Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Like those monsters in horror films that are never quite dead the first time you think they are, Congress came back today for a one day encore. The Democrats got an unneeded boost during what was to be the August recess after Republican Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe cut a deal with Senate Majority leader Harry Reid to pass a state bailout bill to pay for Medicaid and education costs.  That allowed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call the House back into special session with much fanfare to pass the bill today on a party line vote.  The media has played into the Obama Administration’s claims that this will “save” hundreds of thousands of teaching jobs, it is really a sop to 1/states like New York and California that have spent themselves into bankruptcy and 2/ teachers unions who have deliberately accepted layoffs as the alternative to benefit cuts.  The unions know two things:  their dues depend on the number of members and they need the dues this election year to defeat conservatives.  In an excellent American Spectator piece today (also on our website), Vincent Vernuccio uses the Milwaukee school system as an example.  Right now, Milwaukee teachers get $40,000 in benefits, including a Cadillac health care plan costing $26,000 per year. When asked to accept a plan with co-pays to avoid layoffs, the union refused.  On top of that, the bill doesn’t actually require the funds be used for teachers, and the bloated education bureaucracies will surely find other uses that have nothing to do with the classroom.

This bill also has the same flaw as the stimulus.  It’s a one time shot of money.  Those who accept it will be in the same fix next year, thus in the position of asking for another bailout.  As for the allocation of funds, a large percentage will go to states that have been the most irresponsible, such as New York, New Jersey and California. One state won’t get anything:  Texas, because they refused to use the stimulus money to increase spending, instead shored up their rainy day fund and don’t need a bailout.

Interestingly, besides giving more money to the Bath Iron Works in Maine, the Democrats were forced to make actual cuts in a number of popular welfare programs, such as food stamps and renewable energy grants to fully pay for the $26 billion cost of the bill.  However, both Reid and Pelosi assured the liberals in the caucus that they would figure out a way to restore the funds later, admitting these were phony cuts.

With any luck, the monster is really dead this time until September 13, when showdowns loom over energy, taxes and possibly the START Treaty with Russia, although many believe that will be held until the inevitable lame duck session after the election.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The deal cooked up by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the two Republican Senators from Maine, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, to get a badly need win for the Democrats, not surprisingly turned out to involve money for Maine.  Each time this $36 billion bill has been brought up there have been different funds to partially offset the cost.  One part of it would have meant less money for Bath Iron Works, a sacred cow of funding in Maine since the days of Senator Bill Cohen, a Republican who became bill Clinton’s Defense Secretary.  So that was scrapped and Reid was able to convince House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call the House into special session next week to pass the new version of the bill, another demand by Snowe.

Now Reid is taking grief from the powerful renewable energy lobby for stealing $1.5 billion from the bloated renewable energy loan program set up in the stimulus to help offset the state bailout.  The solar energy industry has packed a powerful political punch with Republicans and Democrats in western states, including Reid’s Nevada, and they are furious with Reid for not including a mandate to purchase renewable energy in his energy bill. So Reid now says he will find a way to “restore” the funds to the program, which is also missing $2 billion used for the absurd “Cash for Clunkers” program.  Reid has a point on this one, since most of the $20 billion in the program has never been given out, due to bureaucratic ineptness and the odd requirement of the program that the Treasury Department share responsibility.  Treasury, of course, had no one in the Department with knowledge on these issues.

Nevertheless, the state bailout bill is a big win for the Democrats who had failed for weeks to get a vote on their “jobs” agenda.  Most of the money will go to big urban states such as New York, New Jersey and California where the state employee unions are strong.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Just when it looked like the Democrats in Congress had completely failed to pass any of their much heralded “jobs” agenda before the August recess, the Republicans came to their rescue.  Maine Senators Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins provided the votes to pass a state bailout bill. This bill gives $16 billion to the states to help pay their Medicaid bills and $10 billion demanded by the teachers unions who claim it will save teachers jobs in some states.  Up until now, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had been frustrated at every turn in attempts to pass a small bank bailout bill and any type of energy legislation.  To get the Republican votes, Senate Democrats had to actually cut some spending on food stamps and some feel-good programs to “foster industrial and scientific innovation.  They are also raising taxes on multinational companies by restricting the use of a foreign tax credit.

The irony is that the House originally scheduled its recess to begin August 6 along with the Senate, but with no action by the Senate decided to leave a week early for an unprecedented six week summer break.  But have no fear. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will call the House back into special session next week to pass the bill and give her Democrats something to talk about other than the miserable failure of the Stimulus and the rest of the Obama/Pelosi/Reid agenda. The bill is small potatoes as far as government spending goes these days but it gives the Democrats a much needed morale boost at a time when all major legislation has come to a halt and the polls are looking grim for them.

www.conservative.org

August 4, 2010

Honorable Senator Daniel Inouye, Chairman
Honorable Senator Thad Cochran, Ranking Member
Committee on Appropriations
Room S 128
U.S. Capitol, Washington, DC 20510

Honorable David Obey, Chairman
Honorable Jerry Lewis, Ranking Member
House Appropriations Committee
H-218
U.S. Capitol, Washington D.C. 20515

Dear Chairman Inouye, Chairman Obey, Senator Cochran and Representative Lewis:

Today the American Conservative Union, the nation’s oldest and largest grassroots conservative organization, launched a new effort entitled ACU ACORN ACTION.

Despite the fact that Congress voted to cut funding for ACORN, multiple stories have surfaced that groups housing former ACORN leadership and staff are being established throughout the country to simply avoid scrutiny.   It is our belief that these entities may seek to obtain taxpayer funding despite the desire of Congress to eliminate funding for programs directed by these very same leaders.

ACU is tracking these entities.

To date, as you can see on our website www.ACUAcornAction.com we have identified several organizations whose close ties to ACORN raise suspicion.

We look forward to working with your staff to help you identify these groups.

Millions of Americans were shocked by the actions of ACORN office staff members shown on videos last year.  In addition, ACU and others have raised concerns over ACORN’s potential role in the subprime mortgage crisis and voter fraud.

We urge you to remain vigilant in ensuring that taxpayer funds are not misspent on illegal, unethical or political activities.

On behalf of our ACU members throughout the nation, I appreciate your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

Larry Hart,
Director of Government Relations
The American Conservative Union

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Adding to a growing list of failures, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid threw in the towel today on yet another bill he had promised to pass before the August recess.  After capitulating on cap and trade, Reid has drawn up an “energy” bill dealing with oil spill liability, more energy tax increases (oil tax) and further restricting domestic energy production.  In addition, although the bill claims to be a “response” to the BP oil spill, it would pave the way for BP and a few other large oil companies to dominate offshore oil drilling by eliminating any cap on the amount of liability a company would have for a spill.  No small or medium size company could afford that type of risk. Senate Republicans led by Lisa Murkowski have drawn up an alternative bill that would be more favorable to domestic energy production but would give the Obama Administration the power to decide liability caps which is not what some conservatives would think is a good solution to the problem.   In any case, by refusing to allow Republican amendments to bills some Republicans would have helped pass, Reid has failed on every issue since the financial overhaul bill with the exception of an extension of unemployment insurance.

As expected, Republicans are going through the motions on the Kagan nomination to the Supreme Court. They have agreed not to object to dealing with other business during the Kagan debate.  This helps lessen the intensity of media coverage on issues the Democrats would just as soon avoid, such as Kagan’s unlawful actions in throwing military recruiters off the Harvard Law School campus.

