- The House passed a bill aimed at preventing another January 6. Just 9 Republicans voted for it.
- The bill amends the Electoral Count Act and clarifies the vote-counting role of the vice president.
The House of Representatives passed a bill on Wednesday to reform the Electoral Count Act, with just nine Republicans — all of whom are leaving Congress after this session — joining every Democrat passing the legislation by a 229-203.
The "Presidential Election Reform Act," co-sponsored by Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California and Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, aims to prevent another January 6 attack by clarifying the laws that govern Congress's role in counting Electoral College votes.
"If your aim is to prevent future efforts to steal elections, I would respectfully suggest that conservatives should support this bill," said Cheney in floor remarks ahead of the vote. "If instead your aim is to leave open the door for elections to be stolen in the future, you might decide not to support this or any other bill to address the Electoral Count Act."
Most significantly, the bill clarifies that the vice president's role is simply to count votes, and does not include the power to unilaterally reject certain states' electors, as former President Donald Trump argued ahead of the January 6 riot at the Capitol.
It also narrows the grounds for objections to a small set of issues, including explicit constitutional requirements for candidates, while requiring those objections to receive the support of at least one third of each chamber to be heard; currently, it takes just one lawmaker in each chamber.
The text of the bill was only released this week, and several House Republicans — ranging from moderates like Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina to conservatives like Rep. Chip Roy of Texas — told Insider on Tuesday that they hadn't yet decided whether they would support it.
But that afternoon, House Republican leadership began urging their members to vote against the bill, calling it a "political messaging exercise" and likening it to a "federal takeover of elections."
Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia told Insider on Tuesday that she would oppose the bill because "Congress did nothing wrong" on January 6.
"It's always been this way," she said. "So why change it?"
On the other hand, retiring Republican Rep. Peter Meijer of Michigan — one of just 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump for incitement of an insurrection following January 6 — told Insider on Wednesday that it was "painfully obvious" that the reforms were needed.
"The ambiguity around the Electoral Count Act was the overwhelming rationale behind objections" on January 6, he said, indicating his support.
Despite the bill's passage, it's unclear whether it will ultimately become law. The Senate introduced its own separate bill to reform the Electoral Count Act in July, and it now has ten co-sponsors from each party, a good indication of potential success.
On Tuesday, Republican Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah — a member of the group that worked on the reforms in the Senate — condemned Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer for the lack of action in the Senate in light of the House voting on its own bill.
"His delay has now led to a setting where the House is apparently proposing their own bill, which unfortunately will be a party line vote," he told reporters. "I'm afraid that our Democrat friends these days are more interested in messaging than they are in actually legislating. It would be nice to actually get laws passed that will help protect our election system."
Here are the 9 House Republicans who voted for the bill:
- Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming
- Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois
- Rep. Peter Meijer of Michigan
- Rep. Tom Rice of South Carolina
- Rep. Fred Upton of Wisconsin
- Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington
- Rep. John Katko of New York
- Rep. Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio
- Rep. Chris Jacobs of New York