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Democratic senator opposes Biden’s preemptive pardons. Here’s why.

December 10, 2024
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said he “strongly opposed” President Joe Biden’s consideration of preemptive pardons for President-elect Donald Trump’s political rivals. Blumenthal described it as a “terrible idea.”

“It would, in effect, be an implicit acknowledgment of some culpability or guilt,” Blumenthal told reporters. “And it would apply only to the top officials, probably leaving the underlings exposed and vulnerable.”

Multiple outlets reported Biden’s senior aides are debating blanket pardons for those possibly targeted by the incoming Trump administration. Former Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and Dr. Anthony Fauci are among possible Trump targets.

Prosecution speculation

Blumenthal said if there is a prosecution, it would be better to create a legal defense fund. This way, the accused can have a strong, bipartisan team of attorneys.

As a former prosecutor, he expressed doubts about getting a conviction on purely political charges.

“I think that pushing back and achieving acquittals, in effect giving the president a black eye when he brings these retribution prosecutions, would be a way to uphold justice,” Blumenthal said.

Trump threatens Jan. 6 investigative committee

President-elect Trump added to concerns about retribution, saying members of the Jan. 6 investigative committee should go to jail.

“For what they did, honestly, they should go to jail,” Trump said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Trump said he wouldn’t direct his FBI director and attorney general to send them to jail.

“I think that they’ll have to look at that. I’m going to focus on drill, baby, drill,” Trump said.

Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., a former member of the committee, said he did his job and the findings of the investigation should be preserved.

“They’re incredibly concerning,” Aguilar responded to Trump’s comments. “But I also think that within that same interview, he said that he could not tell the American public that their prices were not going to be impacted by the tariffs. So this is somebody who doesn’t keep his word.”

Aguilar said he hasn’t been a part of any conversations about pardons, calling it speculation.
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Johnson’s government spending plan on rocky ground as shutdown looms

September 10, 2024
House Speaker Mike Johnson’s, R-La., effort to approve a temporary government spending plan is on rocky ground. His bill would keep the government open for six months at current funding levels and require proof of citizenship to register to vote. Both Democrats and the right flank of the Republican Party oppose the bill.

“House Republicans are leading us toward a government shutdown.” Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., said.

“The worst thing that Republicans in the House can do is create a fake fight that the base knows they’re lying about and frustrate our voters going into Nov. 5,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said. “That’s how you lose the House of Representatives on[sic] an election.”

Congress needs to approve funding by Sept. 30 to avoid a shutdown. Both sides have different issues with Johnson’s spending plan.

Republicans who oppose the bill do not think it sufficiently reduces spending, after all, a continuing resolution is an extension of the current budget.

“You have to vote for a continuing resolution that continues the Biden administration’s budget that pays for the Green New Deal that pays for all these horrific things that all these people are sick of,” Greene said. “It’s absurd.”

Republicans are also concerned Johnson could remove the measure to require proof of citizenship for voter registration once Senate Democrats refuse to approve it. But Johnson said he is standing strong.

“I am resolved on this and I don’t know what more I can say to show that conviction,” Johnson said.

House Democrats are also opposed to the measure. It appears a clean continuing resolution that keeps everything exactly as it is now with no strings attached is becoming increasingly likely.

“The only way to pass a government funding bill is to pass it on a bipartisan basis,” Aguilar said.

Typically, when congressional leadership in either party bring forward a bill they know will not be signed into law, they do it to strengthen their negotiating position. If they can get all the members of their party behind to vote for it, they have a lot more leverage. But in this case, Johnson will lose leverage if he brings this up for a vote and a number of Republicans vote against it.

The federal government’s budget for fiscal year 2025, which goes from October 2024 to September 2025, is supposed to be finalized this year, under this Congress and this president. Pushing it to March means the new president and new Congress would finalize the spending bills.

There is disagreement on how long a continuing resolution should last, with suggestions between three and six months. That will also need to be sorted out.
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Republicans say Speaker Johnson is not weakened by Democratic support

April 30, 2024
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., was uncharacteristically quiet when she left the House chamber Tuesday, April 30. She told reporters, “I’m headed back to my office,” and kept walking just hours after Democrats announced they would not join her in voting to remove House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., effectively saving his job.

Democratic leadership said it would vote to table the motion to vacate, and added, “If she invokes the motion, it will not succeed.”

