Liz Goodwin

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[liz-goodwin]

Democrat Doug Jones beats Roy Moore to claim deep-red Alabama Senate seat

In a stunning upset, Democrat Doug Jones defeated Republican Roy Moore in Alabama’s Senate special election Tuesday.

With 89 percent of the votes counted, the Associated Press declared Jones the winner.

Jones, a former U.S. attorney who prosecuted Ku Klux Klan members for an infamous 1963 church bombing in Birmingham, will be the first Democrat to represent Alabama in the Senate in 20 years. He fills the seat left vacant by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and is not up for re-election until 2020.

The upset will doubtless send a loud message of warning to the White House, where President Trump threw his full support behind Moore, who was a controversial figure even before multiple allegations emerged that he had pursued sexual relationships with teenagers as an adult. It’s also a shot in the arm for Democrats, who are hoping that anger at Trump and congressional Republicans will fuel a “wave” election in 2018, flipping the U.S. House of Representatives, and perhaps even the Senate, blue.

Moore, a former judge who was removed from office twice before running for the Senate, was hit by multiple allegations from women who said he sexually pursued them when he was in his 30s and they were teenagers. One woman said Moore touched her sexually when she was 14; another said he sexually assaulted her when she was just 16 years old and he was an assistant district attorney.

Moore vehemently denied the allegations, but several high-profile Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, said they believed the women, who made the accusations on the record. Trump, however, never abandoned Moore, even cutting a robocall for him in Alabama that called Jones a “puppet of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.” Trump won the state last year by 28 points, and his failure to push Moore over the finish line could spell trouble for the unpopular president’s political strategy going forward.

Doug Jones, right, greets supporters and voters outside the Bethel Baptist Church, Dec. 12, 2017, in Birmingham, Ala. (Photo: John Bazemore/AP)

Moore’s troubled candidacy unexpectedly turned deep-red Alabama into a battleground, with Moore leading his Democratic opponent by just 2 percentage points in an average of polls. In the end,

Jones’s victory also endangers Republicans’ tax reform legislation in Congress, which passed by a narrow majority in the Senate earlier this month. Both the Senate and the House will have to pass another combined version of the tax bill to send it to the president’s desk. With one fewer Republican in the chamber, McConnell can lose only one vote and still push through the bill, which has not attracted any Democratic support. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., has already voted against the legislation once, and Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has made several demands regarding health care that must be met before she’ll support it again. McConnell could rush the vote before Jones is seated in January, however.

Though Moore’s defeat reduces McConnell’s razor-thin majority in the Senate, it also means Senate Republicans will not be associated with someone accused of abusing children. They’ll also avoid what would have been a contentious ethics investigation and potential expulsion vote for Moore.

Jones ran a vigorous campaign up to the end, targeting the state’s black population last weekend. He brought in Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-La., to stump for him. Jones also ran ads featuring prominent Republicans, including Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., disavowing Moore, in a bid to peel off conservatives.

Meanwhile, Moore lay low, holding no campaign events until a rally Monday with former White House strategist Steve Bannon.

“If you don’t believe in my character, don’t vote for me,” Moore said then.

Read more from Yahoo News:

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[liz-goodwin]

A Roy Moore victory would put Senate GOP in a tough spot

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Alabama senate candidate Roy Moore. (Photos: Aaron P. Bernstein/Reuters, Nicole Craine/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — If Republican Roy Moore defeats his Democratic opponent Doug Jones on Tuesday in Alabama, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell won’t necessarily be celebrating.

A Moore victory means the Kentucky majority leader will be able to hold onto his slim two-vote majority, but the former judge brings to the Senate a toxic mix of baggage that few Senate Republicans are keen to touch.

Moore, who’s been accused by women of sexually touching one when she was 14 years old and of assaulting another when she was 16 year old — both when he was in his 30s — would likely enter the Senate under the cloud of an official ethics investigation into those allegations.

The Senate Ethics Committee, after investigating, could recommend censure or even expulsion for Moore. But that would put Senate Republicans in the unhappy spot of voting to kick someone out for allegations the people of Alabama knew about before voting for him.

Expelling Moore would likely delight former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon, who’s been stumping for Moore and criticizing McConnell as an “establishment” Washington figure who is out of touch with the GOP base. The move to boot out the Alabama people’s choice would help Bannon paint that picture of Washington Republicans trampling over the grassroots.

Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., who runs the Senate GOP’s campaign fundraising arm, has said he believes the body should vote to expel Moore if he wins Tuesday. But other senators are wrestling with the question, wondering if it would be seen as an overreach.

