House of Representatives

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Republican Julia Letlow takes Louisiana seat husband won before dying of Covid

      by

      The Republican Julia Letlow easily won a Saturday special election for a north-east Louisiana-based US House seat her husband, Luke, won before his death from complications related to Covid-19.Julia Letlow becomes the third woman ever elected to the US House from Louisiana, the first Republican woman elected to Congress from the state and the only woman among its current congressional delegation. She trounced 11 contenders.“This is an incredible moment, and it is truly hard to put into words,” she said. “What was born out of the terrible tragedy of losing my husband, Luke, has become my mission in his honor to carry the torch and serve the good people of Louisiana’s fifth district.”Further south, the race to fill a second vacant congressional seat for Louisiana was headed to an 24 April run-off, the seat certain to stay in Democratic hands.Two state senators from New Orleans – Troy Carter and Karen Carter Peterson – secured spots in the runoff after leading among 15 candidates. The New Orleans-based second district is open because Cedric Richmond took a job as a special adviser to Joe Biden.In Louisiana, all candidates regardless of party compete in the primary. If no candidate tops 50% of the vote, a runoff is held between the top two vote-getters.Julia Letlow ran in her deep red district with the backing of Donald Trump, the endorsement of the state GOP and more money than all her competitors combined. She ran on issues similar to those her husband discussed during his campaign, supporting agriculture in the largely rural district, expanding broadband internet access and supporting conservative values.Governor John Bel Edwards offered congratulations.“She has continued to exemplify strength, determination and tenacity in the wake of a terrible tragedy. I know that these same characteristics that got her through the last few months will make her an excellent advocate for Louisiana in Washington,” the Democrat said.Luke Letlow died on 29 December, days before he was to be sworn into office. His wife announced her candidacy in January, sidelining high-profile Republicans.In the second district, Carter received Richmond’s backing and ended the primary as top vote-getter in the majority minority district along the Mississippi river.Peterson squeaked into the runoff, edging out Gary Chambers Jr, a Baton Rouge community activist and publisher who focused on social media outreach. Peterson would be the first Black woman elected to Congress from Louisiana. More

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      How Democrats can use Biden's $1.9tn Covid relief to win the midterms

      by

      Just days after signing the $1.9tn coronavirus relief package into law, Joe Biden was on the road selling the benefits of the bill to the American people – and also to his own party’s political prospects.The president kicked off his “Help is Here” tour last Tuesday, visiting a Black-owned flooring business in Chester, Pennsylvania. “We’re in a position where it’s going to bring immediate relief – $1,400 – to 85% of the American public,” Biden said as he toured Smith Flooring. “And I think you should be aware: more help is on the way, for real.”Democrats have been eager to trumpet the message that Biden has followed through on his campaign promise to deliver another round of stimulus checks and an extension of federal unemployment benefits to Americans who have financially struggled because of the coronavirus pandemic.But the passage of the relief bill may also be the Democratic party’s best chance of keeping control of both chambers of Congress after next year’s midterm elections. Democrats are hoping that the aid it brings can help them avoid the historical trend of the president’s party losing congressional seats in the midterms following his election.There is little room for error too, given Democrats’ narrow majorities in both chambers of Congress. Republicans need to flip just five seats to take control of the House, and a loss of a single Senate seat would cost Democrats their majority in the upper chamber. Such losses would seriously hobble Biden’s ability to enact his agenda.With those high stakes in mind, the president and Vice-President Kamala Harris have been traveling across the country to advertise the relief bill in swing states that will hold key Senate races next year. Biden told House Democrats earlier this month that he was determined to learn from 2009, when Barack Obama was hesitant to take a “victory lap” after the passage of the stimulus bill.“We didn’t adequately explain what we had done,” Biden told lawmakers. “And we paid a price for it, ironically, for that humility.”Democratic groups are helping with Biden’s victory tour, flooding the airwaves to remind voters in battleground states where those $1,400 direct payments came from. American Bridge 21st Century, a progressive political action committee, has announced a six-figure ad buy focusing on the impact of the relief package. The first ad, which featured a special education teacher talking about how the legislation would help schools reopen, started airing in Pennsylvania as Biden visited the state on Tuesday.“This is a law that is going to help people’s lives across the board, and something that is this holistically comprehensive on the policy side is also going to be holistically popular for the midterms,” said Jessica Floyd, the president of American Bridge. Echoing many Democratic lawmakers and strategists in recent weeks, Floyd made a point to cite polling showing the relief bill enjoyed the support of a broad majority of Americans.But Republicans, who unanimously voted against the relief bill in Congress, are not sitting on the sidelines as Democrats make their marketing pitch. Republican party leaders have been busy attacking the legislation as a liberal “wishlist” that does nothing to confront the crises facing the nation.“Americans deserve targeted legislation that will accelerate vaccine distribution, get Americans back to work, and safely reopen our schools – not hyperpartisan and wasteful pork spending,” Ronna McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, said in a statement after the passage of the bill.The National Republican Senatorial Committee has already launched its own digital ads against two vulnerable Democratic incumbents, Mark Kelly of Arizona and Raphael Warnock of Georgia, accusing them of “bailing out” New York and California by approving the state aid in the relief package.“Packed in the bill are provisions that will really hurt vulnerable senators in tough states,” a Republican operative focused on Senate races said. The operative predicted that Republicans’ criticism of “bailout” money to Democratic-controlled states and stimulus payments to undocumented immigrants would linger longer in voters’ memories than the $1,400 checks they received.There is still time for both parties to shape how Americans view the relief package. Despite the positive polling about the bill, a recent survey from the progressive firm Navigator Research showed a majority of voters say they know little to nothing about the legislation.So the challenge for Democrats and Republicans will be to both convince voters of the merit – or lack thereof – of the relief bill and then keep that issue at the forefront of voters’ minds as they start to consider which candidates to support next November.In that sense, these competing messaging campaigns from the two parties represent the start of a months-long competition to define the beginning of Biden’s presidency in the court of public opinion. The winner of that competition will probably walk away with control of Congress.“Part of our job is not to let people forget that Democrats put together a bill that is hugely popular now,” Floyd said. “Our job is to keep it popular and also point out for the coming months that every single Republican in Congress voted against it. I think keeping both of those facts top of mind starts today.” More

