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Race to find lost submarine as oxygen is running out: June 22 rundown

June 22, 2023
Search and rescue operations in the North Atlantic for a lost submarine continued as the vessel’s remaining oxygen runs out, and the House of Representative voted to censure Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) over his role in investigations of former President Donald Trump. These stories and more highlight the rundown for Thursday, June 22, 2023.

Submarine still missing as deadline approaches

The deadline to find the lost submarine that disappeared on its way to the Titanic wreckage site was fast approaching Thursday morning. The submarine was not only still missing, but running out of oxygen.

Rescue ships and planes have been searching an area twice the size of Connecticut since Sunday, June 18 in waters over 13,000 feet deep. They’ve also had to deal with fog and stormy conditions common to the area of the north Atlantic where the lost submarine vanished.

Underwater sounds had been detected Tuesday, June 20 and Wednesday, June 21, providing hope that there could be a last-minute rescue. While those sounds offered a chance to narrow the search, their exact location and source hasn’t yet been determined.

“The echo from the deep is what’s going to help locate the submarine ultimately. Then a [remotely operated vehicle] is going to need to have to be deployed probably and, hopefully, can assess and maybe assist the submarine in freeing itself if it’s stuck or perhaps somehow helping it drop those weights so it can rise to the surface,” marine geologist Jeffrey Karson said.

Rep. Adam Schiff censured by House Republicans

The House voted along party lines on Wednesday, June 21, to censure Rep. Schiff for pushing claims that former President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign colluded with Russia.

The resolution passed 213 to 209, with all Democrats voting against the severe condemnation for Schiff. The passed measure also directs the House ethics committee to open an investigation into the California representative. Schiff was also pulled off the intelligence committee earlier this year by the Republican-led House.

Republicans forgo vote to impeach Biden amid internal party struggles

In a surprise motion brought to the House floor, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) called for an impeachment vote of President Joe Biden. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) squashed the idea, sending the impeachment resolution to two House committees for review instead.

The move was expected to fend off an impeachment vote for some time. Rep. Boebert’s resolution was introduced on her own, blindsiding even members of her own party.

Court docs: Kohberger DNA matches sample at scene

Newly-filed court documents in the murder of four college students in Idaho revealed new details linking suspect Bryan Kohberger’s DNA to a near-exact match to the DNA found on a knife sheath at the crime scene. Kohberger is accused of murdering the four students at a home near campus in November of 2022.

Law enforcement officials found a knife sheath on the bed next to two of the bodies. A recent cheek swab taken from Kohberger allowed for a direct DNA comparison, which is described to be an overwhelming statistical match.

A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Monday, June 26. A trial date has been set for Monday, Oct. 2.

Tornadoes batter South, 3 dead in north Texas

Another stretch of severe weather has battered parts of the South. At least 11 tornadoes touched down across four states.

Three people died in the small northern Texas town of Matador. At least 10 major structures crumbled during the storm.

Six other tornadoes touched down in Colorado, three in Texas, and one a piece in Wyoming and Nebraska. Hundreds of thousands were left without power following the devastating storm system, all while temperatures in the South lingered in the triple digits.

This was the second time a deadly tornado struck Texas in less than a week. A tornado had left three people dead and more than 100 injured in the state’s panhandle.

FTC sues Amazon, claims millions tricked into prime memberships

Amazon has been sued, accused of tricking millions of people into paying for Amazon Prime subscriptions. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed the lawsuit, accusing Amazon of duping customers into signing up for Prime and charging a $139 annual membership fee. The FTC also said Amazon made it difficult for customers to cancel the membership.

Amazon described the FTC’s claims as “false on the facts and the law.” An Amazon spokesperson said they didn’t find out about the lawsuit until the FTC announced it publicly. The spokesperson added that Amazon will prove its case in court.
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Biden, McCarthy strike deal to avoid default. Now it’s up to Congress.

May 28, 2023

President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced late Saturday night that they have reached a tentative agreement to raise the nation’s debt ceiling and avoid a catastrophic default. The two sides finalized preliminary negotiations on the phone over the holiday weekend, characterizing it as an “agreement in principle.”

