The Everything 118th Congress Thread

[Califan007 The Constipated]

 

 

Rep. Nancy Mace is saying the same thing..

[Larry]

Maybe some Republicans have decided that acting, unanimously, like Jan 6th rioters, might cost them power?  

[Cooked Crack]

 

 

 

[Califan007 The Constipated]

22 minutes ago, Larry said:

Maybe some Republicans have decided that acting, unanimously, like Jan 6th rioters, might cost them power?  

 

Well, to be fair, after that statement she's now being called a RINO lol...

[stoshuaj]

N/m, inappropriate 

Edited January 25, 2023 by stoshuaj

[China]

Hawley introduces Pelosi Act banning lawmakers from trading stocks

 

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) has introduced a bill that would ban members of Congress from trading and owning stocks, using the name of his legislation to take a jab at Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

 

Hawley on Tuesday introduced the Pelosi Act — or the Preventing Elected Leaders from Owning Securities and Investments Act — renewing a legislative push to curtail stock trading by lawmakers that has failed over the last few years.

 

“Members of Congress and their spouses shouldn’t be using their position to get rich on the stock market,” Hawley tweeted in announcing his bill.

 

The GOP senator previously introduced legislation last year seeking to ban lawmakers and their spouses from holding stocks or making new transactions while in office.

 

Last year Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, sold millions of dollars worth of shares of a computer chipmaker as the House prepared to vote on a bill focused on domestic chip manufacturing. A spokesman for Pelosi said at the time that he sold the shares at a loss.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[GhostofSparta]

I can't believe it, but I support Hawley on this. Long overdue legislation, but let's see what it actually is supposed to do and if it passes.

[mistertim]

12 hours ago, Califan007 The Constipated said:

 

 

Rep. Nancy Mace is saying the same thing..

 

Good for her.

 

Also, she may be the most severe looking woman I've ever seen. I'd probably talk **** to a catholic school nun before crossing her.

[Sacks 'n' Stuff]

I also like the idea of the PELOSI rule and I gotta admit, that acronym was one of the more clever barbs I’ve heard from a Republican in a while.

Edited January 26, 2023 by Sacks 'n' Stuff

[Cooked Crack]

 

Big shock

[China]

Fact check: McCarthy’s false, misleading and evidence-free claims since becoming House speaker

 

Since winning a difficult battle to become speaker of the House of Representatives, Republican Kevin McCarthy has made public claims that are misleading, lacking any evidence or plain wrong.

 

Here is a fact check of recent McCarthy comments about the debt ceiling, funding for the Internal Revenue Service, the FBI search of former President Donald Trump’s resort and residence in Florida, President Joe Biden’s stance on stoves and Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff.

 

McCarthy’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

 

Pelosi and the debt ceiling
McCarthy has cited the example of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, his Democratic predecessor as House speaker, while defending conservative Republicans’ insistence that any agreement to lift the federal debt ceiling must be paired with cuts to government spending – a trade-off McCarthy agreed to when he was trying to persuade conservatives to support his bid for speaker. Specifically, McCarthy has claimed that even Pelosi agreed to a spending cap as part of a deal to lift the debt ceiling under Trump.

 

“When Nancy Pelosi was speaker, that’s what transpired. To get a debt ceiling, they also got a cap on spending for the next two years,” McCarthy told reporters at a press conference on January 12. When Fox host Maria Bartiromo told McCarthy in a January 15 interview that “they” would not agree to a spending cap, he responded, “Well Maria, I don’t believe that’s the case, because when Donald Trump was president and when Nancy Pelosi was speaker, that’s exactly what happened for them to get a debt ceiling lifted last time. They agreed to a spending cap.”

 

Facts First: McCarthy’s claims are highly misleading. The deal Pelosi agreed to with the Trump administration in 2019 actually loosened spending caps that were already in place at the time because of a 2011 law. In other words, while congressional conservatives today want to use a debt ceiling deal to reduce government spending, the Pelosi deal allowed for billions in additional government spending above the pre-existing maximum. The two situations are nothing alike.

 

Funding for the IRS
In various statements since becoming speaker, McCarthy has boasted of how the first bill passed by the new Republican majority in the House “repealed 87,000 IRS agents” or “repealed funding for 87,000 new IRS agents.”

 

Facts First: McCarthy’s claims are false. House Republicans did pass a bill that seeks to eliminate about $71 billion of the approximately $80 billion in additional Internal Revenue Service funding that Biden signed into law in last year’s Inflation Reduction Act – but that funding is not going to hire 87,000 “agents.” In addition, Biden has already made clear he would veto this new Republican bill even if the bill somehow made it through the Democratic-controlled Senate, so no funding has actually been “repealed.” It would be accurate for McCarthy to say House Republicans “voted to repeal” the funding, but the boast that they actually “repealed” something is inaccurate.

