IV

105TH CONGRESS

2D SESSION H. RES. 341

Relating to a question of the privileges of the House.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

JANUARY 28, 1998

Mr. GEPHARDT submitted the following resolution; which failed of adoption

RESOLUTION

Relating to a question of the privileges of the House.

Whereas Loretta Sanchez was issued a certificate of election

as the duly elected Member of Congress from the 46th

District of California by the Secretary of State of California and was seated by the U.S. House of Representatives

on January 7, 1997;

Whereas a Notice of Contest of Election was filed with the

Clerk of the House by Mr. Robert Dornan on December

26, 1996;

Whereas the Task Force on the Contested Election in the

46th District of California met on February 26, 1997, in

Washington, D.C., on April 19, 1997, in Orange County,

California, and on October 24, 1997, in Washington,

D.C.;

Whereas Mr. Robert Dornan made unsubstantiated charges

of improper voting from a business, rather than a resi-
2

HRES 341 IH

dent address; underage voting; double voting; and large

numbers of individuals voting from the same address;

Whereas these charges are without merit, as it was found

that those voting from the same address included United

States Marines residing at a Marine barracks and nuns

residing at a domicile of nuns; that business addresses

were legal residences for the individuals, including the

zoo keeper of the Santa Ana zoo; that duplicate voting

was by different individuals and those accused of underage voting were of age;

Whereas the Committee on House Oversight has issued unprecedented subpoenas directing the Immigration and

Naturalization Service to compare its records with Orange County voter registration records, the first time in

any election in the history of the United States that the

INS has been asked by Congress to verify the citizenship

of voters;

Whereas the INS has complied with the committee’s request

and, at the committee’s request, for over eight months,

has engaged in a manual check of its paper files and has

provided worksheets containing supplemental information

on that manual check to the Committee on House Oversight;

Whereas the committee’s investigation has extended far beyond a review of those who actually voted in this contested election;

Whereas the District Attorney of Orange County has ended

his investigation and an Orange County Grand Jury has

refused to return any indictments and allegations of a

conspiracy to engage in voter fraud have been proven

groundless;
3

HRES 341 IH

Whereas the Committee on House Oversight has received a

report from the Secretary of State of California, in response to the committee’s request, which yielded no new

information;

Whereas the committee’s requests have caused this contest to

be needlessly extended for four additional months while

the Secretary of State of California provided no new information regarding the citizenship status of registrants

or voters;

Whereas the Task Force on the Contested Election in the

46th District of California and the committee have been

reviewing these materials and have all the information

they need regarding who voted in the 46th District and

all the information required to make judgments concerning those votes;

Whereas the Committee on House Oversight has after thirteen months of review and investigation failed to present

any credible evidence demonstrating that Congresswoman

Sanchez did not win this election and continues to pursue

never ending and groundless areas of investigation;

Whereas contestant Robert Dornan has not shown or provided credible evidence that the outcome of the election

is other than Congresswoman Sanchez’s election to the

Congress; and

Whereas the Committee on House Oversight should complete

its review of this matter and bring this contest to an end:

Now, therefore, be it

1 Resolved, That the election contest concerning the

2 46th District of California is dismissed.

Æ