers to
remove
county officials who oversee elections
that's actually happened in several
georgia counties already where
democratic officials have been removed
from county boards what the federal
legislation would do
is say no these sorts of things these
sorts of scalebacks or these sorts of
election subversion tactics are not
allowed and they're going to set a
national baseline standard so that no
matter which state you live you can be
relatively assured that your right to
vote is going to be protected you're
going to have all those options to
safely and securely vote and to make
sure that the votes are counted
correctly and that the results can be
trusted