There are two ways to describe the electoral reforms included in the omnibus bill that recently passed in the US Senate and is now hopefully on its way to passage in the House of Representatives: 1) they are the most important voting rights and electoral reforms in a generation; and 2) a last-minute compromise, they represent the bare-minimum protections needed to prevent another US insurrection and largely leave in place the nation’s shell of a democracy.
Both descriptions are correct.
Starting on page 1,934 of the $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill, the “Electoral Count Reform Act” and the “Presidential Transition Improvement Act” tighten up procedural ambiguities and provide protections against future conspiracies to subvert presidential elections. The bipartisan effort, put forth in the very final days of the 117th Congress, is a direct response to former President Trump’s efforts to subvert the 2020 presidential election, which culminated in the January 6th Capitol Insurrection.
The new legislation:
–Prohibits state legislatures from changing how electors can be selected after an election, with exceptions only for “force majeure events that are extraordinary and catastrophic” (such as natural disasters that prevent voting);
–Sets a firm date for the selection of electors;
–Provides expedited judicial review of challenges to electors;
–Raises the Congressional threshold for challenging state electors from a single member to one-fifth of...
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