Nebraska Republican Rep. Adrian Smith began Congress’ recess Friday with plans to return to his home district and hold an infrastructure seminar next week to talk economic development and rural broadband. Pro-impeachment activists hope to crash the party and disrupt the agenda with some mixture of uncomfortable questioning, anti-Trump signage, booing, heckling, or outright protesting. […]
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Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Tuesday announcement regarding the House Democrats’ impeachment plans is less significant than the build-up had suggested. After months of pressure from Democratic colleagues, she declared that the House would begin a formal impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump. While her statement may be a milestone on the path to impeachment, it does […]
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Photo: Alex Wong (Getty Images) Metia hates the grits pot. Whenever it was time to tidy up the house, all the kids in my family had a specific job. Even when our cousins came to visit, they knew the rules. Some people mopped, others swept and we all took turns washing the dishes after a […]
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There’s a certain rhythm to the last two presidential scandals that led to impeachment proceedings. Richard Nixon denied that he had tried to cover up the Watergate break-in during the two-year scandal that followed. The Supreme Court forced him to hand over the White House tapes to prosecutors, including one in which he conspired to […]
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How do you break out of a funk? A change of scenery always helps. That, at least, will be Kamala Harris’s approach. After her notable performance in the June debate for Democratic presidential hopefuls, California’s junior senator is suffering through what an internal campaign memo (accidentally left behind in a New Hampshire restaurant) referred to […]
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After nine months of negotiation, Nancy Pelosi has unveiled her proposal to reduce drug prices. The bill would allow the Secretary of Health and Human Services to negotiate with drug companies on the Medicare prices of between 25 and 250 drugs, setting an upper price limit of 120 percent of the average price of drugs […]
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Want the best of VICE News straight to your inbox? Sign up here. WASHINGTON — After spending the last few years on an apology tour for various scandals, Mark Zuckerberg is now allowing some of his loudest critics to take their swings at him preemptively. In a series of rapid-fire meetings starting Wednesday night, the […]
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On Wednesday, the New York Times published a story on Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, profiling the freshman representative and ostensibly reviewing her evolution after nine months in office. According to the headline, she’s “learned to play by Washington’s rules.” But this isn’t really about Ocasio-Cortez at all: it’s a story about how the Democratic Party disciplines insurgent […]
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The Obamas’ deal with Netflix—a lucrative bag secured last year—trended on Twitter Monday morning after Donald Trump used it to shield himself from accusations he was using the presidency to enrich himself. Trump has drawn renewed scrutiny recently, thanks in part to a federal lawsuit, about whether and how his businesses have benefitted from his […]
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It’s one of the most famous thought experiments ever devised. “A cat is penned up in a steel chamber,” the physicist Erwin Schrödinger wrote in a 1935 paper, “along with the following device (which must be secured against direct interference by the cat): in a Geiger counter, there is a tiny bit of radioactive substance, so […]
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Thursday’s Democratic debate was billed as a kind of battle royal. The first four nights of debates? They were preseason. Now, at long last, the ten leading candidates would appear on the same stage—and everything would again make sound-bite-sized sense in American politics. But even if the party is done with the two-night debate format—and […]
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Former El Paso Congressman Beto O’Rourke launched into a candid tirade against gun violence and assault weapons during Thursday’s Democratic presidential debate — and the GOP didn’t waste any time seizing on the comments as proof that Democrats want to take away Americans’ guns. “Hell, yes,” O’Rourke said in response to a question about whether […]
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HOUSTON — Former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro did not pass up the chance to take a swing at former Vice President Joe Biden in his first answer during the Democratic debates Thursday night in an exchange about healthcare — and made it a personal attack on Biden’s memory. “Are you forgetting what […]
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The ten Democratic candidates on the stage tonight in Houston, Texas will get a shot at speaking to millions of Americans across the country, and will likely talk about everything from healthcare access to gun safety policies. But the host venue for the debate, Texas Southern University, is a more specific audience. The historically black […]
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In this Democratic primary, it can be difficult to distinguish between the candidates’ various criminal justice reform proposals—but at least they have them. Finally, maybe, Democratic presidential candidates no longer need to signal their “tough on crime” stance. They can propose that some criminal laws should be scrapped. They can commit to reducing the number […]
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When it comes to North Carolina politics, there’s not much left to say, and yet there is everything to shout. Last night, rightwing Republican Dan Bishop claimed the 9th District over moderate Democrat Dan McCready in a heavily watched special election for the House of Representatives. The seat remained vacant after the 2018 midterms due […]
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In less than two weeks, the ten leading Democratic candidates will all appear on the same debate stage for the first time. Outlets priming the pump for what will likely be the most important day of the nascent primary season are teasing a series of potential conflicts: Joe Biden vs. Elizabeth Warren. Bernie Sanders vs. […]
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If there’s one thing Joe Biden loves more than approaching women from behind and putting his hands on their shoulders, it’s stealing valor. Not just troop valor, but coal miner valor, civil rights valor—if you’ve got valor, Joe Biden will steal it. In a speech on Friday, the former vice president regaled the New Hampshire […]
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A surprise retirement from a longtime senator has handed Democrats another potential path to winning back the Senate in 2020 — one that would run through his purple-trending, fast-diversifying state. Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia announced Wednesday that he’ll leave office at the end of 2019 because of his declining health, creating a new open […]
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Joe Biden never thought he’d have to do this. Positioned, as he was, as the affable veep to an immensely popular president, the veteran of three previous bids for the Democratic nomination assumed a presidential primary was just a way to garner free media until main event, the general election. But, since declaring his candidacy […]
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