[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 120 (Monday, July 17, 2017)]
[House]
[Pages H5904-H5911]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           VOTER SUPPRESSION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2017, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Veasey) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.

[[Page H5905]]

  



                             General Leave

  Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include 
extraneous material on the subject of this Special Order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Texas?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, it is great to be here with you this evening 
and to talk about a very important topic.
  Before I get into the topic of this hour, it is with great honor that 
I rise today to coanchor this CBC Special Order hour with my dear 
friend, Delegate Stacey Plaskett from the Virgin Islands, and also 
acknowledge our CBC chair, the Honorable Cedric Richmond from the great 
State of Louisiana.
  For the next 60 minutes, we have a chance to speak directly to the 
American people on issues of grea importance to the Congressional Black 
Caucus, the Congress, the constituents that we represent, and all 
Americans on this very important issue of voter suppression.

  Before I go into my remarks, Mr. Speaker, we do have some colleagues 
here that would like to also speak about this very timely and important 
topic.
  There have been many developments that have occurred over the last 
week dealing with commissions that are being formed out of the White 
House to help aid in voter suppression and other things that have been 
very troubling.
  So I am going to ask for the first speaker to rise, and that would be 
my colleague, also from the great State of Texas, from Harris County 
and the city of Houston, the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, who has been 
very thoughtful and been a great voice on expanding the rights to vote 
of all Americans. I thank Representative Jackson Lee for taking the 
time during this hour to come out and talk about this very important 
topic.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Texas.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman 
from Texas (Mr. Veasey), the coleader of this hour, along with Delegate 
Plaskett, for not only their astute leadership of the hour, but 
certainly of their astute leadership of the issue. I am delighted to 
join my colleagues. I thank the chair of the Congressional Black 
Caucus, Mr. Cedric Richmond, for continuing to make sure that the 
conscience of the Congress, the Congressional Black Caucus, is heard on 
these crucial issues.
  Mr. Veasey, I am going to focus my issues--because this is not a 
Republican or Democratic issue. It is an American issue. I do want to 
personally thank you for your leadership as the named plaintiff of the 
Texas voter ID litigation, which has been--how should I say? I wanted 
to say Earth-shattering--but it has been groundbreaking in its 
recognition of the diminishing of the rights of people to vote by a 
draconian voter ID law. We know that it has been somewhat modified, but 
your astuteness recognizes that, even in its modification, in the 
coming elections, we should be very wary of the effort that the State 
will utilize the voter ID law for voter suppression.
  So today I want to rise in the backdrop of the Shelby case, which 
many of us are well aware of. The Shelby case, which occurred in 
Alabama, was the unfortunate case that turned back the clock on the 
1965 Voting Rights Act that had been working for decades with 
absolutely no problem; but, unfortunately, this conservative-leaning 
Supreme Court made decisions not on what is good for America, not even 
on what is good in terms of the law, but decided to eliminate section 
5.

                              {time}  1930

  I am reminded of the very astute words of Justice Ginsburg, very 
astute words, when she was appalled that the Supreme Court yielded to 
what I would consider misinterpretation, that there is no problem with 
discrimination and there is no problem with racism, and Justice 
Ginsburg very astutely said: Well, we have been very fortunate that the 
polio vaccination has all but extinguished polio in the United States.
  That is great news. But because we have extinguished polio, does that 
mean we need to get rid of the polio vaccination? And any commonsense 
thinker, any American, any hardworking American, would absolutely, 
because they love their children and their families, would have a 
resounding ``no.''
  So why would you get rid of section 5 when there is documentation, 
unfortunately and sadly, of discrimination and of racism? Racism is a 
question of being discriminated against because of race. It does not 
say Black, it does not say any particular type of race, but it does 
mention race. That means that section 5 was a protector for all 
Americans and giving them the added protection of one vote, one person.
  So, unfortunately, on June 28, 2017--and, by the way, Mr. Speaker, 
the pending meeting of this established Commission, the Presidential 
Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, PACEI, is going to be 
meeting July 19, this week. This is a dangerous phenomenon.
  The chair and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach wrote to the 
Nation's secretaries of state requesting extensive personal information 
on American voters--personal information, when we have stood in this 
well fighting against the PATRIOT Act when it was not written well 
after 9/11 because its premise was to spy on the American people and to 
ignore the Fourth Amendment, which is to protect Americans against 
unreasonable search and seizure.
  This is unreasonable search and seizure. Let me list for you what 
this Commission is asking for. Some of this is public knowledge, but 
listen to this list: the full first and last names of all registrants; 
middle names or initials, if available; addresses, dates of birth, 
political party, if recorded in your State; last four digits of Social 
Security, if available; voter history--voter history--what elections 
you voted in from 2006 onward; active and inactive status.
  I would venture to say that if I asked my Republican colleagues if 
they want their constituents sending this information in I would hear a 
little bit of grumbling.
  Canceled status; information regarding any felony convictions.
  All these are State issues.
  Information regarding voter registration in another State; 
information regarding military status; and overseas citizen 
information.
  First of all, there is no documentation of massive voter fraud.
  ``The right to vote, and the sanctity and privacy of the vote, is 
protected by the U.S. Constitution, including the Fifth, Fourteenth, 
and Fifteenth Amendments. Due process. All of these allow you to have a 
degree of privacy. It is an obligation of your administration,'' which 
is a letter to President Trump that I am reading from, ``to preserve 
the sanctity and privacy of the vote, not to undermine it as would be 
the case if Texas were to comply with the PACEI's unconscionable 
request. The only approved government use of voter registration data, 
outside of voting, is jury selection, not a Presidential Advisory 
Commission of dubious purpose formed to search for nonconsistent 
evidence to vindicate your false claim that you lost the popular vote 
by 2.9 million votes, the largest loss in American history, because 
`millions of people who voted illegally.' ''
  As you well know, that was a statement that no one can document by 
this present administration. So this Presidential Advisory Commission 
is a doubling down of an executive order to find a problem that does 
not exist. It is a solution, a false solution, seeking to find a 
problem. It is a dangerous proposition. It is an invasion of the 
privacy of the American people. And any good person who believes in the 
right to privacy, any conservative, liberal, moderate, anyone with any 
political philosophy who believes in the Constitution of the United 
States should stand arm in arm together against PACEI.
  It is the beginning of Big Brother, the arm of Big Brother, the 
frightening Big Brother, to intrude into the homes of the American 
people and to secure information that is, in fact, challenging whether 
you can move from one State to the next, challenging whether or not you 
can have a voter card canceled or expired, challenging individuals who 
have been given pardons but had a felony, and challenging military 
persons who move from place to place. This is an insult, and this is

