As members of Congress left Washington, D.C., to head back to their districts, there was a notable contrast arising between how Democrats and Republicans treat their constituents — and between how those constituents feel about their elected officials from each party. For days prior to the recess, Republicans had been confronted with protests and pressure from […]

Republicans have definitively said that they are going to repeal President Obama’s landmark healthcare law as quickly as possible under the new administration. In January, the GOP-controlled House and Senate appeared to make good on that promise by easily agreeing to a resolution to repeal Obamacare via budget reconciliation. The only problem? They missed their own deadline. Section […]

In 1986, the widowed Coretta Scott King wrote a letter and presented a statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee to oppose Sen. Jeff Sessions’ confirmation to a position as a judge in the federal district court in Alabama. Her powerful testimony cited numerous incidents of Sessions’ participation in persecuting Civil Rights leaders and Black voters […]

Even in the wake of firing his former National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn, for behavior related to communications with Russian officials, Donald Trump continues to dismiss the alarming evidence of his team’s ties with the Russian government as “fake” or a “ruse.” While Trump’s attitude may not be surprising, what is puzzling is why the […]

Donald Trump has been waging an appalling — and deeply self-serving — campaign to discredit the U.S. intelligence community. The end game is, as was admitted by his senior advisor Kellyanne Conway, to replace the intelligence community with “his own people.” Now, following a report that Trump may be compromised by Russia, and that his […]

In the wake of multiple victories in special elections around the country, Democrats are turning their sights on Georgia, where another special election on April 18th will fill the congressional seat vacated by Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary, Tom Price. Georgia’s 6th congressional district has been solidly Republican since 1978, when Newt Gingrich was elected […]

Ever since the Supreme Court’s disastrous 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which allowed groups unaffiliated with campaigns to spend unlimited amounts of money on behalf of elections, there has been an enormous proliferation of “dark money” groups designed for exactly that purpose. The poster children for these groups are Charles and […]

44 years ago today, the Supreme Court handed down an immensely important and controversial decision which reproductive justice activists have been working to protect ever since. In the case of Roe v. Wade, the court declared that a person’s decision to have an abortion was protected by the right to privacy guaranteed by the Due […]

Repealing Obamacare is a worse idea than anyone could have imagined, according to a new report from the Congressional Budget Office. The depth and severity of the results will be difficult to convey in headlines and soundbites. To cut through some of the likely confusion, here is a brief breakdown of what the report says. The report finds that […]

Every sworn-in House Democrat has now signed on to sponsor Rep. Elijah Cummings’ and Rep. Eric Swalwell’s Protecting Our Democracy Act, which would establish a “12-member, bipartisan, independent commission empowered to interview witnesses, obtain documents, issue subpoenas, and receive public testimony to examine attempts by the Russian government or others to use electronic means to […]

So far, the Republican effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act has been a disaster, and the latest stunt from Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) and his fellow House Republicans is an utter farce. Ryan and the House leadership have placed the draft legislation in a sealed room in the basement of the U.S. […]

The Republican Party has apparently chosen yet another woman, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), as the villain they hope to use to personalize their party’s attacks on Democrats. Because they believe she “motivates donors to open their wallets and voters to go the polls,” Politico reports, “Republicans are already making plans to raise her profile — in […]

Senator Jeff Sessions, if confirmed to serve as President-elect Donald Trump’s Attorney General, will be tasked with enforcing the laws of the United States, and a major concern of his critics has been that he does not seem to understand or concern himself with those laws, especially around protecting equality. In an yet another alarming […]

Senator Al Franken is not a lawyer. He made this point repeatedly while grilling Senator Jeff Sessions during his confirmation hearing, in order to underscore that Sessions’ carefully parsed questions about his claimed involvement sounded like nonsensical rubbish to his layman’s ears. But Franken laid out his case that Sessions has exaggerated his civil rights […]

At his confirmation hearing for the position of Attorney General, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) was confronted by Senator Pat Leahy (D-VT) for saying that women and LGBT people did not experience the sort of discrimination that hate crimes legislation addresses. Sessions responded with the twin defenses that he had said no such thing, and/or that […]