Republican candidate Roy Moore was seen as a shoo-in for a US Senate seat, but allegations that he molested minors decades ago have dealt a blow to his campaign (AFP Photo/JOE RAEDLE)

“I think that’s the tough question,” Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said on “Face the Nation” Sunday. “If the allegations are known prior to the election, which they weren’t in the case of Al Franken, for example, then we have a very tough decision to make about whether it’s our role as senators to overturn the will of the people.”

But if Moore does remain in the body, he becomes a walking attack ad for any senator who associates with him.

“I’m not going to sugarcoat it, this is a terrible situation that Roy Moore has put Senate Republicans in,” said Alex Conant, a Republican political strategist who worked for Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. “He won’t find a lot of friends in the Senate if he wins. I don’t think anyone who ever wants to win a future campaign will want to closely associate with him.”

“He’ll be the gift that keeps on giving for Democrats,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told Politico. “If you’re running in 2018, Roy Moore’s going to be your new best friend.”

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., one of the more vulnerable Senate Democrats in the next cycle, called Moore’s continued candidacy “a real headscratcher.”

The fact that the race looks close in one of the most Republican states in the country — and one that Trump won by 28 points — is a testament to Moore’s relative unpopularity. Right now, he leads Jones by just 2.2 points in an average of polls.

Alabama Democrat Doug Jones faces an uphill battle in the US Senate race against Republican Roy Moore

If Moore wins Tuesday, he’ll receive an at-best chilly reception from his colleagues. Many of them have publicly called on him to step aside, including the senior senator of Alabama, Richard Shelby, who said he wrote in the name of another Republican in Alabama on his ballot rather than vote for him.

“I’m not going to help him, I’m not even going to vote for him,” Shelby said last week of Moore.

Asked if Moore would be assigned to important Senate committees if he wins, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, replied, “Hopefully we won’t be in that situation.”

Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., who is retiring, tweeted out a picture of a $100 donation to Jones.

Country over Party pic.twitter.com/JZMTaEYdxQ

— Jeff Flake (@JeffFlake) December 5, 2017

Given there’s no love lost between Moore and his potential future Republican colleagues, the 70-year-old former judge will likely feel little pressure to vote with them, especially when it comes to the handful of legislative measures Senate Republicans have taken that Trump has disapproved of. Trump tweeted angrily in July when senators nearly unanimously levied sanctions against Russia in retaliation for their meddling in the U.S. elections last year. Moore, who suggested Vladimir Putin was right that America is a “focus of evil in the world” in a news interview in August, would be unlikely to stick with his fellow Republicans on that issue in the future.

“I don’t think Roy Moore is going to feel much loyalty to other Republicans in the Senate,” Conant said.

But Moore doubtless will feel loyalty to the president, who alone has stood by him while other national and state Republicans fell off amid the allegations that he sexually pursued teenagers as an adult.

Trump cut a robocall in support of Moore in Alabama, saying if he loses the president’s agenda will be “stopped cold” in Washington.

[liz-goodwin]

Congress tax conference to tackle individual mandate, corporate tax cut

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., left, and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, R-Wis. (Photo By Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

WASHINGTON — A group of bipartisan lawmakers appointed to the Senate and House conference committee on tax reform will have a host of issues to iron out when they have their first meeting early next week — from calls to raise the corporate tax rate to delivering on a healthcare deal to win over a key swing vote in the Senate.

President Trump recently called the conference committee a “mixer” in which lawmakers will combine the House and Senate tax reform bills and come out with something that’s “perfecto.” He expects that bill to land on his desk before Christmas.

The mixing is likely to be a messy process, however, as many differences remain between both pieces of legislation and House and Senate Republicans face distinct political pressures.

Some House conservatives are bristling at a deal made between Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, that both the House and Senate would pass two bills to shore up Obamacare’s individual markets in order for her to back tax reform. One of the bills restores billions of dollars in subsidies to insurance companies that lower premiums for lower-income customers while the other allows states to form high-risk pools for sicker customers.

Collins made the deal because the Senate bill repeals Obamacare’s individual mandate, and she believes these two stabilizing bills are needed to help offset negative effects on customers’ premiums from that repeal. (The Congressional Budget Office estimates that premiums would rise if the individual mandate is repealed.)