Congress is due to go into recess Friday, not with a bang, but with a whimper.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

While the House left town a week early for an unprecedented 6 week vacation, the Senate is once again tied up in knots over Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s refusal to allow Republican amendments that would make some Democrats look bad and the ability of the 41 Republicans to stick together on this one issue.  On the bill to “aid” small business, appointed Senator George Lemieux of Florida provided the 60^th vote needed to add a “small bank bailout” provision to the bill.  This would give the treasury a $30 billion fund to “encourage” small banks to lend more to small business in much the same way the TARP injected funds into large financial institutions.  But Lemieux then backed off further support of the bill until Reid agreed to allow further amendments. One of the amendments at issue would repeal a “tax compliance” law passed to help pay for the health care bill, which requires every small business to file a tax form every time they pay out or receive a payment of $600 or more.  There is so much concern over this issue by small business, many Democrats have jumped on the bandwagon.  This is somewhat embarrassing to supporters of Obamacare as it could be considered the first very small step toward repealing its provisions.  So the small business bill is in limbo for now.

Next, the energy bill.  Having abandoned cap and trade, Reid now has a bill to change the laws on offshore drilling that would also eliminate any cap on liability for an offshore spill.  Although this measure is a response to the BP spill, it’s clear that unlimited liability would favor large companies like BP and prevent smaller companies from competing, often the end result of government regulation.  So it looks like this bill will also fall short of 60 votes to proceed this week.  Unless Reid relents on the amendment issue, that leaves the nomination of Elena Kagan as the final vote before the Senate takes a break.  Reid would have liked to push that debate as late in the week as possible to make it difficult for Kagan’s opponents to have the usual three or more days of floor time.  To do that, he needed something to fill up the time.  He didn’t have it and thus has been forced to start the debate Tuesday.  Stay tuned.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Democrats in the House are trying a series of maneuvers that they hope will make them look better to constituents who are in revolt over runaway spending and a massive annual deficit (latest estimate–$1.47 trillion).  Their method is to pass bills that look good but use deception that allows them to make misleading statements.  In some cases, the Republicans are going along with this game.

Today’s bill, though, has drawn strong Republican opposition.  It’s the Transportation and Housing Appropriation bill, known as THUD.  This bill actually totals $500 million less than last year.  The problem is, spending for this bill is up 38 percent since 2008. Last year alone saw a one year increase of 23 percent. This, of course, will not be mentioned in most of the stories written about the bill.  In addition, there are numerous wasteful and politically oriented programs that won’t be touched.  One example is $677 million for “sustainability and livability” programs that no one has been able to adequately define.  There is concern that these vague programs can be used to interfere with local land use and zoning decisions.

Then there is the “Transformation Initiative Program.”  This allows the HUD Secretary to take up to 1 percent from a program within HUD and create a fund to “research, capacity building, technical assistance and demonstration programs.”  Since these are not defined and there is no oversight, these monies could be used as a “slush fund” to benefit political friends.  Anyone voting for this bill (and subsequent appropriations bills) should not be allowed to get away with calling themselves “fiscal conservatives” back home.

A more disturbing gimmick was used to pass a bill on Tuesday using the “Suspension of the Rules” calendar which allows no amendments, a few minutes of debate and a two-thirds vote to pass.  It was HR 5730, labeled the Surface Transportation Earmark Recission Act.  Sponsor Betsy Markey (D-CO), a very liberal member of Congress from a conservative district, claims it will save the taxpayers money by “eliminating $713 million in unobligated funding for 309 earmarks.”  Sounds pretty good.  The problem is, it doesn’t reduce federal spending by one penny.  It takes off the books projects that will never happen.  Nevertheless, Ms. Markey sent out a news release headlined, “MARKEY SCORES WIN AGAINST WASTEFUL SPENDING.”  This bill passed 394-23. Republican John Duncan of Tennessee spoke on the floor in favor, saying he “applauded the gentlewoman from Colorado for this legislation,” although he acknowledged it will have “no impact on spending.”  Duncan noted that this bill was similar to one sponsored last week by Congressman Tom Perriello (D-VA) which also did not cut one penny from the federal budget.  Remarkably, Perriello is also a very liberal member of Congress from a conservative District.  You can expect to see more of these political gimmick bills in September and October, particularly if the Republicans don’t object.

www.conservative.org

Dear Senator:

On behalf of the American Conservative Union, I strongly urge you to vote “NO” on the motion to proceed to H.R. 3628, the DISCLOSE Act.  Despite revisions to the House-passed bill, this measure remains what it has been from the start-a cynical ploy to affect election campaigns already in progress in the hopes that its constitutionality may not be dealt with until after November.

This bill should really be renamed the SUPPRESS Act because it suppresses free speech far beyond its stated purpose of overturning the Citizens United decision of the Supreme Court.  This bill’s supporters would have you believe that it only deals with “powerful corporations” who, under the Citizens United decision, will have “unlimited ability to pour millions of corporate dollars” into political campaigns.  In reality the greatest effect would be on issue organizations, whether conservative or liberal in nature, that happen to be incorporated, as most are.  Even local chambers of commerce and agricultural organizations could come under this regulatory regime, as may bloggers, who do not get the same protection as other media organizations.  The bill also penalizes groups that have a government contract from exercising their free speech rights.

The disclosure requirements themselves make no sense, as the top donors to any group would be “disclosed,” even if they did not fund the organization’s communications.

Despite the bills revisions, this bill still carves out special rules for unions.  As Senator Susan Collins said about the revised bill, “(it) would provide a clear and unfair advantage to unions, while shutting other organizations out of the election process or subject them to onerous reporting requirements that would not apply to unions.” So who really has the most money to spend? Federal Election Commission statistics compiled by the Roll Call newspaper show, that of the 15 organizations with a total of over $93 million to spend on the election, 14 of them are unions with a total of $81 million in the bank.

The fact is, donations to groups for independent expenditures and electioneering communications over $250 are already required to be disclosed through the FEC.  This bill is nothing less than an attempt to place a chill on groups of all persuasions who want to participate in the American political system.  Please vote “NO” on the motion to proceed to S. 3628, the DISCLOSE Act.

Sincerely,

Larry Hart
Director of Government Relations
The American Conservative Union

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was two votes short of creating yet another $30 billion pot of money controlled by federal bureaucrats, this time a “lending fund” for small business.  But, as has often been the case, two Republicans obliged.  The two, George LeMieux of Florida and George Voinovich of Ohio are leaving the Senate next year and don’t have to answer to the voters.  The $30 billion was added to a hodge-podge of tax breaks and “enhancements” to existing small business programs.  Ironically, the bill still did not pass because these two Republicans are upset that no other amendments have been allowed to the bill and say they will withhold their further support until that happens.  So Reid punted and instead filed cloture to force a vote on the so-called DISCLOSE Act on Tuesday.  This partisan bill which passed the House overturns the Supreme Court Citizens United decision that gives incorporated groups political free speech rights and adds new draconian rules to keep these groups from being effective in the 2010 elections.  The conventional wisdom has been that with even Scott Brown of Massachusetts saying the bill is too partisan for him to support, there are not 60 votes to move the bill in the Senate.  As we have seen with these other bills, you never know until the vote is taken.