    • 150 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      Two New Orleans State Senators Win Runoff Spots for U.S. House Seat

      by

      Troy Carter and Karen Carter Peterson will meet in an April runoff for the seat vacated by Cedric L. Richmond.NEW ORLEANS — A pair of Democratic state senators from New Orleans claimed the most votes Saturday in a special election to replace former Representative Cedric L. Richmond, who is now a senior advisor to President Biden. State Senators Troy Carter and Karen Carter Peterson (they are not related) will advance to an April 24 runoff that will determine who represents a heavily Democratic seat in a Black-majority district that stretches from New Orleans along the Mississippi River to Baton Rouge.With 98 percent of precincts reporting in a notably light turnout, Mr. Carter was winning 36 percent of the vote, while Ms. Peterson claimed 23 percent in a 15-person field. Gary Chambers, a Baton Rouge activist, finished a surprisingly strong third place, nearing Ms. Peterson thanks to strong support in white liberal precincts. In another special Louisiana congressional election, in the northern part of the state, Julia Letlow, a Republican, won over 50 percent of the vote, averting a runoff and winning a seat that had been held by her husband, Luke, before he died of Covid-19 in December.Ms. Letlow is one of two widows running this year to claim House seats that had been held by lawmakers who succumbed to the virus. In Texas, Susan Wright is attempting to succeed her late husband, Ron Wright, in a special election later this year.It’s in South Louisiana, though, where the first competitive congressional race of the Biden era is taking place.Mr. Carter and Ms. Peterson are both veteran politicians and have roots in the competing, and fractious, Black political factions of New Orleans. Both have also run for this seat before — both of them in 2006, and Mr. Carter again in 2008 — without success.But when Mr. Richmond resigned after a decade in Congress to work for Mr. Biden, it gave Mr. Carter and Ms. Peterson a new chance to fulfill their longstanding ambition.As with many New Orleans elections, the contest quickly became a proxy fight. When another local ally of his decided not to run, Mr. Richmond quickly backed Mr. Carter in hopes of blocking his rival, Ms. Peterson.Recognizing the popularity and clout of his patron in the West Wing, Mr. Carter has sought to capitalize on Mr. Richmond’s endorsement. “I would have the ear of the guy who has the ear of the president of the United States of America,” Mr. Carter said.In response, Ms. Peterson has sought to run to the left, portraying herself as an anti-establishment Democrat even as she trumpets her role as a former state party chair and her numerous national endorsements.She has dismissed Mr. Carter’s calling card, saying that she has her own contacts in the Biden administration and does “not need to have the ear of the ear of the ear of the toe of the thumb of someone.”Given the intensity and history of their rivalry, as well as the often spicy politics of New Orleans, the runoff could be hard-fought.Two of Louisiana’s most prominent Democratic officeholders have yet to weigh in and could prove consequential if they do intervene. Mayor LaToya Cantrell of New Orleans surprised some in the city by not endorsing Ms. Peterson, an ally, before the first round of voting. Also still on the sidelines is Gov. John Bel Edwards, who has clashed with Ms. Peterson in the past and is widely thought to be in Mr. Carter’s corner.Perhaps most significant is who shows up to vote next month. Early voting before Saturday’s all-party primary was anemic — fewer than 6 percent of eligible voters cast ballots — and turnout was little better the day of the vote.The combination of the turbulent 2020 election, a pandemic that is only now showing signs of receding and a new, no-drama president has left the electorate apathetic, according to local officials. “Grandpa Joe has really taken the air out of the balloon, and there’s not that fever about politics,” Andrew Tuozzolo, a Democratic strategist said, referring to Mr. Biden. More

