For so many of our hard-working public servants, times like these are opportunities to serve nobly, forthrightly and honestly. In the face of the difficult circumstances that the novel coronavirus pandemic presents from a public health and economic standpoint, I commend our public servants in our communities working to connect residents and families to important resources to stay healthy, access health care when needed, begin a process to assist those who have lost jobs, and importantly, participate in our democracy. And I say this for Republicans and Democrats alike.
That said, I have no patience for the career politicians and opportunists who never let a good crisis go to waste. Thankfully, there aren’t too many among us in the state of Nevada. But be forewarned – our state has faced attacks from unscrupulous, partisan warriors, intent on using all mechanisms during this crisis to, among other things, eliminate reproductive choice for millions of women, cancel requests for political asylum at our borders, needlessly investigate and harass digital technology firms that are building resiliency for small businesses across our state, and the latest, prevent Nevadans from participating in our most sacred civic duty, voting.
Who could forget our president himself threatening that Nevada would be denied critical relief funding because we planned to enable reforms so Nevadans can participate, safely, in voting. The president’s brazen political threat to “hold up” federal funding for our state and others that enable “vote by mail” was a pure political ploy. Thankfully, Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford stood up to the president, quickly mobilizing the state’s legal resources in preparation for the president to follow through on his threats, conveying to Trump: “We’ll see you in court.”
With nearly half a million Nevadans successfully submitting mail-in ballots leading up to the primary election, our state’s leadership proved that they were willing to take the steps necessary to ensure Nevadans could safely participate in our democracy.
Unfortunately, with the help of Republicans like Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and U.S. Attorney General William Barr, this baseless attack by the president and other cronies on mail-in voting persists, among other political aggressions. Even our own Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske appears to have joined the president and his henchmen with pushing forward in-person voting during COVID-19. As captain of Trump’s cheer squad in Texas and the chief enabler of the president’s political retributions, Paxton and Barr have been emboldened like never before, advancing a conservative agenda to the detriment of civil – and human – rights. It’s unfortunate Cegavske has joined this venerable crew of political opportunists.
It all started at the onset of the pandemic, when Texas Gov. Greg Abbot moved forward with his selective shutdowns in the state, which sadly included health care clinics providing family planning and reproductive health.
Paxton moved aggressively and swiftly in the courts to defend this decision.
And despite the remarkable efforts by businesses of all sizes to scale and change their modes of product delivery, remote work arrangements, customer experience and digital resiliency, Paxton has continued to lead a partisan investigation at the state level of the top technology companies, mirrored by federal efforts led by Barr. Both of whom are now being encouraged by our own president on this topic, believing that companies such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google, who is poised to dramatically grow its presence here in Nevada, are run by the “radical left.” Trump and his cronies like Ken Paxton and Bill Barr stop at absolutely nothing, including a pandemic ravaging our economy.
Ford was right to defend our state’s right to safely determine our own election procedures – cogent leadership is required right now, not partisan broadsides, empty threats and ill-advised investigations and lawsuits that distract us from protecting our communities, supporting our business owners, and ensuring safe participation in our democracy. And with Ford now thrust into the national spotlight, we know he will continue to take an equally forceful stance against the laundry list of transgressions emanating from the Trump administration through shameless vectors like Ken Paxton and Bill Barr.
April Mastroluca twice served as a Nevada legislator.