One of the lessons you are taught as a child is that you have to stand up to a bully.
No matter how fearsome the bully may seem, no matter how many others have been cowed by the bully, no matter how many others cheer on the bully, if you don’t stand up to your tormentor, it only leads to more and even worse.
Easier said than done, of course. Resistance can be unpleasant for the person being targeted if the bully is stronger or more powerful or more popular. It takes courage to stand up to a bully, and some just can’t command the courage.
But it was good to see this past week a Mississippi Republican senator stand up to the biggest bully in state politics today: fellow Republican Gov. Tate Reeves.
To bludgeon those with whom he disagrees, Reeves uses the bully pulpit of his position and the favorite tool of modern-day bullies: social media.
Reeves singled out Sen. Elections Committee Chairman Jeremy England for ridicule after a bill the Republican lawmaker authored to allow no-excuse, in-person early voting in Mississippi passed the Senate.
“Congrats to Senator England — he has earned his MVP award for the Mississippi Democratic Party!” Reeves snarkily posted.
To associate a Republican in Mississippi with the Democratic Party is akin to marking him with that dreaded “L” word: “liberal.”
To his credit, England punched back. “I don’t care if you’re Governor,” he posted. “You won’t bully me. And you’re just plain wrong on this one.”
England is correct. Reeves is wrong about early voting, in more ways than one.
First, early voting is not a partisan issue. While all 12 Democrats voted for England’s bill, so did 21 Republicans. In fact, almost twice as many Republicans voted for the measure (21) as voted against it (12).
Reeves didn’t call out those other 20 Republicans because, as with most bullies, he fears being outnumbered.
Second, he is wrong when he claims that in-person voting before Election Day would increase the potential for fraud. It would do just the opposite.
In-person early voting would reduce the demand for absentee ballots, which are the primary means of fraud in elections in Mississippi. Absentee ballots are also responsible for why very close elections are often thrown out and ordered by judges to be run again. The byzantine rules that govern the casting of absentee ballots result in frequent technical violations that can invalidate those ballots when challenged in court. The more that Mississippi can do to reduce the use of absentee ballots, the cleaner and less mistake-prone elections will be.
Other than Reeves’ misleading opposition, most of the pushback on early voting is coming from the circuit clerks, who just don’t want to have the extra work of running a mini-precinct for 15 days before an election. They are probably exaggerating how much trouble it would be. Forty-seven states — including most of those with Republican majorities, by the way — already have some form of in-person early voting, so it can’t be that big of a deal.
Reeves’ bullying, as irritating as it is, is miniscule compared to what’s coming from the governor’s idol, President Donald Trump, and the flatterers with which Trump has surrounded himself in the White House.
Those federal employees whom Trump & Co. can’t fire, they’re trying to bully into quitting if the employees don’t appear to be sufficiently loyal to the president.
Trump also has summoned the electoral muscle of his diehard MAGA supporters and the financial muscle of Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, to bully Republican senators into confirming some of the most unqualified and conflicted cabinet members in U.S. history.
When Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine crackpot, was confirmed as health and human services secretary, it was an abdication of reason and congressional independence by the Republican Party.
One GOP senator, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, had the power to stand up for science and his own medical profession when Kennedy came before the committee Cassidy chairs. Cassidy had a history of actions and comments from Kennedy that should have disqualified the nominee from consideration. Cassidy pressed Kennedy on some of that. But in the end, the senator, facing a tough reelection race next year, decided he better not buck Trump a second time. So he cast the deciding vote to advance Kennedy’s nomination.
Cassidy stood up to the bully in 2021, being one of the few Republicans to have the guts to vote in favor of Trump’s impeachment for inciting the Jan. 6 riot on the Capitol. To the senator’s discredit, he flinched when asked to show such courage again.
- Contact Tim Kalich at 662-581-7243 or tkalich@gwcommonwealth.com.