[[Page H5906]]

clearly voter suppression, not in any way a way to speak to the issue 
of fraud.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to take this very seriously. I have 
asked my State to stand down. I have asked the President to pull this 
request, and I, frankly, believe this executive order should be 
eliminated.
  Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record two documents related to this.

                                    Congress of the United States,


                                     House of Representatives,

                                     Washington, DC, July 6, 2017.
     President Donald J. Trump,
     The White House, Washington, DC.
  Dear Mr. President: I am writing to urge you to rescind your May 11, 
2017 Executive Order establishing the Presidential Advisory Commission 
on Election Integrity (PACEI) and to direct that the PACEI be dissolved 
immediately. The PACEI is charged with studying ``the registration and 
voting processes used in Federal elections'' and identifying 
``vulnerabilities in voting systems'' that could lead to voter fraud. 
Many people, however, suspect that the real purpose of the Commission 
is not investigate widespread voter fraud, which every reputable study 
has already debunked as a myth, but to gather data to aid in future 
voter suppression efforts.
  On June 28, 2017, PACEI Chair and Kansas Secretary of State Kris 
Kobach wrote to the nation's secretaries of state requesting extensive 
personal information on American voters threatens to violate individual 
privacy. Specifically, the PACEI seeks to obtain, inter alia: ``the 
full first and last names of registrants, middle names or initials if 
available, addresses, dates of birth, political party (if recorded in 
your state), last four digits of social security number if available, 
voter history (elections voted in) from 2006 onward, active/inactive 
status, cancelled status, information regarding any felony convictions, 
information regarding voter registration in another state, information 
regarding military status, and overseas citizen information.''
  Releasing the confidential voter information sought by the PACEI 
which will be stored in an unsecure database on unsecured servers and 
accessible to the public is illegal, irresponsible, jeopardizes civil 
liberties and privacy rights, and puts our national security at risk.
  It is important that all voters, including those in the 18th 
Congressional District of Texas whom I am privileged to represent, be 
fully protected. While supplying only public voter information may seem 
secure, the sad fact is that it is not. There is no publicly available 
record for voter registration information for any state in America. 
Such data set is protected under the principle of collective privacy, 
recognized by the Supreme Court in the landmark decision of NAACP v. 
Alabama, 377 U.S. 288, 84 S. Ct. 1302, 12 L. Ed. 2d 325 (1964), which 
held that compelled disclosure of affiliation with groups engaged in 
advocacy may constitute an impermissible chilling effect on the freedom 
of association guaranteed by the First Amendment. The Court has 
affirmed this principle and it is now settled law. Accordingly, Texas 
cannot, consistent with the U.S. Constitution, supply the private voter 
information requested by the PACEI. Indeed, if the information sought 
was public as PACEI contends, there would be no need for it to request 
the information from state governments.
  The right to vote, and the sanctity and privacy of the vote, is 
protected by the U.S. Constitution, including the Fifth, Fourteenth, 
and Fifteenth Amendments. It is an obligation of your administration to 
preserve the sanctity and privacy of the vote, not to undermine it as 
would be the case if Texas were to comply with the PACEI's 
unconscionable request. The only approved government use of voter 
registration data, outside of voting, is jury selection, not a 
presidential advisory commission of dubious purpose formed to search 
for nonexistent evidence to vindicate your false claim that you lost 
the popular vote by 2.9 million votes, the largest loss in American 
history, because ``millions of people who voted illegally.''
  Voter suppression is real but the oft-repeated claim that American 
elections are rife with voter fraud is a myth. A comprehensive 2014 
study published in The Washington Post found out of more than a billion 
votes cast only 31 credible instances of impersonation fraud from 2000 
to 2014, and that event this tiny number was likely inflated because 
the study's author counted not just voter fraud prosecutions or 
convictions but all credible claims. Numerous other reports have 
reached the same conclusion.
  Finally, it should be noted that compliance with the PACEI's voter 
data request would put the security of the nation's electoral processes 
at risk. We know from recent and painful experience, including the 
cyberattacks on the Veterans Administration, the Office of Personnel 
Management, not to mention SONY and Yahoo, that large centralized 
databases are targets of opportunities for criminals, terrorists, and 
foreign adversaries. It would be the height of recklessness for Texas 
to provide the PACEI with personal information of millions of person 
via unsecured email address to be stored in undersecured databases on 
undersecured servers.
  This is why the large majority of states, 44 states and the District 
of Columbia, have refused to comply with the PACEI's data requests. To 
date, only five states have indicated they will cooperate with the 
PACEI and with a data set this small, any findings drawn by the PACEI 
will lack external validity and yield no generalizable conclusions. In 
view of all the circumstances extant, the most reasonable and accurate 
conclusion that can be reached about the PACEI is that it is not 
intended to ferret out and prevent voter fraud, but to obtain 
information that can be used to refine voter suppression efforts.
  For these reasons, I strongly urge you to rescind your May 11, 2017 
Executive Order and direct that the President's Advisory Commission on 
Election Integrity be disbanded immediately. Thank you for your 
consideration. Please contact me if you have any questions or need 
additional information.
           Very truly yours,
                                               Sheila Jackson Lee,
     Member of Congress.
                                  ____


