CV NEWS FEED // In a Monday joint session, both houses of Congress unanimously certified the 2024 presidential election, in which President-elect Donald Trump decisively defeated outgoing Vice President Kamala Harris.
The certification marked the first time in 36 years when no Democratic lawmaker objected on the Congressional floor to an election that their party lost. Multiple Congressional Democrats objected to the 2000, 2004, and 2016 elections.
The process was especially notable in that the losing presidential candidate, Harris, by virtue of her responsibility as incumbent vice president, presided over affirming the result.
“The votes for president of the United States are as follows,” Harris said while standing at the podium with recently reelected House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-LA, seated beside her. “Donald J. Trump of the state of Florida has received 312 votes.”
BREAKING: Kamala Harris becomes the 1st woman to certify her own election loss pic.twitter.com/NmMQFWtEo1
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) January 6, 2025
A period of raucous applause began and continued as Johnson, and presumably all fellow members of the Republican majority in both houses, stood up. Democratic lawmakers remained silent and seated.
“Kamala D. Harris of the state of California has received 226 votes,” Harris continued, prompting Democratic lawmakers to stand and applaud.
After overseeing the certification of her own loss, Harris addressed reporters: “Today, America’s democracy stood. Today, I did what I have done my entire career, which is take seriously the oath which I have taken many times, to support and defend the Constitution of the United States – which included, today, performing my Constitutional duties.”
Today was the first time that not a single Congressional Democrat objected to the victory of a Republican presidential candidate since 1988.
— Jeremiah Poff (@JJ_Poff) January 6, 2025
National Review indicated that in the recent past, a minority of Democratic lawmakers had consistently raised objections to presidential elections in which their party’s nominee failed to win the presidency:
After George W. Bush’s win in 2000, 20 House Democrats objected to the counting of votes from Florida. After George W. Bush’s reelection in 2004, 31 House Democrats supported an objection to the counting of votes from Ohio. After Donald Trump’s win in 2016, some House Democrats objected to the counting of votes from ten states.
This is the first time Democrats have accepted a presidential election they lost since 1988. (e.g. in 2000 they said Bush via SCOTUS was "selected, not elected"; in 2004, claimed Karl Rove rigged Ohio voting machines; in 2016 alleged Trump stole by colluding with Russia etc etc)
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) January 6, 2025