Efforts to Repackage Failed Election Takeover Bills Will Meet Same Fate

U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding Democrats’ federal election takeover:

“Last week, Senate Democrats announced what was marketed as a compromise on carving out a bigger role for Washington D.C. in elections across America.

“It was hardly the first time our Democratic colleagues had given their takeover of fifty states’ election law a makeover. Over the years, it’s sometimes been sold as an urgent overhaul of our democracy and other times as just a set of narrow tweaks.

“But for all their attempts to change up the pitch, the unfortunate fact is that the bones of the Democrats’ proposal are still the same.

“This latest version is only a compromise in the sense that the center-left compromised with the far left. Under the hood is the same Frankenstein’s monster that’s been there since 2019, years before the state-level actions which the Democrats now claim have made it all necessary.

“It still makes Washington bureaucrats the de facto board of elections for all 50 states, dictating the terms of things like automatic and same-day voter registration.

“It still insists on impeding state efforts to ensure the integrity of voter rolls through popular, commonsense voter I.D. measures.

“It still has government dollars going directly to politicians’ campaigns – that’s public funds for bumper stickers and attack ads.

“It still empowers partisan regulators to circumvent the bipartisan FEC and engage in even more intimidation of private citizens who engage in political speech. And these, of course, are just to name a few.

“Now surely, Mr. President, as the Senate continues to do its job and strike down misguided ideas like these, we’ll hear plenty from folks who consider it evidence that this body is broken.

“But of course that simply is not true.

“The Senate is fully capable of taking landmark, bipartisan action that makes it easier to vote and harder to cheat. We did it back in 2002 with the Help America Vote Act, which I helped lead.

“We empowered state and local election systems to follow commonsense guide posts for integrity and accessibility. And the Senate passed our bill, 92-2!

“So if our Democratic colleagues really wanted to find common ground and act on common sense, the road map is right there.

“But unfortunately, we know that’s never been the goal.

“Unfortunately, this latest ‘compromise’ is just a repackaging of what even reporters called a messaging bill that was headed nowhere.

“The substance is not really changing. And so neither will the result.”