    • 163 Shares139 Views

      in US Politics

      'Our community is bleeding': Asian American lawmakers say violence has reached 'crisis point'

      by

      Asian American lawmakers and leaders warned that violence and discrimination targeting their community have reached a “crisis point” following the shootings in Atlanta this week that killed eight people, including six women of Asian descent.The hearing, the first to examine anti-Asian discrimination in more than three decades, had been scheduled weeks ago amid a surge in violence against the Asian community since the pandemic began. But it took on heightened urgency after the mass shooting that left Asian Americans in Atlanta and across the country shaken and afraid.“What we know is that this day was coming,” Judy Chu, chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, told a subcommittee of the House judiciary committee on Thursday. “The Asian American community has reached a crisis point that cannot be ignored.”Grace Meng, a Democrat of New York, said: “Our community is bleeding. We are in pain. And for the last year, we’ve been screaming out for help.”Meanwhile police in Atlanta revealed new details about the investigation. At a press conference, Charles Hampton, deputy chief of the Atlanta police, said “nothing was off the table”, including whether the killings were motivated, at least in part, by race or gender.“We are looking at everything to make sure that we discover and determine what the motive of our homicides were,” he said, adding that they were still determining whether the murders constituted a hate crime.The suspect, Robert Aaron Long, 21, has been charged with eight counts of murder. Long, who is white, told police that he had a sex addiction and targeted the spas to eliminate “temptation”, denying any racist motivations.Hampton said on Thursday that Long had “frequented” two of the spas where four women of Asian descent were killed. Four more people were killed at Youngs Asian Massage Parlor, on the outskirts of the city.The Cherokee county sheriff’s department announced on Thursday that Capt Jay Baker had been replaced as the spokesman on the investigation.Frank Reynolds, the sheriff, expressed regret amid widespread outrage over comments Baker had made a day earlier. Baker drew criticism for saying Long had had “a really bad day” and “this is what he did”. Reynolds released a statement on Thursday acknowledging that some of Baker’s comments stirred “much debate and anger” and said the agency regretted any “heartache” caused by his words.“Inasmuch as his words were taken or construed as insensitive or inappropriate, they were not intended to disrespect any of the victims, the gravity of this tragedy or express empathy or sympathy for the suspect,” Reynolds said in a statement, adding that Baker “had a difficult task before him, and this was one of the hardest in his 28 years in law enforcement”.In response to the shootings, the White House announced that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were canceling a political event in Atlanta on Friday as part of their Help is Here tour to promote the administration’s $1.9tn coronavirus relief package. Instead, they will spend their visit meeting with local leaders and elected officials from the city’s Asian American and Pacific Islander community.Biden on Thursday ordered flags at the White House and all federal buildings to be flown at half-staff through sunset on Monday to honor the eight victims of the Atlanta spa shootings.At the hearing on Capitol Hill, Meng was joined by experts and advocates who told the panel that the rising tide of anti-Asian bigotry was fueled in part by rhetoric from Donald Trump and his allies, who referred to Covid-19 as the “China virus” the “China plague” and the “kung flu”.Nearly 3,800 hate incidents, spanning the spectrum of verbal harassment to physical assault, have been reported against Asian Americans nationwide since the start of the pandemic in March 2020, according to Stop AAPI Hate. Asian American women reported nearly twice as many incidents as men, at nearly 70%.During the hearing, the subcommittee chairman, Steve Cohen, recounted a number of brutal incidents that included a Filipino man being slashed across the face with a box cutter and an 89-year-old Asian American woman being lit on fire.“All the pandemic did was exacerbate latent anti-Asian prejudices that have a long, long and ugly history in America,” he said.In a particularly impassioned exchange, Meng confronted one of the panel’s Republican members, the Texas congressman Chip Roy, who said, after a lengthy exhortation of China’s handling of the coronavirus, that he was concerned the hearing amounted to a “policing” of free speech.“Your president and your party and your colleagues can talk about issues with any other country that you want,” Meng said through tears. “But you don’t have to do it by putting a bullseye on the back of Asian Americans across this country, on our grandparents, on our kids.”“This hearing was to address the hurt and pain of our community, to find solutions – and we will not let you take our voice away from us,” she said.The Associated Press contributed to this report More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      House Renews Landmark Domestic Violence Bill, but Obstacles Wait in Senate

