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Georgia loss fuels GOP divisions over Trump

Herschel Walker’s loss in the Georgia Senate runoff is setting off a fresh round of recriminations among Senate Republicans, with allies of Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) pointing the finger at former President Trump’s involvement in Senate GOP primaries and discontented conservatives blaming their leadership for lacking an agenda.  

Tuesday’s loss in Georgia reopened the Election Day wound of failing to defeat a single Senate Democratic incumbent or hold onto retiring Sen. Pat Toomey’s (R-Pa.) seat. It’s the first time in recent memory that no incumbent from the president’s party was defeated in a midterm election.

Trump’s Senate critics put the loss in Georgia and other races squarely on his shoulders, arguing his endorsement helped weak candidates win nominations and his relentless claims — unsupported by evidence — that the 2020 election was stolen turned off many voters. 

“Whether we talk about it or not, Trump was going to be a factor and [for] a lot of the folks that he endorsed he insisted the predicate for that endorsement be that the 2020 election was stolen and that’s a losing argument,” Senate Republican Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) said.  

“His obsession with the 2020 election became an albatross and a real liability for people who are running, especially in swing states,” Thune added.  

Sen. Mitt Romney (Utah), one of Trump’s most vocal Senate GOP critics, said Trump had a huge influence on which candidates advanced to the general election because of his influence among Republican primary voters.  

“President Trump has a big impact on the primary and the general. If you get endorsed by him in the primary, you’re likely to win. If you’re endorsed by him in the general, you’re likely to lose. For someone who actually wants to win an election, getting endorsed by President Trump is the kiss of death,” Romney said.  

Toomey, whose seat will be held by Democrat John Fetterman in 2023, echoed those comments.  

“I think it was the badly flawed candidates, candidates that were too clearly aligned with Trump, that’s what was being rejected,” he said.

Toomey noted the Republican gubernatorial candidate in Pennsylvania, Doug Mastriano, embraced Trump’s stolen-election claim and lost by 15 points. That, in turn, was a drag on the party’s Senate candidate, Mehmet Oz, who lost Pennsylvania only by four points. 

Mastriano, a state senator, beat eight other candidates to win the party’s nomination. Trump also endorsed Oz in the primary.

Toomey added Oz wasn’t helped by Trump showing up in Pennsylvania the weekend before Election Day. Trump held a rally with Oz and Mastriano in Latrobe.  

“A guy losing by 15 points at the top of the ticket makes it very, very hard for down-ballot races,” Toomey said. “It wasn’t only Oz who was affected. We lost three House races that could have been pick-ups.” 

Other Republicans described Trump’s drag on Republican candidates in more general terms, arguing candidates who tried to relitigate the results of the 2020 election failed to talk enough about what voters could expect in the future if they won election to the Senate.  

“I think there are two major lessons. One is we need to look forward and that candidates who looked back at the 2020 presidential election did not generally fare that well,” said Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), a prominent Republican moderate. “Second, we need to do a better job as Republicans in appealing to moderate voters.”  

Trump’s Senate allies, however, rallied to his defense and instead blamed the failure of party leaders in Washington to draft an agenda that appealed to working-class voters who turned out in huge numbers for Trump in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections.  

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a close Trump ally, said the claim by fellow GOP senators that Trump is to blame for dragging down Senate Republican candidates was overblown. 

“That analysis makes sense in some places, not in others — not in Georgia,” he said.  

President Biden beat Trump by roughly 12,000 votes in Georgia in 2020.  

He argued Senate Republican candidates were hurt by the failure of the national party to develop a more effective early voting program and to generate enough fundraising to compete with Democratic candidates who outspent their GOP rivals in key races. 

“We’ve got to improve early voting and we’ve got to find a way to be more competitive financially,” he said. “Structurally, we’ve got a problem in several states. [Democrats] get too far ahead in early voting. We got to fix that and they’re outspending us three and four to one.” 

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who traveled to Mar-a-Lago last year to give Trump a “Champion of Freedom” award dismissed criticisms that Walker was a flawed candidate or that his association with Trump turned off voters. 

“I’m really disappointed. Herschel’s a really good person and he’s a good candidate. He would have been a really good U.S. senator,” he said. “If you look at the guy’s background. He’s a successful business guy, he’s a successful football player, he’s a hard worker. If you meet him, he’s a sincere person.” 

Like Graham, he said Walker and other Republican candidates fell behind their Democratic opponents in early voting.  

