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Harris clarifies Biden’s reelection plans

Vice President Harris on Wednesday sought to clarify recent comments she made about President Biden’s reelection plans after she told CNN earlier this week that the president was definitively running again in 2024. 

Harris told a reporter on Air Force Two before departing for California that “the president intends to run and if he does, I will be his ticket mate. We will run together.”

The White House said Harris wanted to clarify comments she’d made two days earlier in an interview with CNN’s Dana Bash. 

In the interview, Bash noted House Minority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), who helped catapult Biden ahead of a crowded Democratic presidential primary in 2020, said Harris would be his top choice to run for president if Biden opts not to seek reelection.

“Joe Biden is running for reelection and I will be his ticket mate,” Harris told Bash.

“Full stop?” Bash asked.

“Full stop. That’s it,” Harris responded.

Harris’s clarification noting that Biden intends to run, not that he is definitively running, mirrors what the White House has consistently said about the president’s plans for 2024. 

Wednesday’s follow up may also be part of an effort to avoid Federal Election Commission disclosure requirements for candidates who have definitively entered the race.

But it is sure to inject further uncertainty into the conversation at a time when Biden’s approval ratings are mired in the high 30 percent range and his age has become a common talking point in D.C. circles.

White House spokespeople have repeatedly said Biden intends to run again in 2024, and the president himself has previously said he plans to run again if his health allows.

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Joe Rogan: DeSantis would be a 'good president'

Podcaster Joe Rogan says he’s a fan of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), arguing the governor’s tenure in The Sunshine State would help boost a potential presidential bid.

“I think Ron DeSantis would work as a good president,” Rogan said on an episode of his podcast this week when asked who he might want to see run for the White House in 2024. “I mean, what he’s done for Florida has been admirable.”

The podcast host particularly praised DeSantis’s handling of COVID-19, an issue that has sparked fierce pushback at times among critics.

“I feel like what he did for Florida, a lot of people gave him a lot of grief, but ultimately he was correct,” Rogan said. “He was correct when it comes to like deaths, he was correct. And when it comes to protecting all vulnerable populations, he was correct in terms of distribution of monoclonal antibodies.”

DeSantis, who is widely speculated to be considering a potential Republican presidential bid despite insisting he is focused on his current duties in Florida, took criticism during the coronavirus pandemic for resisting lockdown measures and vaccine mandates.

Rogan has also sparked controversy for his comments about the pandemic and his promoting of unproven medical treatments as a way for preventing and treating coronavirus infection.

“And he was furious when the government tried to pull those, they were trying to pull very effective treatments,” Rogan said of the Florida governor. “You know, he is not perfect. He’s a human being, but, um, what he’s done is stand up for freedoms … And there was some weird gas-lighting s–t that went on where people equated freedom and saying the word freedom to like right wing bigotry and hate is so strange.”

The popular podcaster is at least the second major media figure to weigh in on DeSantis’s presidential ambitions recently. Last week, pundit Piers Morgan called on Republicans to move on from former President Trump and focus on empowering DeSantis as the party’s new leader.

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Washington Examiner: Hutchinson testimony shows Trump should not hold office 'ever again'

The editorial board of the Washington Examiner, a right-leaning publication read widely by supporters of former president Trump, is arguing congressional testimony given by a top White House aide this week disqualifies Trump from ever holding office again.

Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony before the select House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday “ought to ring the death knell” for Trump’s political career, the Examiner wrote in an editorial published on Wednesday.

“What Hutchinson relayed was disturbing,” the publication wrote. “She gave believable accounts of White House awareness that the planned Jan. 6 rally could turn violent. She repeated testimony that Trump not only knew that then-Vice President Mike Pence’s life had been credibly threatened that day but also that he was somewhere between uncaring and actually approving of Pence’s danger.”

And, the Examiner noted, Hutchinson “told, in detail, that Trump repeatedly insisted that he himself should join his supporters at the Capitol — even after being informed the crowd contained armed elements and that it was breaching the perimeter against an undermanned U.S. Capitol Police force.”

All of the scenes the former top White House aide conveyed what the outlet said was “a damning portrayal of Trump as unstable, unmoored, and absolutely heedless of his sworn duty to effectuate a peaceful transition of presidential power.”

