When President Barack Obama was in office and the White House needed to reach Sen. Joe Manchin, one person was always tasked with making the call: then-Vice President Joe Biden. Manchin arrived in Washington as a former governor, filling the seat of the legendary Robert C. Byrd. He had little interest in talking to staff
Continue ReadingPresident Joe Biden is tasking Vice President Kamala Harris with overseeing efforts with Central American countries to stem the flow of migrants to the US southern border, the first major issue Biden has assigned directly to his No. 2. “I asked her, the VP, today, because she’s the most qualified person to do it, to
Continue Reading
The White House is weighing whether to issue a number of gun safety measures through executive action even as they publicly press Congress to move ahead on legislation aimed at curbing violence. The executive actions could include requiring background checks on sales of so-called “ghost guns” and other measures, Biden administration officials tell CNN. The
Continue ReadingBoth of the President and first lady’s dogs, Major and Champ, have returned to the White House after spending some time in Delaware following a biting incident involving Major, according to Jill Biden’s press secretary Michael LaRosa. The two German shepherds returned to Washington after Major worked with a trainer at the Bidens’ home in
Continue ReadingA leader among the paramilitary group the Oath Keepers said he was coordinating with the Proud Boys about how their members would work together at the US Capitol on January 6, according to a new court filing from prosecutors late Tuesday night. Facebook chats made public in the filing by the Justice Department show Kelly
Continue Reading Colin Kahl’s nomination to be Pentagon policy chief is on track to advance to the Senate floor after West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin supported the imperiled pick in a key committee vote. The Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday deadlocked over the nomination, which means that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer will have to
Continue Reading A bipartisan group of senators is pushing to pass legislation as soon as next month to try to rein in China’s economic influence on the United States, in an effort that represents President Joe Biden’s best chance at a major bipartisan package from Congress. With the looming partisan brawl over a Biden’s next major agenda
Continue ReadingPresidential candidate Kamala Harris campaigned aggressively on gun control reform — making the case that if Congress couldn’t act to make changes, the president could. A California senator without much to lose as she fought to define herself in the 2020 Democratic primary, Harris at the time made bold claims about presidential power that then-candidate
Continue ReadingSome conservatives who pushed and prodded for the Senate to quickly confirm Amy Coney Barrett to succeed the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court last fall are rattled by what they have seen so far. Barrett has only been on the bench since late October, providing an exceedingly small sample size, but
Continue ReadingWhen Supreme Court justices meet behind closed doors Friday, a conference that comes three days after the country’s latest mass shooting, they are scheduled to discuss whether to add a blockbuster issue to the docket for next term: the scope of the Second Amendment. The court has largely dodged the issue since issuing two landmark
Continue ReadingPresident Joe Biden is not the first US president to face a growing number of migrants at the US-Mexico border — and he won’t be the last. Fluctuations in migration flows are common, regardless of which party is in power, as was evident in 2019 during the border crisis under then-President Donald Trump. It’s difficult
Continue ReadingSens. Tammy Duckworth and Mazie Hirono on Tuesday backed off their threat to vote against any of President Joe Biden’s nominees who aren’t minorities, after going public with their anger that the Cabinet lacks Asian Americans, and Duckworth earlier saying she felt insulted by the White House’s attempts to brush off her concerns. The move
Continue Reading Millions of struggling Americans are already accessing the assistance from the Democrats’ $1.9 trillion relief package that President Joe Biden signed earlier this month — including stimulus payments and enhanced unemployment benefits. But not all the aid in the massive law will be available right away. In fact, eligible Americans won’t fully benefit from several
Continue ReadingSen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois on Tuesday backed off her threat to vote against any of President Joe Biden’s nominees who aren’t minorities, after going public with her anger that the Cabinet lacks Asian Americans and saying she felt insulted by the White House’s attempts to brush off her concerns. The move came after a
Continue Reading Actress Jennifer Garner will join first lady Jill Biden on Friday for a trip to Alabama as part of the Biden administration’s “Help is Here” tour, promoting the American Rescue Plan. Garner was a vocal supporter of the Biden-Harris campaign. In October of last year, she hosted an Instagram Live virtual conversation with Jill Biden
Continue Reading US border officials are detaining on average more than 600 unaccompanied migrant children who cross the US-Mexico border each day, a Department of Homeland Security official familiar with the data told CNN. The daily average as of Tuesday is up from around 500 earlier this month, and far surpasses the height of the 2019 surge
Continue ReadingThe Senate on Tuesday confirmed Dr. Vivek Murthy as US surgeon general, a role he had held under the Obama administration and reprises during a key chapter in the Biden administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Lawmakers voted 57-43 to confirm Murthy, with Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Roger Marshall
Continue ReadingSen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois is threatening to vote against any of President Joe Biden’s nominees who aren’t minorities over her fury that the Cabinet lacks Asian Americans, adding she found it “incredibly insulting” that a top White House official had pointed to Vice President Kamala Harris’ South Asian roots as sufficient in defending the
Continue Reading Rep. Madison Cawthorn, a North Carolina Republican who has a history of egregious false claims, posted another one Sunday on Twitter. Cawthorn was criticizing a new $86.9 million federal contract to house some migrant families in hotel rooms as they await legal proceedings to remove them from the US. (Other migrant families are being swiftly
Continue Reading Sen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois is threatening to vote against any of President Joe Biden’s nominees who aren’t minorities over her fury that the Cabinet lacks Asian Americans, adding she found it “incredibly insulting” that a top White House official had pointed to Vice President Kamala Harris’ South Asian roots as sufficient in defending the
Continue Reading