A GOP member of Congress again pushed both Texas senators to object during the counting of Electoral College votes on Jan. 6.
“I’m Lance Gooden. I am proud to be the U.S. Congressman for Texas’ 5th Congressional District,” wrote Rep. Lance Gooden (R-Texas) on Saturday. “I am also proud to stand with @realDonaldTrump by OBJECTING on January 6th. I call on every fellow member of Congress to do the same. RT!”
In a follow-up tweet, Gooden called on Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) to join him in objecting to the vote-counting of certain key states’ electors.
“We have an obligation to fight for the millions of Texans who have been disenfranchised by the CORRUPT Democrat counties in AZ, GA, MI, NV, PA, & WI,” he wrote to the two Texas senators, referring to counties in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, respectively. “Join me in OBJECTING on January 6th. Fight!” he wrote.
Cruz has not made a comment on the matter, but Cornyn made strong suggestions that he wouldn’t join the effort.
“It’s basically going through the motions,” Cornyn told reporters last week. “It’s a futile exercise.”
Since the Nov. 3 election, President Donald Trump and his attorneys have said that the election was stolen from him via voter fraud and irregularities. They first attempted to challenge the results and voting procedures in various state and federal courts before they lobbied state legislatures to approve Republican slates of electors.
I’m Lance Gooden.
I am proud to be the U.S. Congressman for Texas’ 5th Congressional District.
I am also proud to stand with @realDonaldTrump by OBJECTING on January 6th.
I call on every fellow member of Congress to do the same.
RT! 🇺🇸
— Lance Gooden (@Lancegooden) December 26, 2020
But since the Electoral College vote, Trump has pushed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and other top Republicans in Congress to challenge the Electoral College votes on Jan. 6.
A handful of House members have said they would object in an effort led by Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.). Senator-elect Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) hinted that he would join Brooks, and later, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) publicly said he was not ruling it out, either.
The bid to challenge a state’s electors during the Joint Session of Congress requires one member of the House and one member of the Senate, which then triggers a complex series of debates and votes.
Senate Republican Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) said GOP leaders in the Senate will try to quash the effort.
“Ultimately every senator will have to make their own decision about that but I think there will be people, yeah, reaching out him just to kind of find out what he’s going to do,” Thune said of Tuberville’s intentions, according to The Hill. “If nothing else, we need to kind of know the plan,” he added.
“We’ll see. He’s made some public statements,” he again said of Tuberville. “I’m hoping in the end that all senators will conclude that this election needs to be over with and it’s time to move on.”