The Examiner editorial flies in the face of the punditry across other conservative media about Hutchinson’s testimony, much of which has dismissed her as not credible or relying on hearsay.

“Trump is a disgrace,” the Examiner asserted. “Republicans have far better options to lead the party in 2024. No one should think otherwise, much less support him, ever again.”

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The Paycheck Protection Program taught Marco Rubio a very important lesson

The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) provided more than $800 billion in forgivable loans issued by more than 5,500 lenders to over 11.8 million small businesses across the country. It has been responsible for providing much needed funds at a much-needed time that helped these businesses stay open and keep their workers employed during an unprecedented global pandemic.

This is thanks in no small part to Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla).

“It not only was the most impactful legislation I’ve ever passed, but I believe it’s been the most impactful legislation that the Congress has undertaken in a quarter century or longer,” Rubio told me in a recent podcast conversation. “This is probably one of the few and rare times we were able to get something done and done quickly that actually impacted real people in a dramatic life changing way immediately.”

The program became law as part of the March 2020 CARES Act. But it wasn’t created just for the pandemic. In fact, a bipartisan group of senators led by Rubio was discussing a version of the PPP months before, mainly as a potential financing vehicle for small businesses facing supply-chain challenges (yes, there were supply-chain challenges before COVID-19). The pandemic accelerated its progress and turned this unique financing vehicle into law.

Of course, the PPP has not been without its challenges.

Early after its launch, most of the large banks were slow to move forward with the desperately needed financing, slow enough to prompt more than a few frustrated comments and tweets from Rubio at the outset.

“Some of the banks weren’t interested in it beyond their commercial clients, even their business accounts,” he said. “They were acting like if the money was their money, that they were at risk, there was no risk for the bank, the bank was just basically a pass.”

Ultimately, these larger financial institutions came around. But for a while, it was a struggle. The good news, according to the senator, is that many of the regional and independent banks were quicker to react. “Some of them were very proactive about marketing this,” he said. “In some ways, they ended up attracting a bunch of new account holders who haven’t forgotten how those regional banks were there in their time of need. “

Then, of course, there was the fraud. Lots of it.

The media have reported many cases in which crooked business owners used PPP funds to for illegal purposes, including the purchase of boats, cars and homes. A government watchdog recently estimated that as many as 57,500 PPP loans worth $3.6 billion were issued to potentially ineligible recipients. And this doesn’t even consider the many loans that were legally received, but by businesses owned by celebrities, investment firms and other wealthy shareholders who had dubious claims of “need.”  But were these fraud claims a surprise to the senator? Not really.

“Medicaid’s full of fraud,” he says. “There’s also credit card fraud, does anybody talk about getting rid of their credit card?” he says.

According to Rubio, the way you deal with fraud is to build some things at the front end to make it harder, but also to prosecute it at the back end. As the larger loans are being audited, an increasing number of fraudulent loans are being uncovered and addressed. “I think that’s beginning to happen, and people should go to jail and pay restitution for what they stole,” he says.

So, if it wasn’t the reluctance of banks or the significant amount of reported fraud, was there anything that the senator learned from creating and implementing this unprecedent government stimulus program in such a short time?

As a matter of fact, there was one big thing that took him Rubio surprise: many small businesses that needed help could only get this help through a bank or lender, and he soon learned that many of these business owners weren’t properly setup as businesses — at least from a banking perspective.

“Food trucks (for example) in some places don’t have a corporate entity business account,” he said. “There are many businesses out there that actually don’t have business banking relationships.”

This was a surprise to Rubio and others involved in developing the PPP. But when you think about it, maybe it shouldn’t have been such a shock.

According to a 2019 FDIC survey, an estimated 5.4 percent of U.S. households (approximately 7.1 million) were “unbanked” in 2019, meaning that no one in the household had a checking or savings account at a bank or credit union. Another study conducted by research firm Morning Consult found that 25 percent of Americans are either unbanked or “underbanked,” which means there is a just a personal checking account in the family and even then alternative financial service companies for money orders or check-cashing services were primarily used.

Of the 30 million small businesses in this country, about 6 million are employer-owned, which means that more than two-thirds are independent contractors, freelancers or individual proprietors — all eligible for PPP funds. But, unfortunately, many of these business owners couldn’t access the funds because they were either unbanked or underbanked.

