The Congressional Black Caucus is huddling to discuss its members' threat to block a must-pass defense policy bill without the inclusion of voting rights

What's happening? The Congressional Black Caucus is making a last-ditch — and very long-shot — push for voting rights legislation in the final days of Democrats’ House majority.

The Black Caucus is meeting Wednesday afternoon to discuss next steps after several of their members told Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her leadership team that they will refuse to advance a must-pass defense policy measure without securing a vote on their voting rights bill, according to multiple people familiar with the situation.

Many Black Democrats see the defense bill as their last chance to secure any voting rights advancement while their party holds all levers of power in government. But many know that even if they can muscle something through the House, their effort has slim chances of success in a 50-50 Senate.

The bill they're pushing to add, as first reported by Punchbowl News, has already been passed by the Democratic-controlled House. It would restore a key pillar of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — which requires states with histories of discriminatory voting practices to have new election laws or practices reviewed by a federal court or the Justice Department. Democrats named their bill after the late Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.).

How the chair put it: Black Caucus Chair Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) pointed to a legal dispute involving the 1965 voting rights bill that's currently before the conservative-led Supreme Court — a case, she said, that could lead to a post-Voting Rights Act nation.

It's the second case involving that bill that SCOTUS has considered this year.

"A post-VRA world means we are in 1964-58 years ago — the clock could simply just be turned backwards 7 months from now," Beatty wrote. "That is simply too high a price to pay."

This article was originally published by Politico on December 7, 2022.