[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 19 (Thursday, February 28, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Page S1341]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                            ELECTION REFORM

  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I will now talk a little bit about 
election reform. Of course, that is the bill that is before us now, but 
we have not been able to move it forward in the last day and a half or 
so. Whether we will be able to or not, I do not know. No one disagrees, 
of course, with seeking to do something to make elections fair; to make 
the changes, if there need to be changes made, to make elections 
available to everyone on a free basis, an open basis, and a legal 
basis.
  I am glad the Senate has taken up this bill. I happen to believe the 
major responsibility for voting, whether it be in Florida or whether it 
be in Wyoming, lies with the State. Where there are problems with 
voting, the State election officers, it seems to me, have the primary 
responsibility to do that.
  One of the issues that has come up--not unusually, I suppose; it 
comes up in many areas such as health care, education--there is a 
difference between how you do things in New York City and Meeteetsi, 
WY. That has kind of become an interesting issue with regard to setting 
up voting standards and the requirements that need to be made for 
voting precincts. When one has a precinct that has thousands of people 
in it, that is one thing. Go to Wapiti, WY, with a precinct that may 
only have 30 to 40 people in it; that is quite different.
  When I went home last weekend, we were talking about the proposal 
initially that there had to be a paved parking lot and access for the 
disabled. Everyone wants the disabled to be able to vote, and they were 
saying sometimes we have to look hard to find a place that has a 
toilet, so we need to do something about that.
  I have talked with the chairman, and certainly we could, I think, 
come to some kind of an agreement. This bill currently requires each 
polling place to have a machine that is adaptable for ADA. I am a great 
supporter of ADA, as a matter of fact, and have worked very hard on 
that, but I think we have to be realistic about how it is dealt with. 
We have curbside voting, for example. We can do that for people who are 
disabled. We have these certain kinds of machines in every county seat, 
but to require that in some 400 rural polling places, as we have in 
Wyoming, would be extremely difficult. Even though the return sometimes 
is, ``Well, the Government is going to pay for it,'' regardless of who 
pays for it, some of it is not good use of taxpayer dollars.

  I do not know exactly how it will end up. Perhaps we will not be 
having a bill if we cannot move it any more than we have. Perhaps we 
can continue to talk to the chairman, who seems to be receptive, 
knowing there are differences in how it is dealt with in one place or 
another.
  I do want to say we have talked with the elected officials in 
Wyoming. As I said, our voting has been very satisfactory. We have a 
good many registered voters. We had more voters last time than we had 
registered before the election who came in and could register on 
election day. It is really quite simple.
  We are concerned, if we were required to have very complicated 
machines in every polling place, that that would not be appropriate. 
Instead, if we could offer the flexibility to where they could make 
proposals as to how to deal with voting for disabled and other voters, 
those could be viewed, and if they were acceptable, then they could do 
it the way they wanted to do it in that community.
  In any event, I do not know whether we will have an amendment. If 
that becomes necessary--or perhaps we could have a colloquy with the 
chairman to deal with this in the conference committee--we can do that.

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