House Republicans examines bill that would rewrite D.C. election laws

House Republicans examined D.C. election laws Wednesday in their latest hearing digging into the city's affairs, an opportunity for them to advocate for stricter voting laws in the deep-blue city.

Republicans in the joint hearing of the House Oversight and Administration committees painted a picture of unsecure and "mismanaged" elections in the city — which the D.C. Board of Elections’ executive director pushed back on — as Democrats decried what they saw as an effort to restrict voting in a city that already lacks voting representation in Congress.

That dynamic is indicative of the strain between officials in a liberal city and congressional Republicans who want to use D.C. as a model city for their own policy preferences. Republicans cite Congress's constitutional authority to oversee laws and spending in the federal district, but local officials often resist, saying members of Congress do not know what is best for D.C. residents.

In this case, the committees are examining the American Confidence in Elections Act, which includes provisions that would undo existing D.C. election laws or create additional restrictions. "The ACE Act takes D.C. from being the poster child on how not to run an election to being the model for states to follow," House Administration Chairman Bryan Steil (R-Wis.) said in his opening remarks.

The American Confidence in Elections Act would require people voting in person to present identification, which D.C. law does not require. It would prohibit D.C. from sending unsolicited mail-in ballots to all registered voters and also prohibit same-day registration, which D.C. allows. The bill would add restrictions on the use of drop boxes and, among other things, would ban noncitizen voting, which D.C. will allow in local elections starting in 2024 under a new law.

"It's been more than a week, so it must be time for another hearing designed to inflict insult and injury on 700,000 disenfranchised Americans living in the nation's capital," said Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (Md.), the top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, referencing the sustained interest Republicans have taken this year in intervening in D.C. affairs with multiple hearings and bills trying to block D.C. laws.

"If we are being honest, this hearing is not actually about Washington, D.C.," said Rep. Joseph Morelle (N.Y.), top Democrat on the Administration Committee. "This hearing, and the entire ACE Act, is about giving Republicans a platform to impose extreme restrictions on voters across this country."

Republicans spent considerable time advocating for a photo ID law in D.C. elections while speculating that the city's mail-in ballot procedures invited fraud, though there has been no evidence that fraud has occurred.

Multiple Republican lawmakers pointed to the fact that in the 2020 and 2022 elections, tens of thousands of mail-in ballots sent to all of the city's roughly half-million registered voters were returned as undeliverable. One of the Republican witnesses, Ken Cuccinelli, a former Trump administration official and Virginia attorney general who leads the Election Transparency Initiative, said bad actors might "snatch up" those ballots to try to vote fraudulently.

Under questioning, Monica Holman Evans, executive director of the D.C. elections board, acknowledged that it was correct that thousands of mail-in ballots sent to voters were returned as undeliverable. But she said that it is also one way the board conducts maintenance of its voter rolls, regarding outdated voter addresses. She also described some other election integrity procedures, including signature verification for all mail-in ballots that come in.

"In D.C. we take elections very seriously, and I take my job very seriously," Evans said toward the end of the hearing. "I’ve heard allegations that we have no desire to find fraud in the District of Columbia. That is untrue. We do have measures in place to address [voter] list maintenance. We not only have measures to be transparent but we are increasing those efforts."

Wendy Weiser, vice president for democracy at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, said she could think of "no valid reason" to undo the District's same-day voter registration law or its relatively new law allowing mail-in ballots to be sent to all registered voters, a practice the city began in 2020 because of the pandemic and opted to continue. Some states have been doing this for years without issue, she said.

"This has also shown to be fraud-free and provide voters with reasonable options and convenience in voting," she said.

Republicans also were fired up against D.C.'s new law allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections, particularly considering the foreign embassies in D.C. It was an expected hot-button topic after congressional Republicans tried and failed this year to overturn the law. The House passed a disapproval resolution to block the noncitizens voting law from going into effect — with support from dozens of Democrats — but the resolution died in a Senate committee.

Steil envisioned a Russian Embassy staffer showing up to vote and presenting a Russian passport if D.C. had a voter ID law — "That's ridiculous!" he exclaimed — while Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) envisioned a Russian national trying to run for D.C. mayor.

"This is the nation's capital. We shouldn't have Russian Embassy or Chinese Embassy officials voting in our elections," Steil said, with Cuccinelli calling it a "rather brazen invitation to foreign interference in a local election."

Raskin volleyed back: "If only they had shown a fraction of the interest in stopping Donald Trump's sellout of the American government to Vladimir Putin — on everything from NATO to Syria to Ukraine — as they’re showing about the possibility that a handful of Russian diplomats could sway an Advisory Neighborhood Commission election in Dupont Circle, America would be in a much stronger position today," he said.

Members on both sides of the aisle at times tried to appeal directly to the people of D.C.

Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) began by trying to explain in detail why the committees were seeking to rewrite D.C. election laws, even as Republicans in general believe in the federalist principle that states know best, not the national government. He pointed to the Constitution, which gives Congress the authority over D.C., and said election integrity is an issue of national concern.

"This is why we’re focused on D.C., my D.C. citizen brothers and sisters," he said. "You live in a beautifully unique city, the capital of the nation that stands as a beacon of hope for the entire world. The people of America are concerned about election integrity, so we put forth legislation, through our constitutional authority as Congress for Washington, D.C., that could stand as a model for the entire nation."

Democrats apologized to D.C. residents for that.

"All of the D.C. residents that are here, let me apologize to you for what has been put on the record about you and your right to be a citizen of a state, of a community where you live and pay taxes," said Rep. Norma J. Torres (D-Calif.). "I don't know a better example of taxation without representation than what you go through every single day under this extreme majority."

Local D.C. officials decried the hearing, while disputing that there were any problems with current D.C. election laws. Considering that Washington is a plurality-Black city, D.C. Council member Janeese Lewis George (D-Ward 4) raised a concern that increasing voting restrictions would disproportionately impact people of color, and argued Congress should follow D.C.'s lead in expanding voting access, not try to restrict it. "This is a tactic to suppress the voices of people of color," she said on Twitter, a point made by Democrats on the committee as well.

D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb (D) said Republicans are "kicking the District of Columbia like a political football, this time to advance a nationwide agenda of voter suppression."

"Not only is it hypocritical coming from national politicians who have built their careers decrying federal government overreach, but there is absolutely no evidence of irregularities or fraud here in local DC elections," Schwalb said in a statement.

If House Republicans intended to take up the ACE elections bill, it would still face low odds of success in the Democratic-controlled Senate.