            [From Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas]

 Trump's Voter Fraud Commission is a Fraud and Should Be Disbanded Now

       Unable to cope with the brutal fact that he lost the 
     popular vote to Hillary Clinton by 2.9 million votes, the 
     largest vote deficit of any president in American history, 
     Donald Trump tweeted that he would have won the popular vote 
     but for ``millions of people who voted illegally.'' Instead 
     of producing any credible evidence to support this claim, a 
     hoax that has been repeatedly and decisively debunked by 
     experts, the President doubled down and issued an Executive 
     Order establishing the ``Presidential Advisory Commission on 
     Election Integrity'' (PACEI), appointing Kris Kobach, anti-
     immigration warrior and poster-child for voter fraud 
     conspiratorialists everywhere, to lead the Commission.
       It would be more accurate to characterize the PACEI as the 
     ``Presidential Advisory Commission on Vote Suppression.'' 
     Voter suppression is real but the oft-repeated claim that 
     American elections are rife with voter fraud is a myth. 
     According to a comprehensive 2014 study published in The 
     Washington Post, out of more than a billion votes cast 
     between 2000 and 2014, only 31 credible instances of 
     impersonation fraud were found, and even this tiny number was 
     likely inflated because the study's author counted not just 
     voter fraud prosecutions or convictions but all credible 
     claims. Numerous other reports have reached the same 
     conclusion.
       Any lingering doubt regarding the true purpose of the PACEI 
     should be laid to rest by the request made by Commissioner 
     Kobach on June 28, 2017 when he wrote each of the nation's 
     state secretaries of state requesting that they provide the 
     Commission with ``the full first and last names of all 
     registrants, middle names or initials if available, 
     addresses, dates of birth, political party (if recorded in 
     your state), last four digits of social security number if 
     available, voter history (elections voted in) from 2006 
     onward, active/inactive status, cancelled status, information 
     regarding any felony convictions, information regarding voter 
     registration in another state, information regarding military 
     status, and overseas citizen information.''
       The information requested by the Commission will not 
     prevent voter fraud. It will violate rather than protect 
     voter privacy. And it will make it easier to craft 
     legislation and devise campaign strategies intended to 
     suppress the vote in urban clusters and among targeted 
     demographic groups, particularly minority voters.
       It is important that all voters, and the people of the 18th 
     Congressional District of Texas whom I am privileged to 
     represent, be fully protected. While supplying only public 
     voter information may seem secure, the sad

[[Page H5907]]

