Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, is expected to lead a bipartisan delegation of six senators on a trip to China next week, the latest in a series of high-level visits by U.S. officials to Beijing. The lawmakers are expected to hold meetings with Chinese government and business leaders and discuss a number of contentious […]
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Laphonza Butler, president of Emily’s List and a former labor leader, is Gov. Gavin Newsom of California’s choice to fill the Senate seat of Dianne Feinstein, who died at 90 on Thursday in Washington, D.C. The selection was announced on Sunday. Though Ms. Butler, 44, has never held elective political office, she has been a […]
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Extremists in my party have threatened to try and remove Speaker Kevin McCarthy for relying on the votes of Democrats to keep the government open. Some of them appear to be authoritarian separatists who reject pluralism — a founding American principle that expects disparate groups to come together to keep the government functioning. Some of […]
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Just five years ago, Wael Hana was reeling from a string of bad business deals in New Jersey, having tried to launch a truck stop, an Italian restaurant, a limousine service and other companies without ever hitting it big. Then, his friend started dating Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, one of the most powerful […]
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Dianne Feinstein, who died on Thursday at 90, was the first senator to die in office since John McCain in 2018. But since the first Congress convened in 1789, deaths in office have been a fairly regular occurrence. “You look back in history, nearly one in 10 members of Congress have,” Jane L. Campbell, the […]
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When I was interviewing Senator Dianne Feinstein in 2011 for a book about San Francisco’s tumultuous history from the 1960s to the ’80s, she suddenly began to tear off her microphone and terminate the exchange. My offense? I asked about her decision as mayor of the city to veto a 1982 ordinance that would have […]
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WASHINGTON — I’ve always said that the Washington Monument is an apt symbol, a Freudian obelisk redolent of all the male egos that have shaped our capital. To appreciate what Dianne Feinstein accomplished, you need to know how male this city was in 1992, when she was swept into Congress in the “Year of the […]
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The federal government is careening toward a shutdown at midnight on Saturday. That’s because Congress has not yet passed any of the 12 yearlong spending bills that fund the federal government, and it remains jammed on a temporary stopgap measure to keep funding flowing while lawmakers pass those annual spending bills. Here’s what you need […]
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Hard-line conservatives on Friday tanked Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s long-shot bid to pass legislation to avert a government shutdown, in an extraordinary display of defiance that made it clear that Congress would almost certainly miss a midnight deadline on Saturday to keep federal funding flowing. It appeared evident even before the vote that the stopgap bill […]
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Dianne Feinstein, who rose to become the grande dame of California Democrats over four decades in politics, first as the mayor of San Francisco and most recently as the longest-serving woman in U.S. Senate history, died last night at her home in Washington. She was 90. U.S. flags were lowered to half-staff, and Feinstein was […]
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The death of Senator Dianne Feinstein has put Gov. Gavin Newsom of California under immediate pressure to name a replacement, especially given the narrow advantage that Democrats have in the Senate. Under California law, the governor has the authority to name a successor. Governor Newsom, a Democrat, does not face a deadline, but he is […]
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Naturally, Newsom doesn’t have to actually keep his promise about appointing a Black woman. In 2021, when Kamala Harris resigned from her Senate seat to become vice president, Newsom appointed Alex Padilla, who became the state’s first Latino senator. But assuming he does stick to his word, there are still some options. Names that have […]
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Dianne Feinstein, the grande dame of California Democrats who became the mayor of San Francisco after a horrific double assassination at City Hall in 1978 and then gained national stature as an influential voice in the United States Senate for more than 30 years, died on Thursday night She was 90 and the Senate’s oldest […]
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Senator Dianne Feinstein, the trailblazing Democratic power broker who served in the Senate for 30 years, died on Thursday night, according to a family member. In recent years, Ms. Feinstein, 90, had suffered from frail health and memory issues that made it difficult for her to function alone and prompted calls for her to step […]
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But here’s where we come to the Catch-22, because the stability of our system rests on supermajority rules so strong that they stymie all but the broadest attempts to change that system. And who is to say that stability is such a paramount goal? In a dynamic society, which is to say in a human […]
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Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey made a defiant and impassioned speech to his fellow Senate Democrats on Thursday, maintaining his innocence and repeating that he had no intention of stepping down after being indicted on bribery charges, despite calls from many of his colleagues to do so. Mr. Menendez’s obstinate address at a closed-door […]
