Tag Archives: Topic: Congress

Tony Mauro at The Blog of Legal Times: By an 11-7 vote, the Senate Judiciary Committee today approved a bill that calls for television access to Supreme Court proceedings. The bill, S.1945 . . .

The Hill: Members approved the Expedited Legislative Line-Item Veto and Rescissions Act, H.R. 3521, by a 254-173 vote . . . Among Republicans, the vote was 197-41 in favor of the bill, and among Democrats, the vote was 57-132 against.

Daily Caller carries the video.

LifeNews: Boehner Pledges Congress Will Overturn New Obama Mandate (includes video)

News from The Associated Press: 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.

News from The Associated Press: Republican Rep. Dan Burton of Indiana says he won’t seek re-election to a 16th term.

NYTimes.com: The system for reviewing presidential appointments is broken. The Senate has a constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on the naming of judges and high-ranking executive branch officials. But the process has been hijacked by cynical partisanship and cheap tricks.

TheHill.com: President Obama will raise the nation’s debt limit to $16.39 trillion after the Senate on Thursday killed a measure to stop the president from adding $1.2 trillion to the total.

News from The Associated Press: House Republican leaders are drafting a bill to replace President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul if the Supreme Court strikes it down this summer.

WSJ.com: -Senate Republicans won’t launch a direct legal challenge to the White House’s contentious move to use recess appointments to install senior officials at a new consumer financial agency and the National Labor Relations Board, a senior GOP leadership aide said.

News from The Associated Press: More than 70 nominees to judgeships and senior federal agency positions are awaiting the next move from Republicans, who can use Senate rules to block votes on some or all of Obama’s picks.

The Tennessean: Rand Paul’s office claimed the senator set off the full body scanner and then refused a full pat down.

MetroWeekly: Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) announced today on Facebook that her campaign for U.S. Senate raised more than $1 million in the last three months of 2011.

The Hill: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has postponed Tuesday’s scheduled vote on a controversial online piracy bill “in light of recent events,” he announced Friday.

News from The Associated Press: New Jersey Sen. Joseph Kyrillos will seek the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate to run against Sen. Bob Menendez in November.

AthensNews.com: Ohio U.S. Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Marietta, recently threatened to file a lawsuit against President Barack Obama over his recent controversial recess appointments.

Washington Times: It’s official: Congress ended its least-productive year in modern history after passing 80 bills — fewer than during any other session since year-end records began being kept in 1947.

News from The Associated Press: Rep. Jerry Lewis of California became the latest Republican to announce his retirement from Congress after new boundaries drawn through redistricting promised to make the road to re-election more difficult.

DOJ: The convening of periodic pro forma sessions in which no business is to be conducted does not have the legal effect of interrupting an intrasession recess otherwise long enough to qualify as a “Recess of the Senate” under the Recess Appointments Clause. In this context, the President therefore has discretion to conclude that the Senate is unavailable to perform its advise-and-consent function and to exercise his power to make recess appointments.

Bloomberg: In September 2010, President Barack Obama nominated New York lawyer Caitlin Halligan to replace John Roberts on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington. Halligan waited for more than a year as her file made its way through the Senate.

TheHill.com: In a memo, Justice argued the pro-forma sessions held every third day in the Senate do not constitute a functioning body that can render advice and consent on the president’s nominees. It said the president acted consistently under the law by making the appointments.

Obama asks Congress for $1.2 trillion increase in nation’s borrowing limit – The Washington Post: President Barack Obama is asking Congress for another $1.2 trillion increase in the nation’s debt limit. The request is largely a formality.

Reuters: The White House on Thursday refused to say whether lawyers at the U.S. Justice Department gave the green light to President Barack Obama’s controversial appointments to two agencies but experts said the department almost certainly did provide advice.

Bruce Ackerman at WSJ: Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley, writing for all eight Republican members on the Judiciary Committee, has asked Attorney General Eric Holder to elaborate the Justice Department’s position on the key issues.

Michael McConnell at WSJ.com: It’s a mistake to excuse Obama’s disregard for the Constitution. Precedents set now will be exploited by the next administration.

Human Events: “Business as we know it in the Senate is over for this administration in terms of accomplishing anything legislatively or finding any cooperation from this side of the aisle,” said Sen. John Barrasso (R. –Wyo.). “He has poisoned the well.”

The Washington Post: “It is disappointing that a former constitutional law professor does not understand that the president is not a dictator or a king who can simply ignore the Constitution whenever he feels frustrated by the system of checks and balances wisely put in place by our Founders,” Paul said in a statement.

The Hill: Rick Santorum said the Senate should sue over President Obama’s decision Wednesday to appoint Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and name three members to vacancies on the National Labor Relations Board.

TheHill.com: President Obama is confident he had the authority to recess-appoint Richard Cordray to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, White House press secretary Jay Carney said Thursday.

The Hill: Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), who chairs a House subcommittee that oversees the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), on Wednesday said President Obama’s decision to recess-appoint a director for the CFPB is a move against transparency and accountability.

