Senator Kamala Harris of California, whom Joseph R. Biden Jr. chose on Tuesday as his running mate, will be the first Black woman and the first person of Indian descent to be nominated for national office by a major party. A pragmatic moderate and one of Mr. Biden’s former rivals in the presidential race, Ms. […]
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Senator Kamala Harris of California will be the first Black woman and the first person of Indian descent to be nominated for national office by a major party. A pragmatic moderate and one of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s former rivals in the presidential race, Ms. Harris was a barrier-breaking prosecutor before being elected to the […]
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WASHINGTON — Facing sharp criticism, administration officials on Sunday struggled to explain the executive actions President Trump used to circumvent Congress in the absence of an agreement on a coronavirus aid package, even as they defended him and insisted that Americans would receive the relief he promised. The president’s decision on Saturday to sign a […]
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WASHINGTON — In February, Democrats began getting anxious about the crucial Senate race in North Carolina. An unknown Republican-affiliated group was suddenly pouring millions of dollars behind the candidacy of Erica Smith, a progressive state senator who they believed had no chance of winning the seat in November. So party leaders began spending millions of […]
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President Trump took executive action on Saturday to circumvent Congress and try to extend an array of federal pandemic relief, resorting to a legally dubious set of edicts whose impact was unclear, as negotiations over an economic recovery package appeared on the brink of collapse. It was not clear what authority Mr. Trump had to […]
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Marquita Bradshaw, an environmental justice advocate who has run her Senate campaign on a shoestring budget, won an upset victory in the state’s Democratic primary on Thursday, brushing aside a party-backed candidate who had significantly out-raised her. Ms. Bradshaw, a political novice who grew up in South Memphis, won by roughly 9 percentage points to […]
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WASHINGTON — Senator Mitch McConnell has put himself in one of the toughest spots of a political life that has seen plenty of them. Up for re-election in the middle of an unforgiving pandemic, the Kentucky Republican and majority leader is caught in a family feud between a group of endangered incumbents in his party […]
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On July 25, Republicans in Grundy County, Tenn., gathered to hear the candidates in the state’s Senate Republican primary hold forth ahead of Thursday’s election. Most of them kept their comments polite and predictable — and then came Bill Hagerty. Though there are 15 names on the ballot, Mr. Hagerty, the race’s Trump-endorsed front-runner, singled […]
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On Friday, Congress effectively pushed millions of Americans off a financial cliff when it failed to extend the enhanced unemployment benefits put in place in March to soften the economic pain of the coronavirus pandemic. Millions of Americans are also in imminent danger of losing their homes as federal moratoriums on evictions expire. Preventing this […]
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“This never happened. It will shock you how much it never happened.” This is a Don Draper line from “Mad Men,” delivered as advice he earned the hard way, when he stole another man’s identity and left his own behind. It’s also the way that many Republican senators hope to deal with the memory of […]
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With coronavirus cases spiking in dozens of states, the prospect of anything resembling a normal school year is fading fast. Schools can’t safely reopen if infections are exploding in the communities they serve. But in regions where the pandemic appears to be under control, it is most important to get the youngest children back into […]
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On the first day of the first full week when tens of millions of Americans went without the federal jobless aid that has cushioned them during the pandemic, President Trump was not cajoling undecided lawmakers to embrace a critical stimulus bill to stabilize the foundering economy. He was at the White House, hurling insults at […]
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Representative Louie Gohmert, Republican of Texas, is not the first member of Congress to test positive for Covid-19. At least 14 lawmakers, hailing from both parties and both chambers, are known to have either tested or been presumed positive for the coronavirus. But something about the diagnosis of Mr. Gohmert, who has belligerently flouted public […]
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WASHINGTON — Top Trump administration officials and lawmakers cautioned on Sunday that a deal over a new relief package to help people and businesses weather the coronavirus crisis remained elusive even as the debate over the details of the aid was set to take center stage in the coming week. A meeting on Saturday in […]
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Representative Louie Gohmert, a mask-shunning Republican from Texas, might never have known he had the coronavirus had he not had a mandatory rapid test at the White House in line with its strict protocols put in place to protect President Trump. So when he tested positive this week, prompting alarm and anger on Capitol Hill, […]
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WASHINGTON — Former President Barack Obama called on Thursday for eliminating the filibuster, joining a growing chorus of Democrats who portray the Senate’s signature procedural weapon as an obstacle to social progress that must be abolished if the party captures the Senate and White House. The appeal by Mr. Obama to do away with a […]
