House Passes Two Sweeping Bills on Voting Rights, Police Reform

The House was very busy yesterday passing not one, but two sweeping reform bills. The first bill titled For the People Act deals with voting rights issues. It hopes to change campaign finance, voting and ethics laws by expanding access to ballot boxes nationwide, creating automatic voter registration, restoring voting rights to formerly incarcerated people, expanding early voting and modernizing the nation’s voting systems. The bill would also crack down on oversight of political lobbying and campaign finance. The second piece of legislation passed last night was the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, named in honor of George Floyd who passed away last May while in police custody. The bill calls for the establishment of a national registry of police misconduct, bans racial and religious profiling at federal, state and local levels, eliminates qualified immunity for police officers, mandates deadly force as a last resort, and bans no-knock warrants and choke holds. Both bills will now move to the Senate where Democrats will need the support of at least 10 Republicans to pass them.