Then there are minority considerations. According to the Morning Consult analysis, 30 percent of the banked or unbanked are Black and 41 percent are Latinos. Florida, Rubio’s home state, is home to 5.3 million Latinos, or 8 percent of the U.S. Latino population. There are more than 604,000 Hispanic-owned firms in Florida, not including the countless other independents and freelancers. So, he missed this one.

One thing’s for sure: For the next iteration of PPP, which has proven to be a model for future public/private financing initiatives, it’s likely that Rubio, or whoever is involved, will consider businesses that don’t have business banking relationships. But let’s not blame the senator entirely for this oversight. It’s also the business owner’s responsibility to stayed informed and involved.

Gene Marks is founder of The Marks Group, a small-business consulting firm. He frequently appears on CNBC, Fox Business and MSNBC.

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Four facts you should know about the Supreme Court decision to revive a GOP-drawn voting map

The Supreme Court voted Tuesday to reinstate a Louisiana voting map that was previously found to discriminate against Black voters in an unusual case that fell under the court’s “shadow docket” — an action by the court that does not go through the full process of briefing and oral arguments.  

In a 6-3 vote, the court’s conservative majority voted to keep a Louisiana U.S. House district map, despite U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick finding it was likely in violation of federal voting protections for diluting the franchise of Black voters. 

The justices’ decision pauses Dick’s earlier ruling, and the court will add Louisiana’s case, Ardoin v. Robinson, to next term’s docket. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in a similar case out of Alabama over a Voting Rights Act challenge.  

Here are four facts about the Ardoin v. Robinson case you should know: 

1. Redistricting maps are at the heart of the case 

After the 2020 Census, states have been working on drawing up new congressional maps, including Louisiana. The original map in Louisiana, crafted by the GOP-led legislature, consolidated large numbers of Black voters into one majority-Black congressional district and dispersed the remaining Black voters throughout five districts. Voters and voting rights advocates were concerned the now-reinstated map did not accurately reflect the state’s population, which is about a third Black or African American.  Gov. John Bel Edwards vetoed the maps in March, which the state legislature then overrode.  

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news. 

2. The Supreme Court is bypassing a lower court’s ruling 

Voters and civil rights groups challenged Louisiana’s new congressional map, and Dick agreed that the state should include two majority-Black House districts, instead of one. Dick ordered the state’s legislature to draw a revised map and use that in the state’s upcoming primary elections, scheduled for Nov. 8. 

Louisiana’s Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin (R) tried to stop Dick’s ruling from taking effect and went to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5^th circuit, but a three-judge panel rejected his request. 

That’s what brought Ardoin to the Supreme Court, where he petitioned on June 17 for his case to be heard. On Tuesday, the judges decided to hear the case while also voting to keep the map in place. 

3. The case stems from the Supreme Court’s “shadow docket” 

The “shadow docket” refers to decisions that the Supreme Court issues that “defy its normal procedural regularity,” according to the American Bar Association (ABA). These types of decisions lack public deliberation and transparency and are typically delivered in short summaries. They also don’t include information about how or why each justice voted.  

In the Louisiana case, Ardoin petitioned to have his case heard by the Supreme Court—but Tuesday’s decision doesn’t include any details on why the court decided to take it up. 

However, it does include a dissent by the court’s three liberal justices who indicated they would have denied the application for stay—meaning they would not have granted the request to block Dick’s ruling—and they disagreed with the court taking the case without first waiting for the U.S. Fifth District Court of Appeals to weigh in. 

4. It’s a pivotal moment for voting rights 

In Tuesday’s decision, the Supreme Court also agreed to hear Ardoin’s case in its next term, which starts in October—a few weeks before Louisiana’s Nov. 8 primary election. That’s because the court is scheduled to hear a similar case, Merrill v. Milligan, which calls into question new district maps in Alabama that a lower court panel also found to be in violation of the federal Voting Rights Act (VRA).  

Both the Louisiana and Alabama cases call into question the interpretation of VRA, which bans racial discrimination in voting policies, including forbidding congressional maps from diluting a particular racial group’s voting power.  

The decision in both those cases could have long-lasting impacts, as every 10 years each state redraws its political lines and their results determine the balance of power in Congress for the following decade. 