The text of the deal had not yet been finalized as of Saturday and is not guaranteed to garner the congressional support needed to pass. McCarthy said Saturday night that the House would vote on it Wednesday, five days before June 1, which is Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the U.S. will run out of funds absent a debt limit increase.

“The agreement represents a compromise, which means not everyone gets what they want. That’s the responsibility of governing,” Biden said in a tweet.

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1662639703764484096?s=20

Biden and Democrats had previously pushed for Congress to pass a clean debt ceiling hike, which would not have included any spending cuts.

McCarthy and House Republicans, meanwhile, had passed a bill that would dramatically cut deficits while raising the debt limit. Democrats had characterized the bill as a nonstarter.

“It’s a first offer at a bargaining table,” former Trump economic advisor Kevin Hassett had said of the House bill.

McCarthy said he plans to release the text of the bill Sunday when finalized between his staff and the White House.

“This is an agreement in principle that’s worthy of the American people,” McCarthy said. “It has historic reductions in spending, consequential reforms that will lift people out of poverty into the workforce, reined in government overreach. There are no new taxes, no new government programs.”

https://twitter.com/SpeakerMcCarthy/status/1662624437399584768?s=20

The president strongly urged the House and Senate to immediately pass the measure to avoid any dire consequences of default.

This agreement is good news for the American people, because it prevents what could have been a catastrophic default and would have led to an economic recession, retirement accounts devastated, and millions of jobs lost,” Biden said.
Debt ceiling drama a ‘farce’ since US can’t legally default: economist

January 24, 2023

Congress is at a familiar crossroads in 2023. Since 1960, elected representatives have acted on the debt ceiling 78 times to avoid default.

As the U.S. breaches its current $31.4 trillion ceiling, the Treasury Department is taking “extraordinary measures” to avoid default. Those measures will help stave off decision-making time until June, but Congress theoretically must lift the borrowing cap by then to continue paying the bills.

But is that practically true? Will the government default on its debt if the ceiling isn’t raised? According to economist James Galbraith, a former executive director of the U.S. Joint Economic Committee, the government legally can’t default, even absent congressional action.

“This is a political show,” Galbraith said. “It’s a bit of a farce, which has been played out many, many times. It’s surprising that people aren’t tired of it or questioning the reality of what they’re saying about it.”

According to Galbraith, the current Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair in Government/Business Relations at University of Texas at Austin, the Treasury cannot stop payments on any of its legal obligations, “debt ceiling or no debt ceiling.”

“Interest payments are required, Social Security payments are allocated by law, civil service salaries are allocated by law and military expenditures are allocated by law. The laws exist. So you can say, ‘Well, there’s this other law which says they can’t exceed the debt ceiling.’ That’s a bit like saying that you’re holding up the stop sign in the middle of the interstate highway. You can hold it up. That doesn’t mean traffic is going to stop,” he said.

The current debt-ceiling showdown was easily foreseen when Republicans gained control of the House in the midterms, with a vocal minority calling for cuts to Medicare and Social Security in exchange for raising the debt ceiling. But those cuts do not have widespread support within the Republican party.

“Under no circumstances should Republicans vote to cut a single penny from Medicare or Social Security,” former President Donald Trump, who is again running for the executive office in 2024, said in a video message.

On the flip side, dozens of House Democrats have pitched legislation that would do away with the debt ceiling altogether.

Watch the full interview above for more on Republican and Democratic debt ceiling proposals, along with Galbraith’s take on minting a trillion-dollar coin to pay debts.
New York Republicans call on Rep. Santos to resign over scandals

January 11, 2023
Republican politicians and officials in New York called on the newly-elected Rep. George Santos (R-NY) to resign in a news conference following revelations of a two-fold scandal involving the representative. Wednesday’s news conference, held by the Nassau County GOP, came on the heels of Rep. Santos admitting he fabricated much of his resume and life story during his campaign.

