More from our inbox: Image“America needs the Senate to be the Senate,” Senator Mitch McConnell, shown here in his office on Capitol Hill, writes.CreditDamon Winter/The New York Times To the Editor: Re “The Filibuster Plays a Crucial Role,” by Mitch McConnell (Op-Ed, Aug. 23): Do we really need lessons in constitutional law from the man […]
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“You’ll regret this, and you may regret this a lot sooner than you think.” That was my warning to Senate Democrats in November 2013. Their leader, Harry Reid, had just persuaded them to trample longstanding Senate rules and precedents. Now that some Democrats are proposing further radical changes to the Senate’s functioning, it is instructive […]
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WASHINGTON — After the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School, Senator Mitch McConnell had a message for his Kentucky constituents as his 2014 re-election fight loomed. “I want you to know that I will be doing everything in my power as Senate Republican leader, fighting tooth and nail, to protect your Second Amendment rights,” Mr. […]
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They were the types of meetings more typical for a political candidate than for the nation’s top diplomat. But on a trip on Tuesday to New York, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Ronald S. Lauder, the cosmetics heir and billionaire Republican donor, two people briefed on the meeting said, speaking on the condition […]
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Listen and subscribe to our podcast from your mobile device: Via Apple Podcasts | Via RadioPublic | Via Stitcher Al Franken resigned from the Senate more than 18 months ago over allegations of sexual harassment. New reporting about those allegations has revived the debate over whether the Democratic Party — particularly senators currently seeking the […]
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Beto O’Rourke is sick of people telling him to run for Senate again. “You know the question’s going to keep coming up,” MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell told O’Rourke on Thursday, “this question of what about dropping out of this presidential race and taking up the race for the Senate.” “Let me make your show the place […]
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WASHINGTON — Representative Joseph P. Kennedy III of Massachusetts is considering a primary challenge next year against Senator Edward J. Markey, according to a senior Democratic official. Such a race could substantially alter the state’s political landscape and has the potential to elevate a fourth member of a Democratic dynasty to the Senate. Mr. Kennedy, […]
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WASHINGTON — Has no one told these people about the free candy? When former Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado dropped out of the presidential race on Thursday, he made a point of noting that people were all but begging him to run for the Senate. Mr. Hickenlooper, who had previously dismissed a Senate run, said […]
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CLEAR LAKE, Iowa — Former Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado is in discussions about ending his presidential bid and entering the race for his state’s Republican-held Senate seat, potentially giving Democrats a strong candidate in a race they must win to have hopes of retaking the chamber in 2021, according to four Democrats familiar with […]
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Endangered species come on lists. But lists obscure relationships. What can it mean that a few mussels, some snails we’ve never heard of, obscure crayfish in marginal headwaters and some island-confined songbirds are vanishing? Some 1,650 species of animals and plants in the United States are listed under federal law as endangered or threatened. But […]
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I am not an expert on all of government, but I do know something about the United States Senate. As the former majority leader, I know how tough it is to get anything through the chamber, which was designed to serve as the slower, more deliberative body of the United States Congress. But what is […]
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August 12 is a date forever ingrained in both of our memories. It’s when our children, Khalid Jabara and Heather Heyer, were murdered in hate crimes — one year apart from each other: Khalid in 2016, on the doorsteps of his family home in Tulsa, Okla.; and Heather in 2017, on a crowded street in […]
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For a political party stocked with people who deny the seriousness of the climate crisis, the Republican Party does some curious things. Did you know, for instance, that a Republican Congress put an explicit price on emissions of the main greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide? That was in early 2018. Companies can now get a tax […]
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WASHINGTON — Under intense pressure to take action on gun safety in the wake of two weekend massacres, Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, expressed a new willingness Thursday to consider a measure expanding background checks for all gun purchasers, saying it will be “front and center” in a coming Senate debate on how to […]
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Senator Mitch McConnell’s re-election campaign remained locked out of its Twitter account Thursday morning after posting a tweet that included a video of people making violent threats against the majority leader in front of his Louisville, Ky., home. The tweet, in which the campaign labeled the protesters an “angry left-wing mob,” is no longer visible […]
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Two United States senators raised questions on Tuesday about whether M.L.B. is doing enough to protect its fans from foul balls, writing a letter to Commissioner Rob Manfred urging him to release data that teams may be collecting on which seats are most vulnerable at their ballparks. The senators, Richard Durbin and Tammy Duckworth, both […]
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WASHINGTON — Congressional Republicans, under pressure to respond to this weekend’s massacres, appear to be coalescing around legislation to help law enforcement to take guns from those who pose an imminent danger — a measure that, if signed into law, would be the most significant gun safety legislation enacted in 20 years. “Red flag” laws […]
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Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul, Republicans of Kentucky, are recovering at home from medical procedures they had over the weekend, their teams said. Mr. McConnell, the majority leader, fractured his shoulder at his home in Louisville, while Mr. Paul underwent surgery to remove a portion of his lung. “This morning, Leader McConnell tripped at […]
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WASHINGTON — Seven months into a new era of divided government, the Republican-led Senate limped out of Washington this week after the fewest legislative debates of any in recent memory, without floor votes on issues that both parties view as urgent: the high cost of prescription drugs, a broken immigration system and crumbling infrastructure. The […]
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If you were cooking up a candidate in a lab to take on Donald Trump, you might come up with someone a lot like Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey. (Well, except for the unmarried vegan part.) Like Pete Buttigieg, Booker was a Rhodes scholar and the dynamic mayor of a city afflicted by industrial […]
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