Piece in Guardian - US Republicans want to repeal Amendment 19 giving women the vote.

[Treaclewell]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/04/women-right-to-vote-disenfranchisement

Land of the free?
Gobsmacked.
Though I think they might have a problem with getting enough turkeys voting for Thanksgiving.

My loose understanding is that the legal theory that will be advance is that "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" doesn't apply to illegal immigrants. Or indeed anyone who cannot prove their parents citizenship regardless of where they were born.

No doubt inspired by the success of the UK Home Office in managing to deport several people born in the UK to UK citizens after the Home Office burned all the records of the parents documented citizenship in the waiting-for-ITV drama series (and long running West End musical) "Windrush !"

I'll end by saying it matters not a jot what you think. Nor what I think. It matters only how SCOTUS choose to interpret the arguments put before them. And the fact they have elected to hear the case, rather than simply allow the lower courts ruling to stand should be a clear enough signal they think they have something to say here. Which probably isn't good news for some.

(Some) Americans are amusingly in awe of the pieces of paper the founding fathers cobbled together to ensure the riff raff stayed in place. Apart from being a really sore break up letter to George III, it's a marvel of avoiding what it actually claims to be. And by duping a large number of like minded tax dodgers it really guaranteed there would be a civil war the like of which the world had never seen was going to happen.

Is one view.

Yes and by your logic that means that every and all rights are under threat. And now you're seriously arguing that the GOP wants to reinstate slavery? Dude, you just need to take your fear mongering propaganda back to your reddit echo chamber where people are far far dumber than they are here bc ain't nobody buying it.

The right has been attacking voting rights in a myriad of ways for years, and the left have been attacking civil and women's rights for years. It's clear the argument you're trying (and laughable failing) to make is right/GOP = bad therefore left/Dems = good. But in the past 15+ years Dems just = different type of bad. Dems didn't protect abortion when they had the chance so as to manipulativly keep their voters under threat. Dems have abandoned science and reason in favor of extreme ideology just as GOP does in favor or religion. Dems threw women under the bus to appeal to men and their fundamentalist fringe just as GOP does, just in a different way. Dems have done just as much to strip women's rights, safety, and dignity as GOP.

You're lying when you imply that the GOP as a whole want to strip women's voting rights - they don't. You're not lying when you say GOP want to undermine the electoral process and democracy as a whole in order to keep their party in power. They clearly do. But Dems did the same thing when they undermined Bernie's campaign and refused to codify abortion rights. There are plenty of blue states that are just as gerrymandered as red states. TRAs and other far-left fundamentalists have had a taste of what it's like to control their party just as GOP's far right has done for decades. And because of this everyone has lost.

Long story short, GOP sucks but voting Dem in the last 15+ years hasn't helped to secure our rights in the slightest. THIRD PARTY NOW!!!

https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/supreme-court-trump-end-birthright-citizenship

My loose understanding is that the legal theory that will be advance is that "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" doesn't apply to illegal immigrants. Or indeed anyone who cannot prove their parents citizenship regardless of where they were born.

If you are physically in a territory, you are subject to its jurisdiction. The notable exception to this principle is people from another state who have diplomatic immunity. If doesn't matter if you are in the US on holiday, illegally, or to work: unless you have diplomatic immunity, you are under US jurisdiction whilst on their soil. If SCOTUS don't accept that, there's a woman called Louise Woodward whose conviction should be quashed.

Someone provably born in the US has provable birthright US citizenship, end of. Likewise, British-born children born until the end of 31st December 1983 have UK citizenship. It's people born after that who need to prove British descent.

Take it up with SCOTUS, not me. They are the ones who appear to think there something in that view. Not me. I think it's pretty clear and unambiguous. However I also think the US will not recover from the spiral it has chosen until there is another civil war when the red states realise they have been fucked over so royally, they have no option but to fight. Almost a rerun of 1859. Only (you'd hope) with better uniforms.

E2A: This floated past my feed:

The team in the White House thinks the slavers should have won the civil war
.
John Roberts is gonna rule the 14th amendment unconstitutional since the defeated slave states were not allowed representation unless they approved it.

The NYT is worse than the Guardian nowadays unfortunately.

