Media Contact:
Jordan Baker
jbaker@frac.org
202-640-1118
Statement attributable to Luis Guardia, President, Food Research & Action Center (FRAC)
WASHINGTON, April 1, 2021 — The Food Research & Action Center (FRAC) commends Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for their leadership on the For the People Act of 2021 (S 1) and urges the Senate to pass this transformational legislation.
The For the People Act returns power to the people by protecting and strengthening voting rights, ending the dominance of big money in politics, ending extreme partisan gerrymandering, and putting in place ethics reforms, among many other voting and election reforms.
This legislation will dismantle obstacles to voting and outright voter suppression efforts – including those caused by the lingering harms of Jim Crow laws and more recent waves of draconian state proposals – and enshrine protections essential to a just democracy. Alarmingly, just this week, Georgia passed an omnibus bill replete with burdensome obstacles to voting, even making it a misdemeanor for offering food and water to voters waiting in line to vote.
Each year tens of millions of people of all genders, races, and ethnicities experience hunger and poverty, regardless of political beliefs or occupations. Many of these same people are kept out on the opportunity to fully participate in the democratic process. Eligible people in households with low incomes are registered to vote at much lower rates than those in high-income households.
When eligible people are missing from the process, our democracy is harmed and our ability to fight hunger is harmed. We must ensure the voices of those struggling against hunger are fully represented in the democratic process so that elected officials are held accountable to address hunger and poverty in this country.
As a nation, we must act now to ensure that every eligible person, regardless of income, regardless of race, and regardless of the state in which they live is able to engage in the democratic process. We urge the Senate to pass the For the People Act.
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For 50 years, the Food Research & Action Center has been the leading national nonprofit organization working to eradicate poverty-related hunger and undernutrition in the United States. To learn more, visit FRAC.org and follow us on Twitter and on Facebook.
