have long been proud of how our State has administered elections.
In 2020, over 65 percent of eligible Arizonans voted, a record number. Our Republican Governor, Republican attorney general, Democratic secretary of state, and our State’s election administrators and volunteers worked with integrity to administer a fair election.
We saw turnout increases in both Republican and Democratic areas, and, in fact, more Republicans registered in this election than any other party. I am proud that many of our Tribal, rural, and underserved communities voted in record numbers, all during a pandemic. In 2020, Arizonans made their voices heard.
The fact is, multiple Federal and State judges, agencies, and State elected officials concluded the winner was Joe Biden.
In Arizona, this process was administered and overseen by officials from both parties. Election officials conducted random, hand-counted audits of many precincts that confirmed there were no errors that would change the result of the election.
The fact is that the Republican chairman of Maricopa County, the largest Republican county in the State, the biggest population county, stated: “More than 2 million ballots were cast in Maricopa County, and there is no evidence of fraud or misconduct or malfunction.”
He concluded: “No matter how you voted, this election was administered with integrity, transparency, and in accordance with State laws.”
The fact is, the President, his campaign, and several Republican-led groups filed eight election lawsuits, all of which were dismissed. The Arizona Supreme Court, a body where all justices have been appointed by Republican Governors, unanimously dismissed the case.
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The justices found that the party had “failed to present any evidence of ‘misconduct,’ or ‘illegal votes’ … let alone establish any degree of fraud or a significant error rate that would undermine the certainty of the election results.”
After these judicial rulings, the Governor said: “I trust our election system. There’s integrity in our election system.”
The fact is, Joe Biden is the certified winner of Arizona’s 11 electoral votes. Arizona’s elected and appointed officials from both parties followed the facts and came to this conclusion. I urge my colleagues to do the same.
To my colleagues across the aisle, I know we may disagree on who we want as President, but what we personally want is not what matters here. Rather, the people’s influence, as reflected in the certified electoral college results, is what matters. Facts matter.
Undermining faith in our election process by attempting to mislead the American public only serves to weaken us and make us vulnerable to foreign actors who do us harm. For the good of our country, this must stop. Now is the time to come together to preserve our democracy and to protect our national security.
I know my constituents are looking to Congress to move past its divisions, find common ground, and pass legislation to improve the lives of struggling families. We must stay focused on fighting the pandemic. We must work to ensure all Americans can be vaccinated as soon as possible so we can save American lives, safely reopen schools, get people back to work, and visit loved ones again. I urge my colleagues to follow this.
Mr. Gaetz. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the objection.
The Speaker. The gentleman from Florida is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Gaetz. Madam Speaker, one of the first things we did when the House convened today was to join together to extend our grace and our kindness and our concern for a colleague who has experienced just an insurmountable amount of grief with his family. And I want all of our fellow Americans watching to know that we did that because we care about each other and we don’t want bad things to happen to each other, and our heart hurts when they do.
Now, I am sure there are plenty of folks over there who don’t like me too much and there are few of them that I don’t care for too much. But if anybody had been hurt today, it would have been even more of a catastrophe than we already saw, and I think that is an important point for the country.
Another important point for the country is that this morning, President Trump explicitly called for demonstrations and protests to be peaceful. He was far more—you can moan and groan, but he was far more explicit about his calls for peace than some of the BLM and leftwing rioters were this summer when we saw violence sweep across this Nation.
Now, we came here today to debate, to follow regular order, to offer an objection, to follow a process that is expressly contemplated in our Constitution; and for doing that, we got called a bunch of seditious traitors.
Now, not since 1985 has a Republican President been sworn in absent some Democrat effort to object to the electors; but when we do it, it is the new violation of all norms. And when those things are said, people get angry.
Now, I know there are many countries where political violence may be necessary, but America is not one such country.
Madam Speaker, it was wrong when people vandalized and defaced your home. It was wrong when thugs went to Senator Hawley’s home. And I don’t know if the reports are true, but The Washington Times has just reported some pretty compelling evidence from a facial recognition company showing that some of the people who breached the Capitol today were not Trump supporters. They were masquerading as Trump supporters, and, in fact, were members of the violent terrorist group antifa.
Now, we should seek to build America up, not tear her down and destroy her. And I am sure glad that, at least for one day, I didn’t hear my Democrat colleagues calling to defund the police.
Now, I appreciate all the talk of coming together, but let us not pretend that our colleagues on the left have been free of some antidemocratic impulses. Just because we signed on to legal briefs and asked courts to resolve disputes, there were some on the left who said that we should not even be seated in the body, that we ought to be prosecuted, maybe even jailed. Those arguments anger people.
But people do understand the concepts of basic fairness, and no competition, contest, or election can be deemed fair if the participants are subject to different rules.
Baseball teams that cheat and steal signs should be stripped of their championships. Russian Olympians who cheat and use steroids should be stripped of their medals. And States that do not run clean elections should be stripped of their electors.
This fraud was systemic; it was repeated; it was the same system; and, I dare say, it was effective. We saw circumstances where, when Democrat operatives couldn’t get the outcomes they wanted in State legislatures, when they couldn’t get the job done there, they went and pressured and litigated and usurped the Constitution with extra-constitutional action of some officials in some States. They fraudulently laundered ballots, votes, voter registration forms, and then they limited review.
In 2016, Democrats found out that they couldn’t beat Donald Trump at the ballot box with voters who actually show up, so they turned to impeachment and the witness box. And when that failed, they ran to the mailbox, where this election saw an unprecedented amount of votes that could not be authenticated with true ID, with true signature match, and with true confidence for the American people.
Our Article III courts have failed by not holding evidentiary hearings to weigh the evidence. We should not join in that failure. We should vindicate the rights of States. We should vindicate the subpoenas in Arizona that have been issued to get a hold of these voting machines, and we should reject these electors.
Ms. DeGette. Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the objection.
The Speaker. The gentlewoman from Colorado is recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. DeGette. Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to yield my time to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Grijalva), the dean of the Arizona delegation.
