America is a Republic whose leaders are chosen in democratic elections. Those elections, in turn, must comply with the Constitution and with federal and state law.

When the voters fairly decide an election, pursuant to the rule of law, the losing candidate should acknowledge and respect the legitimacy of that election. And, if the voters choose to elect a new office-holder, our Nation should have a peaceful transfer of power.

The election of 2020, like the election of 2016, was hard fought and, in many swing states, narrowly decided. The 2020 election, however, featured unprecedented allegations of voter fraud, violations and lax enforcement of election law, and other voting irregularities.

Voter fraud has posed a persistent challenge in our elections, although its breadth and scope are disputed. By any measure, the allegations of fraud and irregularities in the 2020 election exceed any in our lifetimes.

And those allegations are not believed just by one individual candidate. Instead, they are widespread. Reuters/Ipsos polling, tragically, shows that 39% of Americans believe ‘the election was rigged.’ That belief is held by Republicans (67%), Democrats (17%), and Independents (31%).

Some Members of Congress disagree with that assessment, as do many members of the media.
But, whether or not our elected officials or journalists believe it, that deep distrust of our democratic processes will not magically disappear. It should concern us all. And it poses an ongoing threat to the legitimacy of any subsequent administrations.

Ideally, the courts would have heard evidence and resolved these claims of serious election fraud. Twice, the Supreme Court had the opportunity to do so; twice, the Court declined.

On January 6, it is incumbent on Congress to vote on whether to certify the 2020 election results. That vote is the lone constitutional power remaining to consider and force resolution of the multiple allegations of serious voter fraud.

At that quadrennial joint session, there is long precedent of Democratic Members of Congress raising objections to presidential election results, as they did in 1969, 2001, 2005, and 2017. And, in both 1969 and 2005, a Democratic Senator joined with a Democratic House Member in forcing votes in both houses on whether to accept the presidential electors being challenged the most direct precedent on this question arose in 1877, following serious allegations of fraud and illegal conduct in the Hayes-Tilden presidential race. Specifically, the elections in three states — Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina — were alleged to have been conducted illegally.

In 1877, Congress did not ignore those allegations, nor did the media simply dismiss those raising them as radicals trying to undermine democracy. Instead, Congress appointed an Electoral Commission — consisting of five Senators, five House Members, and five Supreme Court Justices — to consider and resolve the disputed returns.

We should follow that precedent. To wit, Congress should immediately appoint an Electoral Commission, with full investigatory and fact-finding authority, to conduct an emergency 10-day audit of the election returns in the disputed states. Once completed, individual states would evaluate the Commission’s findings and could convene a special legislative session to certify a change in their vote, if needed.

Accordingly, we intend to vote on January 6 to reject the electors from disputed states as not ‘regularly given’ and ‘lawfully certified’ (the statutory requisite), unless and until that emergency 10-day audit is completed.

We are not naïve. We fully expect most if not all Democrats, and perhaps more than a few Republicans, to vote otherwise. But support of election integrity should not be a partisan issue. A fair and credible audit — conducted expeditiously and completed well before January 20 — would dramatically improve Americans’ faith in our electoral process and would significantly enhance the legitimacy of whoever becomes our next President. We owe that to the People.

These are matters worthy of the Congress, and entrusted to us to defend. We do not take this action lightly. We are acting not to thwart the democratic process, but rather to protect it. And every one of us should act together to ensure that the election was lawfully conducted under the Constitution and to do everything we can to restore faith in our Democracy.

CINCINNATI — When Bishop Ennis Tait saw the events that unfolded on Capitol Hill Wednesday, he didn't see simply a crowd of Americans who felt their voices weren't being heard.

He saw what he described as a hypocritical culture of white supremacy in the U.S. rearing its head.

"Many have called it one of the worst days in the history of America," said Tait, lead pastor and founder of the New Beginnings Church of the Living God in Avondale and president of the Faith and Community Alliance, during a news conference outside City Hall on Friday. "I beg to differ. Many of the worst days of the history of America have never been recorded."

Tait said he was struck most by how differently Capitol Police treated the crowd that stormed the Capitol Wednesday than police departments across the country treated Black Lives Matter protesters last summer in the aftermath of George Floyd's death.

Mariel Carbone (WCPO)

"What a hypocrisy we saw on Wednesday," Tait said. "What we witnessed on January 6 was the manifestation of common behavior that has been our history here in this country."

Tait isn't alone in calling police action on Wednesday hypocritical. In the hours and days that followed, Capitol Police and other federal agencies have come under fire for being unprepared for the crowd that surged past their barricades outside the congressional building.

Some -- including President-elect Joe Biden -- have pointed to what they argue is a sharp contrast between police presence during last summer's Black Lives Matter protests and that which met the crowd of Trump rally attendees that descended upon the Capitol.

"No one can tell me that if it had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesting yesterday, they wouldn't have been treated very, very differently than the mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol. We all know that's true, and it is unacceptable," Biden said during an address Thursday afternoon.

It's why Tait and other leaders in the region's faith community are renewing calls made last summer to the way the city and Hamilton County address racial division.

"We are calling on the city of Cincinnati and Hamilton County to review and reallocate funding to organizations that are working authentically to bridge the racial divide in our region," Tait said.

Council members Jan-Michele Kearney and Wendell Young called Friday's special session for the city's lawmakers to pass a resolution formally condemning the events of Jan. 6, when attendees of a Trump rally marched from the White House to the Capitol building, eventually turning chaotic and violent, and forcing entry into Congressional chambers.

