Joni Ernst, Mariannette Miller-Meeks decry Democrats’ push to pass voting rights legislation

Republican members of Iowa's congressional delegation claimed Tuesday that Democrats are manufacturing a voting crisis in order to exert more control from Washington, D.C.

U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, decried Democrats’ attempt to change the Senate filibuster to help pass elections and voting rights legislation to overcome the 60-vote threshold that’s now required to pass most bills.

Ernst, in a Senate floor speech, argued Democrats are “using fake hysteria they are trying to blow up the Senate and fundamentally change our country" to promote an effort "that is unpopular, unnecessary and unacceptable."

Ernst, a former county auditor and commissioner of elections, was joined on the Senate floor by U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, R-Ottumwa.

The pair claim Democrats’ proposed election reforms would undermine states’ ability to run elections.

“Their legislation would overturn state laws and election procedures like the ones that have been so successful in states like Iowa," Miller-Meeks said in a statement. "They spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars on an ill-conceived plan to overturn my election and wasted months of precious time. This is nothing more than a partisan power-grab.”

Wheatland Democrat Rita Hart withdrew her election contest of Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District race in March, after months spent asking Congress to investigate Miller-Meeks' six-vote win, making it the closest congressional race in decades.

Hart’s campaign was challenging the state-certified results, claiming 22 ballots were legally cast but not counted after a district-wide recount in all 24 counties because of errors by election workers.

The pair's remarks coincided with President Joe Biden's trip to Atlanta alongside Vice President Kamala Harris as part of the administration's effort to ramp up pressure on Congress to pass major voting rights legislation at a time when GOP-led legislatures, including in Iowa, have advanced bills voting rights advocates argue will make it harder for some groups to vote.

Iowa was among the first state to enact voting restrictions after the 2020 presidential election under a Republican-backed nationwide push to pass so-called election integrity measures.

The new law enacted last spring shortens Iowa's early voting period, shortens the period to request mail-in ballots, restricts the ability of county auditors to establish satellite in-person early voting sites and bars election officials from proactively sending ballot requests, among other provisions.

"In Iowa & other states, we've seen efforts to restrict ballot box access," Democratic U.S. Rep. Cindy Axne of West Des Moines tweeted Tuesday ahead of Biden's speech. "That's why I backed the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act & measures like #HR1 to restore voting rights & combat voter suppression. For the sake of our democracy & all voters, the Senate must act."

Republicans argue recently passed provisions by Iowa and other states safeguard voting and promote confidence in the integrity of elections. That includes voter ID laws and tightening rules related to voting by mail, limiting a voting method that has had growing appeal after many states expanded those options to make voting safer during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Democrats warned (Iowa's 2017 voter ID law) was dangerous and an unnecessary hurdle and a significant barrier for anyone who is not a white male. They could not have been further from the truth," Ernst said. "Three times since the new Iowa voter ID law was implemented the state has seen record-high turnout for elections" and "huge voter participation," including record-high absentee voting in the 2020 election.

"My friends on the other side of the aisle will have you believe that voters are being suppressed in red states all over this country," Ernst said, when states like Delaware and New York, home to Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, respectively, make casting a ballot more difficult.

Ernst called House Democrats' effort to overturn Miller-Meeks' narrow victory in 2020 the "opening salvo in the left’s ongoing rush to take over elections" and limit voter ID and other "common-sense election reforms."

"Plain and simple, Washington Democrats are gas-lighting the American people," Ernst said. "Their push to blow up the Senate and take over elections isn’t about voter access, it’s about power."