He also criticized the failure by Republican leaders in Washington to lay out a compelling message for how they would govern if in control of Congress.  

“We all have to sit back and say to ourselves, ‘What’s our message? What message do we have? Do we have the right message to get voters to support us?” he said, noting that Senate Republican conservatives will convene a special conference meeting next week to discuss the direction of the party.  

Scott said he hadn’t seen any polls showing that Trump’s influence hurt Walker.  

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) said the lesson from Georgia is that Republican leaders need to work on a better party agenda. 

“Another Senate election, another GOP loss. Maybe time for Senate GOP to change direction, craft a new agenda to, you know, appeal to voters. Just a thought,” he tweeted.  

Scott challenged McConnell for the Senate’s top Republican leadership position in an acrimonious race last month. Graham and Hawley both voted for him.  

Democrats came away from the Nov. 8 election and Tuesday’s runoff in Georgia convinced that Trump and his “Make America Great Again” brand of GOP politics helped them expand their Senate majority despite predictions earlier in the year that they would lose control of the chamber.  

“In May and June, the public began to realize how far right these MAGA Republicans had gone. The Dobbs decision was the crystallization of that, of course, when people said, ‘Wow these MAGA Republicans are serious about turning the clock all the way back,’” Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) told reporters Wednesday. 

He credited the House Jan. 6 hearings for keeping Trump’s election fraud claims in the spotlight as well as his role in encouraging last year’s attack on the Capitol.   

“There were the Jan. 6 hearings. I think they had an important effect because people didn’t just read about something that happened once but every night they saw on TV these hooligans, these insurrections being violent, beating up police officers,” he said.

Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), who beat Walker by nearly 3 points to keep the Georgia seat in Democratic hands, said voters rejected Trump’s divisive brand of politics.  

“I think that the voters of Georgia rejected the politics of division. They saw my real effort to build relationships, even with people on the other side of the aisle and to stay focused on doing the people’s work,” he said. “I think too often the politics has been about the politicians.”  

Source: TEST FEED1

How Democrats won the midterms

Democrats defied expectations up and down the ballot in 2022 despite facing historic headwinds and other challenges going into the midterms. 

Throughout the year, Democrats braced for losses as Republicans worked to tie the party’s candidates over a plethora of issues including rising inflation, crime and the flow of migrants over the southern border. President Biden was also seen as a liability for Democrats as he suffered low approval ratings.  

However, Democrats were able to grow their majority in the Senate, retain and win a number of gubernatorial and state-level races, and temper their losses in the House.  

While Republicans are blaming the GOP’s losses on former President Trump and poor GOP candidates, many Democrats argue that their candidates’ wins came down to their party’s messaging.  

On Wednesday morning, Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) credited the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade and the House Jan. 6 Committee hearings as factors in his party expanding its majority this election.  

“In May and June, the public began to realize how far right these MAGA Republicans had gone. The Dobbs decision was the crystallization of that, of course, when people said, ‘Wow these MAGA Republicans are serious about turning the clock all the way back,’ ” Schumer told reporters.  

Democratic strategists and operatives agree that abortion access and the Supreme Court striking down the federal right to an abortion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization played a pivotal role in turning the tide for the party, despite skepticism that either issue would trump concerns about rising inflation.  

“A huge part of the Democratic message that I think sunk in, that worked so well also because it was the reality that Americans were facing, is that abortion rights is an economic issue,” said Christina Polizzi, communications director at the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee.  

“You are not fully in control of your financial future if you cannot decide when to start a family, how to start a family, how to expand your family. All of those things matter to your finances,” she added.  

And exit polling shows that abortion proved to be a top priority for voters in a number of competitive races. Twenty-seven percent of voters said that abortion was the most important issue in deciding their vote, only behind inflation at 31 percent.  

Meanwhile, voters in California, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana and Vermont weighed on abortion ballot measures in their states and the abortion rights side came out victorious.  

“Not only did Dobbs play a role but the Republican response to Dobbs when they introduced things like a national abortion ban [and] when these states moved quickly to try to limit peoples’ reproductive freedoms,” Antjuan Seawright, Democratic strategist and senior adviser to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said. “I think that that collectively made a heck of a difference, and it gave us a unique constituency that made up a unique coalition to give us the chance of a 50-50 jump ball.” 

Additionally, Democrats say they delivered on financial relief for voters through legislation passed by lawmakers in state legislatures and in Congress, including the Inflation Reduction Act and COVID-19 stimulus measures.  