I notice that right wingers produce more women leaders than the left side..

I read something recently that said this happens because the people who can't stomach a woman in charge are usually the people who are very conservative. So they will always vote against a left or centre left party with a woman in charge, but if there's a woman fronting the conservative option they have to choose between their misogyny and other elements of their position. The suggestion was that if and when the US gets around to having a female leader, it will be a Republican first.

She's citing a couple of fringe youtubers. No republican politician is calling to repeal women's,voting rights. Alarmist nonsense.

How does that work given the left parties often haven't had women as leaders at all? The choice wasn't Thatcher vs a female Labour leader, was it?

And if the conservative parties are so full of sexists why do they get a woman as head of their own party?

Personally I think many left parties are hampered by promoting minority candidates and women based on their sex/race/etc. Margaret Thatcher got where she did because she was herself and difficult to withstand for anyone, not because she was a woman.

They can always make the argument about birthright citizenship in the courts. I'd doubt they'd win.

If they could get enough to agree they could amend it, which in that case almost seems more likely to me. Birthright citizenship is unusual worldwide and the US would not be the first to change it for similar reasons. It's not the only reasonable model and I find it odd that people freak out like it is evil when most of Europe doesn't operate that way.

They can always make the argument about birthright citizenship in the courts. I'd doubt they'd win.

They are making the argument in the courts.

I just drew a voting outcomes table for that, which I will summarise as a list, and it makes sense if you think of it as a reason why the left parties would never choose a female leader, rather than as a reason why a right party might consider one.

The way that you framed your questioning of this phenomenon starts from an assumption that leaders are male by default and people need a convincing reason to choose a woman. If you instead start from the assumption that leaders can be of either sex, you are instead searching for a convincing reason to exclude women.

• In a Left woman versus Right woman contest, the sexist Right voter will vote Right, because neither option satisfies his sexism and the Right option satisifies his politics.
• In a Left man versus Right man contest, the sexist Right voter will vote Right, because both options satisfy his sexism and the Right option satisifies his politics.
• In a Left woman versus Right man contest, the sexist Right voter will vote Right, because the Right option satisfies both his sexism and his politics.
• In a Left man versus Right woman contest, the sexist Right voter may vote Left to satisfy his sexism at the cost of his politics, or may vote Right to satisfy his politics at the cost of his sexism.

By contrast, a Left voter ought to vote Left, no matter the sex of the party leaders

The hypothesis is basically that leftist parties covertly want rightist misogynists to vote for them as a vote maximisation strategy, trusting that their own voters won't defect on the basis of sex. I suspect that the hypothesis is incorrect because rightist parties don't shun female leaders to stave off this defection threat. You might argue that, possibly, they don't recognise the threat. I would suggest the "glass cliff" effect as an alternative possible explanation, thinking of the circumstances of recent Tory female leadership selections, but apparently that's been debunked.

I suspect that your implied suggestion, that leftist party members are wary of anyone they perceive to be a "DEI hire" (to borrow a phrase from the USA, e.g. someone elected via all-women shortlists or reserved shortlist places) and so don't vote for anyone who is even suspected of being a "DEI hire", ruling out anyone who isn't a white able-bodied man. I believe this perverse incentive to vote against women and minorities at leadership level is an example of "unintended consequences".

No, I didn't start from the assumption that leaders are male by default. I am not sure where you get that idea, I didn't say so, and it's not implied by what I said.

It is true that Labour members could be afraid to vote in a female leader if they thought the person would be unelectable when the general public came to vote. I don't in fact see any evidence to indicate that is the case, but it is possible. In general they seem to be very ready to have leaders, candidates, and policies that are unpalatable to the electorate, if they feel they are right on.

I also am not really suggesting that the Labour members are wary of a "DEI" candidate, my suggestion was more that people of lesser ability can use that avenue in the LP to get ahead, the less compelling they as individuals will be as leadership candidates compared to those who get there because they are really accomplished. However - I don't think that's the only issue at work with this, and perhaps not the most important one.

