U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN-09) complained this week about the U.S. Electoral College, one week before next week’s presidential election.
Cohen, on Twitter, said the Electoral College causes low voter turnout and called to abolish it.
“People say we need the Electoral College because it prevents big states from overpowering small#rural communities. The 2020 election proves that’s just not true. Almost all campaign activities are centered in just six states with significant rural populations,” Cohen wrote.
The EC doesn’t privilege urban centers—it arbitrarily heightens the votes of #SwingStates. This means candidates don’t take time to visit the MAJORITY of communities.
No wonder half the country doesn’t vote. No wonder ppl feel their voice doesn’t count. This is NOT democracy. 3
— Steve Cohen (@RepCohen) October 23, 2020
Cohen also said that the Electoral College “doesn’t privilege urban centers — it arbitrarily heightens the votes of #SwingStates.”
“This means candidates don’t take time to visit the MAJORITY of communities. No wonder half the country doesn’t vote,” Cohen wrote.
“No wonder pple feel their voice doesn’t count. This is NOT democracy.”
As The Tennessee Star reported last year, Cohen said our nation’s Electoral College was “conceived in sin” and invented to keep black people down.
In a separate article at the time, Breitbart quoted Cohen as saying “the country is different than it was when the Constitution was drafted.”
“When the Constitution was drafted, a lot of it had to do with slavery. The slave states wanted equal representation in the Senate because they wanted to keep slavery. The slave states wanted to have an Electoral College where the members that they had in Congress counted towards the vote for president, where the slaves counted as two-thirds and in the popular vote they would count as zero,” Cohen reportedly said.
“So the slave states didn’t want a popular election because their slaves wouldn’t count toward voting and the slave states would have less votes. This is all conceived in sin and perpetuating slavery on the American people and on the African-American people directly.”
Also as The Star reported last year, Cohen, a senior member of the House Judiciary Committee, has introduced a bill to eliminate the Electoral College used to select U.S. presidents.
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Image “Rep Steve Cohen” by C-Span.org.
One can search our founders’ quotes on democracy and see that they despised and disdained it as a form of government. So Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution states that the “United States SHALL guarantee to every State in this a republican form if government…” Part of that is that the States elect the President in 50 separate elections in a representative way. The States established the Federal Government and delegated its powers so the chief executive is elected by them, free States and their free People. The vote of each citizen also has a greater effect in that system.
Just another instance proving that the Founding Fathers were a lot smarter than Cohen. No insult intended to the Founding Fathers in comparing them to him.
I realize Speaker Sexton is an approachable guest for your show, but would you please ask him why he led an attempt to make Tennessee one of the first states to do away with the electoral college? Of Cohen thinks it’s terrible and Republican leadership this it’s terrible, maybe we should look at it?
YES!! Please, someone, ask TN House Speaker Cameron Sexton WHY he led an attempt to give away Tennessee’s 11 electoral college votes to the candidate with the most popular votes!
He’s a banker. He should be able to do the math and understand why it’s the worst idea since sin.
The fact that Sexton is in agreement with Cohen on the Electoral College should explain a lot about the man.