A demonstrator holds an American flag during a Trump rally along the East Front of the Capitol in Washington on Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2021. (Photo by Caroline Brehman/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Numerous GOP legislators from NC are making baseless claims that the election should be overturned.
When the US House of Representatives and Senate meet Wednesday, the ceremonial task of certifying the 2020 presidential election will take on greater significance.
Not because the outcome is in doubt.
President-elect Joe Biden won the election, and outgoing President Donald Trump has failed in his attempts via means both legal and extralegal to change that.
Claims of mass voter fraud tilting the election to Biden are baseless. And Trump’s own Attorney General Bill Barr determined that there wasn’t evidence to change the outcome of Biden’s win.
Nevertheless, hundreds of Republican members of the House and Senate — following the lead of conservatives like Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley — are expected to object to certifying the race this week. That includes numerous lawmakers representing North Carolina in DC.
Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell has done his part, congratulating Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris. And Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican from Utah, called Hawley’s move “pointing a gun at the head of democracy.”
Wayne Goodwin, chair of the NC Democratic Party, had his own blistering assessment this week, calling it a “coordinated, brazen attack on our democracy.”
“Not a single one of these spineless, weak Republicans can point to widespread fraud,” Goodwin said. “Instead, they’re meekly going along with their tails between their legs because they’re terrified of crossing a lame-duck president so desperate to cling onto power after losing an election that he’ll attack and bully election officials from his own party, spout unfounded claims of fraud, and seek to steal a free and fair election.”
At Cardinal & Pine, we wanted to make it simple to note which representatives and senators are baselessly objecting to the certification.
In some cases, it’s obvious what lawmakers plan to do Wednesday. In others, it’s murkier, even if they joined other Republicans in a December legal filing supporting Texas’ failed attempt to change the outcome at the US Supreme Court.
Make no mistake though, regardless of the claims being made by many Republicans in the NC delegation, there is no evidence for overturning the election.
At this hour, here’s what we know about what members of NC’s delegation plan to do this week in DC.
US House of Representatives
G.K. Butterfield
Democrat (1st)
Certifying
Deborah Ross
Democrat (2nd)
Certifying
Greg Murphy
Republican (3rd)
Objecting
David Price
Democrat (4th)
Certifying
Virginia Foxx
Republican (5th)
Unclear
Foxx has not made her position clear on objecting. However, the longtime lawmaker joined six other NC members of the US House in signing an amicus brief in December asking the US Supreme Court to overturn the election.
Kathy Manning
Democrat (6th)
Certifying
“It’s abundantly clear this was a fair election that Joe Biden won with an overwhelming majority. The president has brought 60 different lawsuits. Each one of which has been thrown out of court for lack of evidence.”
Manning in The News & Observer on Jan. 4
David Rouzer
Republican (7th)
Objecting
“I will be among those objecting to the Electoral College votes of several states January 6th. When more than a third of the American public — including 17% of Democrats based on a recent Reuters poll — do not believe in the integrity of the election, truth and transparency deserve to be heard.”
Rouzer, to WECT in Wilmington, on Jan. 4
Richard Hudson
Republican (8th)
Objecting
“The American people need to have confidence in the integrity of our election process. Currently, millions of people do not trust the outcome of this presidential election because there is incontrovertible evidence of voter irregularity- if not outright fraud- in multiple states.”
Hudson, in a Jan. 3 statement
Dan Bishop
Republican (9th)
Unclear
Bishop has not clearly stated a position on certifying the election, although he has made multiple unsubstantiated claims of a “rigged election.”
Patrick McHenry
Republican (10th)
Unclear
McHenry, a leader among Republicans on the finance side, has been quiet about certifying the election results. He has not responded to a Cardinal & Pine request for comment.
Madison Cawthorn
Republican (11th)
Objecting
Alma Adams
Democrat (12th)
Certifying
Ted Budd
Republican (13th)
Objecting
US Senate
Thom Tillis
Republican
Unclear
Tillis’s office did not respond to Cardinal & Pine’s request for clarification this week. Nor did he respond to a request from The Washington Post in December. However, in a Dec. 10 interview with NBC News he called Biden the “presumptive president elect.”
Richard Burr
Republican
Certifying
Burr has been quiet since the election, but he reportedly told Politico this week that he would vote to certify the election.
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