HuffPost: Democrats Are Mounting A Push To Expand Voting Rights After Big State-Level Midterm Wins

After a surprisingly successful midterm election in which Democrats increased their power in state governments, party leaders now find themselves in a position to advance or protect one of the party’s top issues: voting rights.

Major voting rights bills are on the move in states like Minnesota, where Democrats won complete control of state government for the first time in five years, and New York, where Democrats held on to their majorities. In Michigan, Democrats will now implement and possibly expand on voting rights reforms enacted by voters after winning full control in the state for the first time in 40 years. And in other states, like Arizona and Wisconsin, Democratic gubernatorial wins will thwart any Republican laws rolling back voter access. …

In New York, where Democrats maintained their hold on the government despite a subpar election, the state Senate is continuing a tradition of passing democracy reforms as the first order of business that began in 2019 when Democrats won back control of the chamber.

“New York historically has been a state that did not keep up with other states’ election administration and voting reforms,” Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause New York, a nonprofit that works on democracy-related issues, said.