Operation Eagle Eye: How It Shaped Elections and Voter Suppression

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Operation Eagle Eye was in operation until 1970
Richard Nixon hired the number two guy at the FBI to be in charge of Operation Eagle Eye
Nixon believed his defeat in 1960 was due to election theft
The Republican Party won a close election in 1968
The Republican Party credited Operation Eagle Eye for their victory
Operation Eagle Eye set the stage for the modern-day voter suppression game
There have been 360 voter suppression bills in 47 states since the 2020 election
The bills are based on the false claim of election fraud
Politicians are willing to sacrifice democracy for power
Restricting access to the ballot box undermines trust and confidence in elections

Republicans claim the election was stolen. They use those claims to justify suppressing people’s right to vote. All of it happening amid a national reckoning on race. Rachel Maddow and Isaac-Davy Aronson tell the story of a time uncannily similar to our own – in the early 1960s. And how it’s both a parallel to our present moment and the origin of conflicts playing out today.

Featuring Guests:

Rick Perlstein, historian, author of Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus

Sherrilyn Ifill, Vernon Jordan Endowed Chair in Civil Rights at Howard University and former President and Director-Counsel of LDF.

Jim Brosnahan, lawyer and author of Justice At Trial: Courtroom Battles and Groundbreaking Cases