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The worst economic news on Thursday was not the official announcement that the American economy shrank at an annualized rate of 32.9 percent in the second quarter of 2020 — a grim quantification of the pain caused by the coronavirus pandemic. No, the really bad news was the lack of action on Capitol Hill. Congress […]
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A Tennessee state senator has been charged with stealing more than $600,000 in federal grant money and using it to pay for campaign events and personal expenses, including her wedding, honeymoon and subsequent divorce, federal prosecutors announced Wednesday. The senator, Katrina Robinson, 39, faces counts of theft and embezzlement involving government programs and wire fraud, […]
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WASHINGTON — The prospects for a quick agreement between the Trump administration and congressional Democrats on a new round of aid for the ailing economy faded on Wednesday, as President Trump undercut his own party’s efforts to negotiate a deal and a top White House official declared that a lifeline to unemployed workers would run […]
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WASHINGTON — In the final days of the Obama administration, intelligence officials laid out evidence of Russia’s 2016 election interference campaign to congressional leaders, prompting Nancy Pelosi, then the House minority leader, to press for Moscow to be punished. “This can’t happen again,” she said. Two Republicans, Speaker Paul D. Ryan and Senator Richard M. […]
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Companies linked to two Russian oligarchs exploited the opaqueness of the art world to buy high-value art, bypassing U.S. sanctions, according to a report by the U.S. Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations that was published on Wednesday. American companies are barred from doing business with sanctioned individuals. But the report said the oligarchs, Arkady and […]
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WASHINGTON — When it comes to the new coronavirus recovery package roiling the capital, Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana could use some detective help from the F.B.I., which has unexpectedly found itself an unwitting accomplice in a legislative meltdown. “I’d like to know what’s in the bill,” Mr. Kennedy, who is part of the Republican […]
Read More WASHINGTON — When it comes to the new coronavirus recovery package roiling the capital, Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana could use some detective help from the F.B.I., which has unexpectedly found itself an unwitting accomplice in a legislative meltdown. “I’d like to know what’s in the bill,” Mr. Kennedy, who is part of the Republican […]
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Supporters of a National Museum of the American Latino are the closest they have ever been to gaining a spot on the National Mall. On Monday, the House passed a bill to establish such a museum within the Smithsonian, delivering a significant victory to a yearslong effort to build an institution devoted to the history […]
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Listen and subscribe to our podcast from your mobile device:Via Apple Podcasts | Via Spotify | Via Stitcher A fight has erupted among congressional Republicans over how long and how generously the government should help those who are unemployed during the pandemic. But what is that battle really about? On today’s episode: ImageRepublicans have been […]
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WASHINGTON — With the economic and public health toll of the coronavirus pandemic continuing to mount across the country, members of Congress are debating another round of federal relief for individuals and businesses. But it remains unclear how Democrats and Republicans will reconcile their vastly different proposals. They are staring down a tight deadline, with […]
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WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans and the White House on Monday threw their support behind a substantial cut in jobless aid for tens of millions of Americans laid off amid the pandemic, proposing a weekly reduction of $400 to a benefit that has cushioned the nation’s economy even as coronavirus cases continue to rise across the […]
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Top Trump administration officials proposed on Sunday potentially short circuiting free-ranging stimulus talks with Democrats to rush through a much narrower bill prioritizing an extension of federal unemployment benefits that are set to expire this week for millions of Americans. Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff, said he would now like to see […]
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WASHINGTON — A conservative Republican House member profanely accosts a Democratic congresswoman as she strides up the Capitol steps to do her job during multiple national calamities. With expanded jobless benefits supporting tens of millions of fearful Americans about to expire and a pandemic raging, Senate Republicans and the Trump White House cannot agree among […]
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Photo: Andrew Harnik-Pool (Getty Images) Y’all, I’m pretty sure Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) is a white supremacist. For legal purposes, I’m not outright saying he is. All I’m suggesting is that the dude who wrote a whole op-ed calling for military intervention to stomp out protests against systemic racism, compared the protesters to Confederate traitors […]
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WASHINGTON — Republicans stumbled on Thursday in their efforts to find agreement on a broad new proposal to lift the struggling economy, with Senate leaders and the Trump administration at odds over multiple provisions, including how to extend unemployment benefits and White House requests for spending unrelated to the pandemic. Even after President Trump folded […]
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