“Republicans were screaming their heads off about these issues but they weren’t actually offering any solutions,” Polizzi said. 

In competitive governor’s races, Democrats point to incumbent governors like Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) and Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly (D) as taking the economy and inflation head-on in their messaging.  

“A lot of our incumbents were successful because they were able to communicate that they understand the tough economic times that families were facing and that they were actually doing things about it,” said Noam Lee, executive director at the Democratic Governors Association.  

Seawright echoed this sentiment.  

“The Republicans had no ability to be able to define us from a policy perspective because every single legislative item that has passed the House and the Senate, signed into law by the president, has had bipartisan applause and approval all across the country,” he said.  

Democrats have also touted what they say was their high candidate quality and the GOP’s poor candidate quality, pointing to Trump-backed candidates like Senate candidates Herschel Walker and Mehmet Oz and gubernatorial candidates Doug Mastriano and Kari Lake.  

“The American people rejected the right-wing, MAGA, election-denying extremists who now have a large say so and chemically make up the Republican Party,” Seawright said.  

But Democrats push back on the notion that their candidates performed better than expected due to Republicans running bad candidates, noting that it’s the Republican base that elects these candidates in the primaries in the first place.  

“It is right to ask that question but essentially it’s sort of almost a moot point because Republicans cannot get themselves out of this cycle where they are running more extreme candidates because it’s the way they’ve allowed their party to drift,” Polizzi said.  

From a logistical standpoint, Democrats say a lot of credit is due to early investments in the campaigns. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee put more money into its ground game than it did into television and other media. The DCCC launched seven-figure advertising investments to galvanize Latino and AAPI voters and rolled out its earliest-ever radio and print outreach campaign to Black voters.  

“There was a real concentration not just on registration but on engagement, motivation, and then in the end participation,” Seawright said.  

Polizzi called for further investment for Democrats in state legislature races.  

“We can win big at the state legislative level of the ballot and we need investments that allow us to do that,” she said. “I think Democrats have a tendency to look at state legislatures and think oh well this problem is really big and it’s really hard, so let’s just focus on federal power. But I think what this election showed is that if you hone in on state legislature chambers, you can win them.”  

Still, some of the Democrats’ biggest victories were won by relatively narrow margins. Incumbent Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock (D) defeated Walker by just under 3 points, while incumbent Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) defeated Republican Adam Laxalt by roughly 1 point.  

While Democrats are taking a moment to celebrate their victories after a contentious midterm cycle, the party will still face tough contests going into 2023 and 2024.  

“Voters do not want extreme elected officials, they want elected officials that are going to focus on the issues that matter to them,” Polizzi said. “Democrats need to continue focusing on those issues [and] talk about our policies because the reality is when we run on what Democrats actually want to do, we win.”  

Source: TEST FEED1

Lawmakers face closing window to pass landmark bipartisan marijuana bill

Lawmakers are facing a rapidly closing window to get key marijuana legislation across the finish line in the lame-duck session.

Despite fetching broad bipartisan support in the House and Senate, opposition from GOP leadership and a tightening timeline is chipping away at the bill’s chances of passage.

The measure, called the SAFE Banking Act, would undo federal restrictions that discourage banks and other financial institutions from offering services to legally operating cannabis businesses. 

Supporters say the bill is desperately needed to crack down on persistent robberies of cannabis businesses, which are forced to carry huge amounts of cash, as well as make it easier for those companies to secure loans at reasonable rates.

But with little legislative time left on the calendar, supporters of the bill, which has passed the House seven times, are divided over how to pass it before January. And they fear it’s even less likely to pass in a divided Congress.

“We still got amendments on the floor. We still got a continuing resolution,” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), who has also been leading efforts pushing the bill in the upper chamber, told The Hill on Wednesday. “We may have an omnibus. Not giving up on this Congress.”

Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), a lead negotiator for the bill, told The Hill on Tuesday that he’s hopeful the measure will be attached to a potential government funding omnibus that members on both sides want to see pass before year’s end. 

“We’ve got nine [GOP] co-sponsors and probably some other Republicans who support it that aren’t on the bill. So, there’s some support for it,” Daines said.

But Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) opposed efforts to link the bill to the must-pass National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) – which many Republicans, including the banking bill’s cosponsors, agreed with.

“We get a lot of bad legislation when we do that, and the bad outweighs the good,” Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), one of the co-sponsors for the marijuana banking bill, told The Hill. “So, I don’t want it on the omnibus, and I don’t want non-defense items hooked to the NDAA.”

