Jmhconsult, LLC Blog

Republicans seek to handcuff Democrats in lame-duck session with resolution
By Molly K. Hooper – 08/08/10 03:53 PM ET
The Hill

The House will vote next week on a Republican measure that would prevent Democratic leaders from passing controversial policy initiatives during a lame-duck session of Congress this year.

Republican Study Committee (RSC) Chairman Rep. Tom Price (Ga.) introduced the privileged resolution last Thursday in response to reports that Democratic leaders told their base that they could move big-ticket legislation after the November elections and before the new Congress convenes in January.

Price explained his resolution says that a lame-duck session should not occur unless there were to be a national emergency.
“When [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid [D-Nev.] and Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi [D-Calif.] began talking about telling their folks not to worry about ‘card check’ [legislation], not to worry about the national energy tax, not to worry about a continued increased spending, that they had a plan to do this in a lame-duck session after the election, we began thinking and talking about what options we had, and this was one of them,” Price told The Hill in an interview on Friday.

Because Price’s measure is a privileged resolution, House Democratic leaders cannot block it from receiving a vote.

Both Republicans and Democrats have moved significant bills in lame-duck sessions during the last decade.

Reid has scheduled the Senate to be in session on Nov. 15, nearly two weeks after the mid-term elections. The House has not yet released its lame-duck schedule.

Political insiders predict major GOP gains in the fall, which would make it politically difficult for Democrats to move the hot-button items.

Reid suggested at a conference of liberal bloggers last week that Democrats could pass major policy reforms that have stagnated thus far — such as immigration reform — in the short window between Nov. 2 and Jan. 3, 2011, when the new Congress will be sworn in.

A key House Democratic leader recently shot down the notion that his party would move controversial measures after the election.

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) Chairman Chris Van Hollen (Md.) on Friday called the idea “nonsense” during an interview.

“This whole effort to whip up hysteria as if there’s some secret plan to do stuff in the lame-duck session is just nonsense. This is a scare tactic at its very worst, they are trying to spread the notion that there’s a plan to do major legislation in a lame duck session — there isn’t. There just isn’t,” Van Hollen said on a conference call with reporters.

Saying he hadn’t read Price’s entire resolution, Van Hollen refrained from taking a position on the measure set for a vote on Tuesday, shortly after the House votes on a $26.1 billion bill on education and Medicaid funding.

Some Democrats are concerned the White House will push for long-stalled trade deals in the lame-duck session.

President Obama last month that said he would submit three controversial trade agreements to Congress “as soon as possible.” The trade deals he wants Congress to pass are with South Korea, Panama and Colombia. Most Republicans back the trade pacts.

Other bills that could come up in the lame-duck session include appropriations, extending some or all of President George W. Bush’s tax cuts and food safety. However, Democratic leaders could finish work on these bills in September and early October.

Rep. Rangel charged with multiple violations by House ethics committee

By Susan Crabtree and Molly K. Hooper – 07/22/10 08:44 PM ET
The Hill

Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) will stand trial on ethics charges after a House panel accused him Thursday of multiple violations.

The veteran lawmaker will challenge the findings in an open hearing.

The news of Rangel’s trial comes at a bad time for Democrats, who are hoping to retain control of Congress this fall.
The House ethics committee stated it has launched a separate panel, called an adjudicatory subcommittee, in the wake of unspecified findings by a four-member panel of the ethics committee that Rangel violated House rules.

The adjudicatory subcommittee, a separate eight-member panel tasked with trying Rangel on the charges, will hold a public organizational meeting July 29.

A visibly frustrated Rangel on Thursday afternoon told The Hill that he did not know what the “alleged violations are finally going to be.”

Less than two hours before the committee posted its statement on the website, Rangel was seen on the House floor on the GOP side of the aisle, engaged in a five-minute conversation with the head of the ethics panel, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), who will chair the adjudicatory subcommittee.

The normally loquacious senior New York lawmaker said he was not supposed to reveal the details of the discussion.

“I am not really informed as to what is confidential and what is not, except they encourage me not to talk to the press about what they are doing,” Rangel said. “Even as you and I talk, I have no idea as to what the alleged violations are finally going to be.”

While Rangel is unlikely to testify at next Thursday’s organizational meeting of the ethics subcommittee, the New York Democrat told reporters he would attend the forum.

