House bill restricts voter registration drives

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Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a measure that would restrict the ability of non-profit organizations to conduct voter registration drives. The measure appeared as an amendment tacked onto a bill providing increased regulatory oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

This latest move by the Republican-controlled House is but one in a series of such attempts to prevent American citizens from voting. In 2003, there was the South Dakota voter ID requirement, clearly intended to thwart Native American voters, and just this year, Georgia also passed a voter ID requirement law, which was struck down by a federal court just a few days ago.

The Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac amendment–which prohibits any non-profit group from receiving federal affordable-housing funds if it has conducted a voter registration drive in the past year (even with its own funds)–was added for the benefit of the ultraconservative Republican Study Committee. It should be noted that one of the RSC’s members is Louisiana Representative Piyush “Bobby” Jindal, who, as an Indian-American, is a man of color. This disconnect from reality apparently doesn’t disturb Jindal’s RSC peers any more than it disturbs the thousands of Louisianians who voted for Jindal, a slick bureaucrat with extreme right-wing views. Some of those views–especially in the areas of church/state separation and choice–if transformed into law, would be harmful to both people of color and non-Christians (Jindal was a Hindu before he converted to Christianity).

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

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