      by

      The House vote was bipartisan, but many Republicans object to new gun restrictions on domestic abusers that could complicate Senate passage.The House moved on Wednesday to renew the Violence Against Women Act, adding firearm restrictions for convicted domestic abusers and other new provisions to a landmark law that has helped combat domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking but expired in 2019.President Biden, who wrote the law into existence as a senator in 1994, has made strengthening it one of his top domestic priorities during his time in office, and Wednesday’s vote was the first significant step toward putting it back into effect after lapsing under President Donald J. Trump. The law’s renewal has taken on added urgency amid alarming increases in domestic violence during the coronavirus pandemic.The House’s 244-to-172 vote was bipartisan, with 29 Republicans joining united Democrats to approve the bill. But substantial conservative opposition to a measure that has enjoyed broad backing from both parties in the past foreshadowed a more difficult path ahead in the Senate, where Democrats control just 50 of the 60 votes necessary for passage.In a statement after the vote, Mr. Biden urged the Senate to “bring a strong bipartisan coalition together” to send him a bill to sign into law as soon as possible.“Growing evidence shows that Covid-19 has only exacerbated the threat of intimate partner violence, creating a pandemic within a pandemic for countless women at risk for abuse,” he said. “This should not be a Democratic or Republican issue — it’s about standing up against the abuse of power and preventing violence.”Much of the House’s proposed update to the Violence Against Women Act, commonly known as VAWA, is noncontroversial. It would build on a patchwork of programs like violence prevention and housing assistance for abuse victims, reaffirm legal protections for victims and their families, and more aggressively target resources to minority communities.In an effort to expand the law’s reach, however, Democrats have also included provisions tightening access to firearms by people convicted of a violent crime or subject to a court order, and expanding protections for gay, bisexual and transgender people. In an attempt to cut into high rates of domestic violence against Native American women, their bill would grant tribal courts new authority to prosecute non-Indians for sex trafficking, sexual violence and stalking.“This bill opens the door of the armor of the federal government and its protection of women who continue to lose their life and men,” said Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, Democrat of Texas and one of its principal authors. “Yes, it is a culturally sensitive initiative that protects immigrant women, it protects Native Americans, it protects poor women.”But what Democrats characterized as equitable expansions of the law meant to meet the needs of a changing nation have prompted intense backlash among conservative Republicans, who have eagerly jumped into ideological battles with Democrats again and again in recent weeks.In sometimes fiery debate on the House floor on Wednesday, several conservatives accused the majority of using a law meant to protect women as a Trojan horse for a “far-left political agenda” on gun control and gay and transgender rights while holding hostage a clean reauthorization of the bill.“The most egregious provisions of this bill push leftist gender ideology at the expense of important protections for women’s privacy and safety,” said Representative Debbie Lesko, Republican of Arizona, who recounted her own experience with domestic violence. “If this bill is enacted, these shelters under penalty of federal law would be required to take in men and shelter them with women, putting vulnerable women at risk.”Ms. Lesko appeared to be referring to provisions barring groups that receive funds under VAWA from discriminating based on gender identity that were enshrined in law in 2013 and merely reiterated in the new bill. Its proponents say they have caused no widespread safety or privacy issues. One new aspect of the bill would require the Bureau of Prisons to consider the safety of transgender prisoners when giving housing assignments.Republicans were just as angry over the proposed closing of the so-called boyfriend loophole. While existing federal law forbids people convicted of domestic violence against a current or former spouse to buy or own a firearm, the new legislation would extend the prohibition to those convicted of abusing, assaulting or stalking a dating partner, or to those under a court restraining order.Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of Georgia, pushed unsuccessfully for amendments that would allow the government to fund firearm training and self-defense classes for women.“If you want to protect women, make sure women are gun owners and know how to defend themselves,” she said. “That’s the greatest defense for women.”Representative Elise Stefanik, Republican of New York, offered an alternative proposal on Wednesday that would have reauthorized the law without changes for a single year to allow time for more bipartisan negotiation. It failed 177 to 249.Democrats and some Republicans did adopt an amendment by Representatives Jackie Speier, Democrat of California, and John Katko, Republican of New York, that appends what would be the first federal law to specifically address “revenge porn.” Forty-five states and the District of Columbia have put their own such laws in place in recent years, but advocates of a federal statute say they are inconsistent.The disagreements were many of the same ones that led the law to expire two years ago. House Democrats first passed a similar version of the bill to the one adopted on Wednesday in 2019 with modest support from across the aisle, but the Republican-controlled Senate declined to take it up for a vote amid an intense lobbying campaign by the N.R.A. to oppose the gun provisions.This time Democrats control the upper chamber and have vowed to hold a vote. Still, they will need at least 10 Republicans to join them to send a bill to Mr. Biden and will have to placate the minority party over many of the contentious new measures in the weeks ahead.Senate Republicans, led by Joni Ernst of Iowa, are preparing their own alternative to try to force compromises. Ms. Ernst, who has spoken about her own experience of sexual assault, told reporters this week that her colleagues objected chiefly to the gun provisions included in the House-passed measure, but she suggested their bill would eliminate other unwanted liberal proposals, too.Mr. Biden, who has called VAWA his “proudest legislative accomplishment,” enthusiastically backed the House bill and has not indicated what, if any, changes he would embrace. He won the presidency last fall in part based on the commanding support of women.The law was considered a watershed when it was written in the early 1990s. It addressed several issues that federal lawmakers had not tackled in a single piece of legislation, including keeping confidential the addresses of abused people and recognizing orders of protection across jurisdictions. Before the law was enacted, a state court order of protection in one state could not be enforced in another state.Though the law authorizing VAWA programs expired, Congress has continued to fund many of them in the meantime.Mr. Biden has already tried to make good on campaign promises to strengthen efforts to prevent domestic violence. His $1.9 trillion stimulus bill allocated $49 million for groups that aid survivors of domestic abuse, as well as housing assistance for people fleeing abuse, sexual violence and human trafficking.Katie Benner More

