Rodney Davis

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlemen from Florida (Mr. Posey), my good friend.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, it is with great pleasure I get a chance to introduce my good friend, whom I have known for a very long time from Illinois. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Bost), and I would like to ask him to throw his papers in the air and hit them when he is done with his speech, too.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, it is great to have the author of the bill here on the floor. I guess if I had a chance to ask a question, it would be why, then, was this new corporate malfeasance fund put in the manager's amendment that was given to me 30 minutes before our Rules testimony last night? There are many concerns with this bill, and a lot of those concerns hinge upon this 6-to-1 matching program that, in the end, is a new mandatory spending program that will have to be funded, have to be funded by the taxpayers to make up the difference if corporate money that is now going to be used--that we can't take right now as congressional candidates--is going to be used to fill the coffers of the campaigns that this author talked about. I had no idea that the Democrats' solution to getting corporate money out of politics was to put more corporate money into campaign coffers of every Member of Congress. It doesn't make sense to me, which is why this bill doesn't make sense to me. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Biggs), my good friend.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer).

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Alabama.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, it is interesting, my colleague, Chairperson Lofgren, mentioned the NAACP, because the next gentleman that I am going to introduce, he and I both share Springfield, Illinois, which is known, after the 1908 race riots, to be somewhat of the birthplace of the NAACP. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood), my good friend.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Illinois.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I have no further speakers, and I am ready to close. I reserve the balance of my time, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. But before I do, Mr. Chairman, may I inquire how much time is remaining.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I appreciate the opportunity. I am not necessarily opposed to this amendment, and if the gentleman is willing, I am ready to move towards closing. I am ready to close on this debate, so I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I claim the time in opposition to the amendment, even though I am not opposed to it.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I appreciate the gentleman's intention, and I appreciate his willingness as a new Member of this institution to come down here and participate in the amendment process. We need folks who come to this institution and they want to legislate, they want to be on the floor, they want to offer amendments. My biggest problem with this amendment is we don't know how much this study is going to cost taxpayers. These are the types of studies that I believe the information that my colleague wants to get is already going to be in place. Why do we need to spend any more tax dollars on another study that is going to provide the same answers that my colleague has already asked them to now do a new study on? The EAC is doing their job. Now, let's get back to the overall issue of H.R. 1. H.R. 1 was a bill introduced on January 3 with zero Republican input, zero outreach to anybody on my side of the aisle, let alone the three Republicans that we have serving on the House Administration Committee, the only committee that marked this bill up. At that announcement of this 571-page bill that is cosponsored by every member of the Democratic conference, it was shown that, heck, the author thanked all the outside special interest groups who helped write it. We were given no input whatsoever on this legislation that is going to cost the taxpayers billions of dollars. I am sorry, Mr. Chairman. I am going to do everything I can to make sure we lessen the amount of undue influence and unfunded mandates coming through this amendment process, and this is my one chance to do that. Now, I am glad that my colleague mentioned the H.R. 1 of the last Congress. I learned my lesson not to yield back, as he just did, because now I get the last word. This is an opportunity to remind my colleague, my new colleague, that it has even been reported 80 percent of what the Congressional Budget Office estimated that our tax cut bill that put thousands of dollars in the pockets of middle-class families, it has already paid for itself by 80 percent. In less than a year, we changed this. This is why H.R. 1 of the last Congress actually helped families put more money in their pockets. H.R. 1 this year is going to actually cost taxpayers billions and put more money in the pockets of Members of Congress' campaigns. This is a travesty that is no comparison, and that is exactly why this bill is terrible. And no offense to my colleague; I just oppose his amendment because I think it is redundant. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I thank the sponsor of the amendment. Mr. Chair, again, this is another added cost to the taxpayers that I believe, and my colleagues, I believe, should agree is already being taken care of. The EAC is already tasked to take on this role. The Election Assistance Commission is an independent, bipartisan commission charged with developing guidance to meet the Help America Vote Act of 2002 requirements. The EAC has already done extensive work on best practices for ballot design that are available to State and local officials already. In fact, the EAC published their insights on the importance of good ballot design just last month and are already in the process of updating its guidance based upon the feedback it has received. I would assume that would have been studied already. Additionally, every 2 years following an election, the EAC sends its election administration voting survey to election officials in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and our four territories. The survey includes national-, State-, and county-level data on voter registration; uniformed and overseas voters; early, absentee, provisional voting; voting equipment usage; and poll workers, polling places, and precincts. All that to say, again, this is a waste of taxpayer dollars to be redundant and have the EAC perform another study that is going to cost the taxpayers of this country. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment. The Acting Chair. The gentleman is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I appreciate the gentleman's willingness to show awareness and concern over climate change and our environment. Maybe this amendment is better suited for when the New Green Deal is called up on the floor for all of us to cast a vote upon, but this is an undue, unfunded mandate from the Federal Government right down to the State and local officials. This is something that can cost local election officials even more money to run elections and then also run the risk of them not having enough money to budget to print enough ballots that will be available on election day for the increased voter turnout that we have seen over the last few election cycles. At that point in time, it becomes a very big burden on local taxpayers. This bill is going to be a burden on local taxpayers. This bill is estimated to already cost almost $3 billion. It creates another mandatory spending program. I appreciate my new colleague's willingness to come here and offer amendments. I just believe that this amendment is, again, adding to the unfair, unfunded burden that H.R. 1 gives to many State and local election officials. State and local election officials know best how to stack their ballot boxes to ensure they have enough ballots for everybody to vote, and this will now be an added cost. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I respect the gentleman's amendment. As important as recycled paper may be, this, I believe, would present an undue burden on our States and our local officials who administer these elections. This requirement of using recycled paper is narrowly tailored for Federal office elections, yet Federal, State, and local elections often occur at the same time. This makes it incredibly impractical and difficult for State election officials to comply with this amendment. States, theoretically, may have to have two different paper ballots: one for Federal elections and the other for State and local matters. Also, recycled paper is less available and more expensive, giving local election officials fewer options. This requirement could have an undue burden on States as they aim to comply with this amendment, and it is impractical, as voters often vote on Federal, State, and local elections on the same ballot. This is ultimately a federalism issue. I have a problem with the entire bill being a federalism issue. We should defer to the States and their budgets on how to best administer elections tailored to their unique considerations. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, while I appreciate my good friend from Florida's amendment, this amendment doesn't go far enough. It does nothing to stem the practice of ballot harvesting. Ballot harvesting is a practice of States allowing any person to collect any number of absentee ballots and then deliver them to the polls. It could be even after election day. This practice, of course, is ripe for fraud, and we saw most recently in North Carolina how it can be abused to the advantage of political campaigns. In North Carolina's Ninth District, the individual who harvested ballots for a Republican, where we will now have a special election, was caught because the practice is illegal. It is unlikely that he would have been caught in a State like California, because the practice is perfectly legal. Take the current law in California. A signature is invalid if the ballot turned in by a harvester doesn't match a signature in the voter file, but the campaign can cure this by getting the voter in question to submit an affidavit that they voted. Then that signature only has to match the signature in the voter file, not the signature on the ballot. A harvester could theoretically take a bunch of ballots, submit them with forged signatures, and then collect signatures afterward, since the campaigns would later get a list of the signatures that were rejected. Loose standards relating to providing notice to voters whose signatures were mismatched, as well as a lengthy cure process without any safeguards, disenfranchises voters who showed up and cast votes before or on election day. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, look, I don't own too many stocks outside of mutual funds, but I do have one that I get statements to ask me to cast a vote for those members who are currently members of the board of directors or running to be. What I do is use the disclosure database OpenSecrets. I find out the political spending of these individuals who are going to determine the outcome of the stock that I have invested in that, hopefully, will grow in value, because that is why people invest in the stock market, and that is why people invest in corporate entities that may be publicly traded. The problem I have with this amendment is I thought corporate money wasn't supposed to go to candidates. I don't take corporate dollars. Frankly, I am probably one of the ones standing in this institution tonight who had many of these super-PAC dollars spent against me in the last election. They can't take corporate dollars. But the issue at hand is, in another part of the bill where this new Freedom From Influence Fund is put together, they are now going to use corporate dollars to create a fund that is flowing through the Federal Treasury that should be going to infrastructure, should be going to pediatric cancer research. Instead, it is going to flow into this new shell that is going to have corporate money go directly to congressional candidates, which is illegal now. That, to me, is the biggest problem with this bill, and that, to me, is a problem with this amendment. Mr. Chair, I look forward to a discussion on many other amendments throughout this long evening. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chair, may I inquire how much time is remaining.

