Today Congress took an important step to restore to Congress the powers our Constitution’s framers intended and check corrupt presidents without infringing on their legitimate authority by reintroducing the Protecting Our Democracy Act (PODA).

Introduced by Representatives Adam Schiff, Jerrod Nadler, Carolyn Maloney, John Yarmuth, Zoe Lofgren, and Peter DeFazio, the legislation is a package of reforms to create or strengthen guardrails preventing the abuse of executive power and restore Congress as a check and balance on executive authority.

In reaction to PODA’s introduction, Soren Dayton, policy advocate at Protect Democracy, released the following statement:

“We applaud Chairman Schiff and the co-sponsors for introducing the Protecting Our Democracy Act. Congress has been ceding authority to presidents of both parties for generations and this bill calls a halt to that dangerous practice. This critical legislation would prevent future presidents from undermining our democratic institutions and contains policy ideas that both parties have endorsed. Congress must pass the Protecting Our Democracy Act to prevent any president — Republican, Democratic, or otherwise — from abusing their power.”