04-05-2021, 10:49 AM
![[Image: 210331095337-georgia-capitol-protest-032...us-169.jpg]](https://cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/210331095337-georgia-capitol-protest-0325-medium-plus-169.jpg)
(CNN)On April 4, 1968, a White gunman shot and killed Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. More than 50 years later, the fight he waged to ensure Black Americans had equal access to vote is still very much alive.
We are now seeing a wave of voter suppression measures championed by Republican elected officials, with the Brennan Center for Justice reporting that 361 restrictive bills have been introduced in 47 states. The most notable (for now, at least) are in Georgia and Texas. Let's not pretend that race is not part of this GOP effort. As King pointedly declared at the conclusion of the 1965 civil-rights march from Selma to Montgomery, "The roots of racism and the denial of the right to vote" were intertwined.
Then the goal was expressly about maintaining White power. Today, it's more about maintaining Republican power, but given that the GOP is overwhelmingly a White party it's not much different. Indeed, the image of GOP Governor Brian Kemp signing the Georgia voting law -- one that President Joe Biden has slammed as "Jim Crow for the 21st Century" -- appears ripped from decades ago, with Kemp flanked by six White men in front of a painting of the former slave-owning Callaway planation.
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