“Reporting has revealed Santos’s many mistruths, embellishments and outright lies about his work and educational experience, heritage and personal life, which clouded the public’s ability to evaluate him as their representative in Congress,” Brendan Quinn with the nonpartisan watchdog Campaign Legal Center wrote Tuesday. “Santos has a lot of people to answer to. First and foremost should be his constituents, the voters of New York’s 3rd Congressional District, who were deliberately deceived regarding critical personal and financial information about the candidate on their ballot.”

Santos responded to the news conference Wednesday afternoon, tweeting and telling reporters in Washington that he will not resign.

“I was elected to serve the people of #NY03 not the party & politicians,” Santos tweeted. “I remain committed to doing that and regret to hear that local officials refuse to work with my office to deliver results to keep our community safe and lower the cost of living.”

The news conference came two days after the center filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission accusing Santos of breaking campaign finance laws. The center accused Santos of the following:
- Concealing the true sources of his campaign funding, including the unexplained and highly suspicious origins of $705,000 Santos purportedly loaned his campaign
- Misrepresenting his campaign’s spending by routinely and deliberately falsifying disclosures regarding the campaign’s disbursement of funds
- Illegally using campaign funds for personal expenses, including the use of campaign funds to pay for a personal residence for Santos
“Santos’s deeply problematic campaign finance disclosures are worse,” Quinn wrote. “They raise numerous red flags of illegal conduct, and they appear to have been intentionally designed to hamper voters’ right to know how his campaign raised and spent its money — information that is essential for voters to evaluate candidates for office.”

The call from New York Republicans for Santos to resign also comes a day after two House Democrats referred the scandals to the House’s ethics committee. Nassau County’s district attorney has already said her office is investigating Santos.

Reuters contributed to this report.
Kevin McCarthy gains new votes in quest for House speaker

January 6, 2023

Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., made progress in his quest to become the next House speaker, but he’s still four votes short. McCarthy needed 217 votes to receive an overall majority, and he received 213.

The threshold has been lowered from 218 votes because some members are absent, including Rep.-Elect Wesley Hunt, R-Texas, who went home because his wife had a baby.

McCarthy told fellow Republicans on a conference call Friday morning that he had made progress but had not reached a final deal. As each of the defectors changed their votes to McCarthy, they received a standing ovation from the rest of the Republican conference.

“We’re going to make progress. We’re going to shock you,” McCarthy told reporters as he arrived at the Capitol.

McCarthy came to an agreement with Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, which gained him 13 votes. However, he has not been able to win over Reps. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., or Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., who are also leading a group opposed to the California congressman. Gaetz and Boebert’s objections to McCarthy are personal whereas Roy’s objection was based on policy.

Democrats are criticizing Republicans for not being able to elect a speaker with their new majority. They said it is holding the House back from doing the people’s work, something some Republicans have echoed.

All who serve in the House share a responsibility to bring dignity to this body.

Sadly, Republicans' cavalier attitude in electing a Speaker is frivolous, disrespectful and unworthy of this institution.

We must open the House and proceed with the People's work.

— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) January 5, 2023

The House of Representatives is at a standstill until it can elect a speaker. It cannot swear members in, debate or pass legislation. Its committees cannot meet and members cannot provide constituent services.
Former Rep. Reid Ribble: House speaker vote ‘has gotten personal’

January 5, 2023

The House of Representatives entered its third day of voting to select its next speaker on Thursday. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., made fresh concessions overnight to the group of House Republicans who have kept him from securing the position in hopes of hitting the 218-vote threshold.

McCarthy agreed to reduce the number of House members needed to bring a vote to remove the speaker from five to one, according to reports. He also agreed to put more members of the Freedom Caucus on the Rules Committee, a powerful group that determines how legislation will be handled prior to being sent to the House floor for a vote.

Former Rep. Reid Ribble, R-Wis., spoke with Straight Arrow News about the situation.

“There’s nothing that’s going to change. There are too many people that are completely locked in,” Ribble said. “There’s nothing that Kevin can give them beyond what he’s already offered that will move them to vote for him.”

Ribble said concessions on the motion to vacate could be a miscalculation on McCarthy’s part.

“I think it’s a mistake for Kevin to, to give them that, I think that there ought to be a threshold of maybe 15 or 20% of the majority to have a motion to vacate the chair,” he said. “But once you start negotiating with people who were not negotiating back with good faith, you’ve already lost the battle.”