Rangel is facing a competitive and crowded primary on Sept. 14. In a poll released this week, Rangel attracted 39 percent of the vote, followed by State Assemblyman Adam Clayton Powell IV with 21 percent.

In all likelihood, Rangel’s trial will not start before his primary.

House ethics committee rules prohibit the committee from acting 30 days before a primary and 60 days before an election.

The House ethics rules also ensure that Rangel and his team of lawyers will have at least 15 days to review the allegations against him before the trial begins.

In a statement issued Thursday evening, Rangel said, “I was notified today, two years after I requested an investigation, that the ethics committee will refer the allegations reviewed by an investigations subcommittee to a subcommittee that will review the facts.

“I am pleased that, at long last, sunshine will pierce the cloud of serious allegations that have been raised against me in the media.

“I will be glad to respond to the allegations at such time as the ethics committee makes them public.”

In order for the committee to move forward with the trial, Rangel had to waive his rights to settle and accept the ethics committee punishment, according to ethics committee rules governing the trial process. Sources told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity that Rangel’s attorney and the committee had failed to reach a settlement, which would have required an admission from Rangel that he broke ethics rules.

Public trials for ethics violations are rare and usually involve serious allegations against members, including censure and removal from office.

The last such trial for a member occurred in 2002 when Rep. James Traficant (D-Ohio) contested findings that he accepted bribes. The House subsequently voted to expel Traficant from the lower chamber. He later served seven years in prison.

Republicans on Thursday pounced on the ethics committee statement.
Ken Spain, communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said, “This is troubling news not only for Congressman Rangel, but for his most ardent defender — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. For over two years, the Charlie Rangel saga dragged on while Speaker Pelosi not only sat idly by, but encouraged her members to vote against an investigation into the deeply troubling matters at hand. It appears that Charlie Rangel will finally be judged by a jury of his peers, but unfortunately for the Speaker, the verdict is already out on what she promised would be the ‘most ethical Congress in history.’ “

Democrats note that Pelosi was instrumental in convincing Rangel to step aside as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. They also point out that she took on the Congressional Black Caucus in ousting then-Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.) from the influential panel in 2006 in the wake of revelations Jefferson was being investigated by the FBI. Jefferson has since been convicted.

The ethics committee statement was released as the trial of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) is wrapping up. Republican operatives are very pleased that Rangel and Blagojevich are attracting headlines nearly 100 days before the midterm elections.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) called for the former Ways and Means Committee chairman to resign.

“Today’s action demonstrates that the notoriously lax ethics committee has found substantial reason to believe that Rep. Rangel has violated federal law, House rules or both,” said Melanie Sloan, CREW’s executive director. “Now the question is whether Rep. Rangel will resign or endure a public trial that promises to be filled with detailed and undoubtedly embarrassing revelations of wrongdoing.

“Rep. Rangel has toughed it out as long as he could — the time clearly has come for him to resign. He can no longer effectively represent the citizens of New York,” she added.

Rangel stepped down as chairman of the tax-writing panel in March after the House ethics committee admonished him in a case involving corporate-sponsored travel to the Caribbean.

The formation of the adjudicatory committee comes after the investigative subcommittee, which spent more than two years looking into several allegations against Rangel, submitted its findings to the full ethics panel Thursday.

The investigative subcommittee submitted a “statement of alleged violation and related motions and replies” to the chairman and ranking member on Thursday.

The probe was prompted after Rangel admitted failing to pay taxes on the rent of a Dominican Republic villa he owns, among several other allegations.

This story was updated at 5:23 p.m., 6:31 p.m. and 8:44 p.m.

Sen. Reid sets up showdown next week on campaign finance

By Susan Crabtree – 07/23/10 09:55 AM ET
The Hill

A vote on the Disclose Act coud come as eary as Tuesday after Reid files motion to move to a vote.

Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) late Thursday night filed cloture on the Disclose Act, which aims to blunt the impact of a Supreme Court ruling lifting restrictions on corporate and union spending on political advertisements. The vote could come as early as Tuesday.

Reid is bringing up the campaign-finance bill even though he has yet to secure the votes needed to break an expected Republican filibuster.

Democrats and watchdog groups point to polls showing that a majority of the public disapproves of the high court’s decision. Reid and others will no doubt use the issue for campaign ads in the fall regardless of whether the legislation moves forward.