 

The need for the Mar-a-Lago search
In his interview with Fox’s Bartiromo on January 15, McCarthy criticized federal law enforcement for executing a search warrant at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort and residence in Florida, which the FBI says resulted in the recovery of more than 100 government documents marked as classified and hundreds of other government documents. Echoing a claim Trump has made, McCarthy said of the documents: “They knew it was there. They could have come and taken it any time they wanted.”

 

Facts First: It is clearly not true that the authorities could somehow have come to Mar-a-Lago at any time, without conducting a formal search, and taken all of the presidential records they were seeking from Trump. By the time of the search, the federal government – first the National Archives and Records Administration and then the Justice Department – had been asking Trump for more than a year to return government records. Even when the Justice Department went beyond asking in May and served Trump’s team with a subpoena for the return of all documents with classification markings, Trump’s team returned only some of these documents. In June, a Trump lawyer signed a document certifying on behalf of Trump’s office that all of the documents had been returned, though that was not true.

 

Biden and stoves
McCarthy wrote in a New York Post article published on January 12: “While President Joe Biden wants to control the kind of stove Americans can cook on, House Republicans are certainly cooking with gas.” He repeated the claim on Twitter the next morning.

 

Facts First: There is no evidence for this claim; Biden has not expressed a desire to control the kind of stove Americans can cook on. McCarthy was baselessly attributing the comments of a single Biden appointee to Biden himself.

 

Schiff and the Ukraine whistleblower
Defending his plan to bar Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff from sitting on the House Intelligence Committee, a committee Schiff chaired during the Democratic majority from early 2019 to the beginning of this year, McCarthy criticized Schiff on January 12 over his handling of the first impeachment of Trump. Among other things, McCarthy said: “Adam Schiff openly lied to the American public. He told you he had proof. He told you he didn’t know the whistleblower.”

 

Facts First: There is no evidence for McCarthy’s insinuation that Schiff lied when he said he didn’t know the anonymous whistleblower who came forward in 2019 with allegations – which were subsequently corroborated – about how Trump had attempted to use the power of his office to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Biden, his looming rival in the 2020 election.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[EmirOfShmo]

 

 

 

[The Evil Genius]

22 hours ago, Sacks 'n' Stuff said:

I also like the idea of the PELOSI rule and I gotta admit, that acronym was one of the more clever barbs I’ve heard from a Republican in a while.

 

..I wonder how it differs from the Dem bill that was proposed in Jan 2022?

 

https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/3494

 

Edited January 26, 2023 by The Evil Genius

[China]

 

[LD0506]

Pfffft, inert....

 

Pretty weak

[Cooked Crack]

 

 

[Larry]

Working on the "them other folks are lazy moochers who want to sit at home and get paid for it" narrative. 
 

And the Democrats are trying to expand Medicaid, to include more of the working poor. Republicans are blocking them from getting it. 
 

But the main reason they're pushing it?  When people have to work two jobs or their kids will starve, then it's easier for people to bully them. 
 

It's class warfare. Them poor types have it too good. 

[China]

Is there any level of bigotry, criminality or mendacity that the GOP won't tolerate?

 

George Santos Posted 'Deeply Offensive' Comment About Hitler, Jews

 

Years ago, embattled Long Island Rep. George Santos commented on a Facebook post with what appear to be intended-jokes about Hitler, a phrase that appears to salute Hitler and observations about "the Jews and black[s]," exclusive screenshots obtained by Patch show.

 

Santos, under fire from Nassau County Republicans and Jewish Republican groups for exploiting claimed Jewish heritage, including a story of grandparents he said fled the Holocaust, has a history of questionable and racially-charged social media posting and comments, former friends of the congressman told Patch. Patch's review of Santos' deleted Instagram and Facebook posts and comments and GoFundMe campaigns reveal a shifting and complicated relationship to racial and ethnic identity.

 

Earlier this month, Nassau County Republican leaders called for Santos to resign, citing his lies about his resume and background as a descendant of Jewish Holocaust survivors. Santos described himself as Jewish several times during his campaign for the 3rd Congressional District seat, but researchers at multiple news outlets failed to discover any evidence of Jewish heritage, and reported that his grandparents were born in Brazil, and did not flee persecution in Europe, as Santos claimed.