    • 163 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      The Intelligence on Russia Was Clear. It Was Not Always Presented That Way.

      by

      A newly declassified intelligence report made clear that government agencies long knew of Russia’s work to aid Donald Trump, but he and allies muddied the waters.WASHINGTON — Representative Jason Crow listened during a classified briefing last summer while a top intelligence official said that Russia was hurting Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s campaign to help President Donald J. Trump.Mr. Crow, Democrat of Colorado, held up an intelligence agency news release from days earlier and demanded to know why it said nothing about Russia’s plans.“‘When are you going to come out publicly and correct this record?’” Mr. Crow recalled asking the official, William R. Evanina. “‘Because there’s a massive disconnect between what is in your news releases and what you’re saying publicly — because of the pressure of the president.’”A report released Tuesday made clear that the intelligence community believed that Russia had long attacked Mr. Biden for the benefit of Mr. Trump. But throughout 2020, senior officials bowed to Mr. Trump’s hostility toward any public emphasis of the threat from Russia, and they offered Congress and the public incomplete or misleading portraits of the intelligence on foreign influence in the election.The picture is complicated. While Mr. Trump’s enmity toward the intelligence community loomed, and his political appointees emphasized the threat from China and Iran, not Russia, career officers did also get key findings about Russian intelligence declassified and disclosed last year.Soon after that briefing to Congress, Mr. Evanina released details about Kremlin-backed operatives denigrating Mr. Biden, fulfilling the demands of Mr. Crow and other lawmakers. In an interview, Mr. Evanina credited Congress for pushing for more information, but said it took time and effort to get other intelligence officials to declassify the information.Once made public, the information broke new ground in describing Russian activity, but it also angered the White House.“We were out there on our island,” Mr. Evanina said. “The White House was unhappy with us, and so were the Democrats.” After Mr. Evanina’s disclosure, Mr. Trump and senior administration officials worked to play down the intelligence about Russian interference or to redirect focus to China’s work.Their efforts allowed Americans to dismiss a widely accepted intelligence assessment as politics, deepening distrust and division among the electorate, current and former officials said, adding that a divided country was vulnerable to foreign interference.“We’re so polarized,” Mr. Evanina said, “we’re going to be even more susceptible for this kind of activity moving forward.”Former Trump administration officials defended their public assessments of the intelligence. Some administration officials saw intelligence analysts, particularly the C.I.A.’s Russia experts, as presenting an overly dramatic analysis of the Kremlin’s intentions.The newly released report, former Trump administration officials argued, blurs the definitions of influence and interference. Russia’s effort was always more about spreading misinformation and propaganda, the former officials said, and there was no evidence that the Kremlin changed votes, the report’s definition of interference.“There is zero evidence,” said Richard Grenell, the former acting director of national intelligence. “Key judgment No. 1 is that no one interfered. This is influence vs. interference.”Throughout 2020, current and former intelligence officials privately expressed concern about how the White House characterized intelligence. Inside the intelligence agencies, officers continued to develop classified information on Russian interference and worked to present it honestly. For example, the designated election security czar, Shelby Pierson, was consistent in how she portrayed Russian actions in briefings to Congress, according to people familiar with her testimony.“We’re so polarized, we’re going to be even more susceptible for this kind of activity moving forward,” said William R. Evanina, a former top intelligence official.Joshua Roberts/ReutersBut one of her briefings, in which Ms. Pierson told lawmakers Russia favored Mr. Trump and was working for his re-election, prompted outrage among Republicans and contributed to the ousting of Joseph R. Maguire as the acting director of national intelligence. Mr. Evanina was then put in charge of briefing Congress, a role he was abruptly thrust into with little preparation, officials said.For Mr. Evanina’s first meeting with lawmakers on election security last March, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, then run by Mr. Grenell, prepared a document that tried to temper Ms. Pierson’s February warning by cautioning that officials had not concluded that Russia was backing Mr. Trump.“The I.C. has not concluded that the Kremlin is directly aiding any candidate’s re-election or any other candidates’ election,” an unclassified summary given to lawmakers said, using shorthand for the intelligence community. “Nor have we concluded that the Russians will definitely choose to try to do so in 2020.”Mr. Grenell privately pushed intelligence officials to provide evidence to back up their conclusion that Russian disinformation activity was about influencing the elections, rather than simply an effort to stoke divisive debates in the United States. He has in the past defended the March briefing as an accurate summary of the intelligence.But the intelligence community ombudsman said in January that there were substantive differences between talking points for briefing Congress and what the intelligence community really thought.The newly declassified report showed that the March briefing was at best misleading to Congress and backed Ms. Pierson’s February testimony.The report laid out how the Russian strategy of attacking Mr. Biden goes back to 2014, before Mr. Trump was a serious candidate for office. While some senior intelligence officials have suggested that intelligence on Russia was in flux at various points in 2020, the new report made clear that the intelligence community’s view on President Vladimir V. Putin’s support for Mr. Trump was little changed from 2016 to 2020.Senior Trump administration officials’ comments about China were also at odds with the report.John Ratcliffe, Mr. Trump’s final director of national intelligence, said publicly before and after the election that China was the greatest national security threat. In a letter to Congress, he said the intelligence community was not applying the same definition to Chinese influence operations as it was to Russia’s.Some intelligence officials defended Mr. Ratcliffe’s comments on China, noting that Beijing was the most serious long-term threat to the United States and that it clearly tried to influence how it was viewed in America and elsewhere. The January ombudsman report did find merit in Mr. Ratcliffe’s critique of how intelligence on Chinese influence operations was handled.Mr. Grenell said his successor was right to focus on China, and that it was wrong to dismiss his critique of the intelligence agencies because analysts used different standards when looking at China’s influence operations compared with Russia’s. “China is a crisis,” Mr. Grenell said. “Russia is a problem.”Still, in appearances on Fox News, Mr. Ratcliffe’s relentless focus on China, rather than Russia, had the effect of leaving the impression, particularly with the president’s most enthusiastic supporters, that China was the most urgent threat to the 2020 election.The new report rejected that assertion.“Trying to equate, or at times suggest that, China was actually more actively interfering than Russia, it just wasn’t true,” said Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. “I certainly tried to call them out on it at the time but wasn’t able to hold up the classified intelligence document to show how misleading they had been. But I think this report makes it very clear.”Even if China is a long-term national security threat, Russia will continue to be the larger threat in the next few elections, Mr. Evanina said.“There’s some political speak about China being a bigger, more existential threat,” Mr. Evanina said. “Sure they are, but not when it comes to elections.” More

