In today's markup of House Resolution 1, the House Committee on Administration defeated on party-line votes all amendments offered by the three Republican members to attempt to fix problems with the bill. The RNLA live-tweeted the markup, and here are some highlights (or, lowlights):

Yesterday was an emotional hearing of the North Carolina election board that generated a fair result, a new election for North Carolina’s ninth Congressional District as a result of ballot harvesting. “Ballot harvesting” is a practice in which paid or organized political operatives collect absentee ballots from voters to whom they have no familial connection and drop them off at a polling place or election office. As happened in North Carolina, critics complain that such actions leave open opportunities for tampering and taking advantage of society’s most vulnerable and those who have no interest in voting.

Yesterday, Mother Jones reported that current FEC Chair Ellen Weintraub has decided to vote against allowing the FEC to defend its positions in court.  Because the FEC currently only has four members and the affirmative votes of four members are required for the FEC to take any official action, this means that Chair Weintraub will prevent the FEC from appearing in court to defend its position.  

California has agreed via settlement to investigate its DMV's latest mishandling of voter registration information:

On Dec. 14, DMV officials revealed that staff members had not transmitted voter registration files for 589 people whose applications or updated applications were filled out before the close of registration for the Nov. 6 statewide election. At the time, state officials could not confirm whether any of those voters had been turned away on election day, or if any had cast last-minute provisional ballots that were rejected in the final tally.

Monday’s settlement raises the possibility that a full investigation of the delayed voter registration documents could reveal races in which the outcome might have changed had those voters been allowed to participate. State officials now have 60 days to complete an investigation into the identity of those voters and why DMV staff members failed to transmit the files in a timely fashion.

As we wrote last week, Lawyers Democracy Fund (LDF) has a full analysis of the election administration portions of HR 1 and how they would centralize control of elections and harm election integrity.  LDF has also released a shorter document highlighting the top ten problems with HR 1:

Lawyers Democracy Fund (LDF) has just released a summary and comprehensive analysis of House Democrats' attempt to commandeer America's elections. In short, the massive compilation of major election chances is being pushed through the House of Representatives, likely without any substantive hearings, expert testimony from election officials, or meaningful markup and on a blatantly partisan basis. As LDF describes:

Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made his first floor speech about the dangers of the House Democrats' flagship legislation, House Resolution 1 (HR 1).  He said it was only a "quick tour" and promised to come regularly to the floor to describe the problems in the lengthy "effort to rewrite the rules to favor Democrats and their friends" so that all Americans can know about the dangers of its provisions.

You would think House Democrats' first bill would be something that polled well for their base or that the public cared about.  Or maybe it would be something crazy and liberal like unofficial House Democrat spokesperson Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's idea for “reparations...for...the New Deal.”  Nope.  In HR 1 House Democrats made their first bill since gaining control of the House about limiting speech (and therefore criticism of them) and rigging election processes in their favor.  As House Administration Committee Republicans state:

#HR1 is a “proposal to grow the federal government’s power over Americans’ political speech and elections.” #FortheDemocrats

— CHA Republicans (@HouseAdmnGOP) January 24, 2019

The new Democratic majority of the House of Representatives carefully crafted House Resolution 1 (H.R. 1) behind closed doors. The first House Resolution of each session is intended to be a symbolic designation for a major legislative priority for the majority of that Congress. This House of Representatives is seeking to drastically change how America administers and conducts its elections. H.R.1—officially titled: “To expand Americans' access to the ballot box, reduce the influence of big money in politics, and strengthen ethics rules for public servants, and for other purposes”—has only recently been released to the general public after being secretly crafted behind closed doors while hyped by the incoming Democrat majority.

According to the Washington Post, in late November: