Democracy 21

09/11/2025

This week from Fred Wertheimer: "It is unlikely that any Chief Justice in history played more of a role in destroying more of our nation’s democracy than Roberts. And that is how he will be remembered."

Chief Justice John Roberts is smart and skilled. He will be remembered, however, as a historic failure. This is not a claim to make lightly, [...]

09/05/2025

This week from Fred Wertheimer: "What better way to celebrate the 250th anniversary of our independence next year than with a new faux king to succeed 'Mad King' George III."

The Robber Baron era of the late 19th century. The Watergate scandals of the 1970s. The soft money influence-buying scandals of the 1990s. All horrendous [...]

08/09/2025

What’s next for campaign reform? Will the Voting Rights Act survive? When can we overturn Citizens United?

08/01/2025

From Fred Wertheimer this week: "The fight for democracy reform is always hard. But that doesn’t mean we give up. On the contrary, it means we fight and continue to fight until we win. We fight because our democracy, our country, & the American people depend on it."

The Robber Baron era of the late 19th century. The Watergate scandals of the 1970s. The soft money influence-buying scandals of the 1990s. All horrendous [...]

07/30/2025

Statement from Fred Wertheimer on the introduction of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act: “What we are facing today is the greatest voter suppression effort in the United States since the Jim Crow era. And what harms one voter, harms us all.”

Statement of Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer Democracy 21 applauds the Senate introduction of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (S. 4), led [...]

07/29/2025

Fred Werthimer: “Trump is obsessed with using the presidency to vacuum up every dollar he can get his hands on. “

Gift Link:

The president’s family stands to make hundreds of millions of dollars from its cryptocurrency ventures.

07/29/2025

"This story is the material expression of the second Trump administration’s turn against a long-standing tradition of Western democracy promotion—and of an embrace of conflicts of interest from which the world’s despots can only take inspiration."

Despots and human-rights abusers can rest easy now that America has gotten out of their way.

07/25/2025

This week from Fred Wertheimer: "Trump’s vicious, vengeful, vindictive, and volatile behavior is a clear and present danger to our democracy."

“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” English politician and historian Lord Acton wrote in 1887. Almost a century and a half later, [...]

07/22/2025

From Fred Wertheimer: “The Roberts Six have done almost nothing to contain Trump’s dangerous power grabs, the Constitution and rule of law be damned.”

In 1788, James Madison wrote in The Federalist Paper, No: 47: “The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of [...]

07/18/2025

This week from Fred Wertheimer: “The Founders fought a Revolution to free us from a king and designed a government they hoped would enable future generations to defend against tyranny. It is now our turn to live up to their ideals.”

In 1788, James Madison wrote in The Federalist Paper, No: 47: “The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of [...]

07/11/2025

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has been longing to gut the Voting Right Act for years. Now he might get the chance.

U.S. Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas has long telegraphed his desire to gut crucial portions of the Voting Rights Act, and he might finally get a chance to undermine protections ensuring equal rights for Black and Hispanic voters.Thomas first laid out his objections to those protections in 199...

07/07/2025

Robert Reich‬: “Let’s be clear: DEI, antisemitism and transgender athletes are not the real reasons for these attacks on higher education. They’re excuses to give the Trump regime power over America’s colleges and universities.”

Demanding that the University of Virginia’s president resign is taken from the Viktor Orbán playbook of authoritarianism