    • 138 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Stimulus Bill as a Political Weapon? Democrats Are Counting on It.

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Biden’s Stimulus PlanBiden’s AddressWhat to Know About the BillBenefits for Middle ClassChild Tax CreditAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyStimulus Bill as a Political Weapon? Democrats Are Counting on It.The $1.9 trillion package is a big bet by the party that it will restore a sense of normalcy by the 2022 elections and that voters will defy history and reward Democrats with more seats in Congress.Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, signed the stimulus bill this week while surrounded by Democratic members of Congress.Credit…Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesMarch 15, 2021, 3:00 a.m. ETWASHINGTON — Triumphant over the signing of their far-reaching $1.9 trillion stimulus package, Democrats are now starting to angle for a major political payoff that would defy history: Picking up House and Senate seats in the 2022 midterm elections, even though the party in power usually loses in the midterms.Democratic leaders are making one of the biggest electoral bets in years — that the stimulus will be so transformational for Americans across party lines and demographic groups that Democrats will be able to wield it as a political weapon next year in elections against Republicans, who voted en masse against the package.Republicans need to gain only one seat in the Senate and just five in the House in 2022 to take back control, a likely result in a normal midterm election, but perhaps a trickier one if voters credit their rivals for a strong American rebound.Yet as Democrats prepare to start selling voters on the package, they remain haunted by what happened in 2010, the last time they were in control of the White House and both chambers of Congress and pursued an ambitious agenda: They lost 63 House seats, and the majority, and were unable to fulfill President Barack Obama’s goals on issues ranging from gun control to immigration.It has become an article of faith in the party that Mr. Obama’s presidency was diminished because his two signature accomplishments, the stimulus bill and the Affordable Care Act, were not expansive enough and their pitch to the public on the benefits of both measures was lacking. By this logic, Democrats began losing elections and the full control of the government, until now, because of their initial compromises with Republicans and insufficient salesmanship.“We didn’t adequately explain what we had done,” President Biden told House Democrats this month about the 2009 Recovery Act. “Barack was so modest, he didn’t want to take, as he said, a ‘victory lap.’”Now they are determined to exorcise those old ghosts by aggressively promoting a measure they believe meets the moment and has broader appeal than the $787 billion bill they trimmed and laced with tax cuts to win a handful of Republican votes in Mr. Obama’s first months in office.Republicans say the Democratic bet is a foolhardy one, both because of how little of the spending is directly related to the coronavirus pandemic and because of fleeting voter attention spans. But Democrats say they intend to run on the bill — and press Republicans over their opposition to it.“This is absolutely something I will campaign on next year,” said Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia, who may be the most vulnerable incumbent Senate Democrat in the country on the ballot in 2022. Senator Gary Peters of Michigan, who heads the Democratic Senate campaign arm, said he would go on “offense” against Republicans who opposed the bill and sketched out their attack: “Every Republican said no in a time of need.”Party lawmakers point out that the measure Mr. Biden signed on Thursday is more popular than the 2009 bill, according to polling; contains more tangible benefits, like the $1,400 direct payments and unemployment benefits; and comes at a time when the pandemic and former President Donald Trump’s continued appetite for big spending have blunted Republican attacks.President Biden will travel the country next week to highlight the passage of the stimulus legislation.Credit…Doug Mills/The New York Times“People are going to feel it right away, to me that’s the biggest thing,” said Representative Conor Lamb, a Pennsylvania Democrat whose 2018 special election victory presaged the party’s revival. “Politics is confusing, it’s image-based, everyone calls everyone else a liar — but people are going to get the money in their bank accounts.”And, Representative Sara Jacobs of California said, Democrats have “learned the lessons from 2009, we made sure we went back to our districts this weekend to tell people how much help they were going to get from this bill.”Mr. Obama’s aides are quick to note that they did promote their stimulus and the health care law but ran into much more fervent, and unified, opposition on the right as the Tea Party blossomed and portrayed the measures as wasteful and ill-conceived.At the end of last week, with the House’s first extended recess looming at month’s end, Speaker Nancy Pelosi pushed House Democrats to seize the moment.Ms. Pelosi’s office sent an email to colleagues, forwarded to The Times, brimming with talking points the speaker hopes they’ll use in town halls and news conferences. “During the upcoming district work period, members are encouraged to give visibility to how the American Rescue Plan meets the needs of their communities: putting vaccines in arms, money in pockets, workers back on the job and children back in the classroom safely,” it said.For their part, White House officials said they would deploy “the whole of government,” as one aide put it, to market the plan, send cabinet officers on the road and focus on different components of the bill each day to highlight its expanse.Democrats’ hopes for avoiding the losses typical in a president’s first midterm election will depend largely on whether Americans feel life is back to normal next year — and whether they credit the party in power for thwarting the disease, despair and dysfunction that characterized the end of Mr. Trump’s term.If voters are to believe the Democrats are delivering on an American rebound, of course, it’s essential the country is roaring back to prepandemic strength in a way it was not at the end of 2009, when unemployment reached 10 percent.