Politics Election category, Page 69
Texas Rep. Kay Granger missed majority of U.S. House votes this year
U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, missed more than half of the votes in the House of Representatives this year, exceeding the number of votes she missed in her entire first decade in Congress. Granger, 81, missed 279 of the House’s 517 votes in 2024, more than the 278 votes...
Joe Biden notches 1 more first-term federal judicial confirmation than Donald Trump
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden will leave office with more lifetime judicial confirmations than his predecessor and a legacy of diversifying the federal bench, a win for Democrats in the final days of the 118th Congress. Senate Democrats on Friday notched the 235th lifetime judicial confirmation during the Biden administration,...
Trump again calls to buy Greenland after eyeing Canada and the Panama Canal
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — First it was Canada, then the Panama Canal. Now, Donald Trump again wants Greenland. The president-elect is renewing unsuccessful calls he made during his first term for the U.S. to buy Greenland from Denmark, adding to the list of allied countries with which he’s picking...
House Ethics Committee accuses Matt Gaetz of paying for sex, including with 17-year-old girlVideo
WASHINGTON — The House Ethics Committee on Monday accused Matt Gaetz of “regularly” paying for sex, including once with a 17-year-old girl, and purchasing and using illicit drugs as a member of Congress, as lawmakers released the conclusions of a nearly four-year investigation that helped sink his nomination for attorney...
Trump wants mass deportations. For the agents removing immigrants, it’s a painstaking process
NEW YORK — The immigration officers sat in their vehicles before dawn near a two-story building. A New York subway line rumbled overhead, then an officer’s voice crackled over the radio. After watching for about two hours, he said, “I think that’s Tango,” using a term for target. “Gray hoodie....
U.S. Steel, Nippon, Mon Valley mayors urge Biden to approve $14.9B deal
The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States told the White House on Monday it is deadlocked on the proposed $14.9 billion sale of U.S. Steel to Japan’s Nippon Steel Co., teeing up President Joe Biden to block the deal. The decision, or lack thereof, was first reported by...
What Trump’s decision to wade into spending fight tells us about the next 4 years
WASHINGTON — After days of threats and demands, Donald Trump had little to show for it once lawmakers passed a budget deal in the early hours of Saturday, narrowly averting a pre-Christmas government shutdown. The president-elect successfully pushed House Republicans to jettison some spending, but he failed to achieve his...
Shutdown saga exposes new fault lines for Speaker Johnson and tests his grip on the gavel
WASHINGTON — One of the most turbulent sessions of Congress in the modern era is about to make way for the next one. Midnight passage of the government shutdown package put in sharp focus the political fault lines emerging in Washington, as President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House,...
Biden signs bill that averts a government shutdown and brings a close to days of Washington upheaval
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden signed a bill into law Saturday that averts a government shutdown, bringing a final close to days of upheaval after Congress approved a temporary funding plan just past the deadline and refused President-elect Donald Trump’s core debt demands in the package. The deal funds the...
Trump taps ‘Apprentice’ producer, Mark Burnett, as special envoy to the United Kingdom
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Mark Burnett, the power producer who helped reintroduce Donald Trump to a national television audience with “The Apprentice,” is being tapped by the president-elect as special envoy to the United Kingdom in his upcoming administration. “With a distinguished career in television production and business, Mark...
Senate review of Supreme Court ethics finds more luxury trips and urges enforceable code of conduct
WASHINGTON — A nearly two-year investigation by Democratic senators of Supreme Court ethics details more luxury travel by Justice Clarence Thomas and urges Congress to establish a way to enforce a new code of conduct. Any movement on the issue appears unlikely as Republicans prepare to take control of the...
Facing Trump threats, Al Schmidt defended Pa.’s 2020 election as free, fair and secure and believes same about 2024
This article is made possible through Spotlight PA’s collaboration with Votebeat, a nonpartisan news organization covering local election administration and voting. Sign up for Votebeat’s free newsletters here. After Donald Trump lost Pennsylvania in 2020, he used Twitter to direct his fury straight at Al Schmidt, then a Philadelphia city...