President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for Attorney General, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), was met almost immediately with strong questioning about his record and views on both reproductive rights and marriage equality during his confirmation hearing today. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, began her questioning by bringing up the Hyde Amendment, […]

At the end of the last Congressional term, Rep. Elijah Cummings, the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Rep. Eric Swalwell, the ranking member of the CIA Subcommittee of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, introduced legislation calling for the creation of a bipartisan, independent commission to investigate […]

Former Arizona Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords issued a powerful statement, and a challenge to Republican officials who are trying to avoid their angry and frustrated constituents: Town halls and countless constituent meetings were a hallmark of my tenure in Congress. It’s how I was able to serve the people of southern Arizona. I believed that […]

Senate Republicans are proceeding full steam ahead to railroad Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees through a fast-track confirmation process, shielding them from ethics scrutiny and financial disclosure requirements. Voters have raised their voices in opposition, and Democrats — including Senator Elizabeth Warren — have forcefully criticized Senate Republicans for abetting the Trump transition ethics crisis. Senator […]

It was the final question at Senator Tom Cotton’s (R-AR) town hall meeting in Springdale, Arkansas, and it was a doozy. After a raucous hour-and-a-half grilling by constituents, Cotton called on a little boy named Toby Smith, who wanted to know why Donald Trump wants to cut funding for PBS, while wasting money on an absurd […]

This piece was co-written by Shareblue staff writers Dianna E. Anderson and Alison R. Parker. Since his election, Donald Trump has attempted to shape himself as a “jobs” president, taking credit for numerous manufacturing decisions and new plants. But Trump’s “jobs jobs jobs” line will be completely undermined by a budget being modeled off the […]

A new major report in the Washington Post reveals that Attorney General Jeff Sessions met twice with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States, the same Russian official with whom disgraced former National Security adviser Michael Flynn also met. During Sessions’ confirmation hearings, Senator Al Franken (D-MN) asked whether Sessions had spoken to the […]

Senator John McCain (R-AZ) has shown some integrity about seeking accountability for Russia’s intrusion into the U.S. presidential election, especially when compared to other Republicans, but even he has been publicly skeptical about the fact that Russia absolutely did affect the outcome in Donald Trump’s favor. This week’s bombshell revelations have apparently had some effect on McCain, […]

I have previously wondered where the Republicans’ oft-touted patriotism has gone in the national crisis surrounding Russian interference in our election. Now, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has raised the same specter of disloyalty, during an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press. Watch: Here’s what I think we should do as a nation: We should all […]

Senate Republicans have been scheming to protect Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees from routine ethics scrutiny, and Senator Elizabeth Warren is pushing back hard, rightly accusing Trump’s nominees of “drag[ging] their feet on ethics paperwork while their Senate friends try to run out the clock.” .@SenateMajLdr & the @SenateGOP are desperately trying to rush Senate confirmation […]

Congressional Republicans’ hostility to rigorous ethics enforcement cannot be in question, given their failed attempt to gut the Office of Congressional Ethics just last week. Now, they are attempting to undermine the work of the Office of Government Ethics by scheduling confirmation hearings for President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees before the OGE has time to complete […]

As House Republicans voted on the new congressional rules package for the 115th Congress, many passages drew controversy, including a provision to unconstitutionally fine legislators for taking video footage on the House floor, and an attempt to gut the Office of Congressional Ethics. But one passage made it through without attention from the corporate media: A provision that […]

With families already being torn apart as a result of Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant agenda, members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus were looking forward to meeting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials to discuss the current and future impact on their communities. However, ICE abruptly cancelled the meeting that had been arranged earlier this week, […]

When Donald Trump announced former Texas Governor Rick Perry as his nominee to run the Department of Energy, it was a baffling choice. One of Perry’s most infamous moments on the national stage, during a Republican primary debate in 2011, was when he attempted to list three departments he would eliminate if he became President […]

At the end of the last Congressional term, Rep. Elijah Cummings, the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Rep. Eric Swalwell, the ranking member of the CIA Subcommittee of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, introduced legislation calling for the creation of a bipartisan, independent commission to investigate […]