It doesn’t look like anyone is working on a post, so I will share this. It’s the first I’ve heard of this new proposal, and it looks like it’s moving along the pipeline.
Interesting article at Lawfare:
The House Prepares to Move Forward With Remote Voting
On May 13, House Rules Committee Chairman Jim McGovern unveiled H. Res. 965, his latest proposal for implementing some form of remote voting in the House of Representatives in response to the coronavirus pandemic. The committee marked upthe resolution today, May 14, and the House of Representatives as a whole is expected to vote on the measure tomorrow alongside the most recent proposal for coronavirus relief. If the resolution succeeds—and partisan politics don’t get in the way—the House will finally be able to operate while respecting the social distancing measures that are almost universally recommended by public health professionals.
McGovern’s latest proposal is similar to the proposed rules change he released late in April, which was briefly scheduled for a vote before Republicans convinced House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to postpone. She and Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy instead agreed to set up an informal task force to try to reach bipartisan agreement on a way forward. That effort, however, appears to have failed. House Democratic leaders now seem determined to move forward with the new McGovern proposal, with Majority Leader Steny Hoyer himself taking the floor to defend the proposal during the recent markup. The leaders of the Republican minority, meanwhile, are calling upon their members to oppose the resolution, on the grounds that “Democrats are jamming through a rules change that would upend 200 years of precedent and have serious constitutional and institutional repercussions.”
So how would this plan work? Like its predecessor, H. Res. 965 is still centered on the idea of proxy voting, a practice in which one member of Congress casts a vote on behalf of another. Yet it incorporates changes that address various concerns with and criticisms of that approach—including some we previously put forward.
It ends with this:
The May 15 vote may well finally allow the House to move forward with a form of remote voting. But it is unlikely to be the end of the surrounding controversy. Some House Republicans may yet decide to protest the perceived partisanship of remote voting procedures by refusing to participate or attempting to obstruct proceedings. And private plaintiffs are almost certain to challenge the constitutionality of the new procedures in federal court.
Yet it’s not clear the House leadership had much of a choice. Presented with the options of either forcing its members to put the public’s health at risk or accepting a disabled House so long as the pandemic endures, the House majority appears set to opt for a third way. This brings with it both legal and political risks, a fact that recent debates have made clear. Yet the House appears to have finally decided that those risks are worth it.
Open thread.
Update: rikyrah found this video of Devin Nunes. Wow. He doesn’t even make it clear that he’s specifically talking about a CA election.
Devin Nunes says Republicans were forced to ballot harvest in California because it’s the only way to win. He goes on to say he doesn’t like it because it’s illegal in 49 states. pic.twitter.com/t7TpdcZIRQ
— Acyn Torabi (@Acyn) May 14, 2020
The House Prepares to Move Forward With Remote VotingPost + Comments (117)