Patrick Berry and Alicia Bannon WaPo Outlook piece:

By the Brennan Center for Justice’s count, state lawmakers have introduced more than 360 voter suppression bills across the nation, and the aim seems clear: Despite rhetorical nods to protecting “election integrity,” it’s a collective Republican effort to suppress the vote in future elections. As Stacey Abrams, the former Democratic minority leader of the Georgia state House explains, these bills “are responding to the big lie, to the disproven, discredited and, sadly, the blood-spilled lie of voter fraud.”

But not only are states trying to restrict access to the ballot box, in many instances, they’re also trying to make it harder for voters to protect their rights in court.

A new Brennan Center analysis identified at least 93 bills in 26 states introduced this year that threaten judicial independence by limiting courts’ power or injecting more politics into state judiciaries. According to the analysis, in at least eight of these states, bills have specifically targeted election-related cases. And in 21 states, broader court bills were introduced that would impact election cases, among others, by changing how judges are selected, which courts hear cases challenging the constitutionality of state actions or how judicial decisions are enforced. It’s a dangerous trend that leaves voting rights at risk and undermines a critical check against abuses of power during our elections.