House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) solicited a letter from Stacey Abrams to members of Congress about the upcoming vote on H.R. 1, the For the People Act.

In her “Dear colleague” letter, Pelosi let Abrams describe how critical the legislation is “to the future of the Democracy.” Abrams compared voter suppression in the 2020 election to the Jim Crow era.

The COVID pandemic revealed both the inequalities in our voting laws and the necessity of standardized guidelines that apply regardless of the U.S. citizen’s state of residence. In response to the critical adaptations made in the 2020 cycle, voter suppression legislation champion by state leaders has accelerated at a pace not seen since the Jim Crow era.

Measures like dramatic limits to voting by mail, drastic cuts in early in-person voting in concreted efforts to throw out eligible voters threatening our democracy. In several states, even the act of registering to vote is, again, under attack. This decentralized yet coordinated voter suppression strategy demands that the federal government provide the type of natural protection envisioned in the Constitution’s Election Clause. No single state should be permitted to erode access to democracy for an eligible citizen.

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The violent insurrection that attempted to take the U.S. Capitol sharpened our understanding of the vulnerabilities of our democracy. Now, across the states, those who fail to win through the quality of their ideas are trying to silence the voices of those who disagree. Competition in our elections is a native good, coercion to eliminate the voice of the people is not. Congress can once again defend our nations values by passing HR 1, for the people.

Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ), House Freedom Caucus Chair, wrote in an Op-Ed Sunday that argued the Democrats have tried to introduce similar legislation every two years since they took back the house.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has introduced legislation that will facilitate the Democrats’ objective of preventing Republicans from winning elections.

The first bill Democrats sponsored in 2019, after gaining control of the House of Representatives, was HR 1. This was a bill designed to allow national Democrat politicians to take over elections. Senate Republicans, led by then-Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., submarined the bill.