“We don’t want to turn the clock back and let Marjorie Taylor Greene dictate the schedule and calendar of what’s ahead,” Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., said when explaining the decision. “We want to turn the page and focus on the pressing issues that everyday Americans care about.”

https://twitter.com/RepMTG/status/1785323610942386593

Greene posted on X, formerly Twitter, that she felt Johnson should resign and switch parties. She also hinted she may bring the motion forward anyway.

“I’m a big believer in recorded votes,” Greene wrote.

Johnson assured reporters he did not ask the Democrats for help.

“I’ve not requested assistance from anyone,” Johnson said. “I’m not focused on that at all. I’m focused on getting the job done and getting the legislation passed. There’s no deals at all.”

Conservative Republicans are frustrated with Johnson because he used Democratic votes to pass key pieces of legislation like Ukraine aid and government funding bills. He also didn’t include border security as part of the deal. However, even conservatives said they wouldn’t support the motion to vacate.

“It makes no difference to me if it’s Hakeem Jeffries as speaker or Mike Johnson right now,” Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., said. “You know I want Speaker Mike Johnson to do the absolute best. I like Mike, I supported him to be speaker and it’s just really sad seeing the policies that are coming out.”

Those same Republicans also said Democratic support does not weaken Johnson.

“I don’t think it makes him weaker,” Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., said. “I mean, Mike’s, you know, he’s under siege in a lot of different areas and I think he feels that now.”

Moderate Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., flipped the script on conservatives who said Johnson is acting like the Democratic speaker.

“Well, it would require Democrats voting with a handful of Republicans to remove the speaker,” Lawler said.

Part of the conservatives’ calculus for standing behind Johnson is the math. If Johnson were ousted, Republicans don’t have a viable replacement. Those members are also concerned that if any more Republicans resign, they’ll hand the majority to Democrats and the gavel to Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.

“Absolutely,” Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., said. “Had the margin been bigger, we wouldn’t have had this, y’all wouldn’t be talking to me. You’d be asking me about ‘How can I be so outstanding at congressional baseball, but still be third string?’”
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Speaker Johnson says Suozzi victory is not a bellwether for November

February 14, 2024

Democrat Tom Suozzi won a special election in New York, Tuesday, Feb. 13, giving Democrats another seat in the House of Representatives and further shrinking the Republican’s majority. Once Suozzi is sworn in, the House will have 219 Republicans and 213 Democrats.

The new balance of power means Republicans will only be able to lose two votes any time they want to pass legislation along party lines.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., gave multiple reasons why Republican Mazi Melesa Pilip lost, and said her loss is not indicative of what will happen in the 2024 general election this November.

“That is in no way a bellwether of what’s going to happen this fall,” Johnson told reporters. “We are absolutely convinced. I’ve been to 17 states in the last 12 weeks. I’m telling you, whether I’m out west, on Long Island, the deep south, mid-South, Midwest, it doesn’t matter. There is a fervor among Americans and it is bipartisan. People know that this country is on the wrong track.”

Johnson said Suozzi won for multiple reasons: Suozzi previously held the seat, Democrats spent $15 million on the race and bad weather on the day of voting hurt Republican turn out.

“The result last night is not something in my view that Democrats should celebrate,” Johnson said. “They spent about $15 million to win a seat that President Biden won by eight points, they won it by less than eight points. Their candidate ran like a Republican. He sounded like a Republican talking about the border and immigration.”

Democrats said they believe Suozzi won because he has a proven ability to work across the aisle. They also said their party was far more productive when they had the House majority from 2020 to 2022.

“I think that’s the lesson here is whatever Donald Trump says is where House Republicans are going to land,” Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., said. “And so from our perspective, people like Tom Suozzi and members who have a track record on these issues have leaned in and will continue to lean in on being problem-solvers, working in a bipartisan way. That’s what the public wants us to do.”

“The American people want a change,” Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif said. “They want a Congress that actually does something. This is a completely do-nothing Congress in the hands of the Republicans and the American people want to have us work on kitchen table, economic issues.”

Republicans lost this seat after former Rep. George Santos was expelled, and they lost other seats that remain vacant due to retirements and resignations, including former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s.
Americans want Congress to make a deal; House leaves for Thanksgiving

November 15, 2023
After failing to move forward on 2024 funding bills, the House of Representatives left Washington on Wednesday afternoon, Nov. 15, for a week-and-a-half long Thanksgiving recess. Meanwhile, a new poll has revealed that Americans want more results and less rhetoric.