     fact is that it is not. There is no publicly accessible 
     database of voter registration information in any of the 50 
     states or the District of Columbia. That is because 
     information of this kind is protected from public disclosure 
     under the settled principle of `collective privacy' 
     recognized by the Supreme Court in the landmark decision of 
     NAACP v. Alabama, 377 U.S. 288, 84 S. Ct. 1302, 12 L. Ed. 2d 
     325 (1964), which held that compelled disclosure of 
     affiliation with groups engaged in advocacy may constitute an 
     impermissible chilling effect on the freedom of association 
     guaranteed by the First Amendment, a holding that has been 
     affirmed repeatedly.
       Accordingly, neither Texas nor any state can, consistent 
     with the U.S. Constitution, supply the voter information 
     requested by the PACEI. Indeed, if the information sought was 
     as public in nature as PACEI contends, there simply would be 
     no need for it to request the information from state 
     governments.
       Trump's voter suppression commission is a solution in 
     search of a problem. Contrary to what Trump and Kobach would 
     have the public believe, American elections are not rife with 
     widespread voter fraud. Studies have shown that it is more 
     likely an American ``will be struck by lightning than that he 
     will impersonate another voter at the polls.'' No, the major 
     ill affecting our election system is not that too many people 
     vote due to voter fraud, but that too many people are 
     prevented from voting due to vote suppression schemes such as 
     discriminatory photo identification requirements, curtailment 
     of early voting, too few polling stations leading to long 
     lines and excessive wait times, purging of election rolls.
       Even in the wholly unimaginable event that the commission 
     created by Donald Trump and led by Kris Kobach could be 
     trusted enough for states to cooperate by sharing their voter 
     data, there is no reasonable basis for assuming that 
     information would be kept secure and the privacy of voters 
     protected. Recent cyberattacks have made clear the 
     vulnerability of large central databases to cyberattack. An 
     information security breach at the Department of Veterans 
     Affairs compromised sensitive personal data of 26.5 million 
     persons and cost the VA between $100 million to $500 million 
     to remediate; another occurring at the Office of Personnel 
     Management impacted 22 million current and former federal 
     employees, many of whom held sensitive security clearances; 
     and the attack on Yahoo, the mother of all security breaches, 
     resulted in 1.5 billion user accounts being compromised.
       Because large centralized databases are targets of 
     opportunities for criminals, terrorists, and foreign 
     adversaries, it would be the height of recklessness for Texas 
     or any state to provide the PACEI with personal information 
     of millions of persons via unsecured email address to be 
     stored in undersecured databases on undersecured servers. One 
     of the biggest strengths of the American election system is 
     its decentralized nature.
       Aggregating all voter data into one centralized database 
     with questionable security protections makes that data highly 
     vulnerable to a cyberattack that could lead to the personal 
     information of hundreds of millions of Americans being stolen 
     and misused. Voter privacy and the integrity of the secret 
     ballot are integral to American democracy. Voter privacy 
     rights should and must be protected. This is especially true 
     since we now know for certain that adversaries like Russia 
     are actively involved in cyberwarfare campaigns to undermine 
     our democracy.
       There is no denying that our election system is under 
     assault, but not in the way Trump imagines. Instead of 
     wasting taxpayer money to fund an investigation into voter 
     fraud, which is as mythical as a unicorn, American democracy 
     would be better served by focusing on and correcting the real 
     problem with our elections--voter suppression and external, 
     illegal, and international interference in our national 
     elections.
       I am not opposed to employing reasonable, legitimate, and 
     workable means to safeguard the integrity of our electoral 
     system and to protect the precious right to vote. But Trump's 
     Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity is 
     incapable of doing either and thus should be disbanded and 
     dissolved immediately.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, let me conclude by holding up this map, 
which indicates the colors of the individual States that are only 
slightly adhering to this Commission. The orange and the blue are 
individual States, some that are not adhering and some that are giving 
basic public information, but not all the personal information.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I hope we can 
collectively fight against the suppression of voters, and I thank him 
for alerting the American people to this severe attempt to perpetrate a 
wrongness, which is that there is voter fraud, and that we should not 
violate the privacy of Americans.
  Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my fellow Texan and colleague for 
her timely remarks. I think the American public really would be 
interested in what she talked about with the criminal background 
history that this Commission wants.
  I know that there are a lot of people--both Democrats and 
Republicans, quite frankly, people of all political stripes--that made 
mistakes when they were younger and now maybe they go and vote. They 
are good Americans. They assimilate themselves into society. They have 
learned from their mistakes, and they would be very disturbed to know 
that this sort of information about something that they did when they 
were 21 years old and now they are 40-something years old, they would 
be very disturbed to know that this type of information was being 
collected. I thank her for raising that issue.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Payne), my 
friend, to also speak on this issue. I thank him for taking the time to 
come out here today and share some of the concerns that he has.
  Mr. PAYNE. Mr. Speaker, let me first thank the gentleman from Texas 
for sponsoring this CBC Special Order hour. It is a great 
responsibility and a responsibility that he has done remarkably well in 
governing the time and the topics on which we speak. This is a timely 
topic, Mr. Speaker.
  In a single decision, the U.S. Supreme Court set ablaze decades of 
progress by overturning critical portions of the Voting Rights Act. 
Four years after Shelby County v. Holder, voter protections that many 
Americans rely on are again under assault.
  Following that decision, we saw an eruption of unjust voting laws. It 
is an unfortunate historical fact that, in the absence of Federal 
safeguards, some States will erect prejudicial barriers to voting. 
States previously under Federal overview were emboldened and, shortly 
after the ruling issued, blatantly added discriminatory rules that 
directly affected minority communities.
  Sadly, one of the most significant and imminent threats to accessing 
the polls comes directly from the administration. Since the 
inauguration, the Trump administration has withdrawn from longstanding 
legal challenges to discriminatory voter laws and created the 
Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity that will 
investigate the President's wildly unsubstantiated claims of voter 
fraud. These sorts of actions and rhetoric only reassure States that 
discriminatory voting laws will be tolerated and upheld in this 
administration.
  I urge Congress to take responsibility and restore vital voter 
protections that have secured the integrity of our democracy for more 
than 50 years. Although the Shelby decision was one of the most 
disruptive judicial decisions in recent American history, passing good 
voting rights legislation will redeem America's promise of a fair vote 
for everyone of eligible age.
  It appears that protecting America's basic right to vote will be a 
task reborn with every generation. Obstacles to voting are no longer as 
blatantly obvious as literary tests and poll taxes. Unjust voter ID 
laws, voter intimidation, and unfair gerrymandering create barriers to 
the polls for individuals from all skin colors and age groups.
  Although these actions appear insurmountable, they are not. Voter 
suppression is an affront to the Constitution and will not be 
tolerated. If we continue to resist all attempts to turn back voter 
protections, we will be successful and once again stand proudly on the 
right side of history.
  Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that this Nation appears to be going 
in reverse. Gains that have been made by people who weren't necessarily 
considered citizens when they first arrived here, but property, have 
had to look to these rulings and laws being created in order for them 
to have the rights every other American has.
  The hands that built this great building could not vote, were 
property. But it is a beautiful symbol of this Nation's history. The 
ancestors of the people that helped build these beautiful buildings 
here will be rolling over in their graves to learn that equality and 
rights for all are still under attack.
  So, Mr. Speaker, the CBC and, I hope, the whole Congress will be 
vigilant in this area, making sure that all Americans, regardless of 
where they come from, where they started, and when they were allowed 
and even seen as citizens, have the right to vote in this great 
country.
  Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey, 
particularly for pointing out about the

