Tim Kaine: ‘We Have All 50 Democrats Onboard’ for Very Robust Voting Protections

Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) said Thursday on MSNBC’s “Ayman Mohyeldin Reports” that all 50 Senate Democrats support a “robust” package on voting.

Kaine said, “January 6 changed the way we look at this issue. The Trump big lie about the election being stolen that he perpetrated for months led to this violent attack. The second lie is motivating legislatures and states, and Republicans control everything. To try to take away people’s voting rights. They may not be wearing Camp Auschwitz t-shirts and battling and battering policemen, you know, down with fence posts, but they’re using the same big lie to try to curtail our democracy.”

He continued, “We take this oath to support and defend the Constitution. In the past, that oath was never my job description. The job description is battling for Virginia and development and education. After January 6, that oath is my job description. And we have to, in order to fulfill that oath, protect people’s rights to vote.”

Kaine added, “We have all 50 Democrats onboard with the very robust set of protections that include elements of the John Lewis Act and the For the People Act. We don’t have a single Republican with us. That is no surprise. They’re not going to join with us. So, I am talking to all of my colleagues. I know reverend and others are too to say we’ve got to do this. Two thousand senators in our history have been in this chamber. Only 100 were here when there was an attempt to attack it to stop the peaceful transfer of power. The weight of history is on our shoulders to try to defend this democracy, and voting rights is critical to that. Joe Manchin is not in favor of getting rid of the filibuster. There are all kinds of filibuster reforms that can be made that the Senate is willing to make in the past, and we should be willing to make them now. Nothing in our oath talks about the filibuster. Our oath talks about defending the Constitution. We have an attack on it to overturn the peaceful transfer of power, and we have to respond.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN