WASHINGTON – Relieved congressional bargainers say they’ve reached agreement on compromise legislation extending payroll tax cuts and benefits for the long-term unemployed through 2012, edging a white-hot political battle a major step closer to finally being resolved. Rep. David Camp, R-Mich., and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., the two top negotiators, strode from a conference room [...]
NEWTON, Mass. – Joseph Kennedy III has launched his campaign for the Massachusetts congressional seat now held by retiring U.S. Rep. Barney Frank. Kennedy released a video announcement on his website Thursday before heading out on a campaign swing through the 4th Congressional District. Kennedy started by greeting commuters at the Newton Center MBTA Station [...]
WASHINGTON – Two Republican senators unveiled a Medicare rescue plan Thursday that features an accelerated transition to private health insurance for many seniors, a gradual increase in the eligibility age, and higher premiums for middle-class and upper-income retirees. Sens. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Richard Burr of North Carolina say they’re not out to win [...]
ANALYSIS | The notion that House Republicans would hand a powerful weapon to a Democratic Party president seems surprising. What may be more surprising is why Obama really isn’t too excited about getting it. The initial thinking is that House Republicans are giving this power to the White House, not Obama per se. That’s because [...]
WASHINGTON – Promoting farm subsidies was once a no-brainer for rural members of Congress seeking re-election. This year, it’s a bit trickier. As lawmakers wade cautiously into writing the next five-year farm bill, agribusiness and farmers’ lobbyists are preparing for the worst. With little appetite for spending on Capitol Hill, subsidy cuts in the billions [...]
WASHINGTON – Congressional leaders are gauging lawmakers’ reactions to a tentative deal extending a 2 percentage-point payroll tax cut and extra jobless benefits through 2012, a pact bargainers reached after House Republicans conceded that the tax cut would not have to be paid for with spending cuts. Both sides cautioned late Tuesday that the agreement [...]
WASHINGTON – After years of procrastination, the White House and Congress have suddenly boosted a long-term plan to improve the nation’s roads, bridges and transit systems to the top of the political agenda. This week the House and Senate are set to take up vastly different bills providing a blueprint for shoring up the nation’s [...]
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama feels he has struck just the right budget balance between providing more short-term support for the economy while putting forth a long-term plan to get control of the government’s soaring budget deficits. Republicans vehemently disagree, attacking his 2013 budget as a replay of the failed economic policies they say have [...]
WASHINGTON – House lawmakers are returning to Capitol Hill to weigh a proposal by GOP leaders to extend the 2-percentage-point cut in the payroll tax through the end of the year and add the approximately $100 billion cost to the nation’s $15 trillion-plus debt instead of scrounging around the budget for ways to pay for [...]
WASHINGTON – The new budget that President Barack Obama is sending to Congress aims to achieve $4 trillion in deficit reduction over the next decade by restraining government spending and raising taxes on the wealthy. To help a weak economy, Obama’s proposal Monday requests increases in transportation, education and other areas. While administration officials on [...]
WASHINGTON – The new budget that President Barack Obama is sending to Congress aims to achieve $4 trillion in deficit reduction over the next decade by restraining government spending and raising taxes on the wealthy. To help a weak economy, Obama’s proposal Monday requests increases in transportation, education and other areas. While administration officials on [...]
LOS ANGELES – Documents detail the terms of a discounted mortgage loan received by U.S. Rep. Howard McKeon from the now-defunct Countrywide Financial Corp. under a VIP program, according to a published report. McKeon received a $315,000 mortgage refinance in 1998 as his family-owned business, Howard Phil’s Western Wear, was going through a Chapter 11 [...]
LOS ANGELES – Documents detail the terms of a discounted mortgage loan received by U.S. Rep. Howard McKeon from the now-defunct Countrywide Financial Corp. under a VIP program, according to a published report. McKeon received a $315,000 mortgage refinance in 1998 as his family-owned business, Howard Phil’s Western Wear, was going through a Chapter 11 [...]
WASHINGTON – Conservatives said Sunday the flap surrounding President Barack Obama’s birth control mandate was far from over, with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell saying he’ll push to overturn the requirement because it was another example of government meddling. While a senior White House official shrugged off such remarks, declaring the issue resolved and new [...]
WASHINGTON – Conservatives said Sunday the flap surrounding President Barack Obama’s birth control mandate was far from over, with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell saying he’ll push to overturn the requirement because it was another example of government meddling. While a senior White House official shrugged off such remarks, declaring the issue resolved and new [...]
NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. – A state senator and his wife said Saturday they were attacked and beaten at a Niagara Falls casino hotel after the lawmaker tried to break up an argument between two men, one of whom accused him of hating the Indian tribe that owned the resort. Sen. Mark Grisanti said he suffered [...]