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D), another co-sponsor, told The Hill that he’s hopeful to see the bill finally pass in the coming weeks, but added it’s “hard for me to see a path this year.” 

“We’re gonna have to spend some time, I think, just talking to people, and some people don’t have to come around. You know, you don’t need unanimity,” Cramer said, acknowledging “just the subject matter itself” makes some members “very uncomfortable.”

Though the bill has Republican backers even outside those co-sponsoring the measure, there is still pushback within the caucus, party members say. Among the loudest has been McConnell, who this week knocked the bill as a measure that aims to make “our financial system more sympathetic to illegal drugs.”

“I’m for the SAFE Banking Act, but there’s a lot of resistance in our conference and it’s come up in two different meetings this week,” Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), who is retiring at the end of the year, told The Hill, “and, I’m not sure how close to evenly divided we are, but we’re pretty divided.”

Blunt, who serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee, also cast doubt on the chances of the bill being attached to any omnibus this month, saying it’s up to the “final negotiators to decide if it costs votes on the package are not.”

Pressed about how McConnell’s support impacts his push for the marijuana banking bill to pass in the current congressional session, Daines said he thinks McConnell is “listening and we’re gonna see where it all goes here in the next couple of weeks.”

The Department of Justice created another hurdle for the SAFE Banking Act when it released a memo Friday saying the bill might need to undergo technical changes so that it doesn’t complicate investigations into drug crimes.

Some Republicans have punted blame to the other side of the aisle for not bringing up the bill sooner.

The bill was included in last year’s House-passed NDAA, but Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) stripped it out because it didn’t include any measures to address damage done to minority communities by the war on drugs.  

President Biden in October pardoned those with simple marijuana convictions, but the order will only apply to a few thousand people who were convicted with federal charges.

As the vast majority of marijuana convictions come at the state level, Democrats want to combine SAFE Banking with the HOPE Act, a bipartisan proposal that would incentivize states to expunge cannabis convictions. 

Meanwhile, Republicans want to include the GRAM Act, which would allow individuals with a cannabis conviction in weed-legal states to purchase firearms.

The cannabis industry is urging Congress to pass SAFE Banking in the lame duck session, arguing that while it enjoys substantial GOP support, Republican leaders would not prioritize its passage after the House flips to Republican control.

“We remain optimistic that we’ll see cannabis reforms appear in another legislative vehicle in the coming weeks,” U.S. Cannabis Council CEO Khadijah Tribble said in a statement.

The banking industry is also lobbying for the bill. The Independent Community Bankers of America commissioned a Morning Consult poll showing that nearly two-thirds of voters support allowing cannabis businesses to access banking services in weed-legal states.

“This legislation enjoys strong, bipartisan support, would resolve a conflict between state and federal law, and addresses a critical public safety concern. We urge its enactment without further delay,” read a recent letter to Senate leaders from the community bankers’ group and 44 state banking associations. 

Source: TEST FEED1

Bruised Republicans point fingers after failure to capture Senate

Senate Republicans, fresh off their loss in the Georgia runoff, began their post-mortem Wednesday after a dreadful midterm cycle that saw every Democratic incumbent win and resigned them to at least two more years in the minority.

Nearly a dozen Senate GOP members who talked to The Hill laid out a troubling picture for the party following Herschel Walker’s loss to Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), as it prepares to fight the 2024 battle on what is expected to be friendlier terrain. Most cited three preeminent reasons for the poor midterm performance: Candidate quality, the inability to look beyond the 2020 election results and the presence of former President Trump. 

“The voters made the final verdict,” Sen. John Thune (S.D.), the No. 2 Senate Republican, told reporters. “What they concluded in a lot of these states was, whether we talk about it or not, Trump was going to be a factor. … His obsession with the 2020 election became an albatross and a real liability for people that were running, especially in swing states.” 

While Trump is never shy about touting his record for candidates he endorsed, one stat he is not expected to note in the coming months is how those he backed in Biden-won swing states fared in the midterms. In Senate, gubernatorial and secretary of state races, Trump-endorsed candidates went 2-14, with only Gov.-elect Joe Lombardo (R) in Nevada and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) emerging victorious.

The question of candidate quality was also top of mind for a number of Senate Republicans. The item has been at the forefront for the GOP ever since Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) raised the issue in August as myriad Republican candidates struggled financially and polling-wise against Democratic incumbents across the map. 

“Candidates matter,” said Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), who is retiring at the end of the year. “We lost two or three or four races we didn’t have to lose this year.”