Kearney voiced agreement with Tait and the president-elect: "As a Black American, I was not surprised, because that has been our history here in this country: that there is white privilege, it does exist and people could see it... (Y)ou could see the disproportionate treatment between the way Black protesters were treated and white protesters in this instance.

"We saw officers helping some of the protesters, helping them down the stairs, opening the gates so they could come in."

Young offered his take on Wednesday's events: "We have never ... pledged allegiance to an individual. Never in this country have – we don't do that. It's always been to the republic."

The council unanimously approved the resolution with a vote of 9-0, but it remained to be seen Friday how City Council might revisit any further calls for police reform.

Councilman Greg Landsman, though, said something needs to be done here locally.

"The racial disparities that were on full display, I think, requires us to act here."

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — The Kentucky House on Friday wrapped up its quick work on legislation that would make early voting a permanent feature in the state’s elections.

The bill, introduced this week, passed the House on a 93-4 vote, sending it to the Senate. It would allow three days of no-excuse, early in-person voting — including a Saturday — ahead of Election Day.

Republican Secretary of State Michael Adams said he hopes the strong bipartisan support in the House will add to the bill’s momentum when it reaches the Senate. Adams describes it as the state’s most significant election-reform legislation in nearly three decades.

Another key part of the bill would allow counties to establish vote centers, where any voter in the county may vote regardless of precinct.

The measure continues some special features allowed in last year’s election because of the COVID-19 pandemic — most notably the early in-person voting.

Last year, pandemic-related rules for Kentucky’s general election included multiple weeks of early in-person voting to prevent a crush of Election Day voting.

Without new legislation, Kentucky’s election laws will revert to the pre-pandemic rules.

But the House-passed bill wouldn’t continue a temporary, pandemic-related accommodation that allowed widespread mail-in absentee balloting in the 2020 election.

The legislation is House Bill 574.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Federal authorities have charged two men for allegedly plotting to blow up the Democratic Party headquarters in Sacramento, California. 

The men reportedly expressed hope the bombing would be the first in a series of politically motivated attacks.
According to the DOJ, the men said they wanted to attack Democrats because they believe Former President Donald Trump won the 2020 election. 

Days after the election, the two reportedly began discussing possible attacks over messaging apps. A person close to one of the men reported him to authorities as "potentially dangerous to the community," according to the public information officer for the Napa County Sheriff's Office.

That man was taken into custody earlier this year, the second man was brought in recently and the federal indictment was unsealed this week.

The Justice Department says investigators found pipe bombs and arsenals of guns and ammunition in one of their homes.
Their first target was the John L. Burton Democratic Headquarters in Sacramento.

Kamil Zawadzki contributed to this report.

UPS is delivering more than packages to Capitol Hill.

New campaign finance records show UPS giving to lawmakers who voted against certifying the 2020 presidential election.

The donations were made after UPS paused political spending in the days following the Jan. 6 insurrection.

"Many of those companies just pulled away: Washington’s burning down, let’s not give any more fuel to it, at least not initially," said Douglas Schuler, an associate professor of business and public policy at Rice University. 

Companies froze campaign donations to avoid heat for funding people who promoted the baseless idea that President Biden didn’t actually win the election, Schuler said.

“A lot of people started asking, Who is behind those members of Congress?” he said.

Newsy reviewed recent filings at the Federal Election Commission and found 16 corporations sending money to Congress again, including to some of the 147 Republican election objectors.

The list includes Ford, General Motors, JetBlue and Lockheed Martin.

Like UPS, they are companies that announced a temporary stop in contributions to all lawmakers after the Capitol riot.

The donations come from employee-sponsored Political Action Committees known as PACs.

UPS reported giving to two Republican election dissenters in a flurry of new PAC donations that also went to Democrats.  UPS never said why it stopped donating after the insurrection and did not respond to questions about why the PAC chose to support election opponents now.

Boeing took a time-out to review political spending in January "to ensure that we support those who not only support our company, but also uphold our country’s most fundamental principles."

Now a new FEC filing shows Boeing’s PAC spending again to Democrats and Republicans, including four who challenged the election.

We asked Boeing: Who would the company not support anymore after its review?

“Thanks for the question,” a Boeing spokesman responded, "but nothing additional to add beyond the statement,” referring to an initial response from the company that said in part, “We will continue to carefully evaluate our giving…”

Cigna said it would no longer donate specifically to lawmakers who encouraged or supported violence, or who "otherwise hindered the peaceful transition of power."

But FEC filings show, two months later Cigna donated to seven members of Congress who tried to prevent certifying the election.

When Newsy asked Cigna about those donations, a spokeswoman referred us to a company statement that said voting against the election was not an act of obstructing a peaceful transition of power.

The FEC records show the companies still not giving to some of the most vocal election skeptics.

"[Missouri Sen. Josh] Hawley with his fist, that was like a very powerful symbol," Schuler said. "There might be a little more attention on those people."

Duke Energy, one of the nation’s largest electric companies, is contributing again to a number of home state representatives, but not to Rep. Madison Cawthorn, who the PAC backed in the 2020 election cycle.

That was before the North Carolina congressman spoke to the crowd of Trump supporters just before the Capitol attack.

The FEC records show companies are slowly returning to the long tradition of donating to both parties, focusing on congressional leaders and committee chairpersons, those most able to shape policies the corporations care about. 

It’s a practice Duke Energy’s CEO defended at a recent shareholders meeting.

"We must be a part of the conversation so that we can bring our subject matter, expertise, our experience, the needs of our customers to the table, and we’ll continue to do that," Duke Energy chair, president and CEO Lynn Good said.