Democrats Could Have Passed Democracy Bills in 2009

In May, former House speaker Nancy Pelosi sent a letter to the editor of the New York Times Opinion section. In the brief missive, Rep. Pelosi pointed to four legislative reforms to reinforce American democracy that House Democrats passed in 2022, only to see the bill, the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act, stymied by Senate Republicans.

Does no one remember 2009? The song “Whatever You Like” by T.I.? Pelosi and the Democrats could have passed three of the four reforms then!

Pelosi does not mention that the democracy reforms she now favors had antecedents in the 111th Congress of 2009-2010, when Pelosi was House speaker and Democrats had trifecta control of the federal government—and a filibuster-proof majority of 60 Senate votes, which would allowed Democratic leadership to bring bills to a vote.

It was a crucial moment in modern politics: If bills had passed the House and gone to the Senate, they would have gone to President Barack Obama to sign. In the Senate:

• The first window was from July 7, 2009, when Al Franken was sworn in after a recount battle, to August 25, 2009, when ailing former Sen. Ted Kennedy died. 
• The second was from Sept. 25, 2009, when Kennedy’s replacement Paul Kirk was sworn in, to Feb. 4, 2010, when Republican Sen. Scott Brown was sworn in after winning a special election for the seat on January 19, 2010—and Democrats slipped to 59 votes in the chamber.

In the fateful 111th Congress, Pelosi did not bring up three of the four bills addressing the four reforms for a House vote. There has been little public explanation for why the below House bills, with a majority of 256 Democrats to 178 Republicans in the chamber, were not even sent to the Senate.

Is this ringing any bells? “Turn My Swag On” by Soulja Boy?

Pelosi’s op-ed highlights the following:

1) Aim to stop voter suppression and election subversion.

In early January 2009, House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers introduced the VOTER Act, or the Voting Opportunity and Technology Enhancement Rights Act of 2009 (H.R.105).

The legislation would have set national standards for a write-in absentee ballot, set requirements for voting systems and poll works, allowed for Election Day registration and early voting, created Internet registration, and set standards for conducting recounts, among many other things. Rep. Conyers said, introducing the bill in the House, that the democracy measure would combat attempted voter disenfranchisement. 

The VOTER Act’s final action came in June 2009 when the Judiciary Committee referred it to the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties. It never received a hearing. Other Democratic bills introduced in 2009 would have allowed for national vote-by-mail, grants for early voting locations and training at election sites, same-day registration, and re-enfranchisement of people who had completed serving felony sentences. Similarly, the bills from rank-and-file Democrats did not receive House votes under Pelosi.

2) Establish a nationwide redistricting commission to end partisan gerrymandering.

In October 2005, Pelosi’s ally Rep. Zoe Lofgren first introduced the Redistricting Reform Act in the 109th Congress. The bill would have required states to establish an independent redistricting commission, or else follow a redistricting plan selected by the state's highest court or developed by a U.S. district court. It also would have eliminated mid-decade redistricting.

Lofgren reintroduced her independent redistricting bill in every subsequent Congress. In the 110th Congress, it was reintroduced in May 2007. 

But in the crucial 111th Congress, it was not reintroduced during the first year, which had the approximately 213-day (interrupted) window when Democrats had 60 Senate votes. Rather, it was introduced during the second year, in June 2010, as H.R. 5596. The bill was referred to the Judiciary Committee, where it expired with no further actions. It had 12 Democratic co-sponsors, all from California. 

Reintroduced in each of the next Congresses by Lofgren, the bill jumped to 83 cosponsors by the 116th Congress of 2019. 

In the following 117th Congress, Lofgren introduced an amendment that included independent redistricting, among other reforms, that was approved. It amended the Democrats’ signature For the People Act of 2021 (H.R. 1), which would have required independent redistricting and banned gerrymandering—but the major voting reform and ethics bill was filibustered to death in the Senate, as expected. By that time, Senate Democrats were at least two votes away (Sens. Manchin and Sinema) in their caucus from being able to change the parliamentary rules.

Lofgren’s was one of several redistricting bills that were introduced in the 111th Congress, the nonprofit FairVote wrote shortly before the 2010 midterm elections. Two bills were introduced by conservative Democratic Rep. John Tanner of Tennessee, who was an initial leader of the corporate-backed Blue Dog Coalition and retired after 2010 to become a lobbyist. Tanner’s two bills had 32 and 39 cosponsors.

