Norton Blasts OGR Republicans for Focusing on Non-Existent Voter Fraud While Millions of Americans Face Obstacles to Voting, and Voting Rights Act Goes Without a Hearing
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today will serve as the Ranking Member of the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee's Subcommittee on Health Care, Benefits, and Administrative Rules for a hearing entitled "The President's Executive Actions on Immigration and Their Impact on Federal and State Elections," and called on the Committee to focus on the urgent task of expanding voting rights for millions of Americans 50 years after the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed into law. The Committee's Republicans are using today's hearing as a vehicle against President Obama's executive actions on immigration reform, again alleging an increase in voter fraud. However, voter fraud is practically non-existent in the United States. Executive immigration reforms, such as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, for example, have not resulted in voter fraud, and the President's executive orders do not change voter eligibility requirements or federal and state laws that deter voter fraud.
"It takes chutzpah and disregard of the real issues facing this Congress to have a hearing on a fabricated crisis about voter fraud while millions of minority Americans are still waiting for this Congress to repair and update the Voting Rights Act following the Supreme Court's decision nearly two years ago," Norton said. "We particularly resent such a hearing when we have been told that there will be no House hearing on the Voting Rights Act in a year when the entire country is commemorating the 50th anniversary of this historic legislation. Republicans on the Committee must have forgotten that the Voting Rights Act has been called the most effective civil rights law in history. Furthermore, the Supreme Court said that the Voting Rights Act needed to be updated, not eliminated. This hearing surely alerts the country that action from the public as well as Congress itself is necessary in order to revive the Voting Rights Act and meet the very real challenges eligible voters throughout the country confront, as demonstrated by the 2014 elections."
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