According to the Brennan Center for Justice, as of June 8, 43 of 44 states with more than one congressional district had finalized new congressional maps and 48 states had final legislative maps.  

Source: TEST FEED1

Raskin on anonymous pushback to Cassidy Hutchinson testimony: She 'has no motivation or interest in lying'

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) pushed back on anonymous sources disputing former top White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony that former President Trump tried to grab the steering wheel of the presidential vehicle and lunged at an agent when informed he would not be able to join his supporters at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Raskin, a member of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” show Wednesday that Hutchinson, a former special assistant to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, is an “entirely credible witness.”

“She has no motivation or interest in lying in any way. What we have on the other hand is some anonymously sourced rumors of feelings of particular agents. Look, anybody who wants to testify, can come forward and testify under oath about what happened. All we’re interested in is the truth,” he added.

Raskin added, “I sort of expected Hutchinson as a young woman telling the truth would come under fire from anonymous sources, but you know, that’s Washington for you.”

The Maryland Democrat said that Hutchinson testified under oath in front of the entire country and that the country was able to “judge her demeanor.”

According to Raskin, nobody is challenging the “central material facts” of her testimony: that “Donald Trump and Mark Meadows were perfectly aware that there were armed people in the crowd” on Jan. 6.

He added that Trump wanted to allow the crowd access to his speech that day in order to “swell the force of that crowd,” which he said the former president then “aimed like a missile at the US Capitol.”

Raskin emphasized that Trump wanted to lead the march up to the Capitol, and that nobody is challenging the assertion that he became irate when he was told he couldn’t join them.

The congressman reiterated that while he fully expected that Hutchinson would come under attack, she spoke not only with credibility but authenticity as well.

MSNBC’s Wlllie Geist also noted that the anonymous sources will be used in “certain quarters as evidence” that Hutchinson is not a credible witness if the story about the altercation turns out to be untrue.

Geist asked Raskin if he was “confident” there will be additional testimony that corroborates her story.

Raskin responded that he has heard nothing so far that contradicts her testimony.

“It’s consistent with multiple accounts we have of the President being incensed and outraged that armed people were being kept out of the crowd and also that he was unable to participate in the march, Mussolini style, on the way to the Capitol, so he could go in, presumably [to] seize the presidency.”

Hutchinson testified on Tuesday that she learned of the episode from Tony Ornato, Trump’s then-deputy chief of staff, and that neither Ornato nor Robert Engel, the special agent in charge for Secret Service on Jan. 6, had disputed the description of the incident.

It has since been reported by several outlets that Engel and the driver are prepared to testify that neither was assaulted by Trump and that the former president did not try to grab the steering wheel.

The Secret Service said on Tuesday that it will have more to say about the allegations and that it has been cooperating fully with the select committee since its inception in spring of 2021.

Source: TEST FEED1

Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony is too incriminating for the DOJ to ignore

Any congressional oversight hearing that seeks to convince an audience of something new must have both style and substance. Recognizing that their work is anything but a typical congressional oversight hearing, members of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6^th Attack on the United States Capitol knew from the outset that they had their work cut out for them.

First, the style. The select committee clearly appreciates that in a hyper-partisan political environment, optics matter just as much as substance. Every step they’ve taken in their presentation was done to preempt the charge that this is a partisan investigation, that we already know what happened on Jan. 6 and that most everyone outside of the D.C. bubble has moved on to more immediately pressing matters such as rising inflation and crime.  

The committee knew its biggest challenge was to get people to pay attention to its findings. That’s why it broadcasted its first hearing in primetime and has relied on taped witness testimony, documentary-style footage of the riot and exquisite audience cliffhangers, such as a tease that they had evidence that several Republican congressmen had asked the White House for preemptive pardons. All of this makes great television.

In response to the charge that this was a partisan witch hunt, the select committee convinced its members to take a back seat to the evidence. Instead of appearing camera-hungry, Democratic committee members have largely let the video testimony of Trump’s own inner circle do the talking for them. The committee understands that no transcript or retelling can substitute for hearing directly from those who were in the room.

The committee has also relied almost exclusively on Republican witnesses, many of whom worked for President Trump. And when there has been questioning, it has predominantly been carried out by the two Republican committee members. So effective has the presentation been that some Republicans (including Trump) believe House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) made a huge tactical blunder in pulling GOP support for the inquiry in hopes that he could then dismiss its findings.