[[Page H5908]]

hands that built this building. That is something that is not widely 
known, that the hands that built this building were not hands of free 
men but hands of slaves that built this building that we stand under 
today, that people come and admire from all around the world, and we 
admire this building as a symbol of freedom. But the hands that built 
it were not free hands.
  And of course what followed emancipation in this country--Jim Crow, 
voter suppression, and all of those things--once we finally got past 
the late sixties and seventies, to see some of that coming back again 
is very, very disturbing, and I want to thank him for his timely 
comments on that.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Beatty). I 
thank her spending so much time here on the House floor working the 
Special Order hour, and particularly when it comes to the thing that we 
are so worried about right now, which is the voter suppression 
commission.
  Mrs. BEATTY. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman Veasey for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, it is an honor for me to stand on this floor, but when I 
think that tonight I have to stand here and talk about the topic that 
the Congressional Black Caucus comes to the House floor to speak out 
against is a sad day.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank my classmate and colleague and friend, 
Congressman Marc Veasey, for taking a leadership role and for making 
that clarion call to ask us to come.

                              {time}  1945

  Many of us will come tonight and speak out. Several of us will file 
our message so it can be recorded. Others will be back in their 
districts fighting for voting rights.
  This is something we have to do because, unfortunately, it has been 
over 50 years since President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Voting 
Rights Act of 1965, which has been the most powerful tool in defending 
the voting rights of minorities.
  The Voting Rights Act, as you have heard tonight and you will 
continue to hear, outlawed the harassment, the intimidation, and the 
violence that many African Americans experienced when trying to 
exercise their right to vote.
  It ended some of the most overtly discriminatory practices in our 
country's history by banning literacy tests, appointing Federal 
examiners in certain problematic areas to register voters and monitor 
elections, and criminalizing voter intimidation threats and coercion.
  Also key to the Voting Rights Act, you have heard many of our 
attorneys explain it and talk about the creation of the preclearance 
process that required certain places with some of the worst histories 
of discrimination to gain approval from a Federal court or the 
Department of Justice before making election changes.
  However, Mr. Speaker, during my first term in Congress, I became a 
part of this history. It was in 2013 that the United States Supreme 
Court struck down this crucial provision of the Voting Rights Act in 
the Shelby County v. Holder decision, opening the door for States to 
reduce--I am going to say that again, Mr. Speaker--opening the door to 
reduce the electoral power of minority communities.
  And with that door open, many States are taking this opportunity to 
pass a slew or a wave of laws, including strict voter ID requirements, 
early voting cutbacks, and registration restrictions, making it harder 
for many hardworking Americans to vote. That is just not right. Every 
citizen should have the right to vote.
  Following the 2016 election, President Trump falsely claimed that 
millions voted illegally, perpetuating the myth of voter fraud long 
used to justify restrictive legislation that suppresses voters in low-
income areas. I stand here today to tell you that it is not true.
  And when the Congressional Black Caucus hears the President of these 
United States using terms like ``voter fraud'' or ``illegally voted,'' 
we can read between the lines, Mr. Speaker. He is signaling his intent, 
in my opinion, to suppress the vote. He is signaling the support for 
efforts that will make it even harder for poor people, people of color, 
women, elderly people, to vote, one of the fundamental rights that we 
have to vote.
  While the legislative maneuvers to restrict our citizens' fundamental 
right to vote should shock the conscience, it has not, and that is why 
we are standing on this floor today. That is why we are asking 
Democrats and Republicans to work together to correct this wrong.
  We have witnessed the history of some 50-plus years of what happened 
to many people in some of our Southern States. Mr. Speaker, it is just 
not right, and that is why we are here today.
  As former President Barack Obama said: ``This is something that has 
constantly been disproved.'' As a matter of fact, ``This is fake 
news.''
  Now, one of my colleagues came to the floor tonight and said this is 
not a Democrat or a Republican issue. Well, let me say it a little 
differently. This should not be a Democrat or Republican issue; but if 
it were a bipartisan issue, we wouldn't be standing here in this 
Special Order hour demanding and asking that we come together, as 
Democrats and Republicans, and restore the voting rights.
  So let me be very clear. The Congressional Black Caucus, through the 
leadership of our chairman, Congressman Cedric Richmond, through the 
leadership of our power-of-the-hour chair, Congressman Marc Veasey, and 
the other members of the Congressional Black Caucus, one of the largest 
minority caucuses in this House, we stand ready to advocate, we stand 
ready to protect those who we come here to protect.
  So as elected officials, we have a responsibility to ensure the right 
of ``one person, one vote,'' and part of this responsibility includes 
making it easier, Mr. Speaker, not harder for citizens to vote. And we 
will not stop our quest in ensuring justice for all Americans.
  Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative Beatty. I really 
appreciate her participating again and her comments, and we are going 
to take her call and continue to push on this issue.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to invite my friend and colleague up from 
the great State of Pennsylvania, Representative Dwight Evans, to also 
speak about this subject. Of course, throughout the history of African 
Americans, Philadelphia and Pennsylvania have played a very critical 
role. I am glad that my colleague from Pennsylvania is stepping up and 
speaking about this very timely issue of voter suppression in the wake 
of Shelby County.
  I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Evans).
  Mr. EVANS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from the great State of 
Texas, Congressman Veasey, for his leadership under Congressman 
Richmond, and for what he and Delegate Stacey Plaskett have been 
providing over the last couple of weeks.
  Right now, as Members of Congress, we are in what I call an Article 
I, section 1 moment. Article I, section 1 in the Constitution grants us 
this power. We need to harness the power of the process to ensure that 
accountability and transparency for Philadelphians, Pennsylvanians, and 
all the American people.
  We know that voting is a fundamental right, and we know that the 
Federal Government should not be in the business of dealing with 
personal information of voters nationwide. Philadelphians, 
Pennsylvanians, and Americans have a right to privacy. Myself and my 
colleagues before you today intend to do everything we can to ensure 
privacy is guaranteed and protected
  The Trump administration has yet to instill confidence and garner 
respect from the American people. Voting is a right that cannot and 
will not be taken away. The right to vote is a core American value and 
guiding principle that must be protected and not tampered with in any 
way.
  Believe me when I tell you, President Trump, we know what you are 
trying to do here. We see the actions of your administration for what 
they are. Our neighborhoods are at risk of voter suppression, and we 
cannot and will not stand for it.
  Last week, I was proud to join my colleagues, the chairman of the 
Congressional Black Caucus, Chairman Richmond, and the United States 
Senator from New Jersey, when they stood up last week and introduced a 
piece of legislation to revoke President Trump's executive order.

