The Christian Right has long openly pursued suppression of rival voters

Evidence

Just months before the 1980 election, Paul Weyrich, cofounder of the American Legislative Exchange Council and the Moral Majority, spoke at a Dallas conference to an audience that included evangelical leaders such as Tim LaHaye, Pat Robertson, James Robison, and W. A. Criswell, as well as GOP presidential candidate Ronald Reagan. Weyrich told his audience, “Now many of our Christians have what I call the ‘goo-goo syndrome.’ Good government. They want everybody to vote. I don’t want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people. They never have been from the beginning of our country, and they are not now.” He went on, explaining: “As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.” — Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross, 311

Categorization

• CANDY: Weyrich naming the entire strategy to Reagan and evangelical leaders in 1980 — ‘our leverage goes up as the voting populace goes down’ — is a quotable shock.
• XREF: connects to: Christian conservatives now justify discrimination via rights language rather than morality — Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross: White Christian…, 292; White Christian nationalism treats voting as a right limited to worthy groups — Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross: White Christian…, 313; Christian TV hosts invoke Iran-style persecution threats to drive voter turnout. — Katherine Stewart, The Power Worshippers: Inside the…, 717 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• White Christian nationalism treats voting as a right limited to worthy groups #exemplifies (0.85) — Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross, 313