Progress 2025: Protecting Voting Rights and Democracy

Sep 26, 2024

For years, Donald Trump and the GOP have made wild, unsubstantiated claims about widespread voter fraud as cover for stripping people of their voting rights and engaging in voter intimidation. From Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis鈥� arresting Black voters, to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton鈥檚 on Latino civil rights activists, conservatives continue to aggressively attack voting rights.

The ultra-conservative Heritage Foundation鈥檚 Project 2025 takes this further, and promotes targeting election workers in multiple states, casts doubt on the legitimacy of mail-in ballots, and continues the right wing鈥檚 decades-long quest to undo the civil rights movement鈥檚 voting gains, including eliminating the Department of Justice鈥檚 Civil Rights Division, which has been at the forefront of bringing lawsuits against counties and states that violate voting rights statutes.

What would a progressive vision of voting rights look like instead? As part of a new initiative at 大象传媒 called , Cliff Albright, cofounder of , answers that question in conversation with 大象传媒 Senior Editor Sonali Kolhatkar on 大象传媒 Presents: Rising Up With Sonali.

Sonali Kolhatkar joined 大象传媒 in summer 2021, building on a long and decorated career in broadcast and print journalism. She is an award-winning multimedia journalist, and host and creator of聽大象传媒 Presents: Rising Up with Sonali, a nationally syndicated television and radio program airing on Free Speech TV and dozens of independent and community radio stations. She is also Senior Correspondent with the Independent Media Institute鈥檚 Economy for All project where she writes a weekly column. She is the author of聽Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice聽(2023) and聽Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence聽(2005). Her forthcoming book is called聽Talking About Abolition聽(Seven Stories Press, 2025). Sonali is co-director of the nonprofit group, Afghan Women鈥檚 Mission which she helped to co-found in 2000. She has a Master鈥檚 in Astronomy from the University of Hawai鈥檌, and two undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin. Sonali reflects on 鈥淢y Journey From Astrophysicist to Radio Host鈥� in her 2014聽聽of the same name.