But overall it seems to me that you are going to a lot of effort to explain how the Conservatives have any number of female, and now even several non-white leaders, while still being racists and sexists. Rather than the simpler, much more obvious, explanation that they don't mind women or black or Asian leaders, and they have female, black, and Asian members to stand as leaders, because they aren't sexists or racists.

But overall it seems to me that you are going to a lot of effort to explain how the Conservatives have any number of female, and now even several non-white leaders, while still being racists and sexists. Rather than the simpler, much more obvious, explanation that they don't mind women or black or Asian leaders, and they have female, black, and Asian members to stand as leaders, because they aren't sexists or racists.
Great response.

Rather than the simpler, much more obvious, explanation that they don't mind women or black or Asian leaders, and they have female, black, and Asian members to stand as leaders, because they aren't sexists or racists.

I don't think having black or Asian leaders automatically absolves the Tories of any charges of racism or sexism. Would you also say the same about Reform? Of course, Labour are no better.

my suggestion was more that people of lesser ability can use that avenue in the LP to get ahead, the less compelling they as individuals will be as leadership candidates compared to those who get there because they are really accomplished

When Party A has x% of it's female MPs elected from AWS, do the party members scrutinise each female leadership candidate to see whether they came from AWS or not? Or are all the female candidates deemed suspect because AWS exists? I suspect the latter.

The great irony is that AWS MPs are more effective in Parliament than both their female and male open shortlist counterparts, so the perception of them as "less compelling" is rooted in bias, not facts.

But overall it seems to me that you are going to a lot of effort to explain how the Conservatives have any number of female, and now even several non-white leaders, while still being racists and sexists.

Read what I said again, in the context of the posts I was replying to, and consider that most Tory voters are not Tory party members.

Pete Hegseth has clarified that he does support women’s right to vote.

Peter Theil Following significant criticism, he clarified his position:

• He stated it would be "absurd to suggest that women's votes will be taken away".
• He added, "While I don't think any class of people should be disenfranchised, I have little hope that voting will make things better".

How do you think elections work? People have a choice and if they feel the left is turning into an authoritarian dictatorship destroying freedom of speech, tracking everyone, imposing harmful absurd ideologies, putting in place two tier justice systems, removing jury trials and encouraging the vulnerable to kill themselves, then they may decide to vote for another party.

You're coming across as quite patronizing.

And you are going to considerable lengths to explain something that doesn't require any special explanation. For some reason you feel this need to hold on to the idea that Caoservative Party members are sexists. Despite the fact that they seem happy to vote in female leaders.

Why the need to hold on to an interpretation that you are having to create complicated theories to maintain? Why not just consider that maybe Conservatives are not particularly more likely to be sexists than anyone else?

I was explaining the likely mechanism underpinning someone else's hypothesis. I have not at any point said that I endorse the hypothesis.

As a reminder, the hypothesis was: I read something recently that said this happens because the people who can't stomach a woman in charge are usually the people who are very conservative. So they will always vote against a left or centre left party with a woman in charge, but if there's a woman fronting the conservative option they have to choose between their misogyny and other elements of their position.

I was positing an explanation as to why.

For some reason you feel this need to hold on to the idea that Caoservative Party members are sexists. Despite the fact that they seem happy to vote in female leaders.

My point is not that Tory party members are sexist, but that Tory voters might be. If any party members are sexist under this hypothesis, it's Labour's, because they will spurn female leadership candidates to woo fickle sexist voters.

Please find where I have called Tory party members sexist. I'll wait.

As you correctly observe, the evidence of their leadership elections indicates that they are not.

You're coming across as quite patronizing.

I'm autistic, so I have very little insight into how others perceive me. When I was younger, I burnt myself out and got suicidal worrying about what others thought of my tone. I'm now of the view of IDGAF.

This is an interesting point so I couldn't help replying late : I partly agree re Fred Phelps but he really was a fringe weirdo. There were lots of evangelical Christian opponents who were really vipuerative and hateful in their language & arguments without being as extreme as Phelps : Jerry Falwell, Scott Lively & many others who were platformed in mainstream evangelical media.

I think this is different from more secular (or in Frum's case , Jewish - Jews have never tended to get as hysterical over homosexuality as evangelicals, even if they disapprove) opponents: and Frum himself came round to supporting in the end, after all.