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US Senate Tag

Posted by Mary Chastain on September 22, 2017 56 Comments
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) officially decided he will vote no on the Graham-Cassidy bill, which is the latest attempt the GOP has taken to repeal and replace Obamacare. From CNN:
"I cannot in good conscience vote for the Graham-Cassidy proposal," the Arizona Republican said in a statement. "I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and Democrats, and have not yet really tried. Nor could I support it without knowing how much it will cost, how it will effect insurance premiums, and how many people will be helped or hurt by it. Without a full CBO score, which won't be available by the end of the month, we won't have reliable answers to any of those questions."

Posted by Mary Chastain on September 20, 2017 13 Comments
Sens. Pat Toomey (R-PA) and Bob Corker (R-TN), two members with opposing views on fiscal policy, have announced "a path forward on tax reform" that "would allow for a tax reduction, as scored on a statistic basis, over a 10-year period." They hope to Senate Budget Committee will vote on said plan next week. The senators did not release any details about the plan, but new outlets have stated it will allow tax reductions up to $1.5 trillion. The Wall Street Journal reported that the "agreement would allow Republicans to lower tax rates while making fewer tough decisions on what tax breaks to eliminate to help pay for the cuts."

Posted by Mary Chastain on September 15, 2017 13 Comments
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) announced today that he is very close to have the votes needed to repeal Obamacare with the bill he coauthored with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC). From The Washington Times:
“We are thinking that we can get this done by Sept. 30,” Sen. Bill Cassidy, Louisiana Republican who co-wrote the bill with Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said Friday.

Posted by Mary Chastain on September 13, 2017 5 Comments
The U.S. Senate has voted to table Sen. Rand Paul's (R-KY) amendment to repeal the 2001 and 2002 war authorizations that have allowed the U.S. military "to fight terrorism across the globe" in everlasting wars. Paul wanted Congress to "reassert its authority to declare war from the Executive Branch." Paul and others, including Democrats, have said that "the Senate is ceding its constitutional war powers" with these amendments.

Posted by Mary Chastain on September 05, 2017 28 Comments
Congress has returned to work and have started to ponder two important tasks at hand: Hurricane Harvey relief bill and the debt ceiling. One option leaders have leaned towards is attaching the two into one bill, thus killing two birds with one stone. The House could pass the Harvey relief bill on Wednesday and send it to the Senate, who could attach the debt ceiling bill to it. Then the Senate would send it back to the House for another vote.

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 31, 2017 65 Comments
Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray to inform him that the committee found in unredacted parts in transcripts that former FBI Director James Comey decided to write a statement to exonerate then-presumptive Democrat presidential candidate before the FBI finished its investigation into her emails.

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 15, 2017 17 Comments
Musician Kid Rock has made waves since he hinted that he may challenge Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) in November 2018. But Michigan rules may prohibit the name Kid Rock and force him to use his real name Robert Ritchie. Roll Call reported:
If Ritchie were to submit enough valid signatures to make the ballot and indicate that he wanted to be listed as “Kid Rock,” the Michigan Bureau of Elections staff would have to research the question of whether that name would be allowed. At an initial glance, Ritchie’s stage name isn’t an obviously acceptable one under the state’s criteria.

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 08, 2017 23 Comments
CNN reported that GOP donors have started to withhold funds and donations after the GOP controlled Senate could not repeal and replace Obamacare. From CNN:
At least $2 million in contributions promised to the National Republican Senatorial Committee have failed to materialize because donors are expressing frustration with the Senate GOP's inability to fulfill their central campaign promise to repeal and replace Obamacare, according to two GOP sources familiar with the matter.

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 08, 2017 10 Comments
Businessman Danny Tarkanian, who has run for different political offices in Nevada,  announced on Fox this morning that will challenge Republican Nevada Senator Dean Heller next year in the primary. Tarkanian called Heller a "Never-Trumper" and promised to carry out President Donald Trump's policies. From NBC News:
Heller charted a meandering course through the Affordable Care Act repeal debate, leading Tarkanian to say the senator had “turned his back on us.” Heller stridently opposed an early version of the GOP health care plan before voting for the final bill in the Senate.

