[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 127 (Friday, August 3, 2007)]
[House]
[Page H9663]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        CHANGING OUTCOME OF VOTE

  (Mr. GOHMERT asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, last night, the Democratic majority 
leadership was in the process of attempting to violate the House of 
Representatives' rules by holding a vote open with the sole intent of 
changing the outcome of the vote.
  As the vote changed from 214 ``yeas'' to 214 ``nays'' to 215 ``yeas'' 
to 213 ``nays,'' the Speaker pro tempore brought down the gavel. 
Because he then realized the vote was in favor of the Republican 
motion, he didn't know what to do. The lighted scoreboard at either end 
of the Chamber showed 215 ``yeas'' to 213 ``nays.''
  Then the Speaker and Parliamentarian allowed two more Democrats to 
change their vote. So the vote finally announced was 212 ``yeas'' and 
216 ``nays.'' The Parliamentarian said the vote was actually 214-214 
when the vote closed. However, of course, he had no explanation for why 
the vote was officially called. He allowed the vote switching to 
continue until the vote became what it was announced. That is clearly 
because there is no proper explanation other than that, on the way to 
violating one rule, it became necessary to violate another.
  It is also noteworthy that the vote was to further enable people who 
are breaking the law in America by being here illegally to not only 
break the law but receive money from those forced to pay taxes.
  Then came the astounding news that the record was wiped clean of the 
computer evidence of what went wrong. When rules and laws don't matter, 
we change the destiny of history.

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