Category: US Senate

GOP Senator Dismisses COVID Deaths Of 400 Children

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Sen. Roger Marshall, a Republican of Kansas and an obstetrician, dismissed the deaths of 400 children who have died from COVID-19 during a Senate hearing Tuesday with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky.

Sen. Marshall’s remarks were based on his false claim that “probably zero” of the 400 children who died of COVID (that number has not been confirmed) had no pre-existing condition.

“Children are not supposed to die,” Dr. Walensky told Sen. Marshall, right before he delivered his remarks dismissing their deaths, as if having a pre-existing condition makes it acceptable for a child to die of COVID-19. Continue reading.

Senate GOP brags about poll showing Biden is more popular than they are

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A new Politico/Morning Consult shows President Joe Biden is faring much better than Republicans.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee circulated a poll on Wednesday, suggesting it was proof that Americans are unhappy with President Joe Biden. But that survey showed him with a majority approval rating — well above their own levels of support.

The committee, which is the official campaign arm of the Senate Republican minority, put out a press release titled, “NEW POLL: Majority of Americans Disapprove of Biden’s Amnesty and Open Borders Agenda.” Citing a Politico/Morning Consult survey released Wednesday, it observed that “only 39% of voters approve of Biden’s handling of immigration and a whopping 50% disapprove.”

“As the Biden administration continues to bungle the response to the crisis they created at the Southern Border, Joe Biden’s approval rating on immigration continues to free fall,” the press release claimed. “It takes a stunning level of incompetence to have numbers this bad.” Continue reading.

Sen. Ted Cruz’s COVID-19 ’Guarantee’ Comes Back To Haunt Him Exactly 1 Year Later

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The Texas Republican’s prediction was “utterly, completely, in every possible conceivable way wrong,” said MSNBC’s Chris Hayes.

MSNBC’s Chris Hayes on Thursday reminded Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) of his exactly year-old “astoundingly, beautifully wrong” prediction that Democrats would forget about the COVID-19 pandemic if Joe Biden won the 2020 election.

“If it ends up that Biden wins in November — I hope he doesn’t, I don’t think he will — but if he does, I guarantee you the week after the election, suddenly all those Democratic governors, all those Democratic mayors will say everything’s magically better,” Cruz predicted.

“You won’t even have to wait for Biden to be sworn in,” the Donald Trump apologist continued. “All they’ll need is Election Day and suddenly their willingness to just destroy people’s lives and livelihoods, they will have accomplished their task. That’s wrong, it’s cynical and we shouldn’t be a part of it.” Continue reading.

Biden’s public lands nominee, once linked to eco-saboteurs, advances with key Senate vote

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Republicans say Tracy Stone-Manning’s past affiliation with eco-saboteurs makes her unqualified to run the Bureau of Land Management

Tracy Stone-Manning, President Biden’s pick to be the top public lands manager, moved one step closer to becoming director of the Bureau of Land Management on Thursday as the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee advanced her nomination solely with Democratic support.

For weeks, Republicans have adamantly called on Biden to withdraw Stone-Manning’s nomination due to her decision as a University of Montana graduate student to send a letter on behalf of eco-saboteurs in 1989. The group drove metal spikes into trees in Idaho set to be cut down — an act designed to make it more dangerous for loggers to saw through the trunks.

“It is hard to imagine a nominee more disqualified than Tracy Stone-Manning,” said Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), the top Republican on the committee, at one point holding up a gray metal spike. He was among the 10 Republicans on the panel who voted against her nomination. Continue reading.

Republicans threaten to hold up debt ceiling days before deadline, raising potential for political showdown

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“There really is no other way,” Sen. Marco Rubio says, but Democrats insist that they have no plans to negotiate

Senate Republicans on Wednesday threatened to vote against an increase to the debt ceiling unless Congress first agrees to new spending cuts or other measures, raising the potential for a major political showdown that could carry vast implications for both the global economy as well as President Biden’s agenda.