Human Events: “Breaking from this precedent lands this appointee in uncertain legal territory, threatens the confirmation process and fundamentally endangers the Congress’s role in providing a check on the excesses of the executive branch,” he said.

Washington Examiner: When President Obama’s Department of Justice (DOJ) defends Obama’s “recess appointment” — made today after the Senate adjourned yesterday — his lawyers will have to argue against the position they took on recess appointments last year, during a Supreme Court hearing.

John Ellwood at The Volokh Conspiracy: In October 2010, my former boss at DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel, Steve Bradbury, and I wrote this op-ed arguing that such pro forma sessions at which no business is conducted do not interrupt a recess of the Senate within the meaning of the Recess Appointments Clause, and thus do not interfere with the President’s recess appointment authority.

The Hill: President Obama plans to circumvent Senate GOP opposition and recess appoint his nominee to head a new consumer bureau.

TheHill.com: President Obama is under strong pressure from liberals to use his recess-appointment power during the congressional break, but doing so would break 20 years of precedent, putting him in a tough position.

Reacting to critics of the Supreme Court who have raised their voices lately about the Justices’ ethical values, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., used his year-end report on Saturday to seek to reassure the nation that he and his eight colleagues are sensitive to the issue, and are entitled to the public’s confidence in their integrity.

TheHill.com: Members were indignant this week after it was reported that the House manual on “franking” — taxpayer-funded mail from Congress — includes a long-standing prohibition on specific holiday greetings. Under the rule, lawmakers can only wish constituents a generic “happy holidays” in official correspondence.

The Hill: Twelve liberal House members are urging the Obama administration to rewrite the rules for foreign aid so it’s clear that information and counseling on abortion — and the procedure itself, in some cases — can be covered.

NYTimes.com: And the Republican Party suddenly has a shot of picking up a United States Senate seat that has been in Democratic hands for more than 30 years, with the announcement by Linda Lingle, a Republican former governor, that she will seek the seat held by Senator Daniel K. Akaka, the retiring Democrat.

The Daily Caller: Attorney General Eric Holder’s list of Operation Fast and Furious critics has grown over the past several days, as four more have signed on to a resolution of “no confidence” in him.

Religion Clause: Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives adopted a resolution urging the Secretary of State to pressure Turkey on issues of religious freedom. House Resolution 306, adopted by voice vote on Dec. 13, is summarized by the Congressional Research Service. The resolution . . .

Texas Pastors’ Council: A trans-denominational, multi-ethnic coalition of pastors in cities across Texas is asking all thirty two Texas U.S. Representatives to support a rule change that would reverse a long standing prohibition on any mention of holidays in their “franked” mailings or other official communications from their office. The Franking Commission has interpreted a 1974 code very broadly and some Congressmen are now asking for change.

The Hill: Republican senators have asked President Obama not to recess appoint his two nominees to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

Washington Examiner: Looks like the PC police have threatened members of the House of Representatives against wishing constituents a “Merry Christmas,” if they want to do so in a mailing paid for with tax dollars.

ABC News: Officials from the policy-neutral National Payroll Reporting Consortium, Inc. have expressed concern to members of Congress that the two-month payroll tax holiday passed by the Senate and supported by President Obama cannot be implemented properly.

OneNewsNow.com: “President Obama and the band of his merry men might as well erect their own pink neon sign at the Arizona-Mexico border saying, ‘Welcome all illegals to your United States. Our home is your home,’” the sheriff responded.

The Hill: Gingrich says if there is broad opposition to a court decision, Congress should subpoena the ruling judge to defend his or her action in a hearing room.

TheHill.com: House and Senate negotiators on Thursday night reached a tentative agreement on a $1 trillion omnibus spending bill that would avert a government shutdown, the Republican chairman of the House Appropriations Committee announced.

The Hill: Opponents of the Stop Online Piracy Act urged House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) to hold additional hearings on the bill rather than report it out of committee during Thursday’s markup.

NCPA Policy Digest: There are about 4,500 criminal statutes, says Edwin Meese, attorney general under President Ronald Reagan and now with the conservative Heritage Foundation.

WorldNetDaily: Congress apparently has decided that allowing bestiality in the U.S. military isn’t a good idea.

Heritage Foundation: Next week, Congress will have an opportunity to bring much-needed oversight to America’s regulatory process by voting for the aptly named REINS Act (Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny), which would require any new regulations costing more than $100 million to be approved by Congress.

LifeNews: Michael Norton of the Alliance Defense Fund, a pro-life legal group, is also encouraged. “The seven former Planned Parenthood employees told Congressman Stearns that they could “state categorically, from personal experience, that abortion is indeed deployed [by Planned Parenthood] as a means of family planning.” They also expressed to Congressman Stearns that, since Planned Parenthood receives $1 billion or more in a three year period, close governmental oversight is indeed warranted,” he explained. “Planned Parenthood’s pro-abortion allies, including the Obama Administration, are doing all they can to resist Congressman Stearns’ long overdue investigation,” Norton said. “Let the Stearns’ investigation proceed apace.”

