Wednesday, Jun 07th
Last update10:06:32 PM GMT
Congressional Glance
Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) on Monday asked a judge to keep sealed the names of the people who cosigned his $500,000 bond in his criminal fraud case.
Media organizations in two separate requests have asked for the court to unseal the names, arguing that there is a public right to access the records.
Santos’s attorney, Joseph Murray, cited a “media frenzy” and said the embattled congressman would rather be detained ahead of his trial than allow his bail sponsors’ names to become public.
The Senate passed legislation on Thursday seeking to repeal the Biden administration's student loan relief plan, setting up a pledged veto from the president.
The relief plan, which would cancel up $20,000 in federal student loan debt for tens of millions of Americans, has been tied up in the courts for months. A Supreme Court ruling that could block the plan is expected by early July.
The latest legislative action against the plan amounts to a symbolic show of congressional disapproval.
Republicans introduced the bill by invoking the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to reverse executive orders and requires only a simple majority in both chambers to pass. But it still requires a two-thirds majority to override a presidential veto, and Republicans aren't expected to have the numbers.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced a deal on the Senate floor Thursday evening to vote on amendments to legislation to raise the debt limit until the start of 2025, and get it passed before markets open Friday morning.
Schumer announced the Senate would vote on 11 amendments to the bill — 10 sponsored by Republicans and one sponsored by Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) — and that votes would be limited to 10 minutes to speed the process.
The chamber would then vote on final passage.
The breakthrough came after a multi-hour standoff with defense hawks, including Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who demanded commitments from Schumer and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) to protect defense spending from a potential 1 percent rescission later in the year and to promise action on a defense supplemental spending bill.
Update: The Senate has passed the bill with a vote of 63 to 36.
Questioning a witness about childcare and the teaching of race, the Oklahoma Republican senator Markwayne Mullin said: “I don’t want reality.”
The remark prompted laughter in the hearing room.
Mullin said he “misspoke” and returned to hectoring his witness about whether a book meant to teach children about racism was appropriate for early learning classes.
Mullin is an election denier, former cage fighter and plumbing company owner who sat in the US House before being elected to the Senate last year.
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A divided U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to suspend the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling on Wednesday, with majority support from both Democrats and Republicans to overcome opposition led by hardline conservatives and avoid a catastrophic default.
The Republican-controlled House voted 314-117 to send the legislation to the Senate, which must enact the measure and get it to President Joe Biden's desk before a Monday deadline, when the federal government is expected to run out of money to pay its bills.
In an edited video of his meeting on Friday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that was released by Zelenskyy’s office, Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, noted that “the Russians are dying” and described the U.S. military assistance to the country as “the best money we’ve ever spent.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov commented Sunday by saying that “it’s hard to imagine a greater shame for the country than having such senators.”
The Investigative Committee, the country’s top criminal investigation agency, has moved to open a criminal inquiry against Graham, and the Interior Ministry followed up by issuing a warrant for his arrest as indicated Monday by its official record of wanted criminal suspects.
Joe Biden and the House Republican speaker, Kevin McCarthy, have reached a deal in principle to raise the federal government’s $31.4tn debt ceiling, with just days left before America was expected to default.
“I just got off the phone with the president a bit ago. After he wasted time and refused to negotiate for months, we’ve come to an agreement in principle that is worthy of the American people,” McCarthy said in a tweet.
Biden and McCarthy held a 90-minute phone call earlier on Saturday evening to discuss the deal.
It was reported that the deal would raise the debt limit for two years, averting any further standoffs until after the 2024 presidential election.
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