Elie Mystal, the man dubbed Mad Scientist Fat Albert in 2019 by the great Varad Mehta, joined MSNBC’s Morning Joe on Monday by plug his new book Bad Law: Ten Popular Laws That Are Ruining America with one of them a comically predictable antidote to fixing our republic: axing all voter registration laws.
“[W]e could eliminate all voter registration laws. See, when Democrats get in charge, we try to protect voting rights. We don’t make voting easier. Now, I’m all for voter eligibility requirements. I might — we might disagree about what those requirements should be, but, you know, I’m going to say that like there should be an age limit to vote,” he explained to co-host Mika Brzezinski.
He then added we only have laws to begin with because....racism:
So, we’re going to agree that there should be voter eligibility requirements. But once you’re eligible. Why do you have to pre-register? Why — why is that even a thing? It wasn’t a thing in this country at the Founding. We didn’t have voter pre-registration in 1787. We didn’t have voter pre-registration in 1821. We only started having voter registration, generally speaking, after the Civil War. Why do you think that is? It’s because a bunch of freed African slaves were migrating up north, and all of a sudden New York was like, we need some registration up in here, right?
In fairness, he also suggested xenophobia was afoot because it harmed European immigrants around the same time.
“[W]e don’t have to protect voting rights. We have to expand voting rights so that the 90 million people that sat on the couch and sat out this last election between democracy and fascism...they have a little bit of an easier time to get up off the couch,” he continued.
Rewinding to the beginning of the interview, co-host Mika Brzezinski made sure to tell him live “I think it’s fair to point out that you’re not saying don’t follow the law,” to which he insisted “I’m not saying don’t follow the law” since “I’m black and I — and I know that that doesn’t always work out very well for us.”
Mystal led into his voter registration issue by saying it was time “somebody on my side of the aisle has to start writing Project 2029” and a “positive agenda for the Democratic Party” and not “another Orange Man Bad book” or enabling the posture of the party to remain “in a fetal position” or “defensive posture.”
The Nation correspondent also delivered a side of sneering at black Republicans:
One of the things that you know in our community is that when you talk to nonvoters, I’m not talking about talking about black Republicans. You can get Byron Donalds up here and he’ll tell you whatever you want to hear. When you talk to people in our community that are not voting, what they will tell you is that it doesn’t seem like it matters. Nothing changes no matter who no matter who gets elected...If we elected better leaders, more focused leaders, leaders committed to our communities, these are the laws that would change and would improve your life tomorrow.
Three other topics were covered (albeit two briefly). One was an unsurprising pick: “I have a whole chapter about felony murder. I have a whole chapter about stand your ground. These are two of the most racist laws that we have on our books that lead to the over-incarceration of people in our community.”
His third concerned the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1921, arguing such a law would be no good since, in his telling of history, it has Nazi roots. Also, take note of how he described the arrest of pro-Hamas Columbia University grad Mahmoud Khalil as an “abduction” (click “expand”):
So, I go really hard on immigration. People who are following the tragedy and the abduction of Mahmoud Khalil have — have recently become aware that the 1921 Immigration and Nationality Act allows Marco Rubio to pull people’s green cards by fiat, just because he says so. Well, in this book, I talk about how the 1921 immigration nationality act is one of the worst laws in the country. That was made based on the testimony and science of a Nazi eugenicist and when I say a Nazi eugenicist, I mean he’s an American eugenicist that did so well, the Nazis was like, bring them over here. We’re going to give them a medal at the University of Heidelberg in 1935. But in 1921, he helped Congress write the Immigration and Nationality Act, which remains one of the most racist laws in our country. That is something that we could change tomorrow that would not only free people like Mahmoud Khalil, but completely reform and reimagine our immigration process.
To see the relevant MSNBC transcript from March 24, click here.