DES MOINES, Iowa – From the start, it’s been a roller-coaster race for the Republican presidential nomination. GOP primary voters can catch their collective breath for the next two weeks after spending the past six lurching toward one candidate and then another in an exercise of political soul-searching that appears far from settled. The next [...]
WASHINGTON – The president will send Congress a budget that will provide short-term help to a struggling economy while offering a long-term plan to deal with soaring deficits, the White House said Sunday. Republicans attacked the spending blueprint as offering more of the same failed solutions for the economy. The 2013 budget being released Monday [...]
SAN DIEGO – House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi predicts that five large states will put Democrats in striking distance of gaining control of the House after the November elections. Pelosi said Friday in San Diego that she expects gains in California, Florida, Illinois, New York and Texas will leave Democrats only about a half-dozen seats [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican senators who back the Keystone XL pipeline plan to file an amendment that would attach the project to highway funding legislation on Monday, another step in their quest to overturn President Barack Obama’s decision to put the project on hold. The latest congressional push to advance TransCanada’s $7 billion project comes [...]
WASHINGTON – Under fierce election-year fire, President Barack Obama on Friday abruptly abandoned his stand that religious organizations must pay for birth control for workers, scrambling to end a furor raging from the Catholic Church to Congress to his re-election foes. He demanded that insurance companies step in to provide the coverage instead. Obama’s compromise [...]
WASHINGTON – The House on Thursday joined the Senate in voting to explicitly prohibit members of Congress and other top officials from making investments on insider information. But an effort to bridle purveyors of Capitol Hill political intelligence could delay the bill’s enactment. House Republicans stripped out provisions from the Senate bill that would: _Treat [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The House of Representatives on Thursday overwhelmingly passed new curbs on insider trading by lawmakers and other government officials despite complaints from Democrats and some Republicans that key anti-corruption provisions were dropped. The legislation, aimed at ensuring lawmakers do not profit from non-public knowledge they gain through their positions, is the most [...]
PHOENIX – Ron Barber was always the behind-the-scenes man for his boss, Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Then he was shot, when a gunman opened fire on the congresswoman and others at a Tucson grocery store as Barber ushered constituents to meet her. Over the year since, he became one of the most visible faces of [...]
WASHINGTON – Facing domestic political pressures, the Bush and Obama administrations released or transferred 600 terror suspects deemed an acceptable threat from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, only to face the challenge that 27 percent re-engaged in terrorist or insurgent activities, according to a report by Republicans on a House Armed Services subcommittee. [...]
WASHINGTON – The House has passed a bill to ban members of Congress and executive branch officials from insider trading. But critics from both parties accuse House Republican leaders of caving in to investment firms by eliminating a proposal to regulate people who try to pry financial information from Congress. The 417-2 vote Thursday will [...]
WASHINGTON – Sen. John McCain says the United States should find ways to help the Syrian people under siege from President Bashar Assad, without putting American “boots on the ground.” McCain tells “CBS This Morning” there are several options available, ranging from medical care and technical assistance to safe havens for refugees of the violence. [...]
SEATTLE (Reuters) – The Washington state House of Representatives was expected to endorse gay marriage on Wednesday in a vote that would move the state another step closer to becoming the seventh to recognize same-sex nuptials. Floor debate was scheduled to begin in the afternoon, with supporters and opponents predicting the measure would win House [...]
WASHINGTON – A federal judge is denying requests to keep private the results of an investigation into prosecutorial misconduct in the case against the late Sen. Ted Stevens. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan denied motions from two unidentified parties in the case to permanently seal a 500-page report that found widespread misconduct in the corruption [...]
WASHINGTON – The Republican-led House is trying Wednesday to give President Barack Obama the line-item veto, a constitutionally questionable power over the purse that has been sought by both Republican and Democratic presidents. The legislation, expected to pass, allows the president to pick out specific items in spending bills for elimination. Currently, the president must [...]
WASHINGTON – A developing Senate plan that would bolster the government’s ability to regulate the computer security of companies that run critical industries is drawing strong opposition from businesses that say it goes too far and security experts who believe it should have even more teeth. Legislation set to come out in the days ahead [...]
WASHINGTON – Lawmakers who came to Washington demanding budget cuts face a tough test now that President Barack Obama and military leaders want to shrink the force, shut down bases and cancel weapons to achieve them. A new national security strategy reflecting an end to decade-long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan offers the opportunity to [...]
LANSING, Mich. – A coalition of black ministers in Detroit called Monday for U.S. Senate candidate Pete Hoekstra to apologize for his Super Bowl ad featuring a young Asian woman speaking broken English to describe the impact of the Democratic incumbent’s economic policies. The request came a day after an Asian-American group called the ad [...]
