Tuesday, Dec 24th
Last update09:30:35 AM GMT
Congressional Glance
The nearly party-line votes came after Democrats had been pressing for the findings to be published even though the Florida Republican left Congress and withdrew as President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general.
Republicans have argued that any congressional probe into Gaetz ended when he resigned from the House. Speaker Mike Johnson also requested that the committee not publish its report, saying it would be a terrible precedent to set.
A hearing examining the Secret Service’s response to the assassination attempts against Donald Trump went off the rails on Thursday, when a screaming match broke out between the agency’s acting director, Ronald Rowe, and a Republican representative.
The hearing, hosted by the House taskforce established shortly after the first assassination attempt against Trump in July, was meant to explore the steps that the Secret Service has taken to improve security measures of protectees, but Pat Fallon, a Republican of Texas, took the questioning of Rowe in a different direction.
Fallon displayed an enlarged photo from a commemoration of the September 11 attacks in New York, which both Joe Biden and Trump attended earlier this year. Fallon accused Rowe, who was standing directly behind Biden and Kamala Harris in the photo, of taking the place of the special agent in charge that day and endangering the president’s security for the sake of a photo op.
Democrat Derek Tran ousted Republican Michelle Steel in a southern California House district Wednesday that was specifically drawn to give Asian Americans a stronger voice on Capitol Hill.
Steel said in a statement: “Like all journeys, this one is ending for a new one to begin.” When she captured the seat in 2020, Steel joined Washington state Democrat Marilyn Strickland and California Republican Young Kim as the first Korean American women elected to Congress.
Tran, a lawyer and worker rights advocate and the son of Vietnamese refugees, declared victory earlier this week. He said his win “is a testament to the spirit and resilience of our community. As the son of Vietnamese refugees, I understand firsthand the journey and sacrifices many families in our district have made for a better life.”
The US general who was photographed as the last American soldier to leave Afghanistan is seeing a promotion blocked by a sole Republican senator, multiple outlets reported.
The move comes amid separate reports that the incoming Trump administration is considering courts martial, for offenses including treason, for officers involved in the evacuation.
Lt Gen Christopher Donahue, 55, is Joe Biden’s nominee to lead the US army in Europe. On Thursday, his name was missing from a list of nearly 1,000 promotions approved by the Senate armed services committee.
The Senate is set for a late night on Wednesday, as Democrats attempt to shepherd through a number of judicial nominees to fill vacancies weeks before they hand over control of the upper chamber to Republicans in January.
The chamber is set to hold votes that could last into Thursday as part of the push, marking the second night where members will be burning the midnight oil. That judicial offensive kicked off on Monday, when Democrats unexpectedly sought to advance more than a dozen judges, including a highly contentious circuit court nominee.
The U.S. House Committee on Ethics is deadlocked on whether to release its report into former Rep. Matt Gaetz, whose nomination to serve as President-elect Donald Trump's attorney general has been plagued by controversy.
After meeting behind closed doors for about two hours Wednesday, panel Chair Michael Guest, R-Miss., told reporters "there was not an agreement by the committee to release the report."
Ranking Member Susan Wild, D-Pa., said shortly after that there was "no consensus" on the issue, and that the committee will revisit the matter in a meeting on Dec. 5.
"I will say that a vote was taken," Wild said. "As many of you know, this committee is evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans — five Dems, five Republicans — which means that in order to affirmatively move something forward, somebody has to cross party lines and vote with the other side ... that did not happen in today's vote."
The Biden administration is aggressively pushing senators to bless continued U.S. weapons shipments for Israel ahead of a first-of-its-kind vote in Congress on the policy, HuffPost has learned ― and administration officials are suggesting lawmakers who vote against the arms are empowering American and Israeli foes from Iran to the militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah, which the U.S. treats as terror organizations.
HuffPost obtained a copy of talking points the administration is circulating on Capitol Hill ahead of a Wednesday vote on several tranches of military equipment that President Joe Biden wants to send Israel. The White House sent the document to multiple Democratic Senate offices on Tuesday, two Senate aides who requested anonymity to speak frankly told HuffPost.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is also privately pressing senators to endorse the ongoing flow of military equipment to Israel, according to one of the aides.
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