House Representatives introduce bill to overhaul old electoral vote law that led to Jan. 6

The United States House of Representatives may vote on a new bill as early as this week that aims to prevent a repeat of the Capitol riot.

The bill, written by embattled Republican Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) and Democrat Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), who both sit on the House Select Committee investigating the infamous DC riot that took place on January 6, 2021, seeks to define once and for all the vice president’s role in the counting of electoral votes in an election.

The bill clarifies that the vice president does not hold the authority to change the electoral votes, only to certify them.

Cheney and Lofgren had an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal on Sunday explaining and defending the bill to the public.

“Our proposal is intended to preserve the rule of law for all future presidential elections by ensuring that self-interested politicians cannot steal from the people the guarantee that our government derives its power from the consent of the governed,” the lawmakers wrote.

The Presidential Election Reform Act (PERA) would further mandate that each state send any early election results to Congress immediately instead of waiting until the scheduled certification session. This change is included in the bill in order to prevent any states from changing their election results after state law has already defined a winner.

The bill will also raise the threshold for objecting to electoral votes from 1 member of each chamber to one-third of the House and one-third of the Senate.

House leaders have indicated the bill may come up for a vote as soon as this week. “We should do this in a timely fashion,” House Majority Whip Rep. Dick Durbin (D-IL) said to NBC. “The sooner the better.”