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US House Tag

Federal prosecutors announced an indictment (pdf.) against Rep. Christopher Collins (R-NY) on insider trading charges and lying to the FBI along with his son Cameron Collins and Stephen Zarsky, the father of Cameron's fiancee. The charges stem from the "securities of Australian biotechnology company called Innate Immunotherapeutics, where the congressman served on the board."

Republican Troy Balderson has a 50.2% lead in Ohio's 12th District special election over Democrat Danny O'Connor, who has 49.3% of the vote, to take over for Republican Rep. Pat Tiberi. The Republicans have held this seat for decades, but the Democrats saw an opportunity to give life to their supposed "blue wave" and poured an insane amount of money and attention into flipping this seat. Despite the vote count, both sides have claimed victory on this one. Yes, even the Democrats. They got so close, but does it matter? Should the Republicans be worried that it took a slim margin to win a historically Republican seat?

Should Republican congressional candidate Elizabeth Heng win California's 16th district seat this November, I might suggest she send the social justice brigade in charge of monitoring Facebook videos a big "Thank You." The social media giant's video team blocked one of her ads, but changed their mind once they received backlash.

Axios obtained a memo written by the office of Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, that plans for the government to takeover the internet and regulate digital platforms. From Reason:
To save American trust in "our institutions, democracy, free press, and markets," it suggests, we need unprecedented and undemocratic government intervention into online press and markets, including "comprehensive (GDPR-like) data protection legislation" of the sort enacted in the E.U.

As midterms approach, the generic ballot has been in flux. The Democrats began with a double-digit lead, this was whittled down significantly, and is now back up at around 8%.  Other factors make predicting whether or not Republicans can maintain control of the House difficult, but Republicans have an advantage in that even if there is a wave election, they may still retain the House.

Back on June 24, Professor Jacobson blogged about how Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) encouraged people to harass Republicans and officials within President Donald Trump's administration in public. Now Waters is facing a protest organized by Oath Keepers and she does not approve.

The House Appropriations Committee has introduced a fiscal year 2019 Homeland Security bill that includes $5 billion for a border wall that spans 200 miles and money to hire more ICE and border patrol agents. This could trigger a showdown with the Senate since that chamber only included $1.6 billion for a wall in its bill. President Donald Trump threatened a shut down of the government if he does not get more.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's victory over Rep. Joe Crowley (D-NY), the head of the House Democratic Caucus, propelled her into the national spotlight. She seems to think she's the new face of the party, which has led her to attack those within the Democrat Party. House Democrats have grown tired of her schtick and want her to cool it before the already fragile party is completely torn apart.

Yesterday I blogged on the latest Axios poll on a few Senate races, which show that the Democrats face losing seats in the chamber. The opposite has happened in House races as The Cook Political Report changed ratings in 10 races and seven of those moves favor the Democrats. The publication's monthly review also revealed that Democrats have a slight edge to win the 23 states they need to take over the House.

It's kind of weird this story is coming out now when Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan's name has become prominent in talks of who should be the next Speaker of the House. Jordan worked as an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University from 1987 to 1995. Now former wrestlers during that time claim Jordan ignored sexual abuse allegations against the team's physician Dr. Richard Strauss.

The Daily Caller's Luke Rosiak continues to do a great job with the story about Rep. Debbie Wasserman Shultz's former IT aide Irwan Awan and his family. The publication received a memo dated February 3, 2017, from Congress's top cop Sergeant-at-Arms Paul Irving to the Committee on House Administration (CHA). Irving and Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Phil Kiko wrote that the House Democratic Caucus's server disappeared after it became evidence in the cybersecurity probe against Awan. The two men "concluded that the employees [Democratic systems administrator Imran Awan and his family] are an ongoing and serious risk to the House of Representatives, possibly threatening the integrity of our information systems and thereby members’ capacity to serve constituents.”

The Democrats are desperate to crash the House and Senate in November, taunting the right that a blue wave is coming their way. Do they even know what is considered a wave in elections? I guess not because analysis from Ballotpedia shows the Democrats that it's not just taking over the House and Senate. In order for an actual wave to happen, the Democrats have to win a lot more seats than they need to control Congress.

*UPDATE: The conservative immigration bill failed to pass the House The House began debating on the Goodlatte immigration bill, considered the more conservative one, at 12:20PM ET. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy announced that the House will vote on the compromise bill tomorrow. It looks like House leadership will meet in the office of Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) ahead of the vote. Chad Pergram tweeted that the House has decided to debate the farm bill between the two immigration bills, which will give House leadership time to persuade GOP members to vote for the compromise bill.

So this morning President Donald Trump gave an impromptu interview on Fox & Friends. He said he wouldn't sign the moderate immigration bill that will go to the House floor next week. Now a White House official said the president misunderstood the question. From The Hill:
"Yes, we fully support both the Goodlatte bill and the Leadership bill. The President misunderstood the question this morning on Fox News," the source said in an email. "He was commenting on the discharge petition/dreamers bill — not the new package. He would 100 percent sign either Goodlatte or the other bill."

Senate Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has started to apply pressure on those in her party to oppose the GOP "minibus" spending package that will likely hit the floor on Friday. The minibus bill has "three appropriation bills: Energy and Water, Legislative Branch, and Military Construction and Veterans Affairs." Rejecting this bill could lead to a shutdown.