[[Page H5909]]

  I am proud to stand with the Governor of my State and my friend, 
Governor Tom Wolf, who has been very outspoken in speaking out for 
Pennsylvanians all across the Commonwealth and clearly told the 
President he will not disclose personal PA voter information.
  I want to leave you with a quote from Dr. King: ``We may have all 
come on different ships, but we are in the same boat now.''
  I have lived my entire life in the City of Philadelphia and know that 
it is a sanctuary city. We are so much stronger when we celebrate our 
differences and use them as strengths to uplift us.
  We will not accept this voter suppression. Together, we will ensure 
the choir of our voices are heard loud and clear. We have an obligation 
to build a stronger tomorrow for all of our neighborhoods.
  Mr. Speaker, I join with my colleagues from the Congressional Black 
Caucus to send a message, a message and a voice that we will not just 
sit here idly by. We will not allow this process to just run roughshod.
  As I said from the beginning, this is an Article I, section 1 moment 
where we all recognize that we, in Congress, Democrat and Republican 
alike, recognize that we have an obligation and responsibility to the 
American public. And this is not about partisanship. This is about a 
fundamental right, and we don't take it lightly.
  So I applaud the leadership, again, of my colleague from the great 
State of Texas, for what he is providing here, and all the members of 
the Congressional Black Caucus.
  Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments and 
appreciate him taking time out to talk about this very critical 
announcement.
  As soon as everyone in the Black community, Black communities around 
the country, and elected officials around the country who are concerned 
about voter suppression and other tools and tactics that have been used 
to suppress the African-American vote, we went to action, and I 
appreciate that the gentleman was one of the first people to step up 
and appreciate his participation tonight.
  Mr. Speaker, my colleague, Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson, who 
was not able to make it here this evening, will be including a 
statement in the Record. She represents the 30th Congressional District 
of Texas and is my next-door neighbor. She represents Dallas and the 
southern suburbs of Dallas. I appreciate her weighing in on this topic 
as well.
  Mr. Speaker, the foundation of American democracy is that, no matter 
who you are, we are all equal once we step into that voting booth. And 
the courage that has been displayed by brave foot soldiers who risked 
and, in some cases, gave their lives to guarantee that constitutional 
promise was fulfilled must never be forgotten, and this is really 
important to point out.
  I mean, we have Representative John Lewis, who is a hero of the civil 
rights movement. But I always encourage people to watch the 
documentary, ``Eyes on the Prize'' so they can see how people were 
treated, how people were treated by law enforcement, how people were 
treated by people who were in positions of power, people who were 
active in the community, people who belonged to the Lions Club, 
belonged to the Elks Club, the way they treated people who were simply 
trying to register to vote.
  There is one scene that I will never forget; it was about a woman who 
was trying to go and vote, and she was being kicked and shoved and hit 
and knocked to the ground by law enforcement in Alabama for simply 
trying to exercise her right to vote that was given to her in the early 
1900s when women in this country were finally given the right of 
suffrage.
  It is really in their memory that Congress originally passed the 
landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965. And for years, both Republicans and 
Democrats reauthorized the Voting Rights Act, agreeing that equal 
access to the polls must be preserved for generations to come.
  But sadly, Mr. Speaker, in 2013, that tradition dramatically changed. 
The Supreme Court ruling in Shelby County v. Holder struck down section 
4 of the Voting Rights Act and made Congress responsible for updating 
the VRA. The Court has left it to Congress to create a new formula for 
determining which States and other jurisdictions should be discovered 
under section 5 of the Voting Rights Act to ensure protection against 
discrimination.
  But 4 years later, we can confidently say that the Supreme Court 
ruling set into motion what most of us feared--that minorities and low-
income Americans would have to face unfair and punitive barriers from 
exercising their most basic right as American citizens, and that is the 
right to vote.

