shameless hypocrite. as covid-relief benefits roll out, you will find republicans trying to take credit for something they, all, voted against. velshi, starts now. good morning, i m ali velshi. it s saturday, march 13th. just over 50 days have passed since joe biden was inaugurated as president of the united states. and now, he has successfully ushered, through congress, his most pressing priority. his $1.9 trillion american-rescue plan. the president promised, help is on the way. and today, help has arrived. help has arrived, for the workers who lost their jobs. help has arrived, for the students, who have been stuck at home. help has arrived, for the families that have struggled to put food on their table. and for the small businesses, that have struggled to keep their doors open, help has arrived, america. for the first time, in a long time, this bill puts working people, in this nation, first. it s not hyperbole. it s a fact. it is, indeed, a fact. and for tangi
require paper backups in future elections. so, that s part of the issue. elections in america even what you think of as national elections are not necessarily national. they re just a lot of local elections. they re complicated. joining us to discuss this, wendy wiser, director of democracy program at nyu. thank you for being here. walk us through this. the state that is don t have paper backups, what do they do to protect the vote? we have actually had a lot of redundant systems in place, regardless of what system you re voting on to secure the vote. good thing. we have increased the security. probably the biggest security that we have is our decentralized election system. which means you can t hack one thing. cannot one thing. you have to hack a lot of systems. not just the 50 different states. 10,000 different jurisdictions in the country, typically at the
$380 million appropriated to shore up our election security. that was a major step forward. this needs to be a priority for the next congress. it needs to take place in 2019 so the systems will be in place for the 2020 election. there s a much more higher risk there will be lots of actors trying to compromise the system and congress has not been able the get a lot of jobs done. this is an important one for congress to get done. wendy, thank you. you made me feel a bit better about it. definitely a little bit smarter. definitely. i feel a lot smarter after that. the midterms are not only about people, they re about important issues like health care. just more reasons why we vote. that is next. first today s monumental american, someone who made the ultimate sacrifice to help others vote.
and immobilizing vote arers. absolutely. people are bushing back. there is a lot of anger at the new voting restrictions being put in place. we are seeing voters show up at the ballot box. not just waiting in line for five, seven hourses to vote. but voting against new voting restrictions when they are put forward at the ballot box. this is something we think will have a significant backfiring effect. courts are also pushing back. that s a silver lining here. the courts are rule aring in favor of voters here. we hope there will be more improvement before the 2014 election. we ll be on this. i m going on tour around the country, particularly these state this is summer to really show this all ovr the country as we tour with civil rights groups around this country. freedom summer 2014. jamal simmons and wendy wiser, thank you for your time tonight. thank you. coming up mississippi
have led to fraud convictions. voter fraud is a flat out myth. the laws are a solution to a problem that simply does not exist. and we can t and won t let them roll back our rights. joining me now is wendy wiser of the brennan center, the lead author of that new report the state of voting in 2014. and democratic strategist jamal simmons. thanks for being here. thank you. wendy, your report found seven states where african-american turnout was highest in 2008 are rolling back voting rights. what was your analysis of why this is happening? we have seen start thing in 2010 a real significant move in states across the country to cut back and race is a significant factor explaining where and why it happens.