Reply #12: Thanks for reminding me! Quite an amazing claim by Miller of Michigan>

[Stephanie]

Mrs. MILLER of Michigan. Mr. Speaker, the American people must be watching this debate and literally shaking their heads. With all of the challenges facing our Nation we are spending our time debating the challenge to the validity of the Presidential election simply because the Democratic Party cannot accept the fact that their candidate lost this election. They cannot accept the fact that their agenda, that their vision for America has been rejected by the majority of Americans. They cannot accept the fact that President George W. Bush simply received more votes than Senator John Kerry.

This election was very hard fought on both sides. The American people have accepted the fact that it is over and they want this Congress to get to work and to work in a bipartisan way.

If this is a minority party's idea of bipartisanship, then let the people of our Nation see it for what it is. Because in the spirit of bipartisanship, the Democrats are asking us to overturn the Presidential election which President Bush won by over 3 million votes nationwide and by over 118,000 votes in the State of Ohio.

In the spirit of bipartisanship they say that somehow Karl Rove was manipulating votes from a secret computer in the White House and that somehow these secret computers were changing the votes on punch cards and optical scan sheets that record actual votes. This language is in their challenge.

How interesting, however, that their challenge as it talks about conspiracies in the State of Ohio, making allegations that have no basis of fact, their challenge is silent about an incident in Ohio where fraudulent voter registration forms were being submitted and the worker who collected them was paid in crack cocaine.

How interesting that their challenge does not mention the Democratic group ACORN which submitted vote registrations for dead people that used 25 different addresses for the same individual.

Mr. Speaker, before I came to Congress I served very proudly for 8 years as the Michigan Secretary of State where my principal responsibility was serving as the chief election officer. So I feel I have a little bit of background to make some observations about the election process. In fact, Michigan is recognized as a national leader on elections. We constructed the first statewide computerized voter registration list which precludes the possibility of anybody having more than one address or registering more than once.

In fact, I might add, I was very proud in my former capacity to receive the highest grade in the Nation of Secretaries of State for voter election reforms and that grade was given to me by the NAACP.

We are all committed to free and fair elections. We all want to make sure that every single vote is counted, that no different voter is disenfranchised.

I do remember clearly, however, how distressed I was in my former capacity to have to threaten the Detroit City Clerk, a Democrat, with court action if she did not comply with our State election law to make sure that every vote is counted, particularly minority votes. However, my dismay at seeing that none of the Members of the United States Congress here ever spoke out to protect the rights of their own constituents to be heard at the ballot box. There was no outrage. There was no indignation. And yet today we hear outrage based on fantasies and conspiracies.

Mr. Speaker, let me say that I am sincerely interested in undertaking the important work of the American people in truly a bipartisan manner. So I would ask that we might be spared from selective outrage, that we might be spared from the righteous indignation based on fantasy.

Mr. Speaker, the challenges to those votes in Ohio are turkeys. I think those turkeys should be given to someone else.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Turner).