The legislation Reid is bringing to the floor has been modified by Sen. Chuck Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) to try to win the support of centrist Maine GOP Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, who have both supported restrictions on campaign finance in the past.

Schumer has stripped and changed some provisions in the House-passed version of the Disclose Act that Collins and conservative groups have criticized as creating an unfair political advantage for unions over corporations.
But those changes are jeopardizing union support for the legislation.

“Based on reports, we are concerned that recent developments could hamper working families’ ability to have a voice in the political process,” an AFL-CIO spokesman said of the modified bill. “We continue to review the legislation and fight to ensure that the final bill addresses the tilted advantage that big business has enjoyed for far too long.”

Rankling labor organizations, however, could play to the Democrats’ advantage and help them court Snowe, Collins and some conservative Democrats wary of the House bill’s exemptions for unions and other special interests.

Orszag asks agencies to trim costs
By Walter Alarkon and Jared Allen – 06/08/10 07:14 PM ET
The Hill

The Obama administration sought to show its seriousness about tackling the deficit Tuesday, even as labor leaders and liberal Democrats called for more stimulus spending.

The White House wants non-security federal agencies to list wasteful programs and produce budgets for fiscal year 2012 that cut spending by 5 percent.

While the move doesn’t necessarily mean the agencies will make the cuts, they will have to come up with a list of programs that aren’t performing well. The move is aimed at helping President Barack Obama achieve his goal of freezing all federal non-security discretionary spending through 2013 while still leaving enough money for new needs and priorities, White House Budget Director Peter Orszag said.

“It’s the beginning of the process, not the end,” he said.
The White House push to identify wasteful measures and devise more restrained budget blueprints comes as Democrats in Congress and their liberal allies struggle over rising deficits and a still-struggling labor market.

Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), the co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said he was “leery” of “across-the-board cuts” that could affect safety-net programs.

“I understand the need to be mindful of the deficit,” he said. “I just wish it would have been surgical.”

Orszag has stressed that the search for more spending reductions would focus on under-performing programs and that some agencies could see increases in spending.

Still, Grijalva warned that pressing for further cuts could complicate negotiations among Democrats over a budget resolution for 2011. Grijalva has pushed back against a budget proposal pushed by fiscally conservative Blue Dog Democrats for a 2 percent cut on non-security discretionary spending. House leaders said they’re still considering their budget options.

A top labor leader on Tuesday called for increased deficit spending, the kind that freshmen and conservative Blue Dog Democrats in the House have recoiled at in recent weeks.

“We do not have a short-term deficit crisis in this country,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka at a forum of prominent liberals in Washington. “We do have a short-term jobs crisis.”

Trumka and others on the left have pushed for an extension of unemployment benefits and an infusion of $23 billion in aid to state and local governments to stave off teacher layoffs.

Freshman Democrats and Blue Dogs in the House worried about the rising $13 trillion debt have started to give greater scrutiny to more spending proposals. They forced House leaders last month to reduce the cost of a nearly $200 billion measure that would have extended jobless benefits, Medicare doctor payments, Medicaid aid to states and other expiring tax provisions. The stripped-down bill cost $115 billion and passed just before the Memorial Day recess on a 215-204 vote.

A similar measure is being debated on the Senate floor this week.

Orszag on Tuesday described an attempt to pit deficit reduction as mutually exclusive from job creation as a “false choice.”

“We face very clear and substantial deficits: a near-term jobs deficit … and a medium- and long-term [fiscal] deficit that would ultimately cause a crisis if not addressed,” he said.

“We ignore either of those problems at our peril.”

Republicans have used the debt numbers — expected to grow by nearly $1 trillion annually for the next decade — to hammer Democrats.

Rep. Paul Ryan (Wis.), the top House Budget Committee Republican, said he’s “hopeful” federal agencies will heed Orszag’s call to cut spending but added that the proposed reforms didn’t go far enough.

“I welcome any and all efforts that recognize the urgent need to get Washington’s fiscal house in order,” Ryan said in a statement.
“Yet, like their elusive quest for jobs, this Congress and this administration’s search for savings has produced plenty of rhetoric with abysmal results. While the administration calls on executive agencies to trim their budgets starting in October 2011, Congress has made no attempt to even offer a budget for the upcoming fiscal year.”

Michael O’Brien and Kevin Bogardus contributed to this story.

This story was originally posted at 11:45 a.m. and updated at 7:13 p.m