To date, everyone’s focus has been Congress, Congress, and yet more Congress. Are the votes there to pass an extension? What will the legislation that Congress passes look like? Will Congress create a good enough record to satisfy the Supreme Court’s congruence and proportionality review?
Yet the last time I checked, we still have a President and we also still have a Constitution (although after all this wire-tapping stuff, the former statement is probably more accurate than the latter). This being the situation, we should remember that the Constitution requires Congress to present whatever legislation it passes to the President for his signature.
So why worry about the President? After all, he is incredibly weak, with approval ratings hovering around the freezing point. And he vetoes, quite literally, nothing. And he’s on record as saying he supports an extension of the Voting Rights Act. Not so fearless prediction: the President will sign whatever Congress sends him.
But what about the President’s infamous signing statements? What will the signing statement for the extension, if any, say? Would a signing statement matter as to how Republican Administrations enforce the Act? Would it matter to the Supreme Court’s determination of the constitutionality of the Act? Should civil rights groups be lobbying the President regarding the content of his signing statement (or lobbying him not to issue any signing statement at all)? Are they already doing this?
Is any discussion of the President in the context of the extension, truly, academic?
–Mike Pitts