Collins, a moderate who voted for the Senate’s bill last week but against the GOP’s Obamacare-repeal plans, said she believes her agreement with McConnell covers the House, as well. “The negotiations are going well and that I remain confident despite your skepticism,” Collins told reporters Thursday.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, center, walks with Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., left, and Sen. Luther Strange R-Ala., right, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

House Speaker Paul Ryan sounded positive about this deal in a press conference, though he said he was not involved in the discussions. “She’s put some very productive solutions on the table,” Ryan said of Collins. “Our members are looking at the same kind of solutions.”

But not everyone is on board yet.

“I am not bound by some deal that a few senators make,” Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, R-Neb., told Yahoo News. “I don’t work for the United States Senate — nobody else does around here, either.”

“Our members wince at voting to sustain a system that none of them supported,” Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., told the New York Times.

Meanwhile, lawmakers will also have to address complaints over the bills’ treatment of state and local income and property taxes. The House and Senate bills allow taxpayers to deduct $10,000 in state and local property taxes, eliminating income tax deductions and deductions for more expensive properties. House members on both sides of the aisle from high tax states such as New Jersey and California have complained that eliminating these deductions will raise taxes on their constituents. Critics have argued that the bill intentionally distributes some of its pain to Democratic states, which tend to have higher local taxes.

McConnell told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Wednesday he was open to changing the bill so that the $10,000 could be used for deducting either property taxes or income taxes, opening up the reduced deduction to more people. “That sounds like a kind of reasonable idea,” McConnell said.

President Trump in the Oval Office on Thursday. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Meanwhile, the president opened the door to giving corporations a slightly less generous tax rate of 22 percent instead of the 20 percent currently in the legislation. (The current tax code levies a 35 percent rate on businesses.)

Some Republican senators have jumped on this idea, hoping the that extra revenue could fund a more generous child tax credit or be used to repeal another tax on corporations, the alternative minimum tax.

But resistance remains.

“I’m likely to advocate on keeping it where it is,” said Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., a member of the conference committee.

[liz-goodwin]

Supreme Court wedding cake case asks whether baking is protected speech

Engaged gay couple Charlie Craig and David Mullins were joined by supporters in Lakewood, Colo., in 2012 to protest Masterpiece Cakeshop. (Photo: Kathryn Scott Osler/The Denver Post via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a case Tuesday that asks whether a baker in Colorado can legally ignore his state’s nondiscrimination law by refusing, on religious grounds, to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple.

The high court’s decision, expected by late June, could send shockwaves through the wedding vendor and gay communities by either boosting or shutting down the claims of several other florists, photographers, bakers, and wedding venue providers who say they should be able to turn away gay customers due to their personal religious beliefs. Just 21 states, including Colorado, prohibit businesses from discriminating against gay people — in all other states, it’s legal to do so.

The case, Masterpiece Cakeshop vs. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, marks the first time the Supreme Court will consider a person’s religious objections to same-sex marriage since the court found in 2015 that a right to marriage extended to gay people. That decision struck down bans on gay marriage in 13 states.

“This case is not really about a cake,” starts one amicus brief by a gay rights advocacy group siding with the same-sex couple.

That might be the only thing on which both sides agree.

Attorneys for the baker, Jack Phillips — as well as the U.S. government and conservative religious groups — argue that Phillips’s cake is much more than food: It’s art and thus protected free speech the government may not infringe upon.

Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips at his store in 2014. (Photo: Brennan Linsley/AP)

A cake is “not an ordinary baked good; its function is more communicative and artistic than utilitarian,” the Justice Department writes in its brief in the case. The baker himself argues that his case is about the “expressive freedom of all who create art or other speech for a living.”

A brief by a group of nearly 100 Republican U.S. lawmakers, including Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, referenced the reality TV show “Cake Wrecks” and described Prince William and Kate Middleton’s elaborate 2012 wedding cake to argue that “asking an artist to especially design a cake to capture the appropriate emotions of a wedding day is more than a request for a food with flour, eggs, and sugar.” Instead, the cake is a “message” of endorsement for a same-sex union, something Phillips says he cannot do in good conscience because of his Christian religion.

Meanwhile, gay rights groups, the ACLU, and attorneys for the couple Phillips turned away, Charlie Craig and David Mullins, say the baker’s refusal to make them a cake is tantamount to hanging a “heterosexuals only” sign outside his shop.

“The fact that you might have to take down a sign that says “whites only” doesn’t mean it’s a case about speech,” argues Louise Melling, deputy legal director at the ACLU. Melling compared Phillips’s objections to those made by business owners in the 1960s after civil rights laws were passed. They said their religious objections to serving black people superseded the government’s interest in preventing discrimination. They were found wrong then and will be found wrong now, she argues.