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who ran the Senate GOP’s campaign arm this cycle, defended the party’s slate of candidates, including Walker, in the aftermath of the runoff. But that hasn’t halted the drumbeat for the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) to resume its previous practice of putting its finger on the scale to aid electable candidates. 

Scott repeatedly declined to intervene in primaries this cycle, citing the need to let the voters speak for themselves. 

“You can’t win a general election just appealing to your base,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), a top McConnell ally who ran the NRSC during a tumultuous 2012 cycle where multiple candidates who were not ready for prime time — Sharron Angle in Nevada, Christine O’Donnell in Delaware and former Rep. Todd Akin in Missouri — emerged from primary battles and lost in November. Democrats similarly expanded their majority that year. 

“That’s always fraught with difficulty,” Cornyn said of the committee inserting itself in primaries. “Whether it’s the national committee getting involved in the primary or whether it’s some of the outside groups … I think there needs to be a focus on: how do we nominate the most conservative person who can get elected in a general election.”

According to one leading Democrat, however, a major factor holding back the GOP was that voters just didn’t like what Republicans were offering this cycle. Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), the outgoing Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee chairman, argued that for all of the messaging on the GOP side, Republicans did a poor job at laying out remedies to problems. Specifically, he cited the Inflation Reduction Act, which every Republican voted against, and their opposition to efforts to lower prescription drugs for seniors, which Democrats were able to message on in the final weeks of the campaign. 

“The polls didn’t show that people particularly liked Republicans. It wasn’t like ‘let’s bring all the Republicans back,’” Peters said.

“That’s such an easy message,” he added about the prescription drugs issue.  

Structurally, Senate Republicans also pressed that the years-long effort by Trump and his allies to dissuade voters from mail voting is harming the party’s ability to win. On top of Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, a number of lawmakers — including numerous Trump allies such as Sens. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) and Scott — pressed that the party must convince its voters that voting by mail is safe and must be embraced.

Nowhere is that situation more acute than in Arizona, which took roughly a week to finalize its results due in large part because instead of dropping their ballots in the mail, a record number of voters dropped off their ballots on Election Day, causing an unprecedented delay in Maricopa County. Statewide GOP candidates who dismissed that idea, including gubernatorial hopeful Kari Lake and secretary of state candidate Mark Finchem, lost. 

“We’ve got two years to convince Republicans that we have a voting month and not a voting day,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who won his eighth term in November. “Election month, not an Election Day.”

Of the 33 seats up in 2024, 23 are held by Democrats, including Sens. Joe Manchin (W.Va.), Jon Tester (Mont.), Sherrod Brown (Ohio) and Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.). But the prospect of battling for these seats with Trump atop the ticket for the third time in three presidential cycles is something that is not appetizing for some lawmakers. 

“The data is just overwhelmingly consistent and compelling. The candidates whose primary qualification for running for high office was their loyalty to Donald Trump did very badly especially compared to, let’s say, more conventional Republicans, including many who had tension with Trump,” Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who voted to convict Trump for his actions on Jan. 6, 2021 and is retiring. 

“It’s so obvious that it’s stunning,” Toomey added.

Source: TEST FEED1

Conservatives ramp up pressure on McConnell to block spending bill

Senate conservatives are trying to tighten the screws on Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and other GOP colleagues in hopes of blocking a year-end omnibus spending bill, threatening to drag out the floor debate right up until Christmas if necessary.

The new push from conservatives to instead pass a stop-gap spending bill freezing federal spending levels until next year, when Republicans will control the House, comes the day after Republican candidate Herschel Walker lost in the Georgia Senate runoff. 

That loss expanded Democrats’ Senate majority in the next Congress and marked the latest GOP disappointment of the midterm election cycle, which Republicans entered with high hopes of recapturing the Senate.  

Senate Republican Steering Committee Chairman Mike Lee (R-Utah) argued Wednesday that Republican leaders will break nearly three decades of precedent if they agree to an omnibus spending package in the lame-duck after a chamber of Congress has flipped control.  

“With regard to the spending bill, it’s important to remember that since 1994 we’ve seen control of the House of Representatives shift from one party to another four times since 1994. In each of those instances, there was no omnibus passed by Congress following the election leading to that shift,” he said. “It didn’t happen because it shouldn’t happen.” 

“The voters have spoken and [when] control of the House of Representatives shifts, there’s an understandable desire on part of the incoming members and especially on the part of those who elected them [that] you’re not going to have spending decisions by the outgoing Congress that was just voted out of office,” Lee argued.  

