“In wake of 2020 election, Democratic senators urge Biden to expand voting rights protections”

WaPo:

A group of Democratic senators sent President Biden a letter Wednesday urging him to use his executive powers to expand voting-rights protections and step up enforcement of campaign-finance violations as part of an effort to turn the page on what they say was former president Donald Trump’s disregard for these priorities.

At least 20 senators, led by Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), asked Biden to take nearly a dozen steps to improve ballot access and address bad actors, including greater efforts to help eligible Americans to register to vote and beefed-up policing of election-related crimes by the Department of Justice, the Federal Election Commission and the Internal Revenue Service.

“In some ways, the 2020 election showed the resiliency of our democracy,” the senators wrote in a letter to be sent to Biden on Wednesday, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Post. “Still, we saw widespread voter suppression strategies, especially targeting communities of color, and record levels of dark money spent to unduly influence voters.”…

The senators’ specific proposals include: expanding protections under the Voting Rights Act to curtail voter suppression by state and local governments; pushing the Justice Department and FEC to give higher priority to prosecuting voting-rights and campaign-finance violations; expanding ballot access for incarcerated voters and those with disabilities; requiring states to do more to assist with voter registration, particularly among Native Americans, naturalized citizens, veterans and the elderly; strengthening sanctions against foreign actors that interfere in U.S. elections; and reinstating disclosure requirements to the IRS for donors to nonprofits that do issue advocacy and are known as 501(c)(4)s

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