Reid and the Obama Administration did suffer their first defeat on their effort to put each sector of the economy under federal control Thursday when Reid threw in the towel on a major energy bill.  This means no carbon tax or even a renewable energy mandate for utilities.  Some type of small energy bill including new provisions on oil drilling will still be unveiled next week.  This leaves the Democrats and eight Republicans who have taken a lot of political heat for supporting the massive cap and trade legislation in the House last year in the position of supporting unpopular legislation and not accomplishing anything.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Although the election of Scott Brown to replace Ted Kennedy in Massachusetts nominally gave the Republicans the ability to stop bad legislation, it hasn’t turned out that way. The Democrats have been either one or two votes short of the 60 they need to move legislation and somehow one or two Republicans have always obliged. Tuesday it looked like a package of “aid to small business bills” in the Senate would pass with one provision dropped—a $30 billion “small bank lending fund” which some have dubbed “TARP III”—a very small version of the $700 billion big bank bailout. Reid had already decreed that no amendments to the bill would be allowed. But this proved to be a deception. Although the bill itself as presented by Majority Leader Harry Reid will not have the bank fund in it, Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu, who chairs the Small Business Committee, has an agreement to vote on the fund as an amendment—the ONLY amendment vote allowed. Even though the most liberal Republican in the Senate, Maine’s Olympia Snowe, opposes this provision, Landrieu says she has the 60 votes needed to pass the amendment. Supposedly, the $30 billion will “only” be used for “healthy” banks to help lending to small business, but the way most of these provisions have been written, wide discretion has been given to federal bureaucrats to decide who gets the money and what it’s used for. The two things to watch for here will be the final language of the amendment—not yet seen—and which Republicans will oblige the Democrats to get the measure passed.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

While campaigning back home as deficit hawks, members of Congress from both parties are continuing to play games with spending issues.  The Senate Appropriations Committee, not known for its fiscal prudence, has announced with great fanfare that they are cutting a grand total of  $14 billion from the $1.14 trillion in discretionary spending Congress has control over for Fiscal Year 2011.  But even this tiny amount is deceptive.  Most of this “cut” will come from the Defense budget.  But what has happened in the past is that any funds cut from Defense gets put back in later in the year through the “emergency supplemental” bills always brought up since the start of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The Republican response? They want to cut $6 billion more from various programs. That’s a difference of ½ of one percent.  That’s not surprising since the senior Republican on Appropriations, Thad Cochran of Mississippi, has spent much of his career fighting conservative efforts to eliminate earmarks and cut wasteful spending.

House and Senate Democrats are each on the verge of giving up pet programs to get some bills passed before the August recess.  The supplemental spending bill for the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan has been held up for months while liberals in the House tried to add on totally unrelated domestic spending programs including a state bailout provision demanded by the teachers’ unions to keep states from reducing spending.  The Senate did not have 60 votes for this, keeping the bill in limbo and infuriating Secretary of Defense Gates.  Now Pelosi and Majority Leader Hoyer say they will try to attach this bad legislation to another bill.  In the Senate, leading senators are saying they are willing to drop a $30 billion “small bank bailout” provision touted by the Obama Administration as providing help to get credit going, but, as with the big bank bailout, leaving open the possibility of another slush fund that could be used over and over again for different purposes.  You can tell the rush to the August recess is on.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Republican congressional leaders were on the airwaves over the weekend saying they had gotten the message from the last time they were in the majority and spent taxpayers’ money without regard to what then looked like large annual deficits.  This, they say, will not happen again.  Yet under the radar, Republicans are enabling new spending.  A case in point is a bill scheduled for a vote this evening (HR 1855) to create a new grant program under the Workforce Investment Act.  Under the suspension of the rules procedure, the bill must get a two-thirds vote to pass, giving the Republicans leverage.  There have been no hearings on this bill or on a reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act as a whole.  Although the $2.5 million cost of the bill is petty cash in the federal budget, it seems odd that Republicans would acquiesce to any new grant program when the emphasis should be on cutting the thousands of grant programs that already exist.  The original intent of the bill was to give unions a big say in the grants but that language was changed to get Republican support. Nevertheless, it’s not hard to figure out who will get preference in the Obama Administration.

Last week, Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce gave unanimous support to a bill authored by cap and trade authors Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) called the Blowout Prevention Act.   While claiming to prevent blowouts, the real aim of the bill is to reduce domestic oil production and raise the cost of energy.  The Republicans explanation for this one is that they got some changes to the bill that made it somewhat better than the original bill, but an excellent analysis by Marlo Lewis at www.openmarket.org shows the final draft of the bill still gives federal regulators life or death decision-making power over deepwater oil drilling and it’s not hard to figure out what those decisions will be under the Obama Administration.  As Rahm Emmanuel once said, a crisis is a terrible thing to waste and Waxman and Markey are seeing to it that this crisis will be used to suppress domestic energy production even more than it has in previous bills, this time with Republican support.

www.conservative.org

Dear Senator:

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Senator Scott Brown (R-MA) who has been the Democrats’ best friend on major economic bills such as the financial services overhaul–, now scheduled to pass this week,– and extensions of unemployment and health care subsidies with no spending offsets, has refused Senator Chuck Schumer’s best efforts to lure him into being the key vote on the campaign finance bill.  The House earlier passed the DISCLOSE Act which would overturn the U.S. Supreme Court Citizens United decision which allowed incorporated groups to have the same political speech rights as individuals and then goes further to clamp down on the ability of these groups to be active in this year’s elections.  Brown says it’s too blatantly partisan even for him (unions are carefully excluded from some of the provisions) and he’ll hold fast with his fellow Republicans, at least for now.  For now, this makes it impossible for Schumer and company to get the 60 votes they need.  Stay tuned.

www.conservative.org

Dear Senator:

On behalf of the American Conservative Union, I strongly urge you to vote “NO” on H.R. 4173, the conference report on the financial services overhaul bill.  Many changes have been made to the bill since it last passed the Senate.  Unfortunately, the heart of the bill remains the same, a massive transfer of power from the Congress to the executive branch, a power grab by federal bureaucrats to take over yet another sector of the U.S. economy with little congressional oversight.

The premise of this bill seems to be that since federal regulatory agencies made a hash of oversight responsibilities of large financial institutions’ exotic investment practices, we should invest these bureaucrats with vastly increased powers of regulation.  This bill still gives permanent bailout authority for large financial institutions deemed too big to fail.  These regulators also get to decide whether to authorize a bailout or liquidate a firm if they feel like it.  To pay for it, the bill, while eliminating a bank tax in advance, authorizes a future tax to pay for either the bailout of liquidation.

This bill creates an Office of Financial Research to accumulate data on all individual financial transactions, leaving it up to the regulators as to how much invasion of privacy this will cause.  Although these provisions have been improved in the conference report, much of the implementation of this data accumulation is still left to federal bureaucrats.

Not surprisingly, this bill is a trial lawyers’ dream, in that it creates new class-action lawsuit opportunities that would allege “price manipulation” of derivatives and credit default swaps, issues so vague as to encourage frivolous lawsuits aimed at pressuring targets to make settlements.

The law firm of Davis, Polk and Wardwell has produced an analysis of this bill showing its implementation will require 243 new rulemakings by eleven federal agencies.  Yet in its 2300 page length, there is not one paragraph that tackles the biggest problem-child of the federal government’s financial services sector, the government sponsored enterprises of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

As with TARP and the federal takeover the U.S. health care system, this bill is expected to pass with very few people having read its contents, setting up another scenario of buyer’s remorse once there is time to review it.  Incredibly, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank admitted as much by saying he plans a follow up bill to “fix” problems he has already found in it, yet urges its passage as is.

Along with its harmful provisions, this bill’s vague language is a complete abdication of congressional power to unelected federal bureaucrats.  Please vote “NO” on the conference report to H.R. 4173.