WASHINGTON – A four-year blueprint for aviation programs that hastens the transition to a new air traffic control system based on GPS technology was given final approval by the House on Friday despite last-minute objections from organized labor. The compromise agreement between the House and Senate authorizes $63 billion for Federal Aviation Administration programs through [...]
CHICAGO – The former congresswoman and one-time Mary Kay saleswoman dashed up to the pulpit of the black megachurch and offered stories of growing up poor and raising two children on her own as she tried to win the congregation’s support for her bid to unseat Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. Debbie Halvorson, who is white, [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican-sponsored transportation legislation that would radically change funding for public transit advanced in the House of Representatives on Friday, leaving Democrats, city leaders and transit groups concerned that commuter systems could be imperiled. The plan, approved by the House Ways and Means Committee, would make a one-time $40 billion deposit into the [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Senate Democrats have begun preparing a backup plan to extend a tax cut for workers if a special congressional negotiating committee fails to reach quick agreement, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said on Friday. Reid’s comments, in a conference call with reporters, were seen by some congressional aides as a signal to [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The House of Representatives will swiftly take up a Senate-passed bill to curb insider trading by lawmakers next week, a top Republican said on Friday as Congress clamors to promote the measure in the face of flagging approval ratings. The “clean government” bill, which aims to prevent lawmakers from using knowledge gained [...]
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – St. Louis businessman John Brunner has already poured at least $1 million into his Republican quest to challenge Democratic U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill, and new documents show Brunner has a lot more where that came from. Brunner and his wife, Jan, have assets worth at least $26 million and perhaps as [...]
WASHINGTON – The Republican-led House on Wednesday voted to repeal a financially troubled part of the 2010 health care law that was designed to provide affordable long-term care insurance. The House vote comes months after the Obama administration suspended the Community Living Assistance Services and Support program, known as the CLASS Act. Health and Human [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The House of Representatives voted on Wednesday to repeal a provision of President Barack Obama’s healthcare overhaul setting up a home-care program for the elderly and disabled that regulators said was unworkable. The Republican-led House voted 267-159 for the bill that would terminate the Community Living Assistance Services(CLASS) Act that was supposed [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The House of Representatives, seeking to cut the U.S. deficit and burnish its own tarnished image, passed a bill on Wednesday to extend a pair of pay freezes for federal workers, including one for lawmakers. The 309-117 vote seemed largely symbolic, however, since the Senate is expected to reject the election-year measure. [...]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday sought to blunt political attacks on the Obama administration over a botched gun sting operation, saying that the idea of allowing weapons to go across the border to Mexico came from field agents and prosecutors. Democrats on the House Oversight Committee issued a [...]
INDIANAPOLIS (Reuters) – Longtime Indiana Republican Congressman Dan Burton, chair of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Europe, announced on Tuesday he will not seek a 16th term in office. Burton, accompanied by his brother, State Representative Woody Burton, made the announcement at the state legislature where his political career began. First elected to [...]
WASHINGTON – An agreement on a bill to provide operating authority for the Federal Aviation Administration over the next four years and to boost the agency’s air traffic modernization effort was reached Tuesday by House and Senate negotiators, culminating a five-year struggle that included a partial shutdown of the agency. The bill authorizes $63 billion [...]
WASHINGTON – Fleshing out a year-old initiative, the Obama administration wants Congress to enact or expand tax breaks for small businesses and remove barriers to startups, seizing on some existing bipartisan proposals that could win support even in the polarized climate of an election year. White House officials say President Barack Obama will call on [...]
WASHINGTON – Democrats looking into Operation Fast and Furious say a yearlong investigation has turned up no evidence that the flawed gun smuggling probe was conceived or directed by high-level political appointees at Justice Department headquarters. The probe, the Democrats say, was just one of four such operations that were part of a misguided five-year-long [...]
WASHINGTON – A new budget report released Tuesday predicts the government will run a $1.1 trillion deficit in the fiscal year that ends in September, a slight dip from last year but still very high by any measure. The Congressional Budget Office report also says that annual deficits will remain in the $1 trillion range [...]
PHOENIX (Reuters) – Arizona Governor Jan Brewer on Friday ordered a special general election to be held on June 12 to fill a congressional seat vacated by Tucson Democrat Gabrielle Giffords, who resigned to focus on recovering from a gunshot wound to the head. The Republican governor also set an April 17 primary to choose [...]
PHOENIX (Reuters) – Arizona Governor Jan Brewer on Friday ordered a special general election to be held on June 12 to fill a congressional seat vacated by Tucson Democrat Gabrielle Giffords, who resigned to focus on recovering from a gunshot wound to the head. The Republican governor also set an April 17 primary to choose [...]