The new ultimatum marked a reversal for Republicans, who agreed to address the debt ceiling — the statutory amount the government can borrow to pay its bills — multiple times to advance policies under President Donald Trump that helped add $7 trillion to the federal debt during his term.

“We had a pandemic that drove a lot of [spending], but what’s been added on top of it, and what [Democrats] plan to spend moving forward on top of that, I think it calls for some level of sanity,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said. Continue reading.

Lawmakers spend more on personal security in wake of insurrection

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In the months after she voted to impeach former President Trump for his role in inspiring the Jan. 6 insurrection against Congress, Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) went to Costco to buy a security system. 

Rep. Richard Hudson (N.C.), one of the majority of Republicans who voted against impeaching Trump, also purchased a security system for his home.  

Herrera Beutler and Hudson did not respond to requests for comment. But they were hardly alone: A review of campaign finance reports made with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) last week shows an unprecedented rise in spending on security for members of Congress.   Continue reading.

Ted Cruz is blocking diplomats from being confirmed, and it has nothing to do with their qualifications

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WASHINGTON — An extraordinary effort by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas to block nominees from being confirmed to vital jobs in the State Department is creating hurdles for the Biden administration and hindering US diplomacy, according to Democrats and Republicans who spoke to CNN.

The Biden administration — with about 60 State Department nominees waiting to be confirmed — is encountering greater roadblocks in securing Senate confirmations at State than at any other agency. Administration officials and Democrats point to Republicans, who admit they’re playing a role. But sources from all three groups say the bulk of the blame should be placed on Cruz.

The junior senator from Texas has become the public face of the State Department’s difficulties, proudly claiming responsibility for blocks on a slew of senior officials. Cruz is trying to pressure the administration on a specific point of Russia policy, a campaign that other Republicans say is fruitless and that triggered a fiery shouting match with Sen. Robert Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat who’s the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

GOP blocks infrastructure debate as negotiators near deal

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Republicans on Wednesday blocked the Senate from debating a bipartisan infrastructure proposal as negotiators say they are near finalizing their agreement. 

The 49-51 vote fell short of the 60 needed to advance what is effectively stand-in legislation that senators will swap the bipartisan group’s text into once it is finished.

Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) changed his vote late in a procedural move that allows him to bring it back up for a second vote quickly. Continue reading.

As Virus Resurges, G.O.P. Lawmakers Allow Vaccine Skepticism to Flourish

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As the coronavirus’s Delta variant rips through conservative communities, most Republicans remain reluctant to confront vaccine misinformation and skepticism in their midst.

WASHINGTON — As the coronavirus surges in their states and districts, fanned by a more contagious variant exploiting paltry vaccination rates, many congressional Republicans have declined to push back against vaccine skeptics in their party who are sowing mistrust about the shots’ safety and effectiveness.

Amid a widening partisan divide over coronavirus vaccination, most Republicans have either stoked or ignored the flood of misinformation reaching their constituents and instead focused their message about the vaccine on disparaging President Biden, characterizing his drive to inoculate Americans as politically motivated and heavy-handed.

On Tuesday, Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the No. 2 House Republican who said he had received his first Pfizer vaccine shot only on Sunday, blamed the hesitance on Mr. Biden and his criticism of Donald J. Trump’s vaccine drive last year. Senator Tommy Tuberville, Republican of Alabama, said skeptics would not get their shots until “this administration acknowledges the efforts of the last one.” Continue reading.

Fauci: Paul doesn’t know what he’s talking about

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Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Tuesday escalated his ongoing feud with the nation’s top infectious diseases doctor Anthony Fauci about the role the National Institutes of Health (NIH) played in funding controversial research in Wuhan, China.

The two traded barbs during a tense exchange, triggering a shouting match in which Fauci accused Paul of lying in order to further his agenda. 

During a Senate Health Committee hearing about the federal COVID-19 response, Paul said the NIH funded illegal gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which created a highly dangerous and transmissible virus able to infect humans. Gain-of-function is a controversial method where researchers make a pathogen more infectious, often to develop more effective treatments and vaccines. Continue reading.