November 3, 2020 – Arkansas Republican Senator Tom Bryant Cotton (R) wins re-election.
U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) announced on Sunday (3) evening that he will not join a challenge to the Electoral College votes during a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6.
The Arkansas senator said that while he is concerned about election irregularities in the 2020 presidential election, he believes that Congress would be setting an “unwise” precedent and exceeding its delegated authority if it tried to overturn the Electoral College vote.
“Congress would be taking the power to choose the president away from the people, which would essentially end presidential elections and put the power in the hands of a partisan Congress.” Cotton said in a statement.
He added that trying to challenge the results of the vote would jeopardize the Electoral College system and give Democrats more reason to pursue their goal of eliminating it. The system has helped Republicans, who won presidential elections in 2000 and 2016.
Cotton also believes that overturning the Electoral College would also result in a Democratic push to federalize election laws.
“Therefore, I would not oppose counting certified electoral votes on Jan. 6.” Cotton said, “I appreciate what the president has accomplished over the past four years, which is why I actively campaigned for his re-election. But opposing the certified electoral vote will not give him a second term and will only embolden Democrats who want to further erode the constitutional system.”
This comes as a growing number of Republican House members and senators have announced that they will intend to challenge the Electoral College votes in several states where election results, disputed by alleged irregularities and voter fraud, are at stake.
Republican members of Congress have been taking sides in this last-ditch effort to ensure that allegations of election fraud are addressed transparently and independently in the run-up to Jan. 6, in order to preserve confidence in U.S. elections for years to come.
By one count, 12 senators have already expressed a willingness to join the effort, and at least 50 House members have pledged to oppose the disputed electoral votes on Jan. 6. Meanwhile, more than two dozen lawmakers from both houses of Congress have said they will not participate in the efforts.
The lawmakers said it is the duty of Congress to restore the people’s trust in the democratic process and therefore the Electoral College votes must be challenged.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said Congress now has a responsibility to fill that role as the U.S. Supreme Court refuses to take up any cases related to the 2020 presidential election.
“We have an independent responsibility to the Constitution. We have an independent obligation to the rule of law.” Cruz said in an interview Sunday with Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo.
With Cruz leading a group of 10 senators, he called for an election commission to conduct an emergency 10-day audit of voter fraud allegations. Cruz said his proposal for an electoral commission is based on the law and supported by historical precedents such as the 1876 presidential election.
The move to challenge the Electoral College was spearheaded by Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ariz.), who previously said the challenge was necessary to “protect our electoral system from fraud and illegality.
Allegations of election fraud have been repeatedly denied by key election officials and members of Congress, while critics and parts of the media have dismissed them as “baseless.
To date, a significant number of cases brought by the Trump campaign and its allies have been dismissed by judges on procedural grounds, including in the U.S. Supreme Court.
At the same time, however, allegations that state officials have violated the U.S. Constitution and state election laws by changing or relaxing election rules and safeguards on their own have not received adequate review in state or federal courts.
Several other cases are currently sitting at the doorstep of the U.S. Supreme Court seeking a ruling from the Supreme Court on whether state officials or state courts exceeded their authority by changing election rules during the pandemic.
Cotton’s statement came on the same day that a group of seven House Republicans announced that they will not oppose the electoral votes on Jan. 6.
The group, led by Rep. Ken Buck (R-Mich.), said participating in such an effort would amount to “unconstitutionally involving Congress in the presidential election process,” which would “steal” power from the people and the states.
They said Congress has no authority to make value judgments about presidential electors or to “disqualify electors based on its own findings of fraud in that state’s election.
“Congress has only one job here: to count the electoral votes that have in fact been cast in any state by a designated person authorized under state law to cast those votes.” The group wrote in a statement.
For an objection to be successful during a joint session, it must be made in writing by at least one member of the House of Representatives and one senator. If either state’s objection meets that requirement, the joint session is suspended and each chamber returns to its own chamber for a maximum of two hours of debate on the issue. The House and Senate then vote separately on whether to accept or reject the objection, which requires a majority vote of both chambers to pass.
If both candidates receive fewer than 270 electoral votes on Jan. 6, a “Contingent election” (also known as a snap election) will be held. At that time, each state’s delegation in the U.S. House of Representatives decides the president on a one-state, one-vote basis, and the vice president is decided by a vote in the Senate.
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