What would happen if—as former President Donald Trump's running mate Sen. JD Vance has suggested—parents of minors actually got more votes than other people?
That's a question my colleague Michael Mechanic tried to answer in his new piece about Vance's so-called thought experiment, one of Vance's many statements that have recently garnered controversy for appearing to privilege Americans with kids over those without. And as Michael writes, when you actually do this thought experiment, you get some interesting results. Long story short: It'd probably be great for Democrats! That's mainly because they're the party typically favored by the majority of nonwhite voters, and, as Michael writes, "America’s youth, and their parents, are more ethnically diverse than the broader population."
But there are many questions that would have to be answered before this (likely unconstitutional) "thought experiment" could ever become reality. Michael posed a few in his piece:
Who gets the extra votes if there’s an odd number of kids and/or the parents are estranged or have opposing views? Who votes on behalf of stepkids—do they count? Adoptees? How about kids living with their grandparents? Noncitizen parents? Parents with green cards? Could undocumented parents vote on behalf of US-born offspring? And how would you verify all of it?
And think about it: Would Republicans, the party of minority rule, actually be willing to answer those questions? It's doubtful. As William H. Frey, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and census expert, told Michael, "They accuse everybody of voter fraud if they just do normal voting. What happens if they do this kind of thing?"
Great question. Make sure to check out Michael's full piece to run Vance's "thought experiment" yourself.
—Julianne McShane
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