For the first time since 1988, no Democrats in Congress objected to the counting of the Electoral College votes for a victorious Republican president. After George W. Bush’s win in 2000, 20 House Democrats objected to the counting of votes from Florida. After George W. Bush’s reelection in 2004, 31 House Democrats supported an objection to the counting of votes from Ohio. After Donald Trump’s win in 2016, some House Democrats objected to the counting of votes from ten states. This time around, no objections were raised, and the votes were counted without event.
The media erroneously refer to what happened today in the joint session of Congress as the “certification” of the Electoral College. It is no such thing. The Constitution says the vice president merely counts the votes of the Electoral College in the joint session. Both the slates of electors and the results of each state’s election for president are certified by the states. Today’s events are simply the transference of that already-certified result from the states to the federal government for the purpose of inaugurating the president and vice president later this month.
It makes perfect sense that Congress does not have the power to certify the results because the joint session is presided over by the vice president, who, in many cases, including this one, is a candidate in the presidential election. It would be an obvious problem if Kamala Harris could prolong or overturn the voters’ rejection of her in November by exercising some kind of power during the Electoral College vote counting.
Yet some Republicans, including Trump and JD Vance, believe that such power exists and could have been exercised by Mike Pence when he presided over the Electoral College vote counting after the 2020 election. Thank goodness they were wrong and Pence did his constitutional duty instead. If Pence had that power, then Harris would as well, and the advocacy of such a position looks especially stupid now that it would have allowed Harris to contest her own election loss.
“I welcome the return of order and civility to these historic proceedings and offer my most sincere congratulations and prayers to President Donald J. Trump and Vice President J. D. Vance on their election to lead this great Nation,” Pence said today. “I also commend the members of the House, Senate and the Vice President who did their duty under the Constitution of the United States, it being particularly admirable that Vice President Harris would preside over the certification of a presidential election that she lost.”
It was great to see Democrats and Republicans today both ditch their crackpot theories about the Electoral College and simply count the votes as certified by the states in accordance with the will of the American people. Let’s keep that up in future elections.