I imagine Gov. Abbott's goal is that because he knows that Covid affects minorities and lower income people more than the wealthy, by actively discouraging mask wearing, more people who are likely to vote against him are going to be unable to vote. It seems the Conservative platform is us vs. them, so the fewer of the them there are, the better.
That has seemed to be the thinking in some quarters the last year or so. At least some Republicans are realizing that a fairly large segment of the people refusing to get the vaccine now are likely Republican voters, so they are doing a 180 on the anti-vax rhetoric.
Bill Maher had a discussion about the people refusing to get the vaccine on his show Friday. They grouped the resisters into three groups: people of color skeptical of any "cure" coming from white people due to past lies, the super organic crowd who were the original anti-vaxxers in general, and a segment of the right who believed the political lies.
It looks like the first two groups are changing. There is a lot of out reach going in the minority communities where resistance is high and they are making progress convincing people that they are safe and this isn't a trick. There is some weakening of the anti-vax lefties too, possibly in part because they find themselves in the same camp with people of the opposite political ideals.
The biggest hold out group is the people who are believing the political lies. So the wiser Republicans are realizing that they need to change their tune because while the people who actually die will be small, the people who get seriously ill and survive along with their friends and families might decide they don't want to vote for the people who made them sick anymore.
You are really betting on a ~1% fatality rate among a voting population to swing an election? It's not like this thing has the fatality rate of Ebola.
There are elections where the margins have been that thin, but it is crazy thinking.
Earlier in the pandemic people who were more likely to vote Democrat than Republican were among those deemed essential workers who had to go to a job that put them in more danger (food production, other critical supply production, critical retail workers, delivery people, etc.) People who were more likely to vote Republican were less likely to have to be exposed to the virus. Most white collar workers were able to work from home and a lot of other right leaning blue collar people didn't work in critical industries that needed to keep going. So there seemed to be some indifference from at least some right leaning politicians to the plight of people who weren't likely to vote for them.
I know personal freedom is a meme among that crowd. Personally I'm a pretty big social libertarian as long as someone is not harming others or putting someone else at risk. In a deadly pandemic, everyone is a potential risk to everyone else. It sucks, but it's reality.
