Small Biz Applaud Passage of John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act
August 24, 2021
On the House passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (H.R. 4) today, Main Street Alliance Co-Executive Director Chanda Causer had this to say:
“Small businesses applaud the passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act in the House today, and encourage a swift passage in the Senate.
As a Black woman growing up in a family of small business owners in North Carolina, I know how important robust voting rights and an engaged community are for the health of our main streets. Everyone’s voice is needed, and must be protected, to call for the investments in communities and small businesses so often on the back burner of politics.
The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (VRAA) fills a distinct and critical role in protecting the freedom to vote and ensuring elections are safe and accessible. When it comes to our elections, we all want an open and transparent process we can trust, where Americans have equal freedom to vote, whether we live in a small town or big city, or the coasts or the Midwest. Passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act will fulfill part of that promise of a democracy that works for — and includes — us all.
Along with the John Lewis VRAA, the democracy reforms in the For the People Act (H.R. 1 / S. 1) are necessary to make real progress on issues that small businesses care about, from health care to racial justice. Small donor matching, modeled after successful systems in cities and states across the country, will reduce the influence of special interests and empower regular Americans to have a meaningful voice in their democracy. What’s more, small donor financing is fully paid for by penalties levied on corporate lawbreakers and wealthy tax cheats - the same powerful interests who have used their lobbying to get around paying their fair share for decades.
It’s now time for the Senate to pass and sign into law both the VRAA and the bold and common sense reforms in the For the People Act to heal our country and build a more just, fair and inclusive democratic society. We need lasting, structural change to reassure small businesses that our democracy is healthy, so we can get to the business of resilient economic recovery. We won’t have one without the other.”