Now, more importantly, the substance. Prior to Tuesday’s unscheduled emergency hearing, the committee’s biggest finding was that Trump was told unequivocally by his closest advisers that the “Big lie” of a stolen election was just that — a lie.

The list of those pleading with him to back off his claims of a fraudulent election included his attorney general, members of his family and even his campaign manager responsible for securing his second term. Senior leaders of the Department of Justice (DOJ ) told him point-blank at several points that they had investigated several of his claims and found nothing.

This means that Trump knew that what he was telling his supporters and the public was not true, and that his Oval Office pressure campaign on state-level elections officials to overturn the results weren’t backed by credible evidence. “Just say that it was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressman,” he reportedly said. Trump was confident that if he could just get officials in certain states to lie for him, his supporters in Congress would do everything they could to keep him in power.

As if that weren’t enough, Tuesday’s hearing uncovered bombshell after bombshell. Cassidy Hutchinson, a former top aide to Trump’s White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, detailed meetings prior to Jan. 6 in which Trump and senior staff were warned of potential violence at the Capitol — warnings that were met with indifference and inaction. When she questioned Meadows about the threats, Meadows told her outright “things might get real, real bad.”

Perhaps most damning in a long list was the shocking revelation that Trump was told that many of his supporters at his speech at the Ellipse on the morning of Jan. 6 were armed, some with AR-15s. When he voiced frustration that they were too far back from the stage and ruining his visual, he was told they didn’t want their weapons to be found. His response? He ordered the Secret Service to get rid of the magnetometers.

The president knew there were weapons in the crowd and yet still sent them to the Capitol with instructions to “fight like hell.” He even wanted to personally march with them despite being told by countless officials that doing so would only make things worse. When he saw the violence escalate on TV, and despite pleas from his most ardent supporters to get his followers to stand down, he stood idly by. In his view, according to Hutchinson, “he didn’t think the rioters were doing anything wrong.”

Given the scope and effectiveness of evidence presented so far, many are asking what the chances are that Trump, or the growing list of Republican officials who asked for pardons, will ultimately be charged with a crime. His own White House counsel warned the president and his chief that they “were going to get charged with every crime imaginable,” from obstructing justice to inciting and encouraging a riot.

The DOJ – the agency with the power to indict and charge Trump – has given hints that it is closely watching the hearings and wants to get its hands on the information collected by the select committee to inform its own investigations. We don’t know the status or scope of the DOJ’s inquiry, but the committee’s findings ultimately may be too incriminating to ignore.

Casey Burgat is an assistant professor and the director of the legislative affairs program at the Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University.

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Nikki Haley attending Iowa fundraiser amid 2024 speculation

Nikki Haley is slated to attend a fundraiser in Iowa on Thursday, prompting fresh speculation that the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations is eyeing her own presidential bid in 2024.

Haley, also the former governor of South Carolina, will join Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) in the Hawkeye State for a fundraiser on Thursday, according to a person familiar with the planning.

Also on Thursday, Haley is scheduled to attend the Feenstra family picnic, hosted by Iowa Rep. Randy Feenstra (R). The congressman announced Haley’s attendance last month, writing on Twitter “From standing up to China to promoting our American values, she served our country with integrity & vision at home & abroad.”

Haley is also spending time in Iowa on Wednesday, attending the Iowa Republican Party’s Dubuque Regional Reception. Additionally, she will join Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa) for an event in Davenport, Iowa, on Wednesday, according to another person familiar with the planning.

The former ambassador’s time in Iowa fuels speculation of a potential 2024 run, as presidential hopefuls commonly visit the first-in-the-nation caucus state before the campaign kicks off.

In April 2021, Haley said she would not run for president if former President Trump decides to launch another bid for the White House.

“I would not run if President Trump ran, and I would talk to him about it,” she said at a press conference at the time. “That’s something that we’ll have a conversation about at some point if that decision is something that has to be made.”

The former U.N. ambassador did, however, find herself up against the ex-president earlier this month, when the two GOP figures backed different candidates in a Republican House primary. Haley endorsed Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) for reelection, while Trump backed her challenger, Katie Arrington.

