The Senate is unlikely to take up a police reform bill until after the Independence Day recess, Republican leaders said on Monday, raising the prospect that it could be a month or longer before a measure heads to President Donald Trump’s desk. A group of GOP senators, led by Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), is expected…
The Justice Department is dropping its investigations into controversial stock trades made by Sens. Kelly Loeffler, Dianne Feinstein and Jim Inhofe in the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic, their offices confirmed Tuesday. The decision comes after the FBI served Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) a search warrant and seized his cellphone earlier this month, as…
Senate Democrats led by Minority Leader Chuck Schumer are pressing the Trump administration to stop targeting Planned Parenthood affiliates that got emergency small business loans designed to keep workers employed during the pandemic. Forty-one members of the Senate Democratic Caucus sent a warning to the Treasury Department and Small Business Administration after it was revealed…
President Donald Trump is lunching with Senate Republicans in the Capitol and prodding them to launch subpoenas against his enemies. Joe Biden is stuck in Delaware and has yet to hold even a conference call with House or Senate Democrats. At this point in a typical presidential campaign, Biden probably would have already visited with…
Impeached president Donald Trump’s buffet lunch with Republican senators Tuesday had a lot do to with his reelection and very little to do with the pandemic still raging across the nation. Or the urgent need for more relief. Or the budget crisis states and counties and cities and towns are facing. Or a persistent lack…
This past Monday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was a lying sack of crap. “They claim pandemics only happen once every hundred years but what if that’s no longer true? We want to be early, ready for the next one, because clearly the Obama administration did not leave to this administration any kind of game…
Senate Republicans are beginning to sour on Christopher Wray. They’re not ready to push for the FBI director’s firing as some of President Donald Trump’s most fervent allies have demanded, but they’re looking for speedier action on Trump’s desires to “clean up” the Justice Department. “I’m not calling on [Trump] to make a change, but…
In a letter from March, the office of former president Barack Obama condemned a congressional investigation into former vice president and now presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden. You likely remember the Republicans’ incessant focus on Hunter Biden’s position at Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian natural energy company. Trump and various Republican allies have…
Amid President Donald Trump’s rapidly expanding campaign to assert more control over independent federal watchdogs, Trump’s pick to monitor the administration’s massive coronavirus economic rescue effort is vowing to protect the office’s “integrity and independence.” “If confirmed, I will conduct every audit and investigation with fairness and impartiality. I will be vigilant to protect the…
Amy Klobuchar is kicking off her next act. Two months after ending her presidential campaign and amid vice presidential speculation, the Minnesota Democrat is launching a new effort to help direct money and campaign help to down-ballot Democrats. The endeavor — called the Win Big Project, a play on one of Klobuchar’s 2020 campaign slogans…
After initially denying the mask he wore was a Confederate flag, a Michigan state senator later apologized for wearing his “choice of pattern” during a Senate meeting, adding that he did not support “the things this pattern represents.” “I’m sorry for my choice of pattern on the face mask I wore yesterday on the Senate…
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats and the Trump administration have reached a deal on a new round of coronavirus aid, though staffers working on the bill cautioned negotiations were not complete. The New York Democrat said that he believed the Senate would pass legislation delivering nearly a half trillion dollars to small businesses,…
The Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday reaffirmed its support for the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that the Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election with the goal of putting Donald Trump in the Oval Office. Tuesday’s bipartisan report, from a panel chaired by North Carolina Republican Richard Burr, undercuts Trump’s years of efforts to…
As congressional Republicans face fundraising woes, money is pouring into the coffers of Democratic candidates in some key Senate races. In fact, Democrats considerably out-raised their Republican counterparts in Maine, Arizona, Colorado, South Carolina, Kansas, and—wait for it—Kentucky! And we’re not talking chump change here. In all those states, Democratic fundraising eclipsed Republicans fundraising by varying degrees of millions,…