According to the NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist National Poll, 67% of Americans want Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to compromise, compared to 27% who said Johnson should stand on principle even if it means a gridlock in Congress.

Straight Arrow News asked some of the most conservative members who have been voting against government spending bills what they think.

“I think the only principles we should talk about is the fact that our government is $33 trillion in debt,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said. “So that’s pretty much a no brainer. It’s not a revenue problem in Washington, it’s a spending problem. And we need to do better for the American people.”

We’re fiscally going off a cliff right now, and if we don’t address that, we won’t have anything. The whole system will collapse and that, we need to address that. That needs to be our priority.
Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn.

“We’re fiscally going off a cliff right now, and if we don’t address that, we won’t have anything.” Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., said. “The whole system will collapse and that, we need to address that. That needs to be our priority.”

On Wednesday, the gridlock continued when members of the House Freedom Caucus blocked further consideration of the bill to fund the departments of Justice, Commerce and other agencies in 2024.

“[This] is a response to our dissatisfaction and our unwillingness to comply and play a part in this failure theater where we act like we’re actually going to do things when we have the opportunity to do things on these spending bills, and then we don’t do them,” Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., told reporters.

Some Republicans aren’t voting for the funding bills because they don’t think it reduces spending enough. However, GOP leaders think they can’t rely on support from Democrats, saying the Left believes Republicans are trying to cut spending too much.

“Our caucus still has questions about what that path ahead is,” Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., said, according to C-SPAN. “They’re marking up bills that have dramatic cuts to programs that we care about.”

The Marist poll also found that if the government shut down, 49% of Americans would blame congressional Republicans, while 43% would blame congressional Democrats and President Joe Biden.
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House Republicans pressure holdouts to vote for short-term funding bill

September 19, 2023
House Republicans postponed an initial vote on their continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government funded until Oct. 31, as they try to make changes needed to get more members of their own party on board. Now the moderates and conservatives who negotiated the bill are publicly pressuring holdouts to vote for it.

“If my conservative colleagues want to vote against that, go explain that. Go explain that you’re voting against a 30 day, 8% cut to the federal bureaucracy while having a piece of legislation attached to it that is the strongest border legislation ever passed,” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, said. “Again, to my so-called conservative colleagues, go explain that.”

“On Thursday I’m gonna vote to cut the government and I will vote to secure the border. I would imagine that would be a very hard vote for other Republicans to break with,” Rep. Dusty Johnson, R-S.D., said.

Under the proposed continuing resolution, government agencies would have their budgets cut by 8%, but not military or veterans. The bill would fully fund disaster relief. It also includes a border bill that would end catch and release, restart the “Remain in Mexico” policy for asylum-seekers, increase detention capacity and resume border wall construction. It would not provide more money to Ukraine.

“This is the most conservative CR ever put forward. And for some of my colleagues to walk away from continuing to fund the government, from securing the border, from cutting spending and for protecting our vets is a mistake,” Rep. Stephanie Bice, R-Okla., said.

Republicans believe the American people support these cuts because the national debt just surpassed $33 trillion. They also contend Americans are frustrated with the current state of immigration. However, Republicans will have to pass this bill on their own because Democrats say they won’t support it.

“Not even the speaker’s own caucus is on board with his plan. More reckless cuts and more MAGA mad libs and zero chance of becoming law,” Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., said.

Senate Democrats also call it a non-starter.

“I’m very concerned about it. We went through this with the debt ceiling and there was an agreement between the speaker, the Republican speaker [and] President Biden. We move forward based on that premise. And now, of course, they are reneging on that agreement,” Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said.

Durbin is referring to the debt ceiling agreement President Joe Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy made back in May. The pair agreed to increase the amount of money the federal government is allowed to borrow to pay its bills and reduce future spending. The current Republican bill does not stick to that agreement, it sets the spending level below the level agreed upon.

Averting a government shutdown will ultimately require a bipartisan vote. But no matter what happens in the coming weeks, lawmakers need a permanent solution for all of fiscal year 2024.
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Democrats elect historic leadership with ‘mandate to stamp out extremism’

November 30, 2022

House Democrats approved a historic leadership team for the 118th Congress starting in January. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., has been appointed party leader, becoming the first Black man to head a political party on Capitol Hill.

Jeffries will have two members of the current leadership team at his side, but in elevated positions. Rep. Katherine Clark, D-Mass., will be the whip, and Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., will serve as caucus chair.