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Rick Scott (R-Fla.) said, “this has got to stop.”  

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said Congress has “abdicated our duty” to hold the “power of the purse.”  

“We abdicated by letting all the spending be thrown into one bill. This is going to happen again,” Paul said. “Dec. 16, Dec. 18, we’re going to get a 3,000 page bill that will be given to us an hour or two before [coming to the floor.] No one will read it, no one will know what [is in it] but what is a guarantee is that it will add over $1 trillion in debt next year.” 

Lee and Paul both declined to rule out raising procedural objections that could drag out the Senate floor debate on an omnibus right up until — or past — Christmas. 

“I’m not going to rule that out. I usually don’t signal in advance precise procedural strategies that I might deploy but I’m not going to rule that one out,” Lee told The Hill.  

Paul also declined to preview what he might do on the floor but also reserved the right to raise procedural objections to bog down a year-end spending package.  

“Some of that depends on where we are in the whole debate process but I’m not very happy about it and someone needs to stand up and say this is a terrible way to run government,” Paul told The Hill. 

“This is why we have $31 trillion debt,” he said. “It’s inexcusable to have 3,000-page bills dropped on our desk that nobody has time to read that don’t go through a budgetary process or appropriations process.” 

Lee, Paul and Scott joined three other Senate Republican colleagues in sending a letter to McConnell Wednesday to “express our strong opposition to passing the Pelosi-Schumer spending bill in the lame-duck,” referring to Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who will step down from her leadership post at the end of the year.  

“For the Senate to ram through a so-called ‘omnibus’ bill — which would fund the entirety of the Pelosi-Schumer spending agenda through most of next year — would utterly disempower the new Republican House from enacting our shared priorities,” they wrote.  

Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Mike Braun (R-Ind.) also signed the letter.  

Despite the push from conservatives to pass a continue resolution instead of an omnibus, McConnell has stated his preference for passing one large bill that wraps all the annual spending bills into one large package.  

Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) told reporters Wednesday that he is continuing to negotiate with the panel’s chairman, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), in hopes of reaching a deal setting the top line spending numbers for the omnibus. Both Shelby and Leahy are retiring at the end of the year.

“Right now we’re probably $25 billion, $26 billion” apart from Democrats on where the top-line spending number should be, Shelby said.  

“That’s a lot of money,” he added. “It’s something we maybe could work to yes on. I hope we could. I just talked to Leahy.”  

Source: TEST FEED1

Biden administration to appeal ruling striking Title 42, pledges new regulation from CDC

The Biden administration on Wednesday said it plans to appeal a court ruling striking down the Title 42 policy limiting asylum, forecasting that public health authorities plan to write a new regulation to replace it.

The coming appeal puts the Department of Homeland Security at the center of conflicting court cases on Title 42, which allows border officials to rapidly expel migrants on public health grounds without allowing them to seek asylum.

“CDC’s Title 42 Orders were lawful … [and] this Court erred in vacating those agency actions,” the government wrote in a filing before the District Court for the District of Columbia, which struck down Title 42 on Nov. 15.

In appealing the case, the Biden administration seeks to challenge a ruling that mooted a decision by another court in a case brought by the state of Louisiana, which had blocked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from rescinding the policy with its April order.

Title 42, crafted in the early days of COVID-19 by the Trump administration, was marketed as a pandemic response policy, but many observers deemed it a transparent attempt to use the pandemic as an excuse to gut the asylum program.

The latest twist in the litigation continues the Biden administration’s complex relationship with the policy, which they have now used to expel far more migrants than under Trump.

“We are not surprised by the decision to appeal given the Biden administration’s vigorous legal defense of Title 42 over the past two years,” Lee Gelernt, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union representing those suing over Title 42.

Wednesday’s filing also indicates that the nation’s public health authorities are grappling with another policy that that could have implications at the border.

“HHS [The Department of Health and Human Services] and CDC have themselves decided to undertake a new rulemaking to reconsider the framework under which the CDC Director may exercise her authority under [Title 42] to respond to dangers posed by future communicable diseases,” according to the filing.

The portion of the law references in the filing specifically deals with the “suspension of entries and imports.”

The CDC did not immediately respond to request for comment seeking more details about the forthcoming rulemaking.

Any new policy limiting migration based on public health under Title 42 could run counter to the CDC’s determination in April that the order limiting asylum was no longer necessary.

