Buckeye Reporter

  U.S. Senator Rob Portman (R-OH) delivered remarks on the Senate floor this afternoon outlining his opposition to Democrats’ controversial, sweeping “voting rights” legislation. Portman detailed the numerous problems with the legislation before chiding Democrats for using this issue to fan the flames of division and partisanship in the country. Portman also voiced his opposition to Democrats’ plan to dismantle the legislative filibuster, which brings members together and leads to bipartisan, sustainable laws — citing the bipartisan infrastructure law as an example. Instead, he called on Senators from both sides of the aisle to work together on common-sense solutions, such as reforming the Electoral Count Act.“Mr. President, I was asked recently what I think is the number one issue facing America. It's a tough question. I had a lot of issues raised through my mind: inflation, the debt workforce issues, the crisis at our Southern border, the explosion of COVID cases, the deadly opioid epidemic, a warming planet, Russia and China flexing their muscles and creating more volatility around the world. We've got plenty of challenges, don't we? “But you know what I landed on? What I think is our biggest problem? It's the increasing division, even polarization, of our politics and our country. It's what makes it so hard to address all those other issues that I named that are so important to the families we represent. “Equally troubling to me is that this seems to be a purely political exercise now in that the conclusion seems predetermined. Apparently the Senate is being dragged through this divisive and ugly partisan debate knowing that it will not achieve a legislative result, but only a deepening and hardening of the political lines in each camp.“First, the substance of the legislative fight: Democrats have been highly critical of those Republicans who refuse to accept the results of the 2020 election, pointing out accurately that dozens of lawsuits failed to show adequate fraud to change the result. They have attacked some Republicans because they had said that the election was rigged for questioning the state-by-state certification process that has led to deeper rifts in our nation and a significant number of Republican voters questioning the legitimacy of the election. I get that. So why now are Democratic leaders and President Biden using the exact same language, literally saying the elections are rigged, literally saying that? Why are they perpetrating their own election narrative that does not fit the facts, but serves to push both sides deeper into their own camps and in particular now leads Democrats to think elections are illegitimate“What Republicans and most Americans don't support is an unprecedented federal takeover of our election system, which is what the overly broad, party-line bills proposed this week by the Democrats will do. Let me be clear. Despite what Democratic leaders are saying to jam these bills through Congress, our democracy is not, as they say, in crisis because it is too hard to vote. We just had a national election in 2020 with the highest voter turnout in 120 years. 94% of voters said it was easy for them to vote. This is according to the Pew Research Center, 94 percent. That's good. Some have said drastic changes are needed at the federal level because the States are now enacting voter restrictions. Some point to the liberal Brennan Center, which reports that 19 states have enacted laws which it characterizes as restricting the right to vote. As noted above, again by the nonpartisan No Labels group, when you really look at these laws, the truth is that they largely make modest changes in election law administration, such as the date that voters may apply for mail in ballots. We're ensuring voters are who they say they are through voter ID and other signature requirements. Something, by the way, the vast majority of Americans support. Some of the laws return to state practices closer to the status quo before the pandemic. As an example, some laws reduced the number of ballot drop boxes in cases where there were no ballot drop boxes before COVID.“I'm very proud of the job that my state of Ohio and our bipartisan election officials in every county do in our elections. In the last election, we had a record 5.97 million Ohioans cast a vote. More voters than ever. It represented 74 percent of eligible voters in our state, the second highest percentage in the history of Ohio. Despite the challenges of running the highest turnout election in our state's history during an unprecedented pandemic, it was widely regarded as the most secure and most successful Ohio election ever. Now is not the time to take the responsibility away from Ohio state and local officials. Article one, Section four of the Constitution clearly assigns that authority over elections to the States. Alexander Hamilton acknowledged in Federalist 59 that only in extraordinary circumstances should the federal government become involved in election law, explaining that allowing the federal government to run elections would have been, 'premeditated engine for the destruction of state governments.' We are not in extraordinary circumstances right now. “Although it's a Senate rule, the legislative filibuster also requires members of the House of Representatives to come up with more bipartisan solutions because they know their legislation has to pass the Senate if they want it to become law. Just as I have been a committed bipartisan legislator here in the Senate for the past eleven years, the same was true in the House for twelve years, where I regularly used the fact that we needed 60 votes in the Senate to force colleagues on both sides of the aisle to come together and find a way to pass legislation in a bipartisan manner. When I was an Executive Branch in two Cabinet level jobs in the Bush 43 administration and as Director of the Office of Legislative Affairs for Bush 41, that 60 vote necessity in the Senate calmed the passions within the administration and forced us to find common ground to work in a more bipartisan manner, resulting in more effective results that last the test of time. “And I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support sensible rules changes and recommit to use the 60 vote margin responsibly to generate consensus and find that elusive common ground that will best serve those we represent and that will keep our great Republic the envy of the world. I yield back my time.”