Sincerely,

Larry Hart
Director of Government Relations
The American Conservative Union

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Having held hostage funding for the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan for many weeks while they argue over how much unconnected domestic spending to add to the bill, congress has upped the ante.  Instead of $25 billion in new deficit spending, as originally proposed, the House and Senate are each insisting on $25 billion of their own pork adding a $50 billion cost to the bill.  Having already warned of the consequences to defense spending, Secretary of Defense Gates was on Capitol Hill today telling members of congress that time has run out and they must act to prevent “stupid” things from happening as he put it a few months ago.  So far this has had little effect and there has been little or no media or public outrage despite the supposedly strong feelings about spending and increasing the debt.  Keep this in mind the next time your member of congress talks about “doing something” to reduce overspending in congress.

The Senate Finance Committee will finally recognize that the country faces the biggest tax increase in its history when the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts expire on January 1.  They will hold a hearing Wednesday on the effects of tax rates on economic growth and distribution.  It will be interesting to see the liberal dominated panel explain how raising tax rates will promote growth but they will surely find a way.  The Democrats have a big dilemma in trying to prevent the most popular tax cuts from expiring while allowing capital gains and “taxes on the wealthy” stay in place.

Senators Jim DeMint (R-SC) and David Vitter (R-LA) have teamed up to offer a bill to prohibit using Justice Department funds to sue the state of Arizona over its new illegal immigration law.  The idea was to get a record vote on an amendment to a pending bill to help small business.  Majority Leader Harry Reed had claimed he would allow an open amendment process but right before the 4^th of July recess reneged and shut the amendment process down.  DeMint and Vitter still hope to find a bill they can use to offer this as an amendment.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

House Democrats are at war with the White House and the White House is at war with Senate Democrats.  Meanwhile, U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are left holding the bag.  The last chance for the House to accomplish anything before the 4th of July recess evaporated at Midnight Thursday night when Democrats insisted on challenging the Obama Administration’s prized “Race To The Top” education program.  As a result, the Senate will have to take up the bill again after the holiday recess. For weeks, the war supplemental funding bill has been held hostage by the liberals in the House that they add funding the teacher’s unions want to preserve some jobs in certain states, in effect a state bailout fund which has been shrinking from around $50 billion to around $10 billion. (There’s another $11 billion in loose change in the latest version for some other pet programs).  But those Democrats who claim to be fiscal conservatives, the so-called “Blue Dogs,” have been under more and more pressure to stop looking the other way on higher and higher spending bills, as they have for years, while at the same time anti-war sentiment in the Democrat caucus has also increased.  Speaker Pelosi and House Majority Leader Hoyer used a legislative trick now a few years old to divide the bill into two parts, one for the troop funding which the anti-war faction could vote against but Republicans would vote for and one for domestic funding which the anti-war faction can vote for but the Republicans would vote against.  Later they merge the bills when it passes the Senate.  It worked again, but barely as 38 Democrats opposed the procedure and it only passed by a vote of 215-210. (Six Republicans and two Democrats didn’t show up for the vote).  The problem is House Appropriations Chairman (D-WI), known for his fierce temper and who has already announced his retirement, satisfied the “Blue Dogs” by taking money from the “Race to the Top” education funds.  This drew a veto threat from the White House and the House, not knowing what the Senate would do on this issue, suspended action and adjourned for 12 days.  The Senate, for its part, has suddenly found itself playing the part of the more responsible body on spending, passing a bill that had few of the goodies included in the House version, which allowed them to pass their version of the war funding bill with considerable Republican support.  This has also made the White House unhappy, as they are looking for ways to satisfy their union supporters and big city mayors looking for extra money this year.

Meanwhile, the deadline set by the Pentagon for getting the funding passed will be missed with the August recess deadline seen as the latest they can go without harming other programs.

Oh yes.  Included in this package is a budget allocation for Fiscal Year 2011.  For the first time since the budget act was passed in 1974, the House will not pass an actual budget resolution that sets priorities for the next five years, despite the Democrats huge majority.  It will be tough for incumbents to have find accomplishments to talk about this Fourth of July, but a Happy Independence Day to you from all of us at ACU.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Despite President Obama’s fist pounding over Republican opposition to the bill giving enormous control of the private financial sector to government bureaucrats, only three House Republicans broke ranks Wednesday to vote for the final version which sailed through on a vote of 237-192.  All three, Mike Castle of Delaware, Walter Jones of North Carolina  and Anh Cao of Lousiana, had voted “No” the first time around.  Meanwhile, seven Democrats flip-flopped from “No” to “Yes,” all with different reasons for doing so. Four of the seven have difficult races for re-election—Baron Hill, Kurt Schrader, Zack Space and Harry Teague, while three are liberal veterans, Solomon Ortiz, Dennis Kucinich and Pete Visclosky.  Despite the House win, the game plan completely fell apart for the week.  The idea was to sweep the bill through the House and Senate in two days and announce the “triumph” over Wall Street during the Fourth of July recess. First, Senator Robert Byrd passed away, then their elimination of a $19 billion bank tax that angered the three moderate Senate Republicans who voted for the bill the first time only succeeded in switching Susan Collins of Maine. Maine’s other senator, Olympia Snowe, and Scott Brown of Massachusetts played harder to get.  I should add that Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson, pilloried for playing both sides during the health care debate, is consistently voting with the Republicans on spending issues these days.  So Majority Leader Harry Reid was forced to give up on that until the week of July 12.

Both sides also refused to budge on an extension of unemployment insurance. The Democrats refused to “pay” the cost by using unspent stimulus funds and Republicans refused to end their filibuster while the bill still increased the deficit.  Even the offer of Ohio Republican George Voinovich, retiring this year and not interested in any battles,  to vote for a bill “half paid for” was turned down, making it obvious that the Democrats felt they were better off talking about Republicans being “mean” to the unemployed than  actually doing anything for them.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

In the past, the Democrat congressional leadership, particularly in the House, has had no compunction about holding hostage spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in order to attach pet domestic spending projects.  They have been doing it with a legislative trick:  separate the war funding (unpopular with liberals) and the domestic pork (unpopular with conservatives) into two separate pieces of legislation.  Then, when each receives a different coalition of majority votes and passes, the bills are merged in the Senate.  This time the willingness of Democrats to play this game is lessening with increasing resistance to deficit spending, and the domestic spending component keeps getting cut although no one is quite sure by how much until the final bill is revealed in the next day or two (some say what was once $50 billion in pork spending will be cut to $10 billion).  Remarkably, Republicans have never made a big issue out of this game playing as you would think it might outrage those who take funding for the troops seriously.

Correction: In Monday’s blog, I mentioned the inability to hold up the Supreme Court nomination of Elena Kagan as long as at least two Republican Senators, Orrin Hatch of Utah and John Thune of South Dakota, are committed to opposing any filibuster of any Supreme Court nominee.  Aides to Senator Thune have clarified his position to note that he does not take the Hatch position that it would be unconstitutional to deny an up or down vote on any nominee, but that a vote should only be denied in “extreme” circumstances.  Senator Thune’s position came about as a result of his contest with then Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle who had delayed and denied votes on President Bush’s early judicial nominees.  I am glad to correct the record.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The final wheeling and dealing on the financial services overhaul bill which ended at 5:30am on Friday morning produced yet another 2,300 page behemoth conference report but the House is not expected to spend much time trying to read it before passing it by Wednesday.  The Senate schedule, however, is up for grabs after the death of legendary Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia at the age of 92.  The bill passed the Senate by a 20 vote margin originally after Republicans refused to use the filibuster to hold it up.  The Democrats badly want this bill passed before July 4th and its unclear what the Republican position will be this time.  The bill gives permanent bailout authority to federal regulators as well as handing them life or death power over a large range of financial businesses.  Added to the bill is a $19 billion bank tax which will ultimately be passed along to the consumer.