“Based on the public health landscape, the current status of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the procedures in place for the processing of covered noncitizens … CDC has determined that a suspension of the right to introduce such covered noncitizens is no longer necessary to protect U.S. citizens,” the CDC wrote at the time.

But the rule comes after Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas hinted that the department would explore other ways to limit migration for Venezuelans after the fall of Title 42. 

In its filing with the court, the Department of Homeland Security said it would likewise seek a pause in litigation with Louisiana, where the government is arguing CDC properly rescinded Title 42 and its termination should be allowed to take effect.

Homeland Security noted that the new regulations from CDC “could likewise moot” the issues underpinning the Louisiana case.

In the ACLU case however, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan last month found the rollout of Title 42 violated the Administrative Procedures Act, writing the government “failed to adequately consider alternatives and the policy did not rationally serve its stated purpose.”

The judge also noted the CDC’s “decision to ignore the harm” caused by the policy likewise violated the Administrative Procedures Act.

“It is unreasonable for the CDC to assume that it can ignore the consequences of any actions it chooses to take in the pursuit of fulfilling its goals, particularly when those actions included the extraordinary decision to suspend the codified procedural and substantive rights of noncitizens seeking safe harbor,” Sullivan wrote, noting warnings that migrants often face persecution and violence once expelled.”

Updated at 5:25 p.m.

Source: TEST FEED1

The Memo: Trump suffers double blow with Walker defeat, courtroom loss

Former President Trump suffered a double blow on Tuesday with Herschel Walker’s defeat in Georgia’s Senate runoff and, roughly 750 miles away in New York, the Trump Organization and a related company being found guilty on all counts in a fraud trial.

The two new setbacks deepen the gloom during a miserable period for the former president — one that has left him at his lowest political ebb since the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

Making matters worse, the bad stretch coincides with the launch of Trump’s 2024 campaign, which he announced with a lackluster speech at Mar-a-Lago on Nov. 15.

The following week, the former president ignited the first of two damaging controversies when he had dinner with two prominent antisemites, Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, and Nick Fuentes. 

Then, on Saturday, he called on social media for the “termination” of parts of the U.S. Constitution.

Meanwhile, legal troubles continue to crowd in on Trump. 

Tuesday’s guilty verdicts, pertaining mostly to dodging tax on perks to employees, may be only the tip of the iceberg. 

Those judgments were rendered against Trump businesses rather than him personally. But it will be a different story if indictments are brought — as they plausibly could be — regarding sensitive information discovered at Mar-a-Lago, the events around Jan. 6, or attempts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election result in Georgia.

Trump’s internal critics feel no surprise at the trouble he has created for himself. But they express frustration at his continued influence on the GOP.

“If the national party’s main focus is on pledging fidelity to a seriously deficient man like Donald Trump over winning, then we are going to have more of this,” former Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.) told this column, alluding to the GOP’s disappointing performance in the midterms.

Sen. Raphael Warnock’s (D-Ga.) win on Tuesday meant Democrats have increased their majority in the upper chamber. Republicans secured a majority in the House, but by a much narrower margin than expected.

“Trying to please Donald Trump [has] helped to bring about this electoral catastrophe,” added Dent, who was elected to seven terms in the House before retiring in 2018.

Dent is a longtime Trump critic. Those who share his views in the GOP appear newly emboldened.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) August warning about “candidate quality” — a clear jab at Trump and his endorsees — has been borne out by results.

Trump picks beyond Walker, including Senate candidates Mehmet Oz, Don Bolduc, Blake Masters and Adam Laxalt, all lost, as did gubernatorial choices Kari Lake, Doug Mastriano and Tudor Dixon.

On top of all that, Republicans unaligned with Trump strongly outperformed his preferred candidates in some states. 

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), whom Trump had tried in vain to defeat in a primary, comfortably beat Democrat Stacey Abrams to win reelection, even as Walker lost his Senate race. 

A similar pattern played out in New Hampshire, where Gov. Chris Sununu (R) won easily while Bolduc, the MAGA-friendly Senate candidate, lost by almost 10 points.

“Republicans will eventually wake up and understand that in order to start winning elections again, especially in purple states, they are going to have to focus on a different leader of the Republican Party other than President Trump,” one GOP strategist told this column, requesting anonymity to speak candidly.

Meanwhile, Trump’s suggestion that parts, or all, of the Constitution could face “termination” drew pushback from senior GOP senators.