 

In March 2011, Santos commented on a photo shared by a Facebook friend which shows someone making what appears to be a military salute with the caption “something like Hitler.” In his comment, Santos writes [sic]:

 

"hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh
hiiiiiiiiiiiitlerrrrrrrrrrr (hight hitler)
lolololololololololololol sombody kill her!! the jews and black mostly lolllolol!!! Dum"

 

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Califan007 The Constipated]

 

 

 

 

"It seems that the vast majority of members of Congress -- including the vast majority of her Republican colleagues -- thought that this was a bad idea, as a vote on the amendment ended with just 14 votes in favor and a whopping 418 votes opposed."

[The Evil Genius]

How dare Biden make the US money in selling high and buying lower. 

[China]

Lawmakers submit more than 140 amendments as House opens process for first time in seven years

 

The House opened up its amendment process for the first time in seven years on Thursday, and began debating on the floor more than 140 proposed changes to an oil-related bill.

 

House Republicans brought the Strategic Production Response Act to the floor on Thursday under what’s known as a modified-open rule.

 

Unlike structured or closed rules, which limit the number of amendments considered — as determined by the House Rules Committee for each bill — a modified-open rule allows anyone to submit an amendment as long as they do so the day before a bill is debated.

 

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) said it was the first time in seven years the House had used such a process, and more than 140 amendments were submitted for the bill. The amendments varied in topic, with some proposing restrictions on where oil from the SPR is sent and others seeking to place constraints on where oil and gas leases are.

 

A number of the amendments were passed or rejected by voice vote on Thursday. On some amendments, however, members requested a roll call vote.

 

The House is expected to continue debating amendments Thursday night, then vote on the entire bill Friday, a longer process than a structured or closed rule.

 

Conservative lawmakers had pushed for a more open legislative process in the lead up to — and during — this month’s protracted Speaker’s race in an effort to empower rank-and-file members.

 

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) touted the process during his press conference on Tuesday.

 

Some Democrats had positive reviews of the modified open rule process, noting that it gives them the opportunity to have their amendments added into legislation.

 

“If I get some amendments passed then I’m gonna like it a lot,” Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who submitted five amendments, told The Hill on Thursday, adding that she is “absolutely for a transparent process.”

 

Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) had similar thoughts.

 

“I think it gives the Democrats an opportunity to offer amendments,” Cohen said, noting that it could give the caucus a better chance of seeing their changes made than if the Rules Committee determined amendments.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[PleaseBlitz]

Love Ted Lieu

 

 

[Califan007 The Constipated]

 

 

 

We Tried to Call the Top Donors To George Santos’ 2020 Campaign. Many Don’t Seem To Exist.

 

In September 2020, George Santos’ congressional campaign reported that Victoria and Jonathan Regor had each contributed $2,800—the maximum amount—to his first bid for a House seat. Their listed address was 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson Township, New Jersey.

 

A search of various databases reveals no one in the United States named Victoria or Jonathan Regor. Moreover, there is nobody by any name living at 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson. That address doesn’t exist. There is a New Mexico Street in Jackson, but the numbers end in the 20s, according to Google Maps and a resident of the street.

 

Santos’ 2020 campaign finance reports also list a donor named Stephen Berger as a $2,500 donor and said he was a retiree who lived on Brandt Road in Brawley, California. But a spokesperson for William Brandt, a prominent rancher and Republican donor, tells Mother Jones that Brandt has lived at that address for at least 20 years and “neither he or his wife (the only other occupant [at the Brandt Road home]) have made any donations to George Santos. He does not know Stephen Berger nor has Stephen Berger ever lived at…Brandt Road.”

 

The Regor and Berger contributions are among more than a dozen major donations to the 2020 Santos campaign for which the name or the address of the donor cannot be confirmed, a Mother Jones investigation found. A separate $2,800 donation was attributed in Santos’ reports filed with the Federal Election Commission to a friend of Santos who says he did not give the money.

 

Under federal campaign finance law, it is illegal to donate money using a false name or the name of someone else. “It’s called a contribution in the name of another,” says Saurav Ghosh, the director for federal campaign finance reform at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan watchdog group. “It’s something that is explicitly prohibited under federal law.”

 

Two other donors who contributed $1,500 and $2,000, respectively, were listed in Santos’ FEC filings as retirees residing at addresses that do not exist. One was named Rafael Da Silva—which happens to be the name of a Brazilian soccer player.

 

Another suspicious donation was attributed to a woman who shares the name of a New York doctor who has made dozens of donations to Democrats. The Manhattan address listed for this donation does not exist.

[EmirOfShmo]

 

[Cooked Crack]