No surprises at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the Supreme Court nomination of Elena Kagan.  The confirmation is a foregone conclusion since at least two Republican Senators, Orrin Hatch of Utah and John Thune of South Dakota, have committed to opposing a filibuster on any nominee to the Supreme Court, but Kagan will be pressed hard on her long record of political activism when the questions get underway Tuesday.  Follow the hearings blow by blow this week on our website and through Facebook and Twitter.

Although Democrats in the House were set to add many billions of domestic spending to the war supplemental bill for Iraq and Afghanistan, the growing opposition to free wheeling spending has reduced the cost but the amount is still unclear.

The House leadership is now refusing to present even a one year budget resolution and instead will pass what is known as a “deeming” resolution.  This means that whatever Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Hoyer allocate to each Appropriations Subcommittee, it will be “deemed” passed just as if the House debated and passed a regular budget resolution.  This avoids the annoyance of actually having a full debate and voting on amendments.  Nevertheless, the House Republican Study Committee has produced a complete budget document which should be a model for conservatives everywhere that balances the budget and produces a surplus in less than ten years.  Check it out at www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Although much has been written about the dramatic change in the political climate which has produced forecasts of big conservative gains in the November elections, the reality is that the Obama/Pelosi/Reid juggernaut has relentlessly pursued their left wing agenda of putting major sectors of the U.S. economy under the thumb of the federal government with great success. Having taken over the housing industry, the Detroit-based auto companies and health care, the banking industry is next on the agenda. That was brought home at 5am this morning when an all-night session of House and Senate negotiators produced a deal on the financial overhaul bill.  There were no major principles at stake in the weeks-long negotiations, only where new bureaucracies would be placed and how much lobbyists from Goldman Sachs and the other big banks could protect their clients’ special interests.

Although the votes will be close, there is little doubt of passage in both the House and senate next week as a Conference Report such as this gets expedited procedures.  Here’s the way things will work under the bill:

• A troika of the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Treasury Department  will be handed permanent bailout authority along with the authority without further congressional approval to pick which businesses will survive or fail.
• A new bureaucracy will be formed to decide what financial products, such as installment plans or credit cards can be offered and what the rules will be.
• There be a $19 billion bank tax which, of course, will be passed along to the consumer in rates and fees.

Oh , and then there is what is missing from the bill—any reform of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac which, since their takeover by the federal government, has bled taxpayer dollars by the billions every month.

You can always expect the last week before a congressional recess to be jam packed with activity and next week will be no exception.  At the same time the full Senate will take up the financial overhaul, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold the confirmation hearings of Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.  ACU will be on hand to let you know whether one of the most blatantly political choices for the court in decades is getting the tough questions or being let off easy.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

As was the case with Senate Democrats on Obamacare, House Democrats have gone through a crude process of backroom dealing for the last month to finally pass a bill to make sure incorporated groups do not get the free speech rights given them by the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision earlier this year.  Amendment after amendment has been added to the bill torturing the language so that favored groups would be exempt from the most onerous provisions and to make sure that unions will be treated differently from business groups.

The latest changes added a threshold level of donations for independent expenditures of $600.   That figure just happens to be one the unions say is high enough to exclude most union dues.  Another piece of added language in the bill creates a loophole for unions to transfer money from one union to another without reporting it.

All this along with the special exemption for the National Rifle Association, the Sierra Club and some other large groups make it less and less likely the bill will pass constitutional muster.  However, the author of the bill, Maryland’s Chris Van Hollen, who just happens to be the Chairman of the Democrats’ campaign committee,  has cleverly left out a key section of every other campaign finance bill to pass in recent years—one that calls for expedited hearings by the courts.  The result, the Democrats hope, will be that they can shut down the opposition for the 2010 election before any court strikes down the law.

Of course, the Republicans are now able to stop this blatantly partisan bill in the Senate if they stick together.  Whether they will remains to be seen.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The Republicans in the House have small numbers and the rules of the House are such that the majority can usually have its way.  However, at times the Republicans have been able to embarrass the Democrats into changing a bill or forcing the majority to cancel a vote altogether.  Such was the case a few weeks ago when a clever amendment strategy forced a spending bill to be cut in half.  Such was also the case today when the Democrats tried to sneak a bill introduced way back in February by New York Democrat Edolphus Towns was put on the suspension calendar.  This is usually reserved for “non-controversial” bills such as naming post offices and congratulating the Los Angeles Lakers basketball champs.  While bills “on suspension” only receive 40 minutes of debate and cannot be amended, they require a 2/3 vote to pass.  In this case, Towns, apparently believing that the plight of social workers needs government attention, wrote a bill setting up a federal commission (yes, another one) to study compensation and license policies of social workers and award taxpayer-funded grants of $100,000 each to improve the lot of said social workers.  The bill does not specify how much all this will cost, but uses a legislative sleight-of-hand by saying the appropriations will be “such sums as needed.”  The conservative Republican Study Committee sounded the alarm about this bill and when it began to look like enough republicans would vote “no” to deny the two-thirds needed. The bill suddenly disappeared from the calendar.  It is possible to bring the bill back in the usual way when it requires only a majority to pass, but that is time-consuming and it’s unclear that will happen on a bill such as this pet project of Mr. Towns.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Under a daily pounding from House Republicans, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer has announced that House Democrats have agreed to bring a budget resolution to the floor—but only for an unprecedented one year instead of the usual five.  This accomplishes two things:  it prevents the opposition from saying that, under this leadership, the House will not pass any budget resolution for the first time since the Budget Act was passed in  1974.  At the same time, it prevents Democrats from having to vote on a five year projection of trillion dollar deficits or—horror of horrors—outline actual cuts in spending.

The excuse Hoyer is using is the federal deficit commission appointed by Obama will be making long term recommendations so we should wait for that to happen—of course, that will happen conveniently after the elections.  Even the one year budget resolution, however, will give conservatives a chance for some roll call votes on various issues, including the proposed conservative budget that ACU included in its ratings for 2009.

Hoyer also all but admitted there will be no regular appropriations process this year, despite the large Democrat majorities.  He suggested that all but one or two of the 12 appropriations bills will be punted to what everyone expects to be a post election lame duck session of Congress.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The liberals in Congress are mad.  They are mad that the congressional leadership cut a deal with the National Rifle Association to exempt that organization from the draconian new campaign finance laws they have cooked up and are attempting to pass.  They are still mad after they expanded what is known in legislative-speak as a “carve-out” to include the left-wing Sierra Club.  The result is another stalemate in what was expected to be an easy ride for the so-called DISCLOSE Act through the House with their strict rules and large Democrat majority.  You can expect more on-again, off-again attempts to pass the bill, H.R. 5175, this week. Chris Van Hollen, the Maryland Democrat in charge of his party’s campaign committee, is now caught between party regulars who are determined to overturn the U.S. Supreme Court decision that gave incorporated groups political free speech rights and more idealistic liberals who are getting sick of the cynical backroom deals that characterized the passage of Obamacare.

