Editorial: Vote ‘Yes’ on Proposition 50 to fight autocracy

The Nov. 4 special election has one measure on the ballot, Proposition 50, designed to neutralize the untimely redistricting expected in Texas. 

Redistricting is the redrawing of Congressional districts based on geography and population ebbs and flows.  It is supposed to be an apolitical process every 10 years coinciding with the Census. 

But this year, at President Donald Trump’s request, the Republican-led Texas legislature voted to redraw its geographic districts mid-cycle to essentially remix the state’s voting maps with the goal of creating five more Republican Congressional seats. 

Proposition 50 in California would temporarily suspend California’s apolitical redistricting process, and rejigger California’s voting maps with the goal of creating five more Democratic Congressional seats to counter Texas’s efforts.

Both processes are not specifically the most democratic approaches to electoral politics, which is why Proposition 50 would be a temporary measure.

If passed, Proposition 50, could help to preserve democracy in a larger and longer term way. 

If it leads to flipping Congress from Republican to Democratic control, it could provide a critical check on President Trump, who with the help of the current Republican Senate and Congress, is quickly and often lawlessly working to dismantle our Constitutional democracy and replace it with  autocracy. 

Regardless of your party affiliation, autocracy should not be the goal of either party, because it takes agency from all of us regardless of our values. Autocracy is neither a Democratic or Republican value.

Gen. Z – that’s us college students – has had low voter turnouts in recent years. 

Let’s turn that around because Trump’s policies – from reversing environmental and climate protections, to destroying LGBTQ+ rights, to going after immigrants, women and non-white Americans, to damaging public health – stand to hurt us for decades to come.

You can vote in person. You can vote by mail. You can vote early. You can vote provisionally if you are not registered. 

And you can vote on campus on or before Nov. 4. 

For more information on how, where and when to vote, visit registertovote.ca.gov and follow @ulv.vote.

To learn more about Proposition 50, visit lao.ca.gov

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Unsigned editorials represent the opinion of the Campus Times Editorial Board.

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