Who Is Voter Suppression?

09/15/20 • 43 min

In the United States, political power is allocated when Americans go to the polls and vote for the candidates whom they believe will best represent their interests in government. For that reason, access to the ballot has been restricted--and contested--since the early days of democracy, with each expansion of the electorate met by measures to suppress the vote. Democracy, it seems, has always been for some, but not others. On this episode of “Who Is?,” join Sean Morrow for a conversation on voter suppression in the aftermath of Shelby County v. Holder, a 2013 Supreme Court decision that gutted the Voting Rights Act and upended how Americans vote. Featuring three women who fight for voting rights nationwide: Stacey Abrams, Lydia Camarillo, and Natalie Landreth.

Stacey Abrams, 2018 Democratic candidate for Governor of Georgia and former Minority Leader of the Georgia House of Representatives. She’s the founder of Fair Fight and Fair Count, and her new book is, “Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America”
Lydia Camarillo, president of the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project and William C. Velasquez Institute
Natalie Landreth, a senior staff attorney at the Native American Rights Fund

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Stacey Abrams, 2018 Democratic candidate for Governor of Georgia and former Minority Leader of the Georgia House of Representatives. She’s the founder of Fair Fight and Fair Count, and her new book is, “Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America”
Lydia Camarillo, president of the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project and William C. Velasquez Institute
Natalie Landreth, a senior staff attorney at the Native American Rights Fund

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Previous Episode

Who Is Black Lives Matter?

On February 26, 2012, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman in Sanford, Florida. On July 13, 2013, Zimmerman was acquitted of all charges in the case of Martin’s death. In response to Zimmerman’s acquittal, Alicia Garza, an Oakland-based organizer, wrote a post on Facebook which contained the phrase “Black Lives Matter.” A friend, Patrisse Cullors, hashtagged it: #blacklivesmatter. Eight years later, following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May, tens of millions of Americans poured into the streets, in outrage and grief, to demand that this never happen again. Nationwide protests in support of racial justice continue, and, tragically, so do police shootings of Black Americans: from Kenosha, Wisconsin, to Los Angeles, California. On this episode of “Who Is?,” a look at how Black Lives Matter has grown into a movement.

Keisha N. Blain, a professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh, and president of the African American Intellectual History Society. She is the author of “Set the World on Fire: Black Nationalist Women and the Global Struggle for Freedom”
Miski Noor, a writer and organizer based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Noor is a co-founder of Black Visions Collective
Vince Warren, director of the Center for Constitutional Rights

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Next Episode

Who Is Vladimir Putin?

Russian President Vladimir Putin is one of the wealthiest and most powerful people on the planet. And yet, much of his story remains a mystery. Born in St. Petersburg, when it was still known as Leningrad, Putin’s childhood unfolded on the streets of a city recovering from a devastating, years-long siege during World War II. Today, Putin is the longest-serving Russian leader since Stalin, and could be in charge until 2036. On this episode of Who Is?, Sean Morrow dives deep into Putin’s past, and talks to some of the Russians who are fighting back against Putinism, and for freedom and democracy in Russia.

Catherine Belton previously served as the Moscow correspondent for the Financial Times. She’s currently a special correspondent at Reuters, and is the author of “Putin’s People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took On the West”
Masha Gessen, a staff writer at The New Yorker and author of many books, including “The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin,” and most recently, “Surviving Autocracy”
Michael McFaul, who has taught at Stanford since 1995. McFaul served for five years in the Obama Administration, which included several years as U.S. Ambassador to the Russian Federation. His most recent book is “From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia”
Nadya Tolokonnikova, a founder of feminist collective Pussy Riot

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