Senator Raphael Warnock Says the Supreme Court Has Done 'Violence' to Democracy

[In It to Win It]

David Marchese writes: Give Raphael Warnock credit for timing. In his new book, “The Crooked Places Made Straight: Reflections on the Moral Meaning of America,” the Democratic senator from Georgia singles out voting rights as one of the country’s most pressing political and moral issues. It’s a matter that, following the Supreme Court’s recent blow to the Voting Rights Act and the resulting rush to redraw districts in the name of partisan gerrymandering, has turned for many into a full-blown crisis.

Warnock’s emphasis on the moral underpinnings of politics comes naturally. In addition to being a senator, he’s also the senior pastor at Atlanta’s famed Ebenezer Baptist Church, where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was once among his predecessors in the pulpit. Given Senator Warnock’s high standing with both the church and the state, he’s well suited to talk about another hot-button topic, which is the influence of Christianity on politics and the public sphere. He and I spoke about that, as well as about what’s behind the attack on voting rights, what certain Republicans get wrong about religion, and his own family’s story.