Reforms to Electoral Count Act Included in $1.7 Trillion Omnibus Bill

Republicans and Democrats have attached a bill revising the Electoral Count Act to their $1.7 trillion omnibus spending package, contending that the new law would prevent a repeat of the Jan. 6 Capitol breach from occurring in the future.
The bill would clarify the role of the vice president in counting Electoral College votes after a presidential election.
“Recent elections uncovered defects in Congress’s interaction with the Electoral College,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) noted on Dec. 19 in an op-ed in the Courier Journal. “Federal law currently leaves ambiguous the role of the Vice President in counting electoral votes and allows an incredibly low threshold—just one member of the House and Senate—to object to a state’s election results.”…}