politicians, and Presidents invalidating elections when the people took power for themselves. That is why, when I joined the Marine Corps, the most sacred part of my oath was to protect the Constitution of the United States.
I never thought I would have to do that on the floor of Congress, but here we are. The people have spoken, and the power of the people, the Constitution, will be preserved.
Madam Speaker, I left my youth, I left my sanity, I left it all in Iraq for this country because there is this one precious idea that we all had, that we all believed: that this country was going to protect everyone’s individual rights, that you were going to be able to vote, that you were going to be able to preserve democracy and pass it on as a legacy, as an inheritance to every American.
But today—today—there was treason in this House. Today, there were traitors in this House.
So I am not asking my Republican colleagues to help me and stop this objection to Arizona; I am asking you to get off all these objections. It is time for you to save your soul. It is time for you to save your country.
That man at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue will forget you. He will use you and he will dump you to the side, but what will be left will be the stain—the stain—on democracy that you are engaging in right now.
Listen to yourselves. I consider most of you very smart, believe it or not, but the idea that we would rig an election for the President but not preserve the congressional seats for all of our friends that we just lost in the last election is absurd.
The idea that we would help Vice President Biden win but wouldn’t make sure that we got enough Senators in the Senate for us to pass a full agenda is absurd.
The idea that there was somehow nefarious border registration in Arizona that tipped the scale when, during that same time of border registration, there were more registered voters that were Republicans than Democrats is absurd.
You are better than this. Many of you did serve, many of you have never served, but there is an opportunity and a time for courage. I hope you never have to face fire or bullets or bombs for your country, but right now—right now—this country is asking you to be better. Right now, this country is asking you to show courage.
That man will leave. Your soul will stay with you for the rest of your life.
You owe it to democracy. You owe it to the hundreds and thousands of men and women that have sacrificed their life.
You know better. You are better. Be the good American. Be the American you want. Preserve this democracy; reject this movement; and stop this terrorism that is happening from the White House.
The Speaker. Members are reminded to address their remarks to the Chair.
Mr. Bishop of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in favor of the objection.
The Speaker. The gentleman from North Carolina is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Bishop of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, it has been quite a day. And in contrast to the gentleman’s comments just now, I couldn’t get over this text that I received from the mayor of Charlotte, Vi Lyles, about 30 minutes ago. She is a progressive Democrat, a political opponent for years, a tremendous and graceful person. She said:
Representative Bishop, I hope you are safe and well. It must have been a day of anguish for the world to see our Capitol buildings under siege. I know you have a long night ahead and want you to know I was thinking about you, your family, and staff.
God bless.
Vi.
Back home, the generosity of spirit still exists.
And I understand the sharp words and feelings on the other side tonight, but there are also good people back home, and I have heard from many, many, many of them.
News would suggest there are millions of Americans—that is a big number—millions, tens of millions, who believe something went awry in this election. And they aren’t dumb. They aren’t mindless. They don’t believe things simply because the President says them. There were problems.
I know that Joe Biden will be President, but I don’t know that it hurts or would hurt any of us to have the generosity of spirit to continue to reflect on what might be better or what might seriously have gone wrong here, even if you reject the notion that the result was wrong.
I would like to offer a slightly different perspective, a distinct perspective. Perhaps it will be rejected. I think if I were sitting on the other side of the aisle, it would be very difficult for me to listen to tonight, but you all have heard it said, and it certainly is true, that many executive branch officials around the Nation departed from State legislatures’ enacted laws.
I know it is less understood how this came to pass.
It was not a spontaneous, independent decisionmaking, but it resulted, I would argue, from a coordinated, nationwide partisan plan. And the fact and scope of the plan really isn’t disputed.
If you go to democracydocket.com, it is the website of Marc Elias, the national Democratic election lawyer who appeared in hundreds of cases across the country in the course of the election year.
This plan was not a response to COVID, by the way. It preexisted that. And his website shows that as well. He explained that in January of 2020.
It was a chaos strategy, a plan to flood State and Federal courts with hundreds of simultaneous election year lawsuits aimed at displacing State legislative control.
Now, as I have seen it, only the most experienced and independent judges appear to have recognized what was afoot. In the fourth circuit, dissenting judges Wilkinson and Agee said this: “Let’s understand the strategy that is being deployed here … Our country is now plagued with a proliferation of preelection litigation.” And as they put it, 385 election year cases to that point on October 20, and they referred to the website healthyelections.org to verify that.
“Around the country,” they wrote, “courts are changing the rules of the upcoming elections at the last minute. It makes the promise of the Constitution’s Elections and Electors Clauses into a farce.”
This was a political operation masquerading as a judicial one. And in keeping with that, it featured gross breaches of litigation ethics: forum shopping, repetitive suits after losses, and collusive settlements with cooperating Democratic officials of State and local governments.
That is what led to officials changing the rules in State after State, mainly through consent orders, or the preliminary, unreviewed decisions of State and Federal trial judges inclined by partisanship or having limited experience with the Electoral Clause.
In turn, the displacement of rules set by State legislatures led to chaotic conditions on the ground, about which so many Americans are angry and disheartened.
I think we can do better. I think that strategy was unwise, and I think, particularly in light of what has happened here today, we should.
Mr. O’Halleran. Madam Speaker, I rise tonight in opposition to the objection.
The Speaker. The gentleman from Arizona is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. O’Halleran. Madam Speaker, as a nation, we have endured trying times and overcome many challenges, and now we face an unprecedented effort to ignore the will of the American people and the people of Arizona. Given the facts and the unprecedented events of tonight, this effort must be finished, and America can be united again. That is going to take leadership.
We are all leaders.
We are elected to be leaders. And if we are going to do that, we have to do it from respect to others, the idea that truth is important, that factual content is important, that we are going to tell the American people what is going on in this country and not what we hope they hear from a 30-second sound bite.
I used to be a homicide investigator. My job was to follow the facts, develop a case, make decisions and recommendations based on where those facts led me. Following the process means that decisions cannot be made on rumors and innuendos alone.
I am proud to say that Arizona has used mail-in voting for over two decades. Both Republicans and Democrats
