.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) — one of the most far-left members of Congress and key player in the partisan January 6 Committee that defied more than 100 years of congressional precedent, claimed during an unhinged interview on Friday that continued use of the Electoral College will “get lawmakers killed.” Speaking with The Free Speech Project at the Riggs Library in Washington D.C., Raskin argued that the continued use of the Electoral College system could lead to violence, especially against lawmakers. In the discussion, he covered various topics, including the January 6 Capitol protests and his push to replace the Electoral College with a popular vote system.
“We passed the nation’s first National Popular Vote Interstate Compact,” Raskin said. “We initiated that; we’re now more than two-thirds of the way there because it’s 2024. How about it’s time to start electing the president the way we elect mayors and representatives and senators and governors? Whoever gets the most votes, wins.” He then referred to the Electoral College as an “18th-century ritual” that will end up getting people “killed.”
“Rather than a convoluted, antique, obsolete system from the 18th century, which these days can get you killed as nearly it did on January 6, 2021,” he claimed. It should be noted, first of all, that the Electoral College is a constitutional construct and therefore, the nation’s founding document would need to be amended to remove the requirement. Also, all four of the deceased victims on January 6 were Trump supporters, including Ashli Babbitt, who was shot and killed while surrounded by riot police by a Capitol Police officer who failed to issue a verbal warning.
“I mean, we were meeting [at the Capitol] just because of the formalities of the 12th amendment which say that you’ve got to have a joint session to count the Electoral College votes sent in by the governors under the certificates of ascertainment,” Raskin said. “But we knew who had won the election. Everybody knew who had won the election, but we’re still going through these 18th century rituals and that’s what gave Donald Trump the opportunity to invoke the mob- ‘come here, we’ll be wild’ and then tell them to go and ‘fight and fight like hell’ or they wouldn’t have a country anymore.”
Again, for the record, Trump — who gave a “Stop the Steal” speech at the Ellipse on Jan. 6, implored his supporters to “March peacefully” to the Capitol Building.
Raskin droned on: “So, look, we’ve had five popular vote losers in American history become president, twice in this century alone, in 2000 and 2016. And I think the vast majority of American people think we should be electing the president just by having an election in seeing who gets the most votes, rather than this convoluted, rickety system where it all comes down to a handful of states, six or seven states instead of everybody’s vote counting equally everywhere in the country.”
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Raskin recently indicated that he and a group of his Democratic colleagues are preparing to challenge the certification of former President Trump’s potential victory in the November election. The congressman, who has consistently labeled January 6 participants as “violent insurrectionists,” proposed that lawmakers might seek to “disqualify” Trump using a Civil War-era statute if he wins.
Raskin specifically referenced Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, expressing a chilling determination to use Congress as a barrier against Trump’s re-election. “What can be put into the Constitution can slip away from you very quickly. And the greatest example going on right now before our very eyes is Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which they’re just disappearing with a magic wand, as if it doesn’t exist, even though it could not be clearer what it’s stating,” he said.
Disclaimer: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author’s opinion.