On Monday, the Committee on House Administration's Election Subcommittee held a hearing in Florida on “Voting Rights and Election Administration.”
Democrats intentionally stacked the panel full of liberal congressional members and witnesses in order to outnumber Republican representation and stifle our perspective from being heard.
While Congressman Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) was the only Republican member and Logan Churchwell (Public Interest Legal Foundation) served as the only Republican witness, they stood their ground and spoke the truth.
Here are some key take-aways from today’s hearing:
Democrats led with emotion and partisan talking points; Republicans produced unbiased facts.
One witness, Marlene Bastiene, claimed that millions were prevented from voting because of ID problems, because they couldn’t find their polling location, and because they weren’t provided English translators at the polls. Other Democrat witnesses testified that discrimination must be the underlying cause and pleaded for laws that protect voters.
There’s just one problem. These laws already exist under the Voting Rights Act.
Furthermore, regarding the federal government’s role, Logan Churchwell shared, “The DOJ has had an administrative veto over state and local jurisdictions. In the 1960’s, there was good reason for this and the nation acted out of an abundance of caution.”
However, looking at the numbers now, we now know that in the lifetime of preclearance – the DOJ was asked 129,000 times to review a polling place change and they only objected to changes 83 times.
“When you show 99% approval rates, you have to ask if we’re focusing federal efforts appropriately,” said Churchwell.
Rep. Loudermilk further explained, “I have caution in having Washington, DC bureaucracy get so involved in the election process, because one size does not fit all. From what we’ve gathered here today, a lot of the work is already being handled at the state level – which I think is the best and the most responsive.”
Democrats refused to oppose noncitizen voting.
Rep. Loudermilk asked Andrew Gillum, the former Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate, this question twice:
“Do you believe that noncitizens should be allowed to vote?”
Gillum refused to answer the question directly and instead punted to something we already know: “the Constitution affords the rights of citizenship”.
Democrats equated voter list maintenance to racism.
Committee Chair, Marcia Fudge, made very clear her position on removing inaccurate names from voting rolls in the states. She doesn’t support it.
There were several statements from Democrats at the hearing claiming that such actions were discriminatory against minorities. Despite that the law requires voter list maintenance, Democrats continue to point the finger at states for being racist and even call for “unjust” laws to be disobeyed.
Perhaps Democrats forget that federal law already provides a solution to this: provisional ballots. A fraudulent vote has no remedy.
Rep. Loudermilk addressed their concerns by praising the fact that there has actually been an increase in voter participation by minorities, “We have to determine what is human error and what is discrimination. I am encouraged that the Latino vote doubled in 2018 from the previous midterm and the African American vote has increased by 10.8%.”
Democrats publicly supported prisoners voting.
While Democratic presidential candidates debate over whether the Boston Marathon bomber should vote, Committee Chair Marcia Fudge had no issue proclaiming, “They should never have lost their right to vote.” She questioned, “Should we have ever taken the right of prisoners away, whether they have been convicted of crime or not?”
In closing...
Democrats put on a performance today in an attempt to demonize every election law that could hurt their re-election efforts. While Republicans shared data, statistics, and historical examples of how current laws are protecting the voter and the ballot, Democrats continued to whine for more federal regulation and fewer protections against voter fraud.