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 03, 2017 5 Comments
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted in favor of the Taylor Force Act 17-4, which now heads to the Senate floor. Five Democrats voted yes: Ben Cardin, Robert Menendez, Christopher Coons, Time Kaine, and Edward Markey. The act is named after American veteran and college student Taylor Force, who was murdered by a Palestinian terrorist in March 2016 in Israel. This act "severely restricts American taxpayer funding for the Palestinian Authority until the State Department verifies that it is no longer inciting terror and has ended its policy of paying monthly salaries to convicted terrorists and their families."

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 02, 2017 9 Comments
The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee has added more conditions to the Taylor Force Act, which includes cutting aid to Palestinian Authority (PA) since it rewards terrorists who kill Jews. From Algemeiner:
A revised version of the Taylor Force Act — amended by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in advance of a vote this Thursday — places even more stringent conditions on aid to the PA as long as it operates a policy dubbed by critics as “pay-to-slay.” Currently, the PA spends more than $300 million of foreign aid money per year on monthly salaries to terrorists and their families that far outstrip the wages paid to Palestinian professionals, including the PA’s own civil servants.

Posted by Mary Chastain on July 31, 2017 19 Comments
After failing to do anything with Obamacare, Congress has gone on recess without addressing the debt ceiling. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has warned Congress to address the debt ceiling for the past seven months and do something before recess. Mnuchin said the government needs to raise the debt ceiling before September 29 or it will run out of money to pay the bills.

Posted by Mary Chastain on July 28, 2017 5 Comments
President Donald Trump hasn't even signed the bill to pass new sanctions on Russia, but the Kremlin decided not to waste time. On Friday, Russian officials demanded that America reduce its number of diplomats to 455 by September 1 and shut down numerous American properties in the country. No one knows exactly how many people work at the U.S. Embassy, but Russian parliamentary vice-speaker Sergei Zheleznyak claims the move will kick out 700 people.

Posted by Mary Chastain on July 27, 2017 17 Comments
Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told Fox News and CNN that the Senate Judiciary Committee learned from Bill Browder, the CEO and co-founder of Hermitage Capital, that Fusion GPS, the firm behind the dossier that contained false information about President Donald Trump, also worked for the Russians. He said:
"What we learned today is that the Russians were behind the organization that tried to get dirt on Trump. The dossier against Donald Trump was created by Fusion GPS and their organization and, guess what, the Russians were helping them. This man said the Russians were behind Fusion GPS.

Posted by Mary Chastain on July 24, 2017 22 Comments
Social media erupted on Sunday when a poll showed musician Robert Ritchie, aka Kid Rock, up by four points over incumbent Democratic Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow. Delphi Analytics, whose website just launched this month, released the findings:
Of respondents who stated a preference between Debbie Stabenow and Robert Ritchie, 54% stated they would vote for Ritchie while 46% said they would vote for Debbie Stabenow. These results could indicate that Ritchie is a popular figure in Michigan, Debbie Stabenow is unpopular, or some combination of concurrent trends. The relatively large, 44%, number of undecided respondents may be due to the early stages of the campaign.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on July 22, 2017 29 Comments
One of my favorite things to come out of the Republican ObamaCare flailing is Kemberlee's term for it:  a cluster. It is that.  But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly has one card left up his sleeve, and he intends to use it next week: force his caucus to record for their constituents (and for posterity) their vote on ObamaCare repeal.  (Democrats will vote, too, of course, but we know how that will go.) I like this move.  Put every single Republican on record for once and for all on ObamaCare repeal, and let us see who stands where and how that compares to the numerous repeal votes each cast when Obama was in the White House, veto pen at the ready. This isn't a single-play for McConnell; it's part of one-two punch that he hopes will rally Trump supporters and others who want ObamaCare gone (or those who want to keep it.).  The pressure resulting from a formal repeal ObamaCare vote will help him herd recalcitrant members behind . . . something that is less of a cluster.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on July 02, 2017 15 Comments
Democrats pride themselves on diversity and inclusiveness, so we might expect to see a united colors of Benneton ad in the Senate yearbook.  But we'd be wrong. According to the Washington Post, they have seen a report released by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) that shows that the majority of Senate staffers are white and female. The Washington Post reports:
People working for Democratic senators are overwhelmingly white and mostly women, according to a first-of-its-kind report on diversity in some congressional offices.
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