The liberals are also mad that the Blue Dog Democrats, self-proclaimed fiscal conservatives, are not rolling over and playing dead on spending bills as they have for so long.  It seems that after the Blue Dogs’ pet bill, the “Pay-As-You-Go” Act, was signed by President Obama in February, liberals felt they had a deal to use the “emergency spending” escape clause to just keep on spending without any offset spending cuts or tax increases—and that’s exactly what happened until now.  As the primaries have proven scary for incumbents and the polls for November remain bad for Democrats, the Blue Dogs have started barking again and holding up spending bills until they have been reduced or stalled.  In the Senate, it’s a combination of moderates like Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska, still suffering from his health care shenanigans, and moderate to liberal Republicans like Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and George Voinovich, that are insisting these bills don’t increase the deficit. (They don’t mind spending and tax increases, just don’t increase the deficit).  This has held up the so-called “extenders” bill for weeks, upsetting both business and labor groups that stand to benefit from various tax breaks and subsidies.  Another sign of leadership weakness is Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s announcement last week that, despite all the delays, the House will go out a week ­early for the summer recess on July 30 instead of August 7. Each week that goes by is making the incumbents more nervous.

www.conservative.org

Dear Senator:

The American Conservative Union is strongly opposed to the continued use of tax increases as offsets to spending bills while no effort is being made to reduce the massive spending increases in federal programs over the past few years.

The most recent examples are offsets used by the Reid amendment to H.R 4213 extending the homebuyer’s tax credit.  While ostensibly aimed at business, many of these taxes will be costly to consumers in the end.  The massive increase in the oil spill liability trust fund tax from 8 to 49 cents per barrel is a job killer that not only affects private sector employment recovery but in the long run raises the cost of energy to every American.

Particularly egregious is killing the tax deduction for punitive damages.  This is yet another effort to increase trial lawyers’ income by simultaneously increasing the number of lawsuits that go to court while giving a hammer to trial lawyers to extort settlements from companies in frivolous lawsuits.  Again, by increasing the cost of doing business, government is making it harder to expand private sector job creation and passing along long term costs to the consumer.

A study by the Washington Legal Foundation shows that by equating punitive damages with criminal liability, which are not deductible, the proposal ignores major differences.  For example, criminal fines are prescribed in law, while punitive damages are often at the whim of a jury. Criminal liability must also be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, which is not true for punitive damages liability in most states.

As a result of these tax increases being added to the bill, we urge you to vote “NO” on H.R. 4213.

Sincerely,

Larry Hart
Director of Government Relations
The American Conservative Union

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The knots we talked about yesterday are still twisted.  More backroom deals have been made on bills the Democratic leadership are desperate to get through, one in the House and one in the Senate, but they have still not met with success. After liberals erupted in fury over the deal with the NRA to pass, H.R. 5175, the bill suppressing free speech for incorporated groups, they expanded the so-called “carve-out” to include more groups, but only the very largest ones. So the Democrat leadership, for the second time in three weeks, set a Rules Committee meeting for 3pm, sending the message that they would push for a vote Friday.  But for the second time in three weeks, the meeting was canceled.  Unless they hold a committee meeting by Midnight, it will be Tuesday before it could be taken up again.  This was expected to be an easy win for the liberals in the House, but it’s getting tougher with every week.

In the Senate, the liberal leadership has been embarrassed by defections on the so-called “extenders” bill, which they refuse to offset with other spending cuts so as not to increase the deficit.  Instead, they have produced smaller and smaller bills that include some tax increases, the latest $118 billion, down from $140 billion. Some tax increases that hit small business were also modified.  Now, more than half the bill is “paid for,” but it would still increase the deficit by well over $50 billion and as of this writing the search was still on for the 60 votes needed.

Dear Representative:

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

Tied up in knots.  That characterizes the Democrats in both houses of Congress today.  In the House, although it is on track to pass what amounts to a small bank bailout bill to help small business lending, the much heralded “deal” with the NRA to pass the so-called DISCLOSE bill to suppress free speech rights of incorporated groups is falling apart.  Now the liberal special interest groups are squawking that this is unfair and too big a price to pay to get their way and overturn the Citizens United decision of the Supreme Court.  The Tuesday morning “buzz” that all was set to ram the bill through the House Wednesday suddenly went silent Tuesday afternoon and there has been no word about a Rules Committee meeting to take up the bill, a requirement before the bill can come to the floor.  Originally scheduled to pass in May, the bill was abruptly pulled from the schedule on May 27 when the NRA said it would score a vote for the bill as against the NRA, which is important to many Democrats as well as Republicans.  The court decision said that incorporated groups should have the same rights of political speech as individuals.

On the Senate side, Democrats are getting nervous about the now weekly attempt to pass new “stimulus” bills that increase the deficit without even one pet program eliminated to offset the cost.  The Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Max Baucus, today saw 12 Democrats vote with Republicans to sink his amendment to the so- called “extenders” bill, to extend some tax breaks, unemployment insurance, etc. on the calendar for months, while the leadership has not yet allowed a vote on a substitute by South Dakota Republican John Thune that would be fully offset.  Could House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer be right when he said even the Democrats have “spending Fatigue?”  We’ll see.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

After two weeks of wrangling, the House Democrats are closing in on a deal to ram through legislation that would not only overturn the Supreme Court Citizens United decision that gave incorporated groups the same political freedoms as individuals but add new requirements that chill free speech.

Up to now, the National Rifle Association and some left-leaning groups such as the Sierra Club and the AFL-CIO have been squawking about provisions that would force organizations to air names of top donors  in the ads they help fund.  As a result a planned vote before Memorial Day was abruptly canceled.  An attempt by Blue-Dog Democrat Heath Shuler from Tennessee to exempt non-profits such as ACU and similar liberal organizations was shot down by outside groups who have demanded a draconian bill.  The compromise centers around an exemption of super large organizations from these rules, such as those with over one million members and get only a small percentage of donations from private corporations.  This fits the NRA and may allow for House passage.  Word is this will not change the opposition of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.  If the deal is sealed, passage could come as soon as Wednesday although the House will be in session through Thursday and possibly Friday.  It’s been expected all along that the House would pass the bill and the real showdown would come in the Senate.

www.conservative.org

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

“I don’t want the EPA turning out the lights on America.”  If you had to guess who made that statement on the floor of the Senate Thursday you would probably pick a conservative who has opposed the efforts that extend back into the Bush Administration to impose a cap on “greenhouse gasses” and raise taxes on energy consumption.  The author of that quote is actually Senator Jay Rockefeller, one of the most liberal members of the Senate, announcing he would vote “yes” on the resolution of disapproval, aimed at the proposed regulations based on the now discredited science of global warming.  Rockefeller hails from West Virginia and knows that these regulations would be devastating to his state’s coal industry. They would also act like a tax on the utility bills of every American.  ACU activists weighed in with thousands of constituent calls and an individual letter was sent to each Senator strongly urging a “no” vote.

Despite Rockefeller’s vote, the votes of five more Democrats and the solid opposition from Republicans, including Maine’s Olympia Snowe and Massachusetts’ Scott Brown, two undecided votes until the last minute, the resolution failed 47-53.  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had to twist some arms to switch “yes” votes to “no”, including that of Virginia Senator Jim Webb.  Ironically, the face-saver Reid came up with was a promise to hold a vote on the Rockefeller bill to postpone the regulations for two years.  We’ll have to wait to see what Reid comes up with to prevent that bill from passing.