Frank Gaffney at Townhall: To the contrary, the Obama administration has been working behind the scenes to do as its Islamist friends have demanded by shutting down the USCIRF. It has enlisted for this purpose Senator Dick Durbin, the Senate’s Number 2 Democrat. Sen. Durbin is not only perfectly placed to do the deed stealthily. He has his own close associations with a number of the Brotherhood’s top fronts and operatives in his home state of Illinois, in Washington and elsewhere across the country.

Findlaw: If Congress forces the issue, it would undoubtedly lead to what Tom Goldstein calls a “constitutional showdown” between the two branches of government. Can the Justices refuse to obey the statute? Can they challenge its enforcement? How do they handle appeals?

TheHill.com: Johnson’s defeat is a bitter pill for conservatives who hyped the race as an important opportunity to bring a fresh conservative voice to the leadership table.

Edward Lee Pitts at Baptist Press: Steven Aden, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, added that “the United States is far from immune to this problem.” Speaking at the Dec. 6 House committee hearing, Aden cited a 2008 study by Columbia University economists Douglas Almond and Lena Edlund that examined the sex ratio at birth among U.S.-born children of Chinese, Korean and Asian-Indian parents. They found “deviation in favor of sons” and “evidence of sex selection, most likely at the prenatal stage,” especially among second and third pregnancies if the first child was not born male.

The Weekly Standard: ven in China they are calling it the “Great Firewall of America.” At least the Chinese are enjoying the irony of the U.S. government moving toward a legal regime that would give it carte blanche to seize and take down websites on the basis of “infringement.”

The Hill: Schmidt said the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) would punish Web firms, including search engines, that link to foreign websites dedicated to online piracy. He said implementing the bill as written would effectively break the Internet.

The Volokh Conspiracy: That’s one of the effects of HJR 90, proposed by Reps. Theodore Deutch, Peter DeFazo, Alcee Hastings, and Jim McDermott, and a similar Senate proposal by Sen. Bernie Sanders . . .

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), asked Wednesday if he was aware of a provision in the National Defense Authorization Bill that repeals the ban on sodomy and bestiality in the military, told CNSNews.com: “No, I can’t say I was.”

The Hill: Senate Republicans blocked the latest installment of President Obama’s jobs plan — a bill to extend the payroll tax cut — for the second week in a row on Thursday.

TheHill.com: A large group of Senate Democrats is fighting to stop plans by the U.S. Postal Service to shrink its services to address its multibillion-dollar operating deficit.

Washington Times: The top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee said Thursday that the Obama administration is fueling speculation about Supreme CourtJustice Elena Kagan’s impartiality because it won’t turn over documents detailing her role in crafting the legal strategy to defend the health care law while she was serving in the administration.

U.S. Supreme Court: On Tuesday, a Senate Judiciary subcommittee heard testimony on Senate Bill 410, the Sunshine in the Courtroom Act of 2011, which would allow cameras in the Supreme Court, an idea that many past and present justices vehemently oppose (to put it mildly).

ADF Attorney Steve Aden appeared yesterday to give testimony before the House Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on the Constitution regarding H.R. 3541, the Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act. Video and testimony from others giving testimony can be found here.

CBN: “No baby should be targeted for abortion because of his or her sex or race, but that’s exactly what’s happening in America,” said Steven Aden, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund.

LifeNews: Tomorrow the House Judiciary Committee Constitution Subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Trent Franks, an Arizona Republican who is the sponsor of the abortion ban, will hold a hearing on the Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act (PRENDA). Witnesses on the panel include Steve Aden, a pro-life attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund . . .

Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Steven H. Aden will provide expert testimony Tuesday at 1 p.m. EST before a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee in favor of a bill that would ban all abortions committed on the basis of a child’s sex or race.

CitizenLink: Late Thursday evening, the U.S. Senate passed a $662 billion defense authorization bill — without any amendments redefining marriage.

Kerri Toloczko at Breitbart’s Big Government: Appeals and lawsuits and all kinds of messy proceedings ensued with Catholic Bishops and Wisconsin-based and national social conservative organizations weighing in on the matter, such as the Alliance Defense Fund, which assisted Mr. Noesen on the legal side.

LifeNews.com: Nancy Pelosi is simply unable to honor the Catholic Church to which she claims to be a member — as she has put her foot in her mouth again by claiming the nation’s Catholic bishops are lobbyists because they oppose an Obamacare mandate.

Chaplain endorsers, representing more than 2,000 military chaplains, are congratulating the U.S. Senate for their vote Tuesday to ensure military chaplains are not forced to perform so-called same-sex “marriage” ceremonies. The chaplain endorsers also reaffirmed their call for congressional hearings on the religious liberty threats brought about by the dismantling of the law against openly practiced homosexual behavior in the military.

News from The Associated Press: The toughest opponent Tommy Thompson may have to overcome in next year’s U.S. Senate race is Tommy Thompson himself.

LifeNews.com: A House committee held a hearing today on the decision by the Obama administration to deny to the nation’s Catholic bishops a grant for a program helping sex trafficking victims because it would not refer for abortions.