It's 2023, and there's a US election in 2024 that will determine the future of climate change, war in Ukraine, the global economy, reproductive rights, and global fascism.
And folks still want to talk about Cambridge Analytica in 2015, instead of stuff like this:
The reason you can't make any progress on:
* Climate change
* Reproductive rights
* Trans rights
Is because too many Black folk are denied the right to vote. Focus on that instead of your pet issue.
I'm a climate doomer, because I know that no progress on the climate can happen unless Black voting rights in the US get sorted. And we aren't even paying attention to the Black voting problem, let alone close to solving it.
There is no path to making meaningful progress on climate change that doesn't go through Black people in the US getting to vote. None. The fact that we still can't accept this, is why I'm not optimistic about our chances to do anything meaningful about the climate.
@mekkaokereke Do you see any hope in this?
“The Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) is launching a super PAC to mobilize Black voters ahead of 2024 in an effort to give the House a Democratic majority and, in the process, elect the nation’s first Black Speaker of the House.”
The Rolling Sea Action Fund
The Congressional Black Caucus is launching a super PAC to mobilize Black voters ahead of 2024 in an effort to give the House a Democratic majority and, in the process, elect the nation’s first Black Speaker of the House. The Rolling Sea Action Fund will raise money as well as invest in different advertising and…
@mickeleh Absolutely not. I think campaigns like this are less than helpful. They turn Black voters off. Especially Black men.
My threads on here are all about racist voter suppression. But the media conversation is always around "getting out the vote" or "mobilising Black voters?" The solution is to yell at the victims to try harder?
The word "suppression" didn't appear in this article even once.
No one is more motivated than Black voters. They don't need to be mobilized. They need help.
Black people wait in line for 8 hours to vote, and take another day off work to register. GOP changes things to make it 9 hours, and requires 3 days off work. The Dem response to this is... to ask Black voters to suck it up because "democracy needs you!" and take the 3 days and 9 hour voting line?
And if Black voters don't take that 3 days off work and wait in line to vote for 9 hours, in sufficient numbers to win for the Dems, then we are blamed for losing the election?
@mekkaokereke @mickeleh Washington switched to mail-in ballots only before I turned 18. I've only ever voted by mail-in ballot.
My ignorance: I didn't realize Washington and Oregon (two of the whitest states) were the only two states that do this until the whole fracas about mail in ballots in 2020.
I still haven't gotten over realizing people have to wait multiple hours in line to vote. It's barbaric and backwards.
I fill out a form on my kitchen table weeks before the election. Takes 5 min
@sidereal @mekkaokereke @mickeleh I have voted in Florida, Texas, New York, and Washington, and Washington is by far the least stressful.
Texas and Florida are the worst. In Texas you have to stand in line while people on the edge of the property line where you're voting tell you to vote for their candidate. Only to go in and find that half the options have only one candidate who is, of course, republican.
In Florida, the voting place I was assigned was held in a church which just feels wrong. Also Florida might whine about voter registration lists being "fake" all while it took me ten damn years to get off their call to update your registration lists. I don't know how many times you have to tell Florida that "no, I don't live there anymore, I'm registered to vote in my new state. Stop harassing me. I'm not going back."
@matunos @EricFielding @CorvidCrone @sidereal @mickeleh
California is *consistently* Blue. Not *deeply* Blue. The margin of victory is not large, because despite what folks imagine, California has fewer Black folk as a percentage of population than states like Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, etc.
The only state with more Trump voters than California, is Texas. Trump won 47% of the white men vote in California in 2020.
Voter suppression in California flips it red easily.
@matunos @EricFielding @CorvidCrone @sidereal @mickeleh
There are more Black people as a percent of population in Paris France, than in California.🤷🏿♂️
If you want to see Black folk in California, go to a big city or an LA suburb like Rancho Cucamonga or Pomona. The rest of the state is very white (Trumpy).
Trump carried 50% of the white men vote in California in 2016. After seeing the mess he did during his 1st term, his support only dropped to 47% among white men California voters.🤡
@mekkaokereke @matunos @EricFielding @CorvidCrone @sidereal @mickeleh
California has more voters of all kinds than almost any other state, by virtue of being by far the most populous state. California has 30% more people than the next closest state Texas. It has almost double the population of #3 Florida and #4 New York.
California is hardly “very white”, being the only state where whites are not the majority.
@Gregnee @matunos @EricFielding @CorvidCrone @sidereal @mickeleh
Very fair.
Let me add some details.
~39% of California is Latinx. About 50% of these Latinx folk present as white, and self-identified as white on the 2020 census, rather than "Other." In 2020, less than 20% did. The demographics didn't change as much as the self-identification.
If you visit Downey or Huntington, you can confirm that from a voting standpoint, many white Latinx voters support Trump.
mekka okereke 
Michael Markman
sidereal
Corvid Crone
Dr. Eric J. Fielding, PhD
Matunos
Gregnee