And some academics are skeptical of Phillips’s claim that what he does is protected speech.

“I question whether baking a cake is really expressive activity,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of UC Berkeley’s law school. “I bake all the time, but I don’t think I’m engaging in speech when I do it. If baking a cake is expressive activity then so is virtually any work.”

David Mullins and Charlie Craig, who are now married, on Nov. 28. (Photo: Rick Wilking/Reuters)

Several legal experts have argued that if the Supreme Court finds that baking a cake is expression and is thus protected from Colorado’s anti-discrimination statute, then nearly every person involved in the wedding industry — or any industry — could argue they have a right to refuse to serve gay people.

Conservative religious groups are hoping for exactly that kind of broad ruling that would allow any wedding vendor to opt out of a gay wedding in states with anti-discrimination statutes.

“If the court rules for Jack Phillips, well he’s a baker so does that mean a photographer is protected, or a florist?” asked Travis Weber, the director of the Center for Religious Liberty at the Family Research Council, which advocates for religious business owners’ right to refuse to serve gay couples. “We have significant cases involving those. There really needs to be clarity here — freedom for these individuals.”

But the federal government, in a brief siding with the baker, explicitly contrasted cake making with renting out a venue or limousine to a same-sex couple, which it said did not count as an endorsement of their union and thus would not violate vendors’ religious beliefs. The government may be hoping the court will issue a narrow ruling specifically dealing with bakers without needing to provide a broad loophole for anyone who doesn’t want to serve gay people.

Melling of the ACLU said she did not believe the government’s narrow reading of the case would persuade the justices. If baking a cake is expression, so is virtually anything else in the wedding industry.

“Think of all the different kinds of services that have a fundamentally expressive aspect,” she said. “The interior decorator who provides the lighting and mood, the caterer who chooses how the food will be plated or displayed on the buffet. Not to mention the florist, the wedding invitation makers.”

“The government’s brief reads like this is only for wedding cakes. But that’s not a neutral principle,” she said.

Court watchers will keep a close eye on Justice Anthony Kennedy during Tuesday’s oral argument, as he could end up being the deciding vote. Kennedy, a conservative justice, has been a swing vote in major cases, including the 2015 decision that struck down gay marriage bans. He also wrote a landmark opinion in 2003 that prevented states from criminalizing sex among gay people.

Justice Anthony Kennedy in April. (Photo: Eric Thayer/Getty Images)

“I think the key is Justice Kennedy,” Chemerinksy said. “He’s the justice that’s written every court opinion in history advancing rights for gays and lesbians.”

But Kennedy has also been drawn to arguments about the need to protect free speech and religious freedom. He joined the majority in Citizens United, arguing that government restrictions on corporations’ election spending and communications violated their free speech.

“If there’s one area where [the conservative Supreme Court justices have been strongest on and most notable for, it has been the First Amendment, and that’s something that in particular Justice Kennedy is interested in,” says Carrie Severino, policy director of the Judicial Crisis Network, a conservative legal organization. “It will be interesting to see where he comes out.”

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[liz-goodwin]

Pelosi: 'Conyers should resign'

John Conyers, Nancy Pelosi (Photos: Carlos Osorio/AP, Alex Wong/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Four days after she was panned for calling Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., an “icon” in the wake of sexual harassment allegations against him, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi called on the veteran congressman to resign.

“Congressman Conyers should resign,” Pelosi told reporters Thursday.

On Sunday, Pelosi said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that she didn’t know who her fellow Democrat’s accusers were when asked if she believed them.

“Just because someone is accused — and was it one accusation? Is it two?” Pelosi said. “The fact is, as John reviews his case, which he knows, which I don’t, I believe he will do the right thing.”

On Thursday she struck a different note.

“The allegations against Congressman Conyers are serious, disappointing and very credible,” Pelosi said. “The brave women who came forward are owed justice.”

She added that she is praying for Conyers and his family. The 88-year-old and longest serving member of Congress was hospitalized recently in Detroit. Conyers stepped down from his role as the top Democrat of the House Judiciary Committee after the allegations from a former employee first surfaced in BuzzFeed. The former employee said she reached a settlement with Conyers after she alleged was fired for not reciprocating his advances.

A second former Conyers employee, Marion Brown, said on the “Today” show Thursday that Conyers sexually harassed her over years, “violating my body, propositioning me, inviting me to hotels with the guise of discussing business and then propositioning me for sex.”

