Is There Enough Time for Reform of the Electoral Count Act to Pass in the Lame Duck Session of Congress?

election subversion risk

I’ve written that this must-pass bill to limit the chances of election subversion must pass during the lame duck session, as there’s no way it gets brought up by a Republican House led by Kevin McCarthy in the next session of Congress.

Here’s the latest on timing and prospects from WaPo:

  • Revising the Electoral Count Act: Nearly 40 senators — including 16 Republicans — have signed on to a bill introduced in July by Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) to revise the Electoral Count Act, the 1887 law whose ambiguities Donald Trump tried to exploit to overturn the 2020 election results. In theory, that should give the measure enough support to overcome a Republican filibuster. In practice, the Senate is running out of time.
    • The House also passed its own version of the bill in September drafted by Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), so the two chambers would need to reconcile the bills — or the House could just pass the Senate bill. In a “Dear Colleague” letter on Sunday, House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) wrote that House Democrats “ought to take swift action to ensure that we secure reforms to our electoral count system” if the Senate passes its bill.
    • Given the time constraints, one way to pass the measure would be to attach it to a must-pass bill like the government funding legislation or the NDAA. (Attaching it to a larger bill would also avoid a messy amendment process.)
  • The House also passed its own version of the bill in September drafted by Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), so the two chambers would need to reconcile the bills — or the House could just pass the Senate bill. In a “Dear Colleague” letter on Sunday, House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) wrote that House Democrats “ought to take swift action to ensure that we secure reforms to our electoral count system” if the Senate passes its bill.
  • Given the time constraints, one way to pass the measure would be to attach it to a must-pass bill like the government funding legislation or the NDAA. (Attaching it to a larger bill would also avoid a messy amendment process.)
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