                              {time}  2000

  In the years since the Shelby County decision, Republican 
legislatures nationwide have been in power to unleash an avalanche of 
purposely restrictive laws that have been aimed to keep, again, mostly 
Black and Latino voters away from the poll. Even when you do discovery 
and when you look into why these laws were passed by State 
legislatures, it is clear what the intent was.
  It is a tactic that the Republican Party has indirectly endorsed, 
since they believe that trying to earn the vote of the growing minority 
population, that they would rather keep them away from the polls 
altogether.
  Prior to Shelby, States with a history of voter suppression and 
discriminatory practices were required to preclear any changes in their 
election laws with the Department of Justice prior to enactment. But 
now, in the absence of an updated VRA, States no longer require the 
DOJ's approval.
  I want to talk about my own State, the State of Texas, which has 
really served as an incubator for the suppressive tactics that 
Republicans nationwide have been eager to enact for years. I saw this 
up close and personal in the 8 years that I spent in the Texas 
Legislature, where I saw Texas Republicans enact SB 14, which severely 
restricted the types of IDs that voters could bring to the polls in 
order to cast the ballot. Texas Republicans claimed that limiting 
acceptable IDs would prevent widespread in-person voter fraud. As vice 
chair of the Voter Identification and Voter Fraud Select Committee in 
the Texas state house, I witnessed how Texas Republicans failed to 
produce any piece of evidence to prove that massive voter impersonation 
was occurring statewide.
  Hearing after hearing--you can go back and look at the record, going 
back to 2005--I and my other colleagues who served on the committee and 
who were concerned about some of the voter suppression tactics asked 
the question: Show us evidence that voter suppression is taking place. 
We have time here during this legislative session.
  That was what we would ask over and over again, and not one person 
could bring any evidence that this had happened.
  Their flawed argument justified limiting voter IDs and instead 
favored an approach that would exclude student IDs but actually say 
that it was okay to use a concealed handgun license as a form of ID.
  What is interesting about that is that these student IDs, campus law 
enforcement, which, in the State of Texas, where I am from, again, if a 
kid has alcohol or if someone is roaming around campus and the police 
need to be able to verify who they are and identify them, that student 
ID that is issued by a State university in the State of Texas serves as 
ID for law enforcement personnel on those campuses to be able to verify 
whether that student is, in fact, who they are and belongs on that 
campus. That same ID, again, that is issued by the State of Texas could 
not be used to go and vote. It just doesn't make any sense.
  When the law was enacted, of course, the DOJ blocked the measure. 
However, hours after the Shelby decision, Governor Perry enacted Texas' 
restrictive voter ID law. I became a named plaintiff in the case 
because I knew that, despite Republicans' claims that the law would 
disproportionately disenfranchise Latino and African-American voters--
the State's own estimates showed that it would potentially 
disenfranchise over 600,000 Texans who are registered but do not have 
one of the required forms of ID. And there are lots of different 
reasons why people may or may not have an ID.
  If they were born in a foreign country and they are now American 
citizens, they may have a hard time getting access to some of those 
documents. They may not have the money

[[Page H5910]]

or the transportation to go to the county that they were born in to be 
able to get the documents that they need in order to get one of these 
IDs. Again, there are costs and there are transportation and geographic 
barriers that may take place.
  You may have people who were born in the country by midwives, and 
they are particularly African-American baby boomers and older that 
migrated from places like Longview, Texas; Marshall, Texas; Tyler, 
Texas, and they weren't really even raised in those cities. They were 
raised in smaller towns outside of those cities and they may not have 
those proper forms of ID.
  Remember, segregation was very rampant back then in Texas, and many 
people were born by midwives, were born in their houses and what have 
you. There are variations of spellings of last names. I have that in my 
own family. There are just so many other examples of that.
  I am proud to report that two Federal courts, including the Fifth 
Circuit Court of Appeals, which is easily considered by most to be the 
most conservative appeals court in the country, have found the law to 
be discriminatory in its intent and its effect. Despite this victory, 
we knew that Texas was only the beginning. We have heard about so many 
other laws around the country that exclude people from being able to 
register to vote unless they have a passport, or unless they have their 
birth certificate, which makes it almost impossible for nonprofits to 
set up a table at a busy grocery store, for instance, on a Saturday and 
do any sort of voter registration. There are just all sorts of issues 
out there. There are organizations like King Street Patriots, for 
instance, that pride themselves on their ability to try to suppress the 
minority vote. Again, Texas was only the beginning. And, sadly, Mr. 
Speaker, unless we can find a new way to come together to do what is 
right when it comes to suffrage in this country, it seems like this is 
going to be something that we have to fight for a long time.
  Now, sadly, I am ashamed to say that our President has also taken a 
page out of the Republican playbook and has begun to perpetuate the 
same myths about widespread voter fraud that, sadly, we have been 
fighting since the Reconstruction era, Mr. Speaker. Very, very, very 
sad.
  Nearly 3 months after winning the Presidency, President Trump could 
not handle the fact that, despite winning the Presidency, he lost the 
popular vote. An unsatisfied with the results, President Trump does 
what he does best: he went to Twitter to blame his unpopularity on 
widespread voter fraud.

