Senate Bill 22 and House Bill 722 were virtually identical when introduced last year in their respective chambers of the Pennsylvania General Assembly. They had bipartisan support and were drafted by legislators, policy staff and advocates for accountable government, with the goal of ending partisan gerrymandering — the intentional drawing of voting district lines to benefit a particular political party. So far, these bills have taken divergent paths: one, exemplifying how the democratic process should work, and the other, demonstrating what can happen when this process is hijacked by partisan politics. [Read more…]
Professor Posts Anti-Semitic Message on an Official University Site
Sixty organizations – Jewish, Christian, educational and civil-rights-focused – have demanded an immediate investigation of anti-Semitism at San Francisco State University (SFSU). For years, the campus has been a hostile environment for many in the university’s Jewish community. Jewish students have reported numerous acts of harassment, discrimination, intimidation and suppression of speech at the hands of anti-Zionist students and faculty. But this time, the discrimination is in plain view on a university social media platform. [Read more…]
Over 1 Million Pennsylvanians Used Online Voter Registration
With all the focus lately on Pennsylvania’s congressional district map, an important electoral milestone may have been overlooked — which is that more than 1 million Pennsylvanians have now used the Wolf administration’s online voter registration (OVR) site. The system, launched in August 2015 by Gov. Wolf, has made it easier and more secure for citizens to register to vote and update their existing registrations. The 1 millionth user was from Delaware County. [Read more…]
Changing the Conversation on Gun Violence
By Shira Goodman
Screenshot from ABC News video on YouTube.
A Jewish Response to the Plight of the Dreamers
Koach Frazier is arrested as Stosh Cotler and Rabbi Jonah Pesner continue to sing. Photo: Bend the Arc Facebook.
Regulating the Communications Industry: From Bells to Bandwidth
The government has repeatedly had difficulty regulating telecommunications, and the current controversy over net neutrality is no exception. It is a battle pitting telecommunications titans AT&T, Comcast and Verizon against virtually everyone else who uses the Internet — which is virtually everyone else. The titans appear to have prevailed, and Internet users, including The Philadelphia Jewish Voice, are seriously worried. [Read more…]
Pennsylvania Gerrymandering Cases Percolating in the Courts
Note: Since submitting this article, Senator Leach has stepped back from his congressional campaign in the light of recent accusations about his personal conduct.
Back in 2004, when I held my first public forum on gerrymandering and 23 people showed up, I could never have predicted that the drawing of legislative district lines would become such a trendy topic. My last forum on this topic drew over 350 people. It seems like every day there is a new article in some national publication on how obscenely drawn our lines are (especially Pennsylvania’s 7th Congressional District, in which I am keenly interested). In addition, the U.S. Supreme Court heard Gill v. Whitford this year, a case directly challenging the concept of gerrymandering that could, if decided right, be one of the most consequential cases in the court’s history.
Here in Pennsylvania, things are really popping. While we await the outcome of Gill, there are two important cases percolating in which the district lines in our state are under judicial review. [Read more…]
Why Anti-Semites Oppose the Marcus Nomination
–Naomi Friedman
Kenneth Marcus.
Note: In January, 2018, the Senate committee that oversees education approved the nomination of Kenneth Marcus. The full Senate needs to confirm his nomination.
Kenneth Marcus, founder, president and general counsel for the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, has dedicated most of his career to fighting for civil rights. Marcus was nominated by President Trump for the position of assistant secretary of education for civil rights in the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR). Meanwhile, anti-Israel groups have been aggressively working to block his confirmation. [Read more…]
Partisan Gerrymandering Is on Trial in Pennsylvania
State and federal courts in Pennsylvania are taking up the issue of partisan gerrymandering — and their decisions could potentially have a significant impact on the 2018 midterm elections. Partisan gerrymandering is the intentional drawing of voting district maps to benefit a particular political party — and Pennsylvania is infamous for its gerrymandered districts. As Stephen Wolf of the Daily Kos explains, “[T]he GOP’s brazenly tortured lines have produced a stable 13-to-5 Republican congressional majority in what is otherwise an evenly divided swing state.” [Read more…]
Gerrymandering Book Author Spoke Against Republican Strategy
Editor’s Note: The Philadelphia Inquirer and Montgomery County have information about today’s election.
Gerrymandering expert and book author David Daley spoke in Plymouth Meeting ahead of the Nov. 7th local elections. Daley is the author of Rat F**ked: The True Story Behind the Secret Plan to Steal America’s Democracy. In “Rat F**ked” (a colorful slang term for political sabotage), Daley documents the GOP’s insidious strategy to redraw the electoral maps in the United States to guarantee a Republican majority in the House of Representatives through 2020. [Read more…]
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