Tag: House Democrats

House Democrats show improved response to Republican messaging votes

Democrats easily defeated a Republican motion to recommit Friday to their HR 1 government overhaul

House Democrats seem to have sharpened their response to Republican motions to recommit after the GOP twice bested the new majority using the procedural tool this year.

The improved messaging and whip operations around motions to recommit, or MTRs, since Democrats lost a second one early last week on a priority gun control bill seem to have quelled an immediate desire to overhaul the procedural tool.

House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer acknowledged Friday during a colloquy on the floor with Minority Whip Steve Scalise that there’s been “consternation” within the Democratic Caucus about the GOP’s MTRs and discussion about whether the tool should be changed. But the Maryland Democrat suggested that’s not on the horizon.

View the complete March 8 article by Lindsey McPherson on The Roll Call website here.

Five things to know about Democrats’ sweeping election reform bill

House Democrats approved on Friday a sweeping elections reform measure that would reshape campaign finance rules, impose new voter registration requirements and compel presidential candidates to release their personal tax returns.

The legislation, H.R. 1, is in many ways a direct response to what Democrats have alleged is potential impropriety on the part of President Trump and his 2016 White House campaign.

But the bill, which spans nearly 700 pages, also has the potential to reshape voting, campaigning and government ethics.

View the complete March 8 article by Max Greenwood on The Hill website here.

For years, Republicans failed to investigate the red flags around Russia. Dems now have a backlog.

Intelligence briefings as far as back 2015 should have prompted members to investigate further. Here are the times Republicans sat on their hands instead.

Republicans have been steadily attacking House Democrats’ sweeping investigations into President Donald Trump’s alleged misconduct, claiming the congressional inquiries are a purely partisan overreach.

But when Democrats ramped up their scrutiny of the president after retaking the House majority in the 2018 midterm elections, they encountered a sprawling backlog of missed oversight opportunities. During the first two years of the Trump presidency, the GOP-dominated Congress ignored serious red flags about Russian election meddling and Trump’s ties to Russia, any one of which should have triggered a congressional investigation.

Still, Republicans took no action. Even when confronted with intelligence briefings (as far back as 2015) about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign, GOP leaders in the House and Senate declined to assume oversight responsibilities or launch serious investigations.

View the complete March 8 article by Danielle Mclean and Casey Michel on the ThinkProgress website here.

House Democrats see new probes in Cohen’s testimony

Michael Cohen was asked who else Democrats should investigate during his testimony before the House Oversight Committee Feb. 27. Here is who he named. (Video: Taylor Turner/Photo: Danielle Kunitz/The Washington Post)

House Democrats on Thursday made plans to dig deeper into President Trump’s business and charity, using testimony from former Trump attorney Michael Cohen as a road map to call new witnesses and seek new internal documents.

The House Intelligence Committee said it anticipates bringing in for questioning the Trump Organization’s chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg. It also plans to interview Felix Sater, a former Trump business associate who helped Trump develop a hotel in Manhattan.

The House Financial Services Committee said it would look into the Donald J. Trump Foundation, Trump’s charity. The Intelligence Committee expressed interest in Cohen’s comments on Russia. And Ways and Means Committee members again discussed the best way to obtain Trump’s tax returns.

Dems ready aggressive response to Trump emergency order, as GOP splinters

House Democrats are vowing an aggressive response to President Trump‘s emergency declaration at the southern border, mulling ways to block his go-it-alone approach with legislation, legal action, or both.

Yet party leaders are in no immediate rush to show their hand, instead hoping to keep the focus on growing GOP divisions while pressuring more Republicans to oppose the president’s unilateral power play.

Heading into the weeklong Presidents Day recess, the office of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is distributing a spreadsheet to members logging a host of wide-ranging local projects potentially threatened by Trump’s effort to shift funds from military construction coffers to the border wall.

The list — nearly 400 projects long — features a number of ventures in GOP districts. It includes maintenance facilities for F-35 stealth fighters at Eielson Air Force Base outside Fairbanks, Alaska; the operation of a middle school at Fort Campbell, Ky.; and funds to replace a training maze at Fort Bragg, N.C.

House Democrats to challenge Trump’s emergency declaration; Republicans divided on action

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Feb. 14 that Democrats will be ready to respond if President Trump declares a national emergency at the border. (Reuters)

House Democrats are gearing up to pass a joint resolution disapproving of President Trump’s emergency declaration to build his U.S.-Mexico border wall, a move that will force Senate Republicans to vote on a contentious issue that divides their party.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said Thursday evening in an interview with The Washington Post that the House would take up the resolution in the coming days or weeks. The measure is expected to easily clear the Democratic-led House, and because it would be privileged, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) would be forced to put the resolution to a vote that he could lose.

