AFPI Statement: Dr. Alveda King & Ambassador Ken Blackwell on Biden-Harris Speech Regarding the Freedom to Cheat Act

President Biden’s and Vice President Harris’s speech in Atlanta today was an insult to all Americans, especially those in the African American community. We were deeply involved in the wars that started and ended the Civil Rights movement in this country. The President and Vice President’s misguided insistence on the ignorant, false claim that America is somehow stuck in the 1960s is disgusting, dangerous, and an affront to all the sacrifices and great successes this country’s brave Civil Rights pioneers made.

In fact, it is grotesquely offensive to compare segregated lunch counters, attack dogs, firehoses, and Bull Connor, to showing a photo ID to vote. Simply proving you are who you say you are to cast a ballot is fundamental to election security. Period. Eighty-five percent of Americans agree and want photo identification requirements for voters.

Nearly 6 decades ago, we fought to ensure every single vote cast in an election is equal — that no vote counts more than another. We won that fight.

What the President and Vice President proposed today would destroy that right. Their Freedom to Cheat Act would bust the door wide open to corruption, fraud, and abuse in our elections by dismantling the guardrails already in place that protect every legal vote of every legal voter.

President Biden and Vice President Harris claim they want to defend the Constitution but then ignore our founding document’s clear language that gives state legislatures the rights and responsibilities to decide how they conduct elections. Do you really think the same inept federal government that left Americans stranded in Afghanistan, completely botched the COVID response, cannot secure our border, and raised the costs of food and gas is the same government that should run your elections?

This Administration’s insulting publicity stunt seeks to divide this nation on racial lines when what we need is leadership that respects the human dignity of all. The Freedom to Cheat Act is a plague on this country and no amount Biden and Harris’ blatant lies, half-truths and hyperbole will change that.