COURIER L 14 IFE, JULY 10-16, 2020
OPINION
Fourth of July messages offer
stark contrast for 2020 elections
The fi ght for absentee ballots and democracy
Over three months ago, I
wrote that New York’s
ballot access laws were
the hardest in the nation and a
threat to our democracy. Since
then, I became the fi rst incumbent
in anyone’s memory in
Brooklyn to be knocked off the
ballot without even facing an
opponent.
It’s still not clear whether I
will be re-appointed to fi ll my
own vacancy. The guys who
knocked me off the ballot (one
was a district leader) were very
badly repudiated on primary
election day two weeks ago.
When my personal political
situation is clear, I will write
about it again.
We are facing another threat
to our democracy in Brooklyn
right now, and it foreshadows
an even greater threat we will
be facing nationwide in November
– the security and sanctity
of our absentee ballots.
A lawsuit fi led on Wednesday
in federal court notes that
in 2018, New York had the highest
percentage of absentee ballots
rejected — votes thrown
away — in the nation. Thirtyfour
thousand New Yorkers —
14 percent of all absentee voters
— had their votes discarded.
This fall, many more of us
will cast absentee ballots than
we did two years ago. It is easy
to imagine that the Dominant
Man of Our Current Era (to
our misfortune) will use uncertainty
about the election result
to try to maintain his grip on
power despite his widespread
and prolonged unpopularity.
Indeed, it’s possible to imagine
that sentence being true about
American politics for a long
while to come.
Right now, a New Yorker
can’t even fi nd out if their absentee
ballot counted. State
senator Brad Hoylman and
state assemblymember Dan
Quart have legislation that
will require local Boards of
Election to give voters confi
rmation their ballot was received.
They’ve also passed a
law to give us no-excuse absentee
voting (which Gov. Andrew
Cuomo granted this year in an
emergency order) but that’s
a state constitutional amendment
so it requires multiple
years of yes votes before it goes
into effect.
Right now, more than two
weeks after the election, the
absentee ballots are only just
starting to be counted and
many of them are being disqualifi
ed. For instance, this
year a large number are disqualifi
ed for missing postmarks
that prove they were
sent on time. This is not the
fault of the voters but of public
offi cials. First, the post offi
ce is a mess. Second, Cuomo
ordered the use of pre-stamped
envelopes, which the United
States Postal Service often
doesn’t postmark. In trying to
keep people enfranchised in
an emergency, he likely disenfranchised
thousands of New
Yorkers. Maybe many more.
It’s likely these absentee
disenfranchisements will alter
several election results in
Brooklyn. Please sit with that
for a second.
The Board of Elections sent
out a large number of absentee
ballots too late for them to
count. This appears to have
been especially prevalent in
Brooklyn. We will not have
fair elections until the bipartisan
cronyist BOE system
is replaced in this state. But
that requires a constitutional
amendment. And that requires
multiple years of yes votes.
Nick Rizzo is a Democratic
District Leader representing
the 50th Assembly
District and a political consultant
who lives in Greenpoint.
Follow him on Twitter
@NickRizzo.
WORDS OF
RIZZDOM
Nick Rizzo
There were two messages
on the Fourth of July that
highlight the choice voters
have in November.
One was, “We believe that
our children should be taught
to love their country, honor
their history, and respect our
great American fl ag. We stand
tall, we stand proud, and we
only kneel to Almighty God.”
The other was, “Black people
have been dehumanized,
brutalized, criminalized and
terrorized by America for centuries,
and are expected to
join your commemoration of
‘independence’, while you enslaved
our ancestors. We reject
your celebration of white
supremacy.”
The fi rst quote was said by
President Donald Trump last
weekend at Mount Rushmore
in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
The second was a tweet
by Colin Kaepernick. The public
messages by presidential
hopeful Joe Biden and other
Democrats echoed those of
the former National Football
League quarterback, denigrating
America rather than
focusing on our greatness.
President Trump, who unveiled
powerful campaign
themes in his Independence
Day remarks, also blasted
those calling for the removal
of American monuments, likening
them to angry mobs
that are “trying to tear down
statues of our founders and
deface our most sacred memorials.”
The day after Trump’s remarks,
events proved this was
not mere rhetoric or fear-mongering
— a favorite phrase
of Democrats to defl ect legitimate
criticism — when a
statue of Christopher Columbus
near Baltimore’s Little Italy
was torn down with rope
and dragged into the Harbor
by vandals. Later, a 12-foot Columbus
statue was beheaded
in Waterbury, Connecticut by
more criminals.
This is on top of statues of
George Washington, Thomas
Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln,
and others being vandalized
and torn down throughout the
country. Does anyone doubt
that if the Statue of Liberty
was not surrounded by water it
would also be a target today?
Democrats, including
Biden, can’t bring themselves
to unequivocally condemn
these actions because it would
mean offending their far-left
radical base.
This is similar to the silence
of Democrats in New
York City relating to our crime
surge. Just over the Fourth of
July weekend, 49 people were
shot and nine were killed
across the Five Boroughs. For
the week of June 29 through
July 5, murder was up 50 percent
citywide, and there was a
206 percent increase in shooting
victims, and a 185 percent
spike in shooting incidents
compared to the same week
last year.
It was heartbreaking to see
a dad shot and killed in broad
daylight in the Bronx last
week while holding his sevenyear
old daughter’s hand.
What was the reaction of
New York City Democrats?
Deafening silence. No protests,
no chants, no tweets,
and zero press conferences for
all these Black lives lost and
damaged at the hands of criminals
— not cops.
Of course, the cat did not
have their tongue when they
were bashing the Police Department
over every alleged
accusation of police misconduct
during the looting and
protests, or when they supported
cuts to the NYPD budget,
or pushing for bail reform.
For the sake of public safety
and American history, voters
need to make sure their voices
are heard on Election Day.
Bob Capano has worked
for Brooklyn Republican and
Democrat elected offi cials,
and has been an adjunct political
science professor for
over 15 years. Follow him on
twitter @bobcapano.
THE RIGHT
VIEW
Bob Capano