Colleen
@lasseire.bsky.social
388 followers 493 following 60 posts
Blue dot in a red county in a blue state in a fascist country. Mom of humans & dogs, cancer warrior, proud liberal | she/her | 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️🍀❄️
Blue dot in a red county in a blue state in a fascist country. Mom of humans & dogs, cancer warrior, proud liberal | she/her | 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️🍀❄️
![Sen. Schuyler VanValkenburg, possibly the most passionate SUPPORTER of the redistricting amendment among Democrats in the General Assembly, did an excellent job explaining why he's voting for HJ6007 - it's not repealing the redistricting commission, and more to the point, "today we are taking a truly proportional response to an extreme situation - the current outbreak of opportunistic, mid-decade redistricting means that we are in a truly unprecedented, constitutional norm-breaking time...we've never had a president threaten and strong arm state governors and legislators for changes to their states' maps for partisan gains - never, that's a fact, never! Yet that's exactly what we are seeing now - because of Trump's jawboning...the reason is because quote, he's 'entitled' to those seats...But what's really going on here is fear...of facing voters; the president knows that if 2026 is a fair fight, Republicans will lose seats, and he will face a legislative branch willing to stand up to him and check his power. Those are facts. That is why we're here. Because [President Trump] is trying to avoid accountability and avoid the voters. And so Virginia Democrats are responding proportionately. We're not trying to end the practice of fair maps. We are asking the voters if, in this one limited case, they want to assure that a constitutional norm-busting president can't rig the entire national election by twisting the arms of a few state legislatures which haven't reformed their process like we have...I think what my friends on the other side of the aisle are really afraid of is that the voters are going to agree with us. For all this talk about the will of the voters, I feel pretty confident that if this thing goes to [the voters], they're going to pass it...and Donald Trump WILL have to face the music in 2026....This resolution is a break-glass maneuver for a truly unpredecented moment...[but] we're still circling the drain with Donald Trump and the MAGA movement..."](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:mlan7kocyn37uzb25btjt2cc/bafkreibs5xhdw4mrqtho3pwf56vjhslmnt62psj4q2xmxctcficknrzasq)