Trump became frustrated with Mace after she criticized him for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The incumbent, however, ultimately won the race.

Haley criticized Trump after the Capitol riot, telling Politico in an interview that he “let us down.”

“He went down a path he shouldn’t have, and we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again,” she added.

Months after, however, Haley said she would not run for president if Trump mounted another bid for the White House.

This week does not mark the first time Haley is spending time in Iowa. Last June, she delivered remarks at the Iowa Republican Party’s Lincoln Dinner, which is known to be a large fundraising event for the state party. The gathering typically attracts Republican figures who are eyeing presidential bids.

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A lesson for Republicans: Voter access is good politics

As the nation watches the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack lay out the details of its investigation, there is a consistent thread in witness testimony from the committee’s hearings: there was no evidence of widespread fraud in 2020. Several Republican officials have rejected the basis of these claims in their statements before the committee. 

It’s an unfortunate turn of events that so many of my fellow Republicans have allowed allegations of fraud—often rooted in conspiracy theories—to become proof positive of the need to restrict voting access. And it may do much more harm than good for Republicans’ electoral fortunes.

As a Republican who oversaw elections in Kentucky as secretary of state, I fought tooth and nail to earn the trust of my constituents. And when I was up for reelection myself, I faced the will of the voters on election night and won my election decisively despite the incumbent Republican governor losing by 17 points. Now out of office, I continue to work to improve our elections in Kentucky and around the country.

Contrary to political conventional wisdom, expanding voting access does not automatically better outcomes for Democrats. In fact, Stanford scholars found no partisan advantage to voting by mail. Not only that, there are endless counterexamples that show how policies that make voting easier have actually worked to the benefit of Republicans.

For all of former President Donald Trump’s complaints about the 2020 election being stolen, he  still received a staggering 74 million votes—more than any other candidate in U.S. history not named Joe Biden. Record turnout does not have a partisan bias. What matters, as always, are the candidates and the arguments they make to address voters’ concerns.

The 2020 election was by far the most accessible election, with millions of Americans utilizing early and mail-in voting due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A whopping 46 percent of voters say they voted absentee or by mail. What happened? Republicans picked up seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, took control of two state legislative chambers, and gained almost 300 net state legislative seats on Democrats. 

I saw this firsthand in Kentucky, as Kentucky lawmakers empowered our Democratic governor and Republican secretary of state to adapt our long-standing election practices to conduct an election in the midst of a pandemic. When the votes were counted, Kentucky hit an all-time high in voter turnout, Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell sailed to his biggest victory ever, and Republicans further added to our previous record-setting margins in the state legislature. As a result, we made several of those changes permanent, including early, in-person voting, drop boxes with security measures, and an online portal to request an absentee ballot for those eligible. This fall, I am confident that Kentucky voters will use these new options to send even more Republicans to our state legislature.

Similarly, the story of the 2021 Virginia gubernatorial election wasn’t one of Democrats riding high turnout to snuff out any chance for Republicans to win. Instead, it was a story of something that is true in every election: the candidate with the ideas and message that best addressed voters’ concerns prevailed. Virginia saw record-high early voting and the highest turnout for a gubernatorial election since 1997. And there is plenty of reason to believe this level of turnout was an asset for now Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R), not a liability.

Even this year’s primaries show how more people voting can be a positive for Republicans. Georgia, a key battleground state, saw its GOP primary early voting numbers surge this year, surpassing that of Democrats. Overall GOP primary turnout was higher too. This is further evidence demonstrating that the GOP restricts voting at its own risk. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have common sense reforms that try to introduce more security—voter roll list maintenance is a perfect example—but balancing security and access doesn’t need to be a binary choice.

Republicans face a massive political opportunity going into the 2022 midterm elections—that is, if we resist the temptation to cry wolf about election fraud. There is no reason we Republicans need to resort to Machiavellian tactics or, even worse, blatant lies, to pick up seats across the country. We need to simply focus on our ideas for the future and point out the opposing party’s record while in office these past two years.

In fact, such a focused message going into more open elections may even give us a better chance of winning the American people’s support.

Trey Grayson is a Republican who served as Kentucky’s secretary of state from 2004 to 2011. Grayson serves as an Advisory Board Co-Chair of the Secure Elections Project. 

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