Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, a longtime President Trump advocate, broke with some of his Republican Party colleagues in the House and Senate, saying he will not answer Electoral College results when Congress meets. to certify them this week.
Cotton said the effort led by Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri in the Senate and Rep. Mo Brooks in the House would set a “reckless precedent” and surpass his authority under the U.S. Constitution.
“The founders entrusted our elections mainly to the states, not to Congress. They entrusted the election of our president to the people, acting through the Electoral College, not the Congress. And they entrusted the adjudication of electoral disputes to the courts, not to Congress, “Cotton said in a statement released Sunday.
“Under the Constitution and federal law, the power of Congress is limited to counting the electoral votes cast by states,” he continued. “If Congress intended to nullify the results of the Electoral College, it would not only exceed that power, but would also set reckless precedents.”
A joint session of Congress will meet on Wednesday to certify the results that gave 306 electoral votes to President-elect Joe Biden to President Trump’s 232.
Challenging the results of the Electoral College to tip the election to Trump would strip people of the power to elect the president and place that power in the “hands of the party that controls Congress,” Cotton of Arkansas said.
Concerned about election irregularities stemming from “relaxed rules” for postal voting, Cotton said he would support the appointment of a congressional committee to examine the election, as requested by Cruz and the his group of Republicans, “to protect the integrity of our election.”
He said he is “grateful” for what Trump has accomplished during his four years in the White House, but “opposing certified election votes will not give him a second term; he will only encourage Democrats who want to further erode our system.” of the constitutional government “.