Congressional leaders unveil rules for counting constituencies

A group of seven House Republicans – including Freedom Caucus members such as Ken Buck (Colorado) and Chip Roy (Texas) as well as Representative-elect Nancy Mace (SC) and Libertarian Representative Thomas Massie (R-Ky. ) – made a rare and long statement on Sunday afternoon opposing the effort to contest the elections.

They argue that the Constitution makes it clear that states – and not Congress – are responsible for the selection of voters.

“We must respect the authority of states here,” the lawmakers wrote in their statement, obtained by POLITICO. “While this may thwart our immediate political goals, we have vowed to promote the Constitution above our political goals. We have to count the electoral votes submitted by the states. “

A handful of Senate Republicans have also spoken forcefully against Trump’s challenges. Besides the senses. Ben Sasse, Mitt Romney and Pat Toomey, who forcefully berated these growing challenges, the senses. Susan Collins and Roger Wicker said on Sunday they would oppose the challenges as well. The Washington Post also revealed on Sunday that Trump a day earlier called Georgian Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and urged him to “find” enough votes to undo Biden’s victory in the state.

Some Trump allies have sought to reject the proceedings altogether. They hoped to empower Vice President Mike Pence, who will chair the session, to unilaterally reject Biden voters; it is unclear whether these members will attempt to oppose or change these rules when they come to the House and Senate on Sunday night. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) sued Pence last week in an effort to quash the proceedings, but he was unceremoniously dismissed by two federal courts.

Procedures, if passed, require Pence to present all documents “claiming” to be electoral votes. It needs to read them alphabetically by state and offer lawmakers a chance to object along the way. These long-standing procedures allow just two lawmakers – a single member of the House and a Senator acting together – to curb the process, forcing the House and Senate to break off the joint session and debate challenges for two hours each, before to vote on and return to the joint session.

There is virtually no doubt that the challenges of Biden’s victory will fail. The democratically-run House will oppose them, and enough Republicans in the tightly divided Senate have indicated they will reject any challenge as well. But the scale of the push – with dozens of House Republicans and at least a quarter of the Senate government – will be unprecedented, aided by the full support of the sitting president, who has encouraged supporters to come together in mass in Washington on January 6 to protest the session.

Some Trump allies are encouraging Pence to try to take control of the session regardless of the rules and simply refuse to present Biden voters in states that Trump has challenged. But Pence has refused to adopt this strategy in court, and Congress would similarly refuse to consider such an effort.

The processes in the proposed rules are enshrined in a federal law passed in 1887 called the Electoral Count Act, a law passed to deal with the disastrous election of 1876. The procedures have been adopted by every Congress since then to govern the electoral college of January 6. certification meeting. However, constitutional scholars have questioned whether the House and Senate could be bound by the 130-year-old law and if they could supplement it to clearly define some of its vague aspects, such as Pence’s authorities as president. and the legal requirements that all “deemed” electoral votes be introduced.

One of the questions regarding Pence’s role is whether he intends to present lists of Republicans who have claimed to vote for Trump in key states Biden has won. Future Trump voters gathered on December 14, the day formal members of the Electoral College gathered in their respective capitals and held mock sessions to vote for Trump. If it did, Congress would be legally required to count only those certified by state governments – but that would continue to amplify Trump’s efforts to delegitimize the process.