The EPA effort to impose draconian regulations to reduce greenhouse gases without congressional approval was devised by the Obama Administration as a scare tactic to force passage of the cap and trade bill.  Now that this effort is stalled in the Senate, the prospect of going through with the regs is very real.

On the House side, the expected quick passage of a bill called the “DISCLOSE” Act which would overturn the Citizens United Supreme Court decision giving incorporated entities free speech rights has been stalled.  Groups as far apart as the NRA and the AFL-CIO suddenly realized their programs to participate in the political process would be threatened.  If a compromise is reached next week, the Democrats will try to jam the bill through quickly, so stay tuned.

www.conservative.org

Dear Senator:

On behalf of the American Conservative Union, I urge you to vote “Yes” on the Murkowski Resolution of Disapproval Thursday as well as on the Motion to Proceed to the resolution.

These regulations would allow EPA to set climate policy and regulate key sectors of the economy with no votes in Congress.  It is simply a back-door attempt to implement draconian energy regulations such as those in the cap and trade bill which the Senate will not pass.

The Murkowski resolution is not an attack on science, as the EPA claims, but an attack on the bureaucratic usurpation of power from Congress and the people.

The last thing the American economy needs is a new series of draconian regulations that would raise the cost of energy for every American. The last thing the American auto industry needs is the imposition of additional fuel standards by executive fiat

We are also disturbed that EPA officials have said they are using these threatened regulations as a stick to force the congress to pass cap and trade legislation.  This is a cynical brand of politics that the Congress should firmly reject.

Please vote “Yes” on the Motion to Proceed to the Murkowski Resolution of Disapproval and on the resolution itself.

Sincerely,

Larry Hart
Director of Government Relations
The American Conservative Union

www.conservative.org

Larry Hart :: Director of Government Relations

After a pleasant lull for the Memorial Day recess, Congress is back this week for a four week stretch before the fourth of July.  Contrary to what even some of his fellow Democrats want, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced during the recess that he will insist that some version of the “cap and tax” bill that passed the House come to a vote this Summer.  Reid also wants a companion measure of some kind that would increase oil taxes to help pay for the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  However watered down the bill will be from the House-passed legislation, both measures will serve to decrease domestic energy production, make us more dependent on foreign oil sources and increase the cost of energy, particularly utility bills, to every American.  The continuous effort to decrease energy choices and raise energy taxes since 2007 has been a top priority for ACU and will continue to be with the coming fight.

Since the 2008 election, much of our effort has been aimed at stopping or slowing down the massive legislative initiatives designed to give the federal government control over key sectors of the economy and raise the federal deficit to well over one trillion dollars annually.  This week, on June 10, there is an opportunity to be pro-active by supporting the Murkowski Resolution of Disapproval.  It’s all about the EPA’s “endangerment” finding that would allow the agency to regulate any entity that emits greenhouse gases, thus giving the agency a stranglehold on the America economy. (Does this pattern sound familiar?) Congress has the right to “disapprove” any major regulation like this within a certain time frame.  Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, a moderate on environmental and many other issues, nevertheless is leading the effort.  Because it is a “privileged” resolution, it only required 51 votes for passage, not the 60 required for ordinary bills and the vote is expected to be close.  We will be activating our legion of supporters to put the heat on wavering Senators to pass the resolution, which would be a rare setback for the Obama Administration in the Congress.

During the next month, there will be another attempt  to overturn the Citizens United Supreme Court decision that granted free speech rights to incorporated groups.  The bill as written would actually go further by stigmatizing any incorporated group that has a government contract. The first attempt collapsed in May when Democrats in the House could not agree on a bill.  Also, on June 28, hearings on the Supreme Court nomination of Elena Kagan are set to begin.  We are sifting through the volumes of information that are being released about her background and positions and will be arming our supporters with the facts so they can weigh in to members of the Senate Judiciary Committee that week.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

It’s a rule of thumb that when Congress goes home on recess, the majority want a list of accomplishments they can tout to the folks back home, even if many disagree with what they have accomplished.  This Memorial Day recess, congressional leaders are going home with their plans to pass a series of bills in shreds.

First, just as it was announced that the national debt is approaching the 13 trillion dollar mark, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer admitted that he has all but abandoned plans to pass a budget for Fiscal Year 2011.   This would be the first time in 36 years, since the budget act was passed that the House has not passed a budget, even in years when the Senate didn’t follow through or the two Houses could not agree on one budget.  The deficit number seems just too much for even liberals to deal with in an election year.

Next, they were embarrassed when a bill that would have sailed through in years past with bipartisan support failed twice on the House floor.  It’s called the America Competes Act, a Bush Administration “compassionate conservative” program to improve math and science education by creating new federal government programs and throwing money at it.  The Democrats took the program and tried to double the spending, but the Republicans were able to force an embarrassing vote that would stop the big program spending increases while adding provisions to fire federal employees who download porn off the internet, the focus of a scandal at the National Science Foundation, one of the beneficiaries of the bill.  When that passed, the Democrats pulled the bill off the floor.

A decades long effort to give the District of Columbia congressional representation as if it was a state was killed for the year when left wing ideologues in city government refused to accept an amendment that gives its citizens the right to own firearms without crippling restrictions.

A massive spending bill that included unemployment compensation and health care subsidies and would have increased the deficit by $144 billion was whittled down three times in three days before the House barely passed a very slimmed down version on Friday 215-206. 34 Democrats voted against it and only one Republican, Cao of Louisiana, voted “Aye.”  (The 34 Democrats read like a who’s who of vulnerable incumbents from Alan Boyd of Florida to Jay Inslee of Washington State).  The problem is, Majority Leader Harry Reid, who had threatened to stay in session during the Memorial Day weekend, folded his tent and went home after the Senate passed the war supplemental bill.  This means “temporary” tax credits that businesses have come to rely on, as well as unemployment insurance and Cobra health benefits subsidies, will expire May 31.  Oh by the way, the House left without dealing with the Senate-passed war supplemental, which includes money for the troops.  The Democrats are trying to use the bill to attach yet another $23 billion in spending to deal what they say is an “emergency” problem of teacher layoffs, causing heartburn for those Democrats in the House who claim to be fiscal conservatives.

Even the number one political priority for Democrats, a bill to gut the Supreme Court Citizens United decision, which gave incorporated groups rights to participate in the political process, scheduled for a vote in the House on Friday, was suddenly shelved until mid-June due to Democrat squabbling.

So it looks like those who are willing to face their constituents next week will have to hope they can punt the issues to the next recess—that would be the Fourth of July.

www.conservative.org

Dear Representative:

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The House suspended operations Wednesday while House and Senate Democrats squabbled over just how much they wanted to increase the deficit.  When the smoke cleared, they decided increasing the trillion-dollar deficit by $80 billion would be just fine. (This is down from about $140 billion or so in the original bill). The bill they argued over is known as the “extenders” bill, H.R. 4213, because it extends expiring tax breaks for business and special subsidies for unemployment insurance and health insurance put into place during the recession.  Also included is the annual problem of Medicare payment cuts to doctors put into place many years ago but never enacted.  Because the budget forecast has to include these cuts, even though they know they will never happen, making sure they don’t happen also increases the deficit.  (And you wonder why the government cannot make ends meet?)

