Stopping Harmful Interference in Elections for A Lasting Democracy Act
Floor Speech
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Mr. GRIFFITH. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman so much for yielding to me.
Mr. Chairman, I would say that, if I were in a court of law, I would tell you in advance that I am about to make an argument that is conditionally relevant, meaning: Bear with me. It will make sense when I get to the point.
So this morning, in committee--and I serve on the Energy and Commerce Committee--we were having a hearing and ObamaCare came up. About five or six times, people said, on the Democrat side of the aisle, ObamaCare is being sabotaged by the Trump administration.
Well, I started thinking about that, and I realized that that wasn't really fair, that the problem was that this Congress and the Democrats in this House voted for a bill that mentioned the Secretary, HHS Secretary, 3,033 times; 974 times it said the ``Secretary shall'' and then went on to say something else.
According to Dr. Burgess, he estimated that there were actually 262 different action items in ObamaCare voted on by the Democrats. None of the Republicans in the House at the time--I was not here, but none of the Republicans voted for it. 262 action items were given over to the Secretary.
So now we have the SHIELD Act, and you are saying: All right, Morgan, what does this have to do with the SHIELD Act?
I direct you to page 49, lines 10 to 25, Corrective Action: ``If the Attorney General receives a credible report that materially false information has been or is being communicated in violation'' of this bill, ``and if the Attorney General determines that the State and local officials have not taken adequate steps to promptly communicate accurate information to correct the materially false information, the Attorney General shall, pursuant to the written procedures and standards under subsection (b)''--which, by the way, the Attorney General determines--``communicate to the public, by any means''--any means--``including by means of written, electronic, or telephonic communications, accurate information designed to correct the materially false information.''
What we are about to do in this bill, Mr. Chairman, is we are about to give the Attorney General the power to come into our congressional elections and to come into any election and start running ads, to run robocalls, to get involved in the election process, because I wouldn't want Attorney General Holder making decisions on my ads, and I don't think my friends, Mr. Chairman, on the other side of the aisle would want Attorney General Barr making decisions on their ads.
But that is what this bill does. It creates a situation where the Attorney General is going to come into our districts if they think that one of us has issued a materially false ad and, instead of letting the voters make a decision as to whether or not I have done something wrong or my opponent has done something wrong or you have done something wrong or your opponent has done something wrong, the Attorney General is going to make that decision all by himself.
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Mr. GRIFFITH. Mr. Chair, when you don't like it, you are going to come back and say: Oh, my gosh, they are sabotaging the intent of the bill.
Well, forget the intent. Read the bill. Read the bill.
This bill has significant problems. It needs to go back to committee and be worked on some more. I appreciate it, but until this is corrected, I must vote ``no'' to try to protect our election system from having it being taken over by whomever the Attorney General might be.
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