3) Empower the grass roots with matching funds for small-dollar donors.

In March 2009, Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) first introduced the Fair Elections Now Act (H.R. 1826). The bill would have created the first optional public campaign financing system for runs for the U.S. House and Senate. In other words, a major bill to curb Big Money influence in congressional campaigns, and connect candidates to their constituents in their time and attention, could have been passed in 2009, if more bills had been teed up for the Senate. 

When I spoke with the longtime congressman Larson about the bill in November 2020, he told me that the bill was inspired by the program adopted by the Connecticut legislature in 2005, which provided qualifying candidates with grants covering all election activities. The Connecticut program has been hailed by good government advocates and was used by nearly three in four state candidates in 2016. Similar programs had proven increasingly popular with candidates in Arizona and Maine, which both adopted the option in 2000. As things played out, healthcare reform took up all the legislative oxygen that year, Larson said, and his colleagues had concerns about raising enough money in their districts.

The bill proposed for qualifying candidates an initial allocation in primary elections amounting to 40% of a base amount, which would be equal to 80% of the national average spending of the cycle by winning candidates in the last two election cycles. For general elections, the initial allocation would reach 60% of the base amount. Contributions from state residents to participating candidates would be matched 400% toward a maximum amount.

The bill had 165 co-sponsors, including some Republicans, but FENA expired after a July 30, 2009 hearing in the Committee on House Administration. However, the seismic Citizens United decision of January 2010 put money in politics back on the national radar, and a version of FENA was reintroduced in September 2010 and approved by a voice vote of the Committee on House Administration on Sept. 23, 2010. But the bill expired at the end of 2010, and standing up a small-donor financing program was not a House Democratic plank again until 2021. In the 117th Congress during the first year of the Biden administration, the small donor boosting matching program of the Democrats’ For the People Act was filibustered to death.

4) Curtail the harmful, anti-democracy Citizens United decision by enacting the Disclose Act, which curbs anonymous funders from suffocating the airwaves with misrepresentations.

In the wake of the momentous Citizens United decision, the DISCLOSE Act was introduced in the House on June 29, 2010 and in the Senate on Sept. 9, 2010. The bill would shed light on the original source of funding behind political spending. The Democratic-controlled House passed it in June by a vote of 219–206—but in September, the bill was filibustered for the second time in three months by Senate Republicans, and it expired. The fateful procedural vote was 59-39, one vote short of the 60 needed to break the filibuster.

Remember "Rockin' That Shit", The-Dream?

Other major bills in the 111th Congress that might have become law if not for the filibuster rules, by virtue of passing the House and being likely to receive more than 50 votes in the Senate, included the DREAM Act, a public option for healthcare insurance (51 votes), and the Creating American Jobs and Ending Offshoring Act. In the 112th, bills blocked by the stimulus include the American Jobs Act, a bill providing $30 billion in funding for teachers, the Repeal Big Oil Tax Subsidies Act, and more. As of 2019, the Center for American Progress wrote, “the 21 least-populous states currently represented by two Republican senators—enough to sustain a filibuster—represent less than 25 percent of the U.S. population.”

By one journalist’s widely-share count in January 2022, “48 Democrats who supported reforming filibuster to pass voting rights bills represent 34 MILLION more Americans than 52 senators (all Republicans + Sinema/Manchin) who opposed it.” But in 2020, Democratic primary voters nominated, in Biden, a candidate who would not support filibuster reforms until it was, effectively, too late to protect voting rights, abortion access, on and on.

Some progressive operatives have let slip that Pelosi’s office will “will burn your number for stepping out of line” and that Democratic members did not welcome grassroots pressure in 2009-10 to stand up against corporate lobbying. More political reporters with access to Pelosi could ask why voter protections, independent redistricting, and a public campaign financing option were not passed when they had a chance to become law. Congressional reform expert Craig Holman laid out the behind-the-scenes factors in play to me when I talked to him in 2020: “Those [House Dems] that signed on showed that they didn’t like the private campaign system, but most weren’t ready to sign on to provide sweeping public financing that could vastly benefit opponents, especially in primaries.

“The progressive wing was enthusiastic about it—the Senate wasn’t likely to pass it anyway and everyone knew that,” Holman said. “Other Democrats weren’t enthusiastic about it.” 

Something to keep in mind during the Chicago 2024 Democratic National Convention, and the revolving door that keeps spinning to lucrative lobbying and influence gigs.

(Thoughts? Let me know on Bsky.)