[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 183 (Tuesday, October 19, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7044-S7046]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                           Election Security

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I thank my friend, the senior Senator from 
Vermont, for his courtesy.
  Tomorrow, the Senate will vote on the latest iteration of what has 
come to be known as the Democrats' partisan power grab over our 
elections conducted overwhelmingly by the States--actually, exclusively 
at the State and local level.
  The legislation that prompted this discussion first popped up in 
2019, when the newly elected majority in the House went on a messaging 
bill spree. Over the last 2 years, they have tried a number of 
different marketing strategies to convince the American people that 
this overhaul was needed.
  This latest version is proof that Congress isn't buying what they are 
selling, and that is for good reason.
  Those who were advocating for a national takeover of our State-run 
elections, at one point they said it was a matter of election security. 
Then they said this was designed to help restore voter confidence. Then 
they said this is a way to remove obstacles that prevented people from 
voting.
  But facts are stubborn things. In 2020, we saw record turnout. Two-
thirds of eligible voters cast a ballot, and that was the highest 
turnout in 120 years.
  I was on the ballot in 2020. The last time I had been on the ballot, 
6 years previously, there were 4.8 million voters in Texas. In 2020, 
there were 11.3 million voters in Texas. Compared to the 2016 
Presidential election, 17 million more Americans cast a vote, and we 
saw historic turnouts by Black, White, Asian, and Hispanic voters.
  So facts being stubborn things, clearly it is time for the advocates 
for this Federal takeover to come up with a new sales pitch. So our 
Democratic friends attacked election integrity bills being passed by 
State legislatures, like Texas, all across the country.
  The Constitution itself gives States the power to determine how their 
elections should be run, and States are using that authority to make it 
easier to vote and harder to cheat.
  Our Democratic friends have tried to frame these new State laws as 
somehow suppressing voting rights. As we have seen, if that is the 
objective, they certainly are doing a lousy job at it because people 
are voting in unprecedented numbers.
  Well, it is interesting to contrast some of the changes that our 
Democratic colleagues, including the Merrick Garland's Department of 
Justice, comparing the reforms they have attacked and those that they 
believe are just fine.
  The Georgia law, which the Department of Justice has sued under 
section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, actually expanded early voting in 
person to 17 days. But if you live in Massachusetts, you can only vote 
for 11 days. I haven't heard many complaints about the Massachusetts 
voting laws restricting people's access to the polls. And the 
President's home State of Delaware, they