McConnell commented dryly that someone who believed the Constitution should “somehow be suspended … would have a very hard time being sworn in as president.”

Two other GOP leadership figures, Sens. John Thune (S.D.) and John Cornyn (Texas), also rebuked Trump, with Cornyn telling CNN the former president’s comment was “irresponsible.”

To be sure, there are many examples of Trump’s demise being forecast only for him to bounce back. He has been declared finished almost from the day in 2015 that he first began his quest for the presidency.

Trump still leads most polls of a 2024 nomination fight. He has a fervent following among millions of grassroots conservatives, a fact that also ensures his 2024 presidential quest will be well funded. He would also benefit from a large field of candidates, given that such a scenario would split the anti-Trump vote.

Todd Belt of George Washington University’s Graduate School of Political Management argued that the poor performance of Trump-backed candidates in key midterm races was more likely to discourage similar figures in the future than truly hurt Trump himself.

“I would say he is diminished as a kingmaker but not at all diminished as a potential presidential nominee,” Belt said.

Others don’t see it quite the same way, however. 

While his critics are not counting the former president out just yet, they contend the GOP’s desire to consign him to the past is growing stronger by the day.

“He in a much weaker position,” said Dent, the former congressman. “He is a diminished figure — but he is still a dangerous one.”

The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.

Source: TEST FEED1

Items with classified markings found in Trump storage unit: reports

Former President Trump’s legal team has found at least two documents with classified markings at a storage unit in West Palm Beach, Fla., in the wake of the FBI’s August search of Mar-a-Lago, several outlets reported on Wednesday.

The documents were immediately turned over to the FBI, according to The Washington Post.

The storage unit, which is maintained by the General Services Administration, was one of several locations searched by an outside group hired by Trump’s lawyers to look for any remaining classified materials.

The move comes after a federal judge asked the former president’s legal team to ensure they fully complied with a subpoena from earlier this year that asked Trump to turn over any remaining classified documents.

The National Archives has said it believes Trump retains possession of at least some White House records that should have been turned over at the end of his presidency.

The Post reported earlier in the day that the group had also in recent weeks searched Trump Tower in New York and the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., but had not found any classified materials.

The group also searched a storage closet at Mar-a-Lago, according to The New York Times.

The West Palm Beach storage unit where the classified documents were found reportedly stored items from a northern Virginia office used by Trump staffers after the president left office, according to the Post.

The latest discovery of misplaced classified documents comes nearly a year after the National Archives and Records Administration first discovered classified materials among several boxes of records recovered from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.

Trump’s lawyers returned several more classified documents in June in response to the subpoena issued to the former president. However, investigators found evidence that suggested more classified materials remained at Mar-a-Lago and recovered additional documents in the FBI’s August search of the resort.

—Updated at 2:47 p.m.

Source: TEST FEED1

Supreme Court signals interest in middle path in major election law clash

The Supreme Court on Wednesday appeared to search for a middle path in an election law clash with weighty stakes for American democracy involving a bid by North Carolina GOP lawmakers to reinstate a Republican-drawn voting map.

Questions posed during three hours of oral argument suggested there was not a majority of justices eager to embrace a sweeping legal theory advanced by Republican state lawmakers that would give near-total authority to state legislatures to design congressional districts and shape the rules governing federal elections in the states.

Instead, some of the court’s conservative justices seemed to favor an outcome that would preserve some role — though perhaps a diminished one — for state courts and constitutions in regulating federal elections.

“You suggest that there’s a ‘narrower alternative ground’ to decide the case in your favor, which would allow some substantive state restrictions to be enforced,” Chief Justice John Roberts asked David Thompson, who represented North Carolina’s legislative leaders. “Could you articulate what that is?”

Conservative Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett also posed questions that seemed to reflect an interest in a ruling that would stop short of completely insulating state legislatures from state-level constraints in carrying out federal elections. 

In concrete terms, the case argued Wednesday was an appeal of a ruling by North Carolina’s top court that ordered a new congressional map to be drawn after finding the GOP’s version violated the state constitution due to its pro-Republican skew.

But the dispute’s broader implications for the future of U.S. democracy have seized national attention.

The North Carolina Republicans’ maximalist argument is that because state legislatures’ power to regulate federal elections comes directly from the U.S. Constitution, legislatures need not follow voter protections built into state constitutions.

Voters and voting rights groups, for their part, urged the justices not to foreclose a role for state courts, constitutions and election administrators in regulating federal elections.

Updated at 1:53 p.m.

Source: TEST FEED1