“This is a gross abuse of presidential power,” Nadler said of the news that Trump would declare a national emergency to try to move money around to fulfill one of his central campaign promises. “This is an attempt to overturn the basic constitutional doctrine of separation of powers. Congress has the power of the purse. It cannot be tolerated.”

View the complete February 14 article by Rachael Bade, Seung Min Kim, Mike DeBonis and Paul Kane on The Washington Post website here.

Recent Political Scandals the ‘For the People Act’ Would Prevent From Recurring

The sun rises behind the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., January 2019. Credit: Adam Gray, Getty Images

For more than two years, President Donald Trump and his allies have ignored, undermined, and rewritten the rule of law and long-standing norms—unleashing an unprecedented wave of self-interested corruption in the White House, the executive branch, and Congress. Trump and his allies have given themselves and their donors huge tax breaks, sabotaged access to health care for millions of Americans, conducted insider trading on the White House lawn, aided foreign adversaries in their efforts to interfere in U.S. elections, and increased big money’s ability to influence policy. These individuals are not the first people in power to abuse the country’s often corrupted political system, but they are by far the most flagrant to do so in recent history.

Voters took note in the 2018 midterm elections. Poll after poll showed corruption was a top concern, and Americans voted out the highest number of incumbent members of Congress in decades. Across the country, they elected candidates who committed not to accept corporate campaign contributions, pledged to drive out the influence of big money and special interests in government, promised to protect U.S. elections from foreign adversaries, and pledged to remove improper barriers to the ballot. Continue reading “Recent Political Scandals the ‘For the People Act’ Would Prevent From Recurring”

Democrats Go Into 2019 With Ethics Blazing

Campaign finance is high on Democrats’ agenda. Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi rolled out some details last week. Credit: Bill Clark, CQ Roll Call

Pelosi, Sarbanes tease dark money overhaul as the party’s grand opening salvo

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Maryland Rep. John Sarbanes offered a sneak peak Friday of what will likely be christened HR 1 in the 116th Congress. Instead of starting from scratch, the bill will draw from numerous existing proposals — including some that have languished for years during GOP control.

Though short on specifics, the pair revealed that the package will draw from an existing voting rights measure (HR 2978) and a proposed change in federal ethics laws that would require disclosure of presidential tax returns. Sarbanes, who leads the party’s Democracy Reform Task Force and has been working on the measure for months, called it a once in a generation opportunity to overhaul the nation’s political system. It also will offer Democrats a template as they head into the 2020 presidential campaigns. President Donald Trump, for example, has refused to release his tax returns.

View the complete December 3 article by Kate Ackley on The Roll Call website here.

 

House Democrats say they have proof State Dept. staff was pushed out over disloyalty to Trump

The following article by Karoun Demirjian and Carol Morello was posted on the Washington Post website March 15, 2018:

Rep. Elijah E. Cummings (D-Md.), along with Rep. Eliot L. Engel (D-N.Y.), cited documents from a whistleblower in a letter to White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly and Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan. Credit: Alex Brandon/AP

Two top House Democrats said Thursday that they have proof the Trump administration engaged in an intentional effort to rid the State Department of career officials they suspected of being “disloyal” to President Trump, citing documents a whistleblower gave to the panel.

The ranking Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs and Oversight and Government Reform committees sent a letter to White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly and Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan, writing that they received documents “indicating that high-level officials at the White House and State Department worked with a network of conservative activists to conduct a ‘cleaning’ of employees they believed were not sufficiently ‘supportive’ of President Trump’s agenda.” Continue reading “House Democrats say they have proof State Dept. staff was pushed out over disloyalty to Trump”

Eyeing the House, Democrats move to hire operatives in 20 GOP-held districts

The following article by Mike DeBonis was posted on the Washington Post website February 2, 2017:

Democrats are moving urgently to harness the wave of grass-roots protests that have greeted President Trump in his first weeks in office to reclaim the House majority in next year’s midterm elections.

As of this week, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is hiring full-time operatives to do political organizing work in 20 key Republican-held districts — an unusually early investment in House races that do not even have declared candidates yet.

Rep. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), the committee’s chairman, called the move “unprecedented” for Democrats, who need to pick up two dozen GOP-held seats to win the majority. Continue reading “Eyeing the House, Democrats move to hire operatives in 20 GOP-held districts”