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don't even offer in-person early voting, but they will in 2022. But 
even then, they are even more restrictive than Massachusetts. It will 
only be for 10 days.
  So somehow a short period of early voting in Delaware is acceptable--
actually, currently is not available but soon to be acceptable for 10 
days--but 17 days of early voting in Georgia is an assault on voting 
rights. Both cannot be true.
  Of course, our Democratic friends believe the only answer to this 
manufactured assault is an unconstitutional, partisan power grab that 
they have been pushing for years, as I said. Well, the initial 
iteration of this came up for a vote in June, and it was sadly 
rejected, for good reason. The bill would have turned the bipartisan 
Federal Election Commission into a Democrat-controlled Commission. This 
is supposed to be evenly split and nonpartisan, but that would change 
under the proposal that we voted on in June.
  It would have also allowed ballot harvesting--a dubious practice that 
is a recipe for mischief and wrongdoing, as a ballot could be harvested 
by paid campaign staffers, political operative, or anyone who had a 
stake in the outcome of the election. Just go to your closest nursing 
home or community center, get people to sign a ballot, and harvest 
away. That would have been permitted. And, actually, prohibitions 
against ballot harvesting would have been prohibited under the 
Democrats' bill.
  And the bill would have commandeered States' constitutional authority 
to draw their own congressional districts. The only thing this proposal 
would have done for the people, as it is called, would be to help make 
sure that the outcome of virtually every future election meant that 
Democrats win and Republicans lose; thus, Republicans would be 
relegated to a permanent minority status. That was the goal.
  If this bill weren't so dangerous, it would have been laughable. 
Nobody would have taken it seriously. It is no surprise that the only 
thing bipartisan about this legislation is the opposition. In both the 
House and the Senate, Republicans and Democrats voted against this 
legislation.
  Still, our Democratic colleagues--I admire their perseverance--they 
refused to throw in the towel. They decided to work on what they now 
call a compromise.
  Well, generally, a compromise indicates that you have found common 
ground with somebody who holds a different view. But the so-called 
compromise bill we are scheduled to vote on tomorrow isn't the result 
of negotiations between Republicans and Democrats; it is a compromise 
between the left and the radical left. You really can't call something 
a compromise when your negotiating partner is sitting on the same side 
of the table with you.
  All this is done to create the illusion or a narrative that the 
partisan pieces have been stripped out of the bill and it now includes 
mainstream reforms. But that is far from the truth.
  Just like its predecessor, this bill seizes States' constitutional 
authority to make decisions on matters like voter registration and 
early voting. It contains invasive disclosure requirements that would 
undermine citizens' privacy and chill free speech. It places Federal 
standards on States for redistricting, and threatens action from the 
Democratic-controlled Attorney General's Office if those standards 
aren't met. And it makes it harder to root out election fraud, and 
easier to cheat.
  If that is not bad enough, it also takes tax dollars from the 
American taxpayer and would require it be given to candidates for 
public office that those taxpayers disagree with. They call that public 
funding of elections.
  Nothing about the bill is a compromise. They may have stripped out 
some of the most outrageous provisions, but certainly overtly partisan 
provisions remain.
  Republicans uniformly oppose the first attempt at this partisan power 
grab, and it is no surprise we will oppose this one as well.
  This is not a good-faith attempt to ensure our elections are secure 
from fraud and interference and accessible to all eligible voters. It 
is rather a political stunt and statement designed to mislead the 
American people and appeal to the most radical members of the 
Democratic base.
  I am certainly not one to tell the majority leader how to do his job, 
but it seems like show votes ought to be pretty low on our list of 
priorities.
  Our Democrat colleagues narrowly averted a debt crisis 2 weeks ago, 
and they have less than 2 months to figure out how to increase the debt 
ceiling and avoid an economic disaster.
  In the coming months, the Senate needs to do what has become an 
annual tradition, which is to pass the National Defense Authorization 
Act to give our troops the support they deserve and our commanders the 
predictability they need for the future. And we need to pass a full 
slate of appropriations bills to avoid a government shutdown just 
before the holidays. Those are the things we need to do, at a bare 
minimum.
  We should also be advancing legislation to avert--or to address the 
border crisis, which has been raging on since January. We need to 
reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act. We need to bring down sky-
high drug prices, and approve accountability and transparency in 
policing.
  There is a lot we should be doing to solve real problems that deserve 
action from the country and which our constituents deserve as well.
  There is a strong appetite for bipartisan work on both sides of the 
aisle, but the leadership of the Democratic Party has effectively 
stonewalled bipartisan legislating in favor of a completely partisan 
approach. It is really a head-scratcher.
  Our Democratic colleagues don't have the kind of majorities that FDR 
had during the New Deal. We have a 50-50 Senate, with the Vice 
President as the tie-breaker. Common sense ought to tell you that that 
demands and requires bipartisan legislating, not these kinds of show 
votes.
  We have a long list of tasks that are far more important than virtue 
signaling. So I hope our colleagues will reevaluate the wisdom of this 
parade of partisan bills and spend time working with us to find where 
we have common ground, where we can actually pass legislation and make 
a difference for our country.
  Until that time, we will continue to oppose partisan attacks on our 
Nation's elections and any other damaging, politically motivated bills 
Democrats bring to the Senate floor.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Mr. KING. Mr. President, with regard to the comments of the esteemed 
Senator from Texas, I say to the Senator: I would suggest, if your 
colleagues are interested in election reform and election laws, that we 
have a dialogue and that we have some discussion. I would welcome a 
proposal from your side of the aisle on election laws and how we deal 
with efforts to suppress the vote in other parts of the country, and 
also to change the Electoral Count Act.
  Is the Senator interested in those and entering into such 
discussions?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, if I may respond to the Senator from 
Maine.
  I am always interested in working on bipartisan bills and finding 
common ground. I think my record--and as the Senator knows, we have 
worked together on a number of things. The fundamental problem with our 
Democratic friends' approach to election reform is they want to 
nationalize the election. They want to take the authority away from the 
States, which is clearly given to the States under the Constitution.
  But if we can take that off the table and talk about some other 
areas, we could work together in that area, I would be more than happy 
to work with my friend from Maine.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Mr. KING. Not to prolong the discussion, but Article I, Section 4 of 
the Constitution makes it abundantly clear that the responsibility for 
election administration is a joint one between the States and the 
Congress, and that the Congress, at any time, can alter regulations or 
the efforts to control the vote in a particular State.
  That has been true ever since the drafting of the Constitution. It 
was true at the time of passage of the 15th Amendment. It was true at 
the time of the passage of the Voting Rights Act.

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  So I look forward to the possibility of working with any colleague on 
protecting the sacred right to vote in this country.
  I will have further comments on this legislation today.
  Thank you.
  I yield the floor.