Senate passes Social Security benefits boost for many public service retirees
WASHINGTON — The Senate passed legislation early Saturday to boost Social Security payments for millions of people, pushing a longtime priority for former public employees through Congress in one of its last acts for the year. The bipartisan bill, which next heads to President Joe Biden, will eliminate longtime reductions...
Senate approves 235th judge of Biden’s term, beating Trump’s tally
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden secured the 235th judicial confirmation of his presidency Friday, an accomplishment that exceeds his predecessor’s total by one after Democrats put extra emphasis on the federal courts following Donald Trump’s far-reaching first term, when he filled three seats on the Supreme Court. Senate Majority Leader...
Trump was poised to inherit a strong economy. Then things got rocky and he added to the uncertainty
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — The smooth economy that Donald Trump was poised to inherit suddenly looks a bit rockier — with critics saying the president-elect is contributing to the uncertainty. The Dow Jones stock index essentially ended Thursday flat after having posted 10 days of losses. The Federal Reserve...
White House starts scrapping pending regulations on transgender athletes and student debt
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is abandoning his efforts to provide some protections for transgender student athletes and cancel student loans for more than 38 million Americans, the first steps in an administration-wide plan to jettison pending regulations to prevent President-elect Donald Trump from retooling them to achieve his own...
Government funding bill clears Congress and heads to President Biden, averting a shutdown
WASHINGTON — Facing a government shutdown deadline, the Senate rushed through final passage early Saturday of a bipartisan plan that would temporarily fund federal operations and disaster aid, dropping President-elect Donald Trump’s demands for a debt limit increase into the new year. House Speaker Mike Johnson had insisted Congress would...
International students urged to return to U.S. campuses before Trump inauguration
CONCORD, N.H. — A growing number of U.S. colleges and universities are advising international students to return to campus before President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated, over concerns that he might impose travel bans like he did during his first administration. More than a dozen schools have issued advisories, even though...
Closures, Social Security checks, furloughs: What a government shutdown might mean
Congress has until midnight Friday to come up with a way to fund the government or federal agencies will shut down, meaning hundreds of thousands of federal employees could be sent home — or stay on the job without pay — just ahead of the holidays. Republicans abandoned a bipartisan...
Power grab by Republicans in N.C. becomes a referendum on democracy in the states
RALEIGH, N.C. — Democrats in North Carolina were celebrating big wins in the swing state after the November election, including victories in races for governor and other top statewide offices. But the political high didn’t last long. Republican lawmakers are stripping away some core powers of the newly elected officials...
House rejects Trump-backed plan on government shutdown, leaving next steps uncertainVideo
WASHINGTON — The House rejected President-elect Donald Trump’s new plan Thursday to fund federal operations and suspend the debt ceiling a day before a government shutdown, as Democrats refused to accommodate his sudden demands and the quick fix cobbled together by Republican leaders. In a hastily convened evening vote punctuated...
Government funding plan collapses as Trump makes new demands days before shutdownVideo
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump abruptly rejected a bipartisan plan Wednesday to prevent a Christmastime government shutdown, instead telling House Speaker Mike Johnson and Republicans to essentially renegotiate — days before a deadline when federal funding runs out. Trump’s sudden entrance into the debate and new demands sent Congress spiraling...
Pa. Electoral College meets, casts votes for Trump
HARRISBURG — The 2024 presidential election formally closed Tuesday in Pennsylvania with the Republican Party’s 19 certified electors casting their respective ballots in the Electoral College for President-elect Donald J. Trump. The official action, mirrored in statehouses across the U.S., precedes the scheduled joint session of Congress on Jan. 6...
Senate passes defense bill that will raise troop pay and aims to counter China’s power
WASHINGTON — The Senate passed a defense bill Wednesday that authorizes significant pay raises for junior enlisted service members, aims to counter China’s growing power and boosts overall military spending to $895 billion while also stripping coverage of transgender medical treatments for children of military members. The annual defense authorization...
House Ethics Committee secretly voted to release Matt Gaetz ethics report, source says
WASHINGTON — The House Ethics Committee voted in secret to release the long-awaited ethics report into ex-Rep. Matt Gaetz, raising the possibility that the allegations against the Florida Republican who was President-elect Donald Trump’s first choice for attorney general could be made public in the coming days. The decision by...