  And, worse, now he has created this Presidential commission on 
election integrity. It is a sham commission that will, no doubt, work 
to justify claims that elections are being compromised by our own 
citizens and serve as a catalyst to continue the wave of voter 
suppression and intimidation that we have witnessed across this 
country.
  I am proud that the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional 
Hispanic Caucus, and the Asian Pacific American Caucus have all gotten 
together to introduce legislation to ensure that not a single dollar 
from the taxpayers is spent towards this phony commission.
  Again, I think that everybody should be concerned about this 
commission. Any commission that wants to gather private information on 
citizens, put it in a database, information that--quite frankly, 
mistakes that people made back when they were in college. There are a 
lot of people out there that I know, that I went to high school and 
college with, people that I have known around the Fort Worth and Dallas 
community for a long time, all around the State of Texas, they made 
mistakes when they were younger. Maybe it was a DWI. Maybe it was some 
other sort of issue, but they have assimilated themselves back into 
society. They are working. They are paying taxes. And the fact that 
this database would want to take the mistakes that they made in their 
youth and put them in this database and to look at whether or not they 
are committing some sort of fraud is just something that--again, 
doesn't matter if you are Democrat or Republican, there are a lot of 
people out there who made mistakes when they were younger. It is just 
awful that this could come back to haunt them.
  The fact is that the voter fraud myth has been debunked by various 
reputable research organizations, including the ACLU, the Brennan 
Center for Justice, the Campaign Legal Center, and the Pew Research 
Center, to name a few. But that has not changed the fact that 
Republicans and now our President want to turn back the clock on voting 
rights. It is really sad, Mr. Speaker.
  The commission recently requested sensitive voter information as part 
of their fake investigation, and we are already seeing the effects. Out 
of fear of having their Social Security, voting history, party 
affiliation, again, their criminal background history that I talked 
about in a concentrated voter base, news sources have already reported 
voters deregistering to vote. That is sad because that is exactly the 
type of voter intimidation that Republicans want to nationalize.
  House Republicans have purposely dragged their feet on updating the 
VRA and ignored their duty to uphold the Constitution and ensure the 
sacred right of all Americans to be able to cast their vote.
  Even as these courts begin to rule against the purposely prejudiced 
tactics of these GOP State legislatures, it is up to us to bring our 
voices together and lift the veil on their true intentions. It is our 
duty now to stand up against these discriminatory practices that are 
being implemented nationwide, because the President's sham commission 
will have its first meeting this Wednesday, and we have to send one 
message loud and clear: We will not allow voter suppression to become 
normal. We have to make that clear.
  I thank my colleagues for working alongside me in this fight, because 
every member of the Congressional Black Caucus is talking about this in 
their district when they are going back, townhalls, various other 
events that are out and about in their respective areas that they 
represent around our country to let them know what is in store.
  I have got to tell you, Mr. Speaker, I am confident that we will once 
again be able to ensure that the sacred right to vote is not denied to 
a single American. It has been overcome a lot. We are going to continue 
to overcome this, just like we have after the Reconstruction era, like 
we did in the 1960s, and we are going to fight this all the way until 
we get the fairness that we want.
  I want to remind everybody that there is going to be a voter 
suppression forum tomorrow that members of the Congressional Black 
Caucus, along with the House Judiciary Democrats, will host on this 
very topic, voter suppression in the wake of Shelby County, which is 
the name of the Special Order that we are working on right now. And 
Members will hear from Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan 
Grimes and others about the President's voter fraud commission and the 
bipartisan backlash that it is facing. The forum will be live-streamed 
on the House Judiciary Democrats' Facebook page. I invite all Americans 
to join in this very important and crucial conversation that is going 
to be taking place on Wednesday.
  I thank everybody again that came out to participate for this Special 
Order hour on voter suppression in the wake of what happened in Shelby 
County.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time
  Ms. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in 
solidarity with my colleagues in the Congressional Black Caucus to 
speak out against voter suppression. Voter suppression is a serious 
issue that threatens the integrity of our elections. While the 
Congressional Black Caucus members have highlighted their numerous 
concerns, we should all be deeply involved in combating voter 
suppression and expanding access to the polls for all Americans--
particularly in the wake of the destructive ruling in Shelby County v. 
Holder.
  When fellow Texan and former President Lyndon Baines Johnson signed 
the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law, our country was in the midst of 
wrestling with literacy tests, the purging of voter rolls, and 
intimidation by those who wished to keep minorities and other 
vulnerable segments of the population from casting their ballots at the 
polls. It was a difficult time in our nation's history, but one that we 
seemingly overcame together in a broad recognition that all Americans 
should have equal access to the polls. The positive effects of the 
Voting Rights Act grew quickly apparent.

[[Page H5911]]

  Following passage of the VRA, nearly 1 million black voters 
registered to vote within just four years, including over fifty percent 
of the black voting age population in every southern state. We 
witnessed the number of black elected officials in the South more than 
double, from 72 to 159, following the 1966 elections. By the mid-1980s, 
there were more African Americans in public office across the South 
than throughout the rest of the nation combined.
  More than fifty years later, we are once again faced with the same 
fight under a different, more sinister guise. The United States Supreme 
Court's decision in Shelby v. Holder has brought our nation back to our 
darkest times in history. Discrimination on the basis of race is a 
persistent reality throughout many localities in states once protected 
by Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act--including my home state of 
Texas. Absent these protections, many voters are at risk of losing 
their fundamental right to vote.
  On May 11, 2017, President Trump issued an executive order that would 
create an ``election integrity'' commission. The stated purpose of this 
commission was to combat voter fraud, but we know the true meaning 
behind an executive order of this nature. It is to repeat the egregious 
mistakes of our past and once again prevent legitimate voters from 
exercising their constitutional rights to vote.
  Mr. Speaker, the concerns of the Congressional Black Caucus and the 
concerns of countless Americans are worthy of our time in Congress. We 
must speak out against thinly-veiled commissions meant to suppress the 
vote. We must bolster the Voting Rights Act to its former power and 
encourage others to combat voter suppression and protect unfettered 
access to the ballot.

                          ____________________