While there has been discussion about the possibility of any Democrats ending the stalemate by supporting McCarthy, Ribble doesn’t see that happening, unless they simply give up on the process.

“The only way I think Democrats would actually help somebody win other than Kevin or even help Kevin win is simply by not showing up for the vote, they finally get tired of the circus,” Ribble added. “They just don’t come to the floor when a vote is called. And then the threshold required for Kevin McCarthy to become speaker goes down.”
IRS failed to perform required audits of Trump’s tax returns

December 21, 2022

For years, Americans couldn’t escape hearing about former President Donald Trump’s tax returns and why, despite years of precedence, he refused to release them. Trump repeatedly cited it was because he was being audited, but a House committee report reveals the IRS actually failed to audit him as president when it was required.

According to the latest report from the House Committee of Ways and Means, the IRS neglected to audit Trump for most of his time in office, despite a rule dating back to 1977 that requires mandatory tax examinations of all sitting presidents and vice presidents. The rule was spurred by a Watergate-era tax scandal surrounding former President Richard Nixon.

“The designated agents found that there was only one mandatory audit started and none completed during [Trump’s] four years in office. Clearly, the mandatory audit program was dormant, at best, during the prior Administration,” the report read.

The House Ways and Means Committee reported the IRS did not complete a single mandatory audit of President Trump’s tax returns while he was in office.

There’s no suggestion in the report that Trump tried to influence the IRS in any way. In fact, the IRS commissioner through most of Trump’s first year in office, John Koskinen, was appointed by former President Barack Obama.

It appears a move that did have at least some influence on the IRS was Democrats taking control of the House and its committees in 2019.

“Notably, the IRS sent a letter to the former President notifying him that his tax year 2015 return was selected for examination on April 3, 2019, which is the date the Chairman sent the initial request to the IRS for the former President’s return information and related tax returns,” the report authors wrote.

But aside from the one mandatory audit selected later that year, the remaining returns did not come up for examination until after Trump left office, according to the committee.

The IRS did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.
House intelligence GOP and Democrats release dueling COVID reports

December 16, 2022

In another example of partisanship, Democrats and Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee released separate reports on COVID-19. The committee’s work is supposed to be nonpartisan, but the dueling reports highlight what each party has expressed concern about. For Democrats, their concerns are intelligence collection and how the Trump administration handled it. For Republicans, it’s COVID-19’s origins and the lab leak theory.

There are a few key takeaways from both reports. Democrats note the intelligence community’s focus on health security and pandemic warning was “inconsistent at best” before COVID-19. It found the intelligence community today is still not properly positioned to collect information regarding global health security or biological threats.

To fix this, the committee recommends a dedicated global health security center in the office of the director of national intelligence, investments in open source intelligence and better collaboration between the intelligence community and public health agencies.

The Democrat’s report pushed back on claims from the Trump administration that the intelligence community didn’t see far enough ahead. The report found they provided “increasingly dire” assessments of a looming pandemic in late January and early February of 2020, well before President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency on March 13, 2020.

As per the lab leak theory, the Democrat’s report said they don’t have intelligence to reach a definitive conclusion.

“But while we do not know whether the virus was the result of a lab accident or natural transmission, one thing is clear — a future pandemic could result from either phenomenon and we need to prepare against both,” the report states.

The Republican report states the scientific community largely accepts that its feasible COVID-19 may have emerged from a lab-related event involving Chinese scientists experimenting with coronaviruses. They point to a world health organization advisory group and a publication in the medical journal “The Lancet” that states it’s a possibility.

They said the intelligence community downplayed the possibility of COVID-19 being connected to a Chinese bioweapons program because of input from outside experts who have conflicts of interest due to grant funding and professional entanglements.

There’s one important place where the reports converge, the intelligence community did not provide all the requested intel.

“The IC continues to obstruct the Committee’s oversight by engaging in a pattern of refusing to provide information,” The Republican report states.

Republicans said they will work to release more information when they take the majority. They contend some information remains classified that would not harm national security if it was made public.

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