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Voter suppression is real and has had a measurable impact on elections this past decade. David Daley, the journalist and author who has focused on gerrymandering, returns to update us on the Hofeller files.
He returns in this WhoWhatWhy podcast to explain the importance of the recent public release of 70,000 files of the late Thomas Hofeller, the GOP consultant who masterminded many of the redistricting schemes since the 2010 census. Hofeller’s work enabled Republicans to win more districts in states where they have fewer voters than Democrats. In many cases, this was done by disenfranchising minorities.
This podcast was first posted at WhoWhatWhy
In North Carolina, a federal court found that redistricting, combined with voter ID and other requirements, targeted African American voters “with almost surgical precision.” The Hofeller files, released by his estranged daughter, show the level of detailed data used to map the exact location of voters. In Greensboro, Hofeller drew a line down the middle of the campus of the nation’s largest historically black college, North Carolina A&T State University, and was able to predict how many students would be blocked from voting because their driver’s license or other ID did not list their campus address.
If you listen to this podcast and do not come away stunned and outraged, you may want to ask yourself whether you treasure democracy.
David Daley is the author of Ratfucked: Why Your Vote Doesn’t Count. His new book, Unrigged: How Americans Are Battling Back to Save Democracy, is due in March 2020.