Editor’s note: The following are comments made by Rep. Ted Budd in objecting to Pennsylvania’s Electoral College votes on the floor of the U.S. House. Budd made the following comments after a riot in the Capitol perpetrated by supporters of President Donald Trump. Above is a video of those comments.

Mob violence is not representative of our country or of this building. The American people, at least the ones that are still up watching right now, they have seen this body return to a peaceful debate.

And that’s the American way. So, let’s get back to that debate, and let’s talk for a moment about Pennsylvania.

For decades, absentee voting was reserved for members of the military and citizens who were medically or physically unable to get to the polls, but in 2019 Pennsylvania dramatically increased the amount of ballots that would be cast in the presidential election through expanded, no-excuse mail-in voting.

On September 17, Pennsylvania’s Democrat-controlled Supreme Court violated the constitution by extending the deadline to receive mail-in ballots. Article 2 states that legislatures, not the courts, determine the time, manner and place of their state’s elections.

But Pennsylvania’a high court directed the state officials to assume that non-postmarked ballots were received on time without any evidence that they were sent before Election Day.

On October 23, while early voting was already underway, the state Supreme Court ruled that election officials did not have to authenticate signatures for mail-in ballots.

To sum it up, Pennsylvania officials illegally did three critical things.

One, they radically expanded vote by mail for virtually any reason.

Two, they removed restrictions when a ballot could be sent in.

And, three, they removed signature verification on those very ballots.

And just this week, members of the Pennsylvania Senate pleaded with this body to delay certification until the Supreme Court resolves these disputes.

The commonwealth of Pennsylvania violated their own constitution. They violated the U.S. Constitution. They opened the door for thousands of unverifiable ballots because they failed to guarantee the integrity of their votes, I cannot consent to accepting Pennsylvania’s electoral votes.