‘Stolen Vote’ panel finds no individual fault

The House's Aug. 2, 2007, "Stolen Vote" committee released its findings on Thursday, concluding that the result of controversial roll call vote 814, which the Democrats won, was incorrect.

And while the report, which the panel adopted 6-0, found a great deal of fault to go around, it fell short of admonishing any individual members, including Rep. Michael McNulty (D-N.Y.), who was presiding over the House during the vote, and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who had admitted in testimony to the committee that it was “certainly possible” that he helped create an atmosphere in which McNulty felt pressure to close the vote sooner than he might have otherwise.

{mosads}The report dodged the question of who was ultimately responsible for the calling of the vote on the motion to recommit the Agriculture appropriations bill at 212-216, handing the Democrats a victory, calling the sequence of events leading up to the final vote “a perfect storm.” The Republican motion would have amended the spending bill to bar the use of funds to employ or provide housing for illegal immigrants.

The committee agreed that McNulty failed to follow proper procedures of waiting for the “tally sheet” from the clerks, and concurred with Hoyer’s admission that he may have brought undue pressure onto the situation. But it called for no punitive action for any member.

The panel did reach the unanimous conclusion, however, that the 212-216 vote was incorrect.

“There may be a disagreement about what should be the final vote tally, but one fact is indisputable: The vote tally of 212 yeas and 216 nays that was finally announced is incorrect,” the report read. “It is either 215 yeas and 213 nays, which would have reflected the tally at the time the chair prematurely announced the statement of result, or 211 yeas and 217 nays, which would have reflected the tally had [Minority Leader John] Boehner’s [R-Ohio] well card been processed.”

Rep. Mike Pence (Ind.), the ranking Republican on the committee, said the incident — and the specific instance of a member’s vote not being recorded correctly — “will forever be a black mark on the 110th Congress.”

The panel also unanimously recommended that the House rule prohibiting the holding open of a vote “for the sole purpose of reversing the outcome of such a vote” — which Democrats instituted when they regained the majority in 2007 — be scrapped.

“As I have said before,” Committee Chairman Rep. Bill Delahunt (D-Mass.) said, “it is a rule that was enacted with a noble intent — to curb other perceived abuses — but a rule that is, at best, difficult to enforce, and, at worst, the catalyst for the raw anger that we observed on Aug. 2.”