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Edited on Fri Jan-07-05 10:03 PM by Stephanie
on election reform. They are FINALLY GETTING IT.
Who is this guy Cummings?
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Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, today this is not about overturning election results but reforming a broken election system.
Mr. Speaker, as I listen to my friends from the other side I become quite upset when I hear them say things like, we are trying to break down the election system, taking away from the credibility of our election system. Nothing could be further from the truth.
What we are trying to do is make sure that every single voter has the right to vote and that their vote is counted.
This is not a black and white issue. This is not a Republican/Democrat issue. This is a red, white and blue issue.
This Constitution that we base our country and our laws on, the fundamental things of that Constitution, that building block, is the vote; and when we take away that vote, then what we do is we basically are destroying our democracy. That is what this is all about.
I wonder, I really do, if it were your wife who was denied the right to vote or your child, would you be making the same arguments?
All we are saying is we want to make sure that if we have a broken system, if there is one person whose vote is not counted, if there is one person who does not have the right to vote, then that is one person too many. It is as simple as that.
So it upsets me that you keep saying these things about us denying Bush his opportunity to be President and all this kind of thing. That is not true.
What we are addressing is the fundamental right to vote. It is simple as that.
* {Begin Insert}
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express concern for our nation's democracy. At its core, our form of government is based on the premise of ``one person, one vote.''
When you take away that right to vote or when you deny a cast vote from being counted, then you denigrate the building blocks of our great democracy and our Constitution.
We are not here to contest the election results, but urge election reform of a broken system.
In fact, today, we are reliving the painful experiences of the 2000 election.
Those problems included: outdated and unreliable technology, confusing ballots, lack of poll worker training, and inaccurate voting lists.
As a result, 6 million voters were disenfranchised.
We all remember that this disenfranchisement was most prevalent in Florida.
And here we stand again, four years later, to discuss flaws that led to a significant disenfranchisement of voters in the recent 2004 Presidential Election.
This is not an effort to overturn the results of the election. Rather, this is an effort to address the irregularities of the election and to fix our broken election system.
Although there were general reports of irregularities across the country, we must examine the prevalent problems that occurred in the state of Ohio, in particular.
There were numerous accounts of eligible voters--waiting on line for up to ten hours in the cold and rain--facing insufficient resources at polling places, voting machine shortages, the denial of provisional ballots, voting machine errors or tampering, and the intentional distribution of inaccurate information.
I think many of my colleagues find these irregularities appalling.
My friends of the House and Senate this is a red, white and blue issue; not black or white; not urban or rural; or even Republican or Democratic.
We must stand up to these injustices.
That is why, as a result of these irregularities, I believe these critical steps must be taken:
1. Congress needs to enact meaningful non-partisan election reform--HAVA can and needs to be improved, particularly by providing for a verified paper trail for electronic voting machines.
2. Congress should engage in further hearings into the widespread election irregularities reported in Ohio and around the country to fix our piecemeal election system.
Our duty to uphold democracy in America is clear.
If even one American is denied the right to vote, or one vote is not counted, that is simply one too many.
I applaud the brave gentlelady of Ohio, STEPHANIE TUBBS JONES, and the equally brave Senator BARBARA BOXER of the State of California for raising this contest to the electoral votes from Ohio.
I leave this great Chamber with a fitting quote from Thomas Jefferson, `` by their votes the people exercise their sovereignty.''
* {End Insert}
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