The actual cost of the “compromise” reached Wednesday night is $144 billion, and to no one’s surprise, part of the bill’s cost is being “paid for” by tax increases—permanent tax increases to “pay for” temporary spending.  This has been a characteristic of spending bills the Democrats have sponsored since they took over control of the Congress in 2007.  It sets up a scenario to raise different sets of taxes each year as these “temporary” spending measures expire.  The “extenders” bill is expected to sail through the House Thursday.  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will still need one Republican vote to end debate and get a vote in the Senate before next week’s Memorial Day recess, but he is confident he can get that, probably from one of three Senators, Snowe and Collins of Maine or Brown of Massachusetts.  Of course, he has been confident before and lost, at least temporarily, so we will see.

Once again, as predicted by conservatives, the so-called “pay-as-you-go” legislation signed with great fanfare in February by President Obama to “restrain spending” has had no effect on spending but has been used as a great excuse to raise taxes.

Director of Government :: Larry Hart

The last week before a congressional recess in the House of Representatives is characterized by a schedule of legislation that isn’t worth the paper it is no longer written on.  The House leadership knows that its members will be anxious to get away for the holiday so they try to spring controversial bills at the last minute in the hopes that they can jam them through without much debate.  This week’s doozy is a bill called the DISCLOSE Act, H.R. 5175.  It’s designed to minimize the effects of the recent Supreme Court decision which lifted restrictions on corporations and unions to participate in the election process and advocate or oppose candidates, a decision which sent the leading liberal political types, such as Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY), into apoplexy.  This bill was not on the announced calendar for this week, but Monday morning the House Majority Leader announced that amendments to the bill must be submitted by Wednesday, implying the Democrats will try to force a vote before adjournment on Friday.

Although the decision can’t be overturned, the bill attempts to stifle those groups who might make use of this ruling, to force a disclosure of donors to groups who might be involved in political ads or other political activities, whether or not these donors are funding the political activity involved.  Now you might think that unions as well as incorporated groups interested in this activity would oppose this bill.  That might be true if unions were included in the bill.  But in a blatant partisan move, the bill excludes unions from these requirements.  Although it is likely the Democrats with their large majority can ram this through the House, the union exemption may make it difficult for Senate passage, if Republicans hold together, always a big “if.”  The Democrats themselves have disagreements and they may or may not be resolved before the gavel sounds on Friday, forcing a layover until June, but this bill is unlikely to be the only surprise this week.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The Democrats have a dilemma.  Senator Blanche Lambert Lincoln (D-AR) is the Chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee and in a hotly contested primary to get  the Democrat nomination for reelection.  To show her influence, Lincoln successfully passed an amendment which would force influential Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs to give up derivatives trading.  (Derivatives are products based on assets, and bets are made on their rise and fall, much like commodity futures).  Although they claim they are “out to get revenge on Wall Street,” the Democrat leadership has let it be known they were ready to gut this amendment, probably by postponing its effect for two years, so they can then quietly kill it altogether.  At the same time, they did not want to embarrass Lincoln, who they are supporting against the union-backed Lt. Governor Bill Halter. So they did not act before the May 18^th primary.  That did not solve the problem as Lincoln only received 45% of the vote and is in a runoff that will end June 8.  So Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd had to pass the bill Thursday with the amendment intact and not answer any questions about plans for the final bill that will be merged with the House version (which does not have this provision).  Look for action after June 8 to give the coup de grace to the derivatives amendment whether Lincoln wins or loses her primary.

Congress scheduled a seven week session following the Easter recess.  In typical fashion, the House took up no major legislation for six weeks and will try to pass all the bills they have been sitting on in four days.  These include a bill to once again extend business tax breaks along with subsidies for unemployment insurance and health insurance under Cobra which would raise taxes while still increasing the deficit by about $130 billion.  Maryland congressman and congressional campaign chairman for the Democrats Chris Van Hollen is itching to get a bill passed to neutralize the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision which granted more freedom to incorporated organizations to participate in political campaigns.  The House leadership set an amendment deadline for Wednesday but is keeping mum on whether they will try to ram through a vote right before they adjourn.  The Senate will take up the war supplemental spending bill with plenty of amendments including some on border security.  ACU will be following these bills closely as the week progresses.

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

So far, the election of Republican Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts, hailed as the “41^st” vote that would give the minority Republicans the ability to sustain a filibuster and stop the passage of bad bills in the Senate and help shape legislation have affected the following bills: 

None.

On the health care bill, the major issue in Brown’s campaign, the “41^st vote” turned out to be irrelevant as the Democrats used the procedure of budget reconciliation that only requires a majority vote to pass a bill rather than the 60 votes most legislation must have these days.  When it came to increasing the deficit with bills to extend various social programs and business tax breaks for short periods of time without paying for them, Brown decided to join the Democrats in voting to end debate.  At that point, it mattered not whether he voted for or against the bill on final passage. Then, on Thursday, came a pivotal moment: the latest move by the Obama/Pelosi/Reid machine to force a federal takeover of each sector of the American economy.  First it was autos, then health care. This time it’s the banking sector with a bill to transfer enormous power to the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Treasury Department to decide which businesses will succeed or fail and put further price controls on credit card fees.   This, said the Democrats, will “punish Wall Street.”  They said this while taking millions of dollars from Wall Street firms in campaign contributions.  They said this while the bill they produced gained the support of big banks like Citigroup and the opposition of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, representing the supposed “victims” of Wall Street.

On Wednesday, Majority Leader Harry Reid was surprised to find that two of his Democrats, Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, up for reelection, and Maria Cantwell of Washington, miffed because Reid would not allow a vote on an amendment she wanted, voted “no” on the motion to end debate, negating the two Republicans Reid had in his pocket, the senators from Maine, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, who often vote with Democrats on these motions.  The motion to end debate failed.  So Reid needed one more Republican vote.  When he went to Brown, it seemed that Brown didn’t mind this huge government takeover and transfer of authority from Congress to the Executive.  He was just concerned about some obscure provision about his home state insurance in the 1,300 page bill.  No problem, Reid said.  We’ll take care of that when we go behind closed doors to merge the Senate bill with the House bill passed last year.  So Brown, who said he came to Washington to “stop business as usual” cut the deal and provided the 60^th vote Reid needed.  Then, rather than use the 30 hours of further debate allowed under the rules, the Republican leadership cut a deal with Reid to take a vote right away and get out of town for a long weekend.

As Peter Wallison of the American Enterprise Institute puts it so well in a post-mortem in the Wall Street Journal:

We learned that “Democrats are still the party of government and special interests that cling to it.  The trouble is the Republicans have not shown the American people that they have as clear an understanding of what they are for.”

Director of Government Relations :: Larry Hart

The $800 billion stimulus boondoggle was a terrible piece of legislation for many reasons, not the least being the ability of the bill writers to hide legislation within its 2,000 pages that could not have passed as a separate bill.

One of the most insidious sections reversed years of welfare reform philosophy by once again rewarding sates for increasing their welfare caseload, rather than reducing it, a welfare philosophy that went out with the old Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program in 1996.  Here’s how it works:  Section 2101 of the bill created a $5 billion “emergency fund” over two years for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program.  The money comes with strings and the strings include a requirement that the states face an increasing welfare caseload (presumably due to the recession).  The Feds match 80% of the state’s expenses but only that portion of the welfare caseload that represents an increase from the previous year.

This program will be highlighted this week as the House Republicans initiate a project called “YOU CUT” which invites people to vote online for their choice of a program that needs to be cut from the federal budget.  The “YOU CUT” Website can be found here http://republicanwhip.house.gov/YouCut/.  The welfare add-on won this week’s contest.  The Republican leadership plans to use a procedural motion to force the House to at least consider voting on this issue.  We’ll look forward to next week’s contest.  It should be a long time before they run out of ideas for programs to cut.