“You could be looking at an extraordinary growth spurt in the third and fourth quarters, and that takes you into the year when candidates make their way,” said Representative Richard E. Neal of Massachusetts, chairman of the Ways & Means Committee, where much of the bill was crafted.The politics of the legislation, in other words, will be clear enough by this time next year. “If all the sudden you got high inflation and things are hitting the fan, Republicans are going to run on it,” said Representative Filemon Vela, a Texas Democrat. “If things are going well they’re going to run on something else.”For now, Republicans are expressing little appetite to contest a measure that has the support of 70 percent of voters, according to a Pew survey released last week.Part of their challenge stems from Mr. Trump’s aggressive advocacy for $2,000 direct payments in the previous stimulus package late last year, a drumbeat he’s kept up in his political afterlife as he argues Republicans lost the two Georgia Senate runoffs because they did not embrace the proposal.It’s difficult for congressional Republicans to portray one of the main elements of the Democrats’ bill as socialism when the de facto leader of their party is an enthusiastic supporter of wealth redistribution. Moreover, right-wing media outlets have been more focused on culture war issues that are more animating to many conservatives than size-of-government questions.Asked if they would run against the bill next year, the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, said, “There’s going to be a lot of things we run against.”Republicans in Congress hope to change the subject to a surge of migrants along the Southern border.Credit…Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesAt the weekly news conference of House Republican leaders, Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming spoke about the stimulus for 45 seconds before changing the subject to the rising number of migrants at the Southern border..css-yoay6m{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-yoay6m{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}.css-k59gj9{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;width:100%;}.css-1e2usoh{font-family:inherit;display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;border-top:1px solid #ccc;padding:10px 0px 10px 0px;background-color:#fff;}.css-1jz6h6z{font-family:inherit;font-weight:bold;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.5rem;text-align:left;}.css-1t412wb{box-sizing:border-box;margin:8px 15px 0px 15px;cursor:pointer;}.css-hhzar2{-webkit-transition:-webkit-transform ease 0.5s;-webkit-transition:transform ease 0.5s;transition:transform ease 0.5s;}.css-t54hv4{-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-1r2j9qz{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-e1ipqs{font-size:1rem;line-height:1.5rem;padding:0px 30px 0px 0px;}.css-e1ipqs a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}.css-e1ipqs a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}.css-1o76pdf{visibility:show;height:100%;padding-bottom:20px;}.css-1sw9s96{visibility:hidden;height:0px;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-1cz6wm{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;font-family:’nyt-franklin’,arial,helvetica,sans-serif;text-align:left;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1cz6wm{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-1cz6wm:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1cz6wm{border:none;padding:20px 0 0;border-top:1px solid #121212;}Frequently Asked Questions About the New Stimulus PackageThe stimulus payments would be $1,400 for most recipients. Those who are eligible would also receive an identical payment for each of their children. To qualify for the full $1,400, a single person would need an adjusted gross income of $75,000 or below. For heads of household, adjusted gross income would need to be $112,500 or below, and for married couples filing jointly that number would need to be $150,000 or below. To be eligible for a payment, a person must have a Social Security number. Read more. Buying insurance through the government program known as COBRA would temporarily become a lot cheaper. COBRA, for the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, generally lets someone who loses a job buy coverage via the former employer. But it’s expensive: Under normal circumstances, a person may have to pay at least 102 percent of the cost of the premium. Under the relief bill, the government would pay the entire COBRA premium from April 1 through Sept. 30. A person who qualified for new, employer-based health insurance someplace else before Sept. 30 would lose eligibility for the no-cost coverage. And someone who left a job voluntarily would not be eligible, either. Read moreThis credit, which helps working families offset the cost of care for children under 13 and other dependents, would be significantly expanded for a single year. More people would be