[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 117 (Monday, July 10, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Page S2264]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             VOTING RIGHTS

  Mr. SCHUMER. On voting rights, the great John Lewis said, ``Democracy 
is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to 
build what we called the Beloved Community.''
  We should heed these words in our day and age because today House 
Republicans introduced their latest broadside against the fundamental 
right to vote, a sweeping bill that one lawmaker called ``the most 
substantive and conservative election integrity legislation that will 
come before the House in over a generation.'' Let me say that again: 
``the most substantive and conservative election integrity legislation 
that will come before the House in over a generation.'' Democrats here 
in the Senate will never allow such a terrible proposal to become law, 
and very soon, we will once again move to bring real, much needed 
voting rights legislation before Congress.
  People think that the attacks against democracy came and went on 
January 6. Unfortunately, sadly, that is not true. In States as diverse 
as Georgia, Texas, Iowa, Florida, and Arizona, partisans have rewritten 
the rules of our elections in broad daylight to make it harder to 
vote--harder to vote--in a democracy that, of course, for centuries has 
hailed the right to vote and advanced it.
  Today's bill from Republicans is the latest example of the giant step 
backward the Republicans these days are taking when it comes to voting 
rights, and Democrats will fiercely oppose it.

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