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As Congress barrels toward a government shutdown instigated by his own hard-right members, Speaker Kevin McCarthy is toiling to turn a fight over federal spending into a battle over President Biden’s handling of the border. By floating a stopgap funding bill that would slash spending while imposing stringent immigration restrictions demanded by conservatives, Mr. McCarthy […]
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President Biden’s shutdown strategy is simple: Avoid one, if possible. But if not, make sure Americans know whom to blame. His aides at the White House and in his re-election campaign have spent the past several days describing the consequences of what they call an “extreme Republican shutdown” of the government: delayed disaster relief; no […]
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Days before an all-but-certain government shutdown instigated by hard-right Republicans in Washington, Elizabeth Catalino arrived at a Hudson Valley high school looking for answers from her own G.O.P. congressman, Representative Mike Lawler. “I’m very disappointed that you have this band of Republicans that are being so obstinate,” Ms. Catalino, who described herself as an independent, […]
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After a brief departure from tradition that was tailored for Senator John Fetterman, the Pennsylvania Democrat who pressed to vote and preside in shorts and a hoodie rather than a business suit, the Senate on Wednesday formalized a longstanding — but previously unofficial — requirement that members show up to the chamber in business attire. […]
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After a brief departure from tradition that was tailored for Senator John Fetterman, the Pennsylvania Democrat who pressed to vote and preside in shorts and a hoodie rather than a business suit, the Senate on Wednesday formalized a longstanding — but previously unofficial — requirement that members show up to the chamber in business attire. […]
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The White House has begun advising federal agencies to prepare for a government shutdown as Republican lawmakers have shown no signs of progress in negotiations to keep the government funded beyond this week. The Senate on Wednesday continued debate on a bipartisan stopgap bill to fund the government through Nov. 17, but Speaker Kevin McCarthy […]
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Senate Republicans and Democrats reached agreement on Tuesday on a stopgap spending plan that would head off a government shutdown on Sunday while providing billions in disaster relief and aid to Ukraine, according to officials in both parties, but the measure faced resistance in the Republican-led House. The bill, which is slated to face a […]
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Hopefully, Democratic leaders in the Senate will do the right thing, and this column will be obsolete by the time you read it. I would have written it earlier, but I thought that at any moment, the dam would break and Robert Menendez, the recently indicted senator from New Jersey accused of spectacular acts of […]
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A stampede of Senate Democrats led by some of the party’s most endangered incumbents rushed forward on Tuesday calling for Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey to resign, a day after he defiantly vowed to fight federal corruption charges and predicted he would be exonerated. Even as Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority […]
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What started as a trickle, with only Senator John Fetterman last week joining various House and Garden State Democrats in calling for Menendez to resign, became a flood on Monday evening and Tuesday, as more and more came out against him. Many of the Senate Democrats who have condemned Menendez are up for reelection in […]
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What started as a trickle, with only Senator John Fetterman last week joining various House and Garden State Democrats in calling for Menendez to resign, became a flood on Monday evening and Tuesday, as more and more came out against him. Many of the Senate Democrats who have condemned Menendez are up for reelection in […]
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Senator Cory Booker called on Senator Robert Menendez, his fellow New Jersey Democrat, to resign Tuesday morning, ending days of silence after Mr. Menendez was indicted on bribery charges. As New Jersey’s junior senator, Mr. Booker often has described Mr. Menendez, the senior senator, as a friend, ally and mentor. His decision to condemn Mr. […]
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J.D. Vance was trying to find his groove. I had just shown up at his office last week to interview the Ohio Republican about his first nine months in the Senate, where he has proved curiously hard to pigeonhole. As we sat down, Mr. Vance — at 39, one of the chamber’s youngest members — […]
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Since Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey was indicted on federal bribery charges last week, the state’s governor, at least a half-dozen members of New Jersey’s congressional delegation and two U.S. senators — all Democrats — have urged him to resign. On Monday, as Mr. Menendez insisted to reporters that he would not quit, the […]
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The White House has begun advising federal agencies to prepare for a government shutdown as Republican lawmakers have shown no signs of progress in negotiations to keep the government funded beyond this week. The United States has experienced 21 gaps in government funding since 1976, leading to varying degrees of disruption. Under a worst-case scenario, […]
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