eligible, and many recipients would get a bigger break. The bill would also make the credit fully refundable, which means you could collect the money as a refund even if your tax bill was zero. “That will be helpful to people at the lower end” of the income scale, said Mark Luscombe, principal federal tax analyst at Wolters Kluwer Tax & Accounting. Read more.There would be a big one for people who already have debt. You wouldn’t have to pay income taxes on forgiven debt if you qualify for loan forgiveness or cancellation — for example, if you’ve been in an income-driven repayment plan for the requisite number of years, if your school defrauded you or if Congress or the president wipes away $10,000 of debt for large numbers of people. This would be the case for debt forgiven between Jan. 1, 2021, and the end of 2025. Read more.The bill would provide billions of dollars in rental and utility assistance to people who are struggling and in danger of being evicted from their homes. About $27 billion would go toward emergency rental assistance. The vast majority of it would replenish the so-called Coronavirus Relief Fund, created by the CARES Act and distributed through state, local and tribal governments, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. That’s on top of the $25 billion in assistance provided by the relief package passed in December. To receive financial assistance — which could be used for rent, utilities and other housing expenses — households would have to meet several conditions. Household income could not exceed 80 percent of the area median income, at least one household member must be at risk of homelessness or housing instability, and individuals would have to qualify for unemployment benefits or have experienced financial hardship (directly or indirectly) because of the pandemic. Assistance could be provided for up to 18 months, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. Lower-income families that have been unemployed for three months or more would be given priority for assistance. Read more.And by the end of the week, Mr. McCarthy announced he and a group of House Republicans would travel to the border on Monday in a bid to highlight the problem there — and change the subject.After spending the campaign vowing to find common ground with Republicans and make Washington work again, Mr. Biden, in his first major act as president, prioritized speed and scale over bipartisanship.He and his top aides believe in legislative momentum, that success begets success and that they’ll be able to push through another pricey bill — this one to build roads, bridges and broadband — because of their early win on Covid-19 relief.“The fact that we could do it without Republicans forces them to the table,” said a senior White House official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the nitty-gritty of lawmaking.Yet to the G.O.P. lawmakers who have signaled a willingness to work with the new administration, Mr. Biden’s determination to push through the stimulus without G.O.P. votes will imperil the rest of his agenda.“What I would be worried about if I were them is what does this do to jeopardize bipartisan cooperation on other things you want to do — you can’t do everything by reconciliation,” said Senator John Cornyn of Texas, alluding to the parliamentary procedure by which the Senate can approve legislation by a simple majority. “I’ve heard some of our members say that, ‘If you’re going to waste all this money on unrelated matters, I’m really not interested in spending a bunch more money on infrastructure.’”To Senator Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, who was one of the Senate Republicans who went to the White House last month pitching a slimmed-down stimulus, it’s downright bizarre to hear Democrats claiming their 2010 difficulties stemmed from not going big.“I would argue it was too big, it was unfocused, it was wasted money,” Ms. Capito said.To Democrats, though, they are avoiding, not repeating, their past mistakes.“The public didn’t know about the Affordable Care Act and the administration was not exactly advertising,” Ms. Pelosi told reporters last week.Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, was just as blunt, singling out the Maine moderate who was wooed by Mr. Obama to ensure bipartisan support for the 2009 Recovery Act but whose appeals for a far-smaller compromise bill were ignored last month.“We made a big mistake in 2009 and ’10, Susan Collins was part of that mistake,” Mr. Schumer said on CNN. “We cut back on the stimulus dramatically and we stayed in recession for five years.”And, he could have noted, his party would not have full control of both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue for another decade.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 213 Shares139 Views

      in Elections

      'Help is on the way': Democrats cheer as US House passes $1.9tn Covid relief plan – video

      by

      The House of Representatives gave final approval on Wednesday to one of the largest economic stimulus measures in US history, a sweeping $1.9tn Covid-19 relief bill that gives Joe Biden his first major victory in office. The measure provides $400bn for $1,400 direct payments to most Americans, $350bn in aid to state and local governments, an expansion of the child tax credit, and increased funding for vaccine distribution. ‘This is the most consequential legislation that many of us will ever be a party to,’ the House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, said at a ceremony to sign the bill before it goes to the White House
      US House passes $1.9tn Covid relief plan in major legislative victory for Biden
      US news – live updates More