Thread by @Ben__Tobin

.@senatemajldr speaking now AGAINST the objection to certify the Electoral College's vote in favor of President-elect @JoeBiden.

"I've served 36 years in the Senate. This will be the most important vote I've ever cast."

.@senatemajldr: "Nothing before us proves illegality near the massive scale that would have tipped the entire election ... The Constitution gives us here in Congress a limited role. We cannot simply declare ourselves a national board of elections on steroids."

.@senatemajldr: "The voters, the courts, the states -- they've all spoken. They've all spoken. If we overrule them, it would damage our republic forever. This election was actually not unusually close. Just in recent history, 1976, 200- and 2004 were all closer."

.@senatemajldr: "If this election were overturned by mere allegations from the losing side, our democracy would enter a death spiral ... Every four years would be a scramble for power at any costs."

.@senatemajldr: "We cannot keep drifting apart into two separate tribes, with a separate set of facts and separate reality with nothing in common except our hostility towards each other and mistrust for the few national institutions that we all share."

.@senatemajldr ends: "It would be unfair and wrong to disenfranchise American voters and overrule the courts and the states on this extraordinarily thin basis. And I will not pretend such a vote would be a harmless protest gesture while relying on others to do the right thing."