Comment by ciupicri
8 hours ago
I'm not very familiar with the American system, but aren't congress elections prone to gerrymandering which means they don't reflect too accurately the preferences of the people?
8 hours ago
I'm not very familiar with the American system, but aren't congress elections prone to gerrymandering which means they don't reflect too accurately the preferences of the people?
Gerrymandering is one the most powerful ways they suppress votes. They also like to do things like limit the number of polling places and put them out of the way with limited hours, pass laws that require documents many people don't have (while making those documents more difficult to obtain), removing the right to vote from people with criminal histories (while more aggressively policing and convicting the people/communities they don't want voting), spreading disinformation about voting dates/times/locations, creating confusing ballots, having heavy police presence at polling places and putting up speed traps/check points near them, making mail-in voting difficult or unreliable, and actively discourage participation with messaging about how voting doesn't accomplish anything or even that your support of a broken/corrupt system makes you complicit in it.
Even our two party/first past the post system discourages voting by limiting the choice people have in who they can realistically support in the first place.