While the Democrats have been feckless in fighting the Republicans’ assault on democracy, they have been aggressive in carrying out their own assault on democratic elections by suppressing third parties. Ballot access is a voting rights issue. Voters should have the right to vote for who they want once they have their ballots.Suppressing third parties suppresses the vote of third party supporters. Third parties bring more voters out. We know from 2016 exit polls that 61% of Green presidential candidate Jill Stein’s voters and 55% of Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson’s voters would not have voted if they had not been on the ballot. That was 3.4 million voters in 2016. Party suppression is a form of voter suppression. It is what authoritarian governments do. It is what the Democratic Party is doing in the U.S.
