House Democrats and a panel of election experts expressed unwavering confidence in state voting systems and rejected the Trump administration’s claims of widespread fraud and other vulnerabilities during a special “shadow hearing” in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
He accused President Trump and his Republican allies of pursuing sweeping federal reforms – including strict voter ID laws and new restrictions on voting by mail – that would disenfranchise millions of eligible Americans, particularly low-income, rural and elderly voters, as well as voters of color and people with disabilities.
“They’re taking us backwards, not to a better place,” said Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), who co-founded the Daniel K. Inouye helped lead the hearing at the National Center.
He also stressed that he and his colleagues are working hard to prevent such a comeback.
Representative Pete Aguilar (D-Redlands), chairman of the Democratic Caucus, said, “Republicans are expecting Democrats to just sit back as they try to steal another election, with Democrats getting out into the community, sounding the alarm about GOP efforts to rig these elections and fighting in the courts, in Congress, and in our communities.” “We will not let Republicans get away with their undemocratic and un-American plans.”
Such “shadow hearings” allow Democrats to highlight issues that their majority-Republican counterparts would not schedule for formal hearings in Washington. This week’s discussions — with a second scheduled for Thursday in San Francisco — follow other discussions that have taken place in California in recent months, including over Trump’s immigration raids.
Former House Speaker Pelosi led the hearing along with Aguilar and Representative Joseph Morrell of New York, the ranking Democrat on the House Administration Committee, which oversees the elections. He was joined by fellow Democratic representatives. Nanette Barragan of San Pedro, Judy Chu of Monterey Park, Gil Cisneros of Covina, Laura Friedman of Glendale, Luz Rivas of North Hollywood, Linda Sanchez of Whittier, Norma Torres of Pomona and Maxine Waters of L.A.
Pelosi noted the conditions on the grounds of the Japanese American National Museum, where Japanese Americans were unconstitutionally detained during World War II before being stripped of their belongings and transported to internment camps.
Pelosi said, “To be here on a day when the President of the United States has talked about destroying a country’s civilization. It’s appalling, and I don’t think we can ignore comments like that, especially in a setting like this.”
He also said that securing the country’s elections and securing Democratic votes against Trump’s threats is the safest way to restore US relations abroad – and that Trump’s cabinet is far more likely to remove him from office by invoking the 25th Amendment.
He said, “We have to ensure that the mentality that will destroy a civilization, that will weaken democracy by contesting free and fair elections, cannot persist.”
The hearing was designed to challenge the narrative that Trump has promoted for years – that US elections have been deeply marred by widespread fraud, that mail ballots used in California are a particularly hot source of abuse, and that non-citizens are voting in large numbers – none of which he has supported with evidence.
Trump tried unsuccessfully to challenge his 2020 loss to Joe Biden using similar arguments. When he returned to the White House, he immediately directed his administration to pursue renewed claims, including executive orders asserting new and broader federal authority over elections, which are controlled by states by law.
The Justice Department sued California and other states in September over their voter rolls, which the courts rejected. The FBI arrested Fulton County, Ga., in January. Raided and seized 2020 election records at an election office in Washington, D.C. where Trump had rejected the 2020 results. In February Trump said Republicans should “nationalize voting.” Last week, he issued an executive order to give federal agencies control over ballot processing by the U.S. Postal Service, following a previous order seeking to impose new federal requirements on voter identification and proof of citizenship.
Trump has said that his efforts are “common sense” steps supported by average Americans to secure elections against non-citizen voting and other threats.
Experts who testified at Tuesday’s hearing rejected that argument, saying the measures solve problems that don’t exist and are more geared toward securing victory for Republicans than ensuring election security.
Jenny Farrell, executive director of the League of Women Voters of California, said Americans are “more likely to be struck by lightning” than to commit voter fraud, and that many recent proposals designed around election integrity are actually designed to limit access to voting for certain groups. He also said the California polls are particularly strong.
“We are like election dodgers,” he said.
Darius Kemp, executive director of Common Cause California, said the state’s elections are “safe and secure” and that the Trump administration is threatening democratic participation in new and dangerous ways, which his organization is watching carefully.
Loyola Law School professor Justin Levitt said Trump is trying to project power over elections “that he doesn’t have,” and that if local and state officials, courts and pro-democracy groups stick to his guns, he will fail.
“If we stay calm and keep moving forward, we can make our voices heard loud and clear,” he said.
Hector Villagra, vice president of policy advocacy and community education at MALDEF, or Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said, “The evidence could not be clearer – noncitizen voting is extremely rare,” and Trump’s proposals would “raise the cost of legitimate voting” for groups that are already underrepresented at the polls.
“The question is not whether we can confirm eligibility. We have already done that,” he said. “The question is whether we will impose new barriers that will prevent eligible citizens from participating.”
Sonny Vaknin, senior staff attorney at the UCLA Voting Rights Project, said that “democracy is under attack” across the country, and the photo identification requirement that Trump and other Republicans are pushing would disenfranchise one million eligible voters in California alone.
When Cisneros asked what could be done to prepare for the inevitable claims of fraud from Trump and other Republicans after the midterms, Leavitt said such claims should be exposed for what they are.
He said, “We call them lies, because they are lies.”
When Waters asked experts about the impact of federal immigration agents being deployed to polling places, as some of Trump’s supporters have suggested, Villagra said rumors of such action were already causing damage — whether agents showed up or not.
“It’s the threat that’s really powerful here,” he said, because people — especially Latino voters — are already scared, and leaders should do more to reassure voters and provide alternatives to showing up at the polls, such as voting by mail.
