New tensions are flaring on the Senate Judiciary Committee over plans by newly minted Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) to dig into Obama-era scandals.
Graham, a close ally of President Trump’s, has outlined several areas he wants to probe now that he has the Judiciary Committee gavel.
They include the FBI’s handling of its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant applications targeting former Trump campaign aide Carter Page.
Members of Congress discussed ways to break the funding impasse on Jan. 20, the 30th day of a partial government shutdown. (Patrick Martin /The Washington Post)
One month into a historic government shutdown, Republican senators are standing staunchly behind President Trump’s demand for money to build a border wall, even as the GOP bears the brunt of the blame for a standoff few in the party agitated for, according to interviews this past week with more than 40 Republican senators and aides.
Under pressure from conservatives to help Trump deliver on a signature campaign promise and unable to persuade him to avert the partial government shutdown, these lawmakers have all but surrendered to the president’s will. Their comments show how the cracks in the 53-member Republican majority that emerged at the outset of the shutdown have not spread beyond a handful of lawmakers.
Asked about the pressure from constituents and some of the 800,000 affected federal workers to end the impasse, GOP senators insisted they are facing equal — if not more — insistence to stand behind Trump and his call for $5.7 billion for a U.S.-Mexico border wall, especially from conservative voters.
Republicans gave Russia exactly what it wanted — and Russia’s having a good chuckle about it.
The GOP-controlled Senate rejected legislation this week that would have required the U.S. Treasury Department to keep sanctions on companies linked to Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch with close ties to Vladimir Putin.
The move is a major win for Putin, whose economy has been hit hardby U.S.-backed sanctions aimed at punishing Russia for its aggression in Ukraine, its involvement in human rights abuses around the world, and its malicious cyber activities including the 2016 influence operation targeting the U.S. presidential election.
While Democrats had mounted an effort to block Trump’s Treasury Department from lifting sanctions on the Russian companies, Republicans used their majority in the Senate to hand Putin a victory by easing the sanctions.
According to Congress, a president can obstruct justice. Just as long as that president is a member of the opposite political party. (JM Rieger/The Washington Post)
On Aug. 5, 1974, shortly after losing a case at the Supreme Court, the administration of Richard Nixon released an Oval Office recording that it had kept secret to that point. In the tape, Nixon and his aides discussed how to cover up the administration’s involvement in the break-in at the Watergate Hotel, determining that former CIA deputy director Vernon Walters could call acting FBI director Pat Gray and tell the FBI to back off any further investigations.
The release of the tape was definitive proof that Nixon himself was involved in an effort to coverup the break-in and block investigations. The House Judiciary Committee had already voted to advance articles of impeachment against Nixon to the full House, including one focused on obstruction of justice and Nixon’s having “engaged personally and through his close subordinates and agents, in a course of conduct or plan designed to delay, impede, and obstruct the investigation” into the Watergate incident. Nixon’s position was untenable and he resigned, preventing any impeachment from happening.
A few decades later, there was a president impeached for obstruction of justice: Bill Clinton. Clinton at one point faced four articles of impeachment, two centered on perjury (including lying under oath when offering testimony for an affidavit) and one on obstruction related to his efforts to prevent information about his affair with Monica Lewinsky from coming to light — including encouraging her to give false testimony.
Russian metals magnate Oleg Deripaska attends Independence Day celebrations at the residence of the U.S. Ambassador in Moscow in July 2015. Credit: Alexander Zemlianichenko, AP
Republican senators Wednesday successfully defended the Trump administration’s plan to lift sanctions on companies controlled by a Vladimir Putin ally — despite the defection of nearly a dozen Republicans who broke ranks to vote with the Democrats.
The Democratic effort to block the relaxation of sanctions on the companies of Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska fell just a few votes shy of the 60 needed to advance the resolution to a final vote, even after attracting the support of eleven Republican senators including Marco Rubio of Florida, Josh Hawley of Missouri and Ben Sasse of Nebraska.
The defeat means the Treasury Department is likely to lift the sanctions in the coming days. Treasury, Deripaska and his companies didn’t respond to requests for comment.
President Donald Trump answers questions from the press as he departs the White House, January 2019. Credit: Win McNamee, Getty
President Donald Trump recently claimed that he can relate to the strain experienced by federal workers living paycheck-to-paycheck. However, his efforts to prolong the current government shutdown—already the longest in U.S. history—suggest otherwise. In addition to furloughed federal workers, this cruel, manufactured crisis has added immeasurable uncertainty to already stressed low-wage workers and families, disproportionately harming low-income families with children, people with disabilities, and seniors.
Here are just five of the myriad ways that Trump’s shutdown is irresponsibly harming and holding low-income communities hostage.
1. The paychecks of federal workers, contractors, and support staff are being withheld
An estimated 800,000 federal employees—and hundreds of thousands more federal contractors and support staff—have missed paychecks since the shutdown began on December 22. Initially, more than 420,000employees were required to work without pay while another 380,000 had been sent home without pay. But now, nearly 50,000 of the latter group have been pulled back to work without pay at the president’s command. Federal government workers’ salaries run the gamut, with some making as little as $26,000 a year. The Center for American Progress has estimated that these employees, in aggregate, miss out on more than $2 billion per pay period. With President Trump and congressional Republicans still refusing to fund the government and the shutdown continuing for nearly four weeks, workers’ income shortfall continues to grow. While both houses of Congress have approved legislation that guarantees back pay to furloughed federal workers once the government reopens, the lapse in pay exacerbates financial hardship and uncertainty for many American families. Affected families are struggling to pay rent, dipping into savings, and cutting back on food.
Maryland resident Rosa Marquez displays her bills while standing near other furloughed security officers and custodians outside Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s office. An extended shutdown could push first-quarter growth close to or even below zero. Credit: M. Scott Mahaskey, Politico
The impasse is triggering alarms about an already fragile economic environment.
The partial government shutdown was supposed to be a brief non-event for the economy. Now it’s starting to look like a serious crisis that could nudge the U.S. toward recession and threaten President Donald Trump’s economic message during his reelection campaign.
Across Wall Street, analysts are rushing out warnings that missed federal paychecks, dormant government contractors and shelved corporate stock offerings could push first-quarter growth close to or even below zero if the shutdown, which is wrapping up its fourth week, drags on much longer.
Their broader fear: The protracted impasse could convince consumers and businesses that the federal government will spend all of 2019 on the brink of crisis — whether on the border wall, trade with China or the debt limit. That could choke business investment and consumer spending, bringing an end to one of the longest economic expansions on record.
In an effort to move the GOP-controlled Senate to act on the government shutdown, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez searches the Capitol for Sen. Mitch McConnell.
Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., fell short of 60 votes on his Russia sanctions measure. Credit: Bill Clark, CQ Roll Call file photo
Clear majority of senators supported attempt to maintain sanctions on three Russian firms, but not 60 of them
Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer came up just short in his effort to get legislation through the chamber blocking the Treasury Department from easing sanctions on a trio of Russian companies.
Less than 24 hours after securing 57 votes to support a motion to proceed to the joint resolution disapproving of Treasury’s move to lift sanctions on three Russian firms that have been controlled by sanctioned oligarch Oleg Deripaska, the same number of senators voted to limit debate — but that was three short of the 60 needed to cut off debate and get the measure to a final passage vote.
Schumer had been bullish Tuesday night about his chances of getting 60 votes.
