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| Photo Credit: AP. |
The U.S. Senate is considering a bipartisan Electoral Count Act reforms to the 187-year-old election law to prevent a repeat of the January 6, 2021 incident when former President Donald Trump and his allies tried to overturn the election victory of President Joe Biden.
Why is the Senate amending the 1887 law that governs the process of certifying electoral college votes?
Mr. Trump
and his allies tried repeatedly to influence then Vice President Mike Pence to
reject Electoral College votes on the pretext that they were invalid. On Wednesday
Senators at a Rules Committee hearing argued it was weaponized for purposes
outside its intent, Washington Examiner reports.
According to
Washington Examiner the Senate Rules Committee’s hearing is focused on a
bipartisan proposal to reform the 1887 law that governs the process of
certifying Electoral College votes.
Trump tried to overturn 2020 elections
When Trump
and his allies tried to use the law to overturn his defeat at the polls, they
argued that the Vice President could refuse to recognize the results of a
handful of swing states. Mr. Pence rejected the idea along with some of Trump’s
aide, Trump then called a rally where he identified Mr. Pence as the problem on
January 6, 2021.
He called on
his supporters to go to the Capitol Hill to make their voices heard prompting
some of his supporters to chant “Hang Mike Pence”. The mob laid a siege at
Congress in a bid to prevent the certification of Biden’s victory.
Sens. Susan
Collins (R-ME) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) both testified at the hearing as the lead
negotiators on the bipartisan bill, according to Washington Examiner.
Process for counting electoral votes had been abused before the January 6 riot - Collins
Collins said
that the process for counting electoral votes had been abused before the riot,
“with frivolous objections being raised by members of both parties, but it took
the violent breach of the Capitol on Jan. 6 to really shine a spotlight on how urgent
the need for reform was.”
Manchin supported
Collins position saying that their bill “addresses what the bipartisan group
has identified as the most concerning problems with [the Electoral Count Act],
it unambiguously clarifies that the vice president is prohibited and, I repeat,
it clarifies that the vice president, whoever he or she may be, is prohibited
from interfering with electoral votes.”
Vice President's role in Electoral College Votes certification is only "ministerial" - Senate
Washington
Examiner reported that the proposed legislation would amend provisions of the
law to certify that the vice president’s role in certification is “solely
ministerial” and would raise the threshold for objections to certifications to
one-fight of the members of each chamber, up from a lone member of both
chambers.
Following the
Senate session Trump wrote on Truth Social Wednesday saying that “Senators are
meeting right now on reforming the Electoral Count Act so that a Vice President
can no longer do what EVERYBODY, except for certain Conservative legal
scholars, said was not allowed to be done,” according to Washington Examiner.
“So they all
lied,” Trump wrote. “The V.P. could have sent fraudulent votes back to State
Legislatures!”
Both
Senators Roy Blunt (R-MO) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) rejected Trump’s argument.
Blunt said the bill makes “clarifications” that are “so obviously needed” to
prevent confusion in future elections, according to Washington Examiner. Klobuchar
said that on Jan. 6, “enemies of our democracy sought to exploit the provisions
of this antiquated law to subvert the results of a free and fair election.”