Mr. RODNEY DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, again, as I mentioned earlier, I would have liked to have seen these amendments offered during our House Administration markup as my good friend from Maryland is also a member of the House Administration Committee. There was some discussion on issues like this and I was under the impression, during that markup process, that provisions like my opponent put into this amendment were already part of the bill. But let me add, this amendment would turn businesses and corporations into partisan political entities and shareholder meetings and votes into political conventions. It would require corporations to poll their shareholders on whether the corporation's political spending should be made in support of, in opposition to Republican, Democratic, Independent, or other political party candidates and political committees. Business decisions drive corporations' political spending. This would inject partisan political considerations into corporate political spending. And let me remind the American people, corporations are banned by law currently to be able to give directly to candidates or to organizations that will directly support or oppose candidates during an election cycle. This is going to further polarize our political environment. This amendment also relies on unconstitutionally vague and intent- based standards for what corporate spending is covered by the shareholder preference assessment requirement. It is going to encourage the current practice of activists taking hold of proxy advisory firms to socially engineer public policies through proxy shareholder votes. There is no transparency to proxy advisory firms. I am opposed to this amendment because it is vague and impractical, and would, again, infringe upon free speech. It is not clear what speech is covered under this amendment and that is, perhaps, the worst part. The practical effect of this amendment would be that the companies would not have shareholder elections under this new standard. Many would probably stop paying dues to trade associations because the language might be construed to cover that. That would be a bomb on many of the largest and most important trade groups. No similar requirement for other organizations as part of this bill, of course. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.