For the People Act of 2021
Floor Speech
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Mr. McCARTHY. Madam Speaker, this week Democrats are pushing partisan legislation that would change how we conduct elections and how we can speak about political issues. This legislation is the Democrats' most pressing priority. Every single Democrat is a cosponsor.
Democrats made this bill H.R. 1, which is reserved for the bills the majority thinks are the very most important.
Madam Speaker, you know--and those who are watching and those across the country should understand--that when you become the majority, you reserve the first 10 numbers for whatever you want them to be. So this could have been H.R. 2, H.R. 3, H.R. 4, H.R. 5, H.R. 6, all the way up to 10 or go on to any other number.
When I went out to talk to my constituents in the world of COVID who are out of work and out of school, not one of them would think H.R. 1 would be something for politicians to protect themselves to get reelected. But every single Democrat believes that is the case.
It wouldn't just be in my district, but I would say that if you talk to any American, they would say: Back to work, back to school, and back to health.
Madam Speaker, the priorities here are wrong. But it is not just because the Speaker thinks it so, because every single Democrat cosponsored this bill. It was bad when the Democrats introduced it before COVID, and it is bad that they prioritize this over the children going back to school, or people going back to work, or making sure every American who wants a vaccine gets one. No. It shows the truth about what people think is the worst about people in Congress. They prioritize themselves over everything else.
Let's understand this bill. After a year of our country suffering through a pandemic, the Democrats' first piece of legislation does not help the millions of students still out of school, and it does not help the 10 million Americans who are still unemployed. No. Democrat legislation only helps themselves. Democrats want to use their razor- thin majority, not to pass bills to earn voters' trust, but to ensure they don't lose more seats in the next election.
Madam Speaker, I know the leadership on the other side predicted that they would win 20 seats. They only lost. I know that this is the most razor-thin majority the Democrats have seen in the last 100 years, so I guess that is why it is the top priority for every single Democrat.
Now, there are problems with this bill, so let's understand it.
First, H.R. 1 sends public dollars to fund political campaigns. Yes.
Can you believe that, Madam Speaker?
Madam Speaker, it is the number one priority you got elected to Congress to do. Forget everything else, I want to make sure I get more taxpayer money to fund my own campaign. I have to make sure I get reelected--not that the kids go back to school and not to distribute vaccines--to create a slush fund so that politicians can run for reelection.
Let me explain it to you, Madam Speaker. It is in the fine print. Let's say someone donates $200 to a preferred candidate. Under H.R. 1, taxpayers now must chip in not $200, but $1,200.
Where in the world can you get that type of return on your investment?
That is amazing.
You talk somebody into giving you $200 for your campaign, Madam Speaker, so the taxpayers now have to give you $1,200. No wonder you made it the most important bill because it only focuses on you.
Democrats want to raise this money through new fines on corporations which the government will use to pay for campaigns and political consultants. I guess Democrats don't actually believe corporate money is bad in politics.
Today, corporations can't give. I guess they found a loophole to help them.
Second, H.R. 1 weakens the security of our elections by making it harder to protect against voter fraud. This bill automatically registers voters from the DMV and other government databases such as food stamps. In most cases it would prevent officials from removing ineligible voters from the rolls and make it harder to verify the accuracy of voter information. Currently, an estimated 24 million voter records across the country appear to be inaccurate or invalid, and as we saw during the pandemic, this created chaos and confusion.
It doesn't matter if you are a Democrat, Republican, or Independent. Everyone has a personal story of a friend, their family, or their neighbor receiving a ballot they shouldn't have. Every one of those stories erodes trust in election integrity. Yet, under H.R. 1, future voters can be dead or illegal immigrants or maybe even registered two to three times. I guess Democrats just don't care, as long as they get reelected.
Third, H.R. 1 rewrites election laws and imposes one-size-fits-all partisan rules from Washington.
Under the Constitution, we generally defer to States and counties to run elections. Democrats want to change that. First, they outlaw Dr. Seuss, and now they want to tell us what to say.
They want to remove reasonable debates about early voting, registration, and no-excuse mail-in balloting from the States and counties and resolve them with a single Federal solution decided by the whims of Washington. It is not unusual, because I know the committee is also looking at, even though someone didn't win an election, appointing somebody different in Congress.
They want to stop States from listening to their residents on the very best way to protect ballot integrity, whether it is passing voter I.D. laws or using basic safeguards like checking their voter rolls against the Post Office change-of-address system.
They want to mandate no-excuse mail-in balloting and 15 days of early voting as the post-pandemic norm.
Madam Speaker, in the last election, at least twice a week somebody would send me a picture of the ballots that were mailed to their home of people who had died or of people who had not lived there in 8 years. This would guarantee that continues.
Fourth, H.R. 1 politicizes the Federal Election Commission by turning it from an evenly divided commission into a partisan one. But they are also going to create a speech czar.
Can you imagine? The Federal Election Commission has an even number of Republicans and an even number of Democrats. You have the smallest majority you have had in more than 100 years, so your number one priority is to make sure you can't keep that bipartisan. Let's put our thumb on the scale and make sure we get one more Democrat than Republican. Then we can create a speech czar and tell people what to say and what they can't say.
So they can't tell us in a bill we just passed that there is $140 million for a subway just outside the Speaker's office. That would be wrong. But we also could get $200, but get $1,200 from the taxpayer. Who wouldn't want this bill? Every single Democrat does.
H.R. 1 weaponizes the IRS--can you imagine that--by allowing the IRS to consider an organization's political views before granting tax exemptions. Now, they are going to pick and choose. You know, I thought this was unbelievable until I read this document.
If you live in China and you want to fly on an airline, you can walk up to the desk, you can have your money, but that doesn't determine whether you get a ticket. You know what determines whether you get a ticket? Your score; what you have said. And if you said something that the government doesn't like, you can't fly on that plane. Unbelievable, right? That could never happen in America.
Well, now we have a speech czar, we have made sure the Federal Election Commission is where they are, and now we weaponize the IRS to do exactly that.
Remember, under President Obama's IRS, this power was abused by Lois Lerner and other bureaucrats to target conservative nonprofits during the 2012 election. It was a massive scandal, a clear and intolerable violation of public trust, and a crime, which is why singling out groups for political views is banned.
One hundred thirty nonprofits wrote to Congress to strongly object to H.R. 1. Why would nonprofits object to this? They said America should be able to ``support causes we believe in without the fear of harassment or intimidation.'' Well, I guess they are right, because if this majority makes the number one issue--in a world of a pandemic, unemployment, and kids out of school--the protection of themselves, I would be afraid, too.
If you are serious about restoring public trust in government, the ban must remain in place.
Madam Speaker, Democrats call H.R. 1 the For the People Act, but it really should be called the for the politicians act. It is not designed to protect Americans' vote. It is designed to put a thumb on the scale in every election in America so that Democrats can turn a temporary majority into permanent control. It is an unparalleled political grab. I urge all my colleagues to oppose it.
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