Where No One Has Voted Before (Or Since) edition

[[Ed. note: Yes I've been terrible about cross-posting and keeping this space even remotely up to date so here's a Star Trek-themed one you're welcome]]

Democracy … The final frontier.

These are the voyages of the U.S.S. Republican Governor.

Its nine-month mission: To explore strange new bills.

To seek out new lows in democratic civilizations.

To boldly go where no governor has gone before!

… Okay, you’re a good sport to get through that. Ahead, warp factor seven.

he Un-Democratized Country: I’ve been making some hay in this space of all the state legislative elections Republicans keep losing. Because they’re losing a lot of them, and a lot of supposedly safely red seats have flipped from red to blue over the past year.

• Well, Republicans have noticed this, too.
  • Most notably, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker kind of flipped out about it on Twitter after a safely and historically Republican state Senate seat there was won by a Democrat a couple of weeks ago.

So, if you’re a Republican governor, what do you do when you can’t seem to win special elections?

You stop having them, of course!

• A Wisconsin state Assembly seat and a state Senate seat have been open since December (when the Republican incumbents bailed to take spots in Walker's administration), but Walker doesn’t want to call special elections to fill them any time soon.
  • Rather, he wants the hold the specials concurrent with the general elections in November, when he seems to think Republicans have a better chance of holding on. (The state Senate is currently 18 Republicans to 14 Democrats, with one vacancy).
• That means the Wisconsinites living in those districts could remain unrepresented in those chambers for the better part of a year—if not longer.Also, Walker’s probably violating the state constitution by refusing to call specials to fill vacant seats in a timely manner, but whatevs.
  • Walker may be taking cues from Alabama GOP lawmakers, who are reacting to a Democrat winning of one of the state’s U.S. Senate seats in December’s special election by trying to get rid of Senate special elections entirely.
    • Last week, the GOP majority in the Alabama House voted to require Senate vacancies be filled by gubernatorial appointment.
  • And will Florida Gov. Rick Scott follow suit? He’s currently dragging his feet on scheduling a special election to fill a recent state Senate vacancy there, too.
    • If he leaves the seat open, more than half a million Floridians will lack representation in the Senate for almost a year.
  New Frontiers of Unconstitutionality: Republicans in Mississippi are trying to chart new star systems when it comes to infringing on women’s healthcare and right to obtain an abortion.
  Old and busted: 20-week abortion bans. (Mississippi passed one in 2017.)
  New hotness: 15-week abortion bans. 
  • One of these bans just passed out of a House committee in the Magnolia State, but definitely keep an eye out for these garbage restrictions as they pop up in other red states. 

You can read the rest here. 

Sign up to have these delivered hot and fresh to your inbox each week here.