“We look forward to finding opportunities to partner with the other side of the aisle and work with them whenever possible, but we will also push back against extremism whenever necessary,” Jeffries said.

Republicans are taking control of the House, and current Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is working hard to get the 218 votes necessary to become speaker. The new Democratic leadership team said they will work to be bipartisan but will continue to fight against what they called MAGA extremism.

“We heard loud and clear this election from the American people that they want us to work to get things done for them. They want us to reduce the costs that they have and they want us to stamp out extremism in every form. And that’s going to be our mandate,” Aguilar said.

The current top Democrats – Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California, Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland, and Whip James Clyburn of South Carolina – will still be on Capitol Hill, just in different roles. Jeffries said being able to look to them for guidance is a blessing.
Hakeem Jeffries, Pete Aguilar headline new Democratic leadership

November 18, 2022

The House Democratic leadership that has been in power for decades is stepping down. It is also endorsing Reps. Hakeem Jeffries, N.Y., Katherine Clark, Mass., and Pete Aguilar, Calif., to fill its shoes in the hopes of having a smooth transition.

“In the 118th Congress, House Democrats will be led by a trio that reflects our beautiful diversity of our nation. Chair Jeffries, Assistant Speaker Clark and Vice Chair Aguilar know that, in our Caucus, diversity is our strength and unity is our power,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif, said in a statement. “A new day is dawning — and I am confident that these new leaders will capably lead our Caucus and the Congress.”

The outgoing Democratic Whip, Rep. James Clyburn, S.C., also expressed his support for the trio, and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Md., said Jeffries should be his successor. Hoyer’s also stated he would remain as a resource and assist in any way possible.

“I am proud to offer my strong endorsement to Hakeem Jeffries for Democratic Leader, a role in which he will make history for the institution of the House and for our country. He is a skilled and capable leader who will help us win back the Majority in 2024 as we strive to continue delivering on our promises to the American people,” Hoyer wrote in a letter to the Democratic caucus.

So who are House Democrats’ next generation leaders?

Rep. Jeffries, who officially declared his candidacy to be the next Democratic leader Friday, is the caucus chairman. Jeffries has represented Brooklyn in Congress since 2013. The NYU Law School graduate served as a House impeachment manager in the first Senate trial of Donald Trump. He worked his way up the congressional ladder as whip of the Congressional Black Caucus and co-chair of the Democratic Policy Communications Committee.

Rep. Clark is the Assistant Speaker to Pelosi, but is on track to be the next whip. She’s a member of the House Progressive Caucus. Before entering Congress, she was both a senator and representative in the Massachusetts state legislature. If she secures the whip position, she’d be the number two, responsible for building support for legislation and getting bills passed.

Rep. Aguilar is the vice chair of the Democratic caucus and the highest ranking Latino in Congress. He is a member of the Jan. 6 investigative committee and the House Appropriations Committee. Aguilar would be the caucus chair, responsible for developing policy priorities.
Ginni Thomas testifies in front of Jan. 6 investigative committee

September 29, 2022

Virginia Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas appeared for a voluntary interview with the House Jan. 6 Investigative Committee. It lasted more than four hours.

Thomas did not answer reporters’ questions when she arrived, but her attorney previously said she was “eager to answer the committee’s questions to clear up any misconceptions about her work relating to the 2020 election.”

Thomas is involved in conservative political circles, and as the presidential election results were being disputed she was actively communicating with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, in addition to Trump attorney John Eastman. Committee member Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., told reporters the committee wanted to ask about her conversations with Eastman.

“The same individual who came up with this idea and scheme that a federal judge has ruled was likely illegal. And conspired to delay the proceedings here and has criminal exposure,” Rep. Aguilar said.

Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., told reporters Thomas answered some of the committee’s questions and reiterated that she believes the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump.

Thomas also emailed state legislators in Arizona and Wisconsin as members of the Trump team were considering using alternative slates of electors that would vote for Trump, even though President Biden was victorious in both of those states. According to emails obtained by the AP, Thomas told state lawmakers in Arizona to choose “a clean slate of electors” and “stand strong in the face of political and media pressure.”

Thomas has repeatedly denied that her political activities posed any conflict of interest with her husband’s work on the high court.

The committee still has one more, yet to be scheduled public hearing. It will also be issuing a final report which is expected before the end of the year.

The AP and Reuters contributed to this report.

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