CNN reported that members of the Congressional Black Caucus were in talks with Conyers to ask him to resign after the House Ethics Committee announced an investigation into him last week.

The House passed a resolution Wednesday mandating sexual harassment training for all lawmakers and staff. Separate bills that have not yet been voted on would reform the process for reporting sexual harassment so that lawmakers and staff accused of wrongdoing would be responsible for paying for settlements themselves. Currently the Office of Compliance pays for settlements with taxpayer money.

“Understand that it’s all over,” Pelosi said of the culture of hushed-up sexual harassment settlements on Capitol Hill. “There is a new day.”

After Pelosi’s remarks, House Majority Leader Paul Ryan also called on Conyers to resign “immediately.”

But a lawyer for Conyers said during a news conference that the Detroit congressman would not be backing down. The lawyer, Arnold Reed, said Pelosi “sure as hell won’t be the one to tell the congressman to leave,” according to the Associated Press.

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[liz-goodwin]

Republicans move tax bill, putting objections on hold

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI). (Photos: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images – Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON—Two Republican critics of the Senate’s tax reform legislation voted to advance the bill out of committee and send it to the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon without adding their desired changes to it.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., and Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., both voted to advance the measure out of the Budget Committee on a party line vote after Senate Republicans met with President Donald Trump for an hour over lunch. Johnson had threatened to block the bill if it was not amended to include a lower pass-through tax rate for small business owners.

Johnson and Trump went back and forth over the issue in the lunch, and Johnson told reporters he was convinced enough progress was being made for him to vote the bill out of committee–a key first step that could deliver the president his first legislative victory.

Corker, meanwhile, is working with Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma and Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona to include a provision to the bill that would trigger tax increases if the legislation does not generate enough economic growth to offset the steep cuts.

Johnson and Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., both want more generous pass-through rates for small businesses, which would likely increase the deficit even more than the $1.5 trillion already projected. Republican leaders would have to find other ways to pay for those lower rates, which would likely lead to more objections from senators over new issues. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., compared whipping votes on the bill to a “Rubik’s cube.”

But in the hour-long lunch with Trump, the president stressed that these problems could be solved later in the process.

Sen. Pat Roberts, Republican from Kansas, said four or five senators expressed their problems with the bill during the meeting with the president, and the president urged them to address those issues either through amendments on the Senate floor or in a conference committee after the bill passes and is reconciled with the House version.

“The position expressed by the president was we can address these issues in conference or wherever,” Roberts said.

But some senators want assurances of changes before the bill reaches the floor, which could happen as early as Thursday.

Susan Collins, R-Maine, says she is still undecided as she works with Senate leadership on her desired changes.

“I’m an undecided on the tax bill but I am encouraged by the meetings I’ve had today and the receptivity to the changes that I’ve proposed be in the bill,” Collins said after the meeting.

Collins said she wants the bill’s child tax credit to be refundable, meaning those in the lowest income brackets can receive it as a cash refund, for the top income tax rate to stay at the current 39.6 percent for couples making over a million dollars and to retain deductions for state and local taxes. The Senate bill lowers the top rate to 38.5 percent and eliminates state and local tax deductions, hitting taxpayers in higher-tax states and cities.

Collins also says she wants the Senate to pass a bill that would stabilize Obamacare’s individual markets before she votes for the tax reform bill. The tax reform bill eliminates Obamacare’s individual mandate, which could cause premiums to spike in the individual markets.

“That’s one of my top issues because it will cause premiums to go down,” Collins said of the Obamacare fix.

Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, said the tone of the Republican caucus is more positive compared to when their bid to repeal and replace Obamacare failed over the summer, and that no senator has drawn a line in the sand.

“The mood is very different. People really want to get to yes on this,” Risch said.

_____

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[liz-goodwin]

Franken apologizes after groping allegation: ‘I shouldn’t have done it’

Sen. Al Franken, poses for a photo groping LeAnn Tweeden in 2006. (KABC)

WASHINGTON — Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., apologized to a radio anchor and model after she released a photo that showed him grabbing her chest and looking towards the camera on a flight back from Afghanistan.

Leann Tweeden wrote in a blog post Thursday that Franken “mashed his lips against mine and aggressively stuck his tongue in my mouth” during a rehearsal for a skit the pair were performing for U.S. troops in Afghanistan in 2006. Tweeden told Franken she didn’t want to rehearse the kiss, but he insisted, Tweeden wrote.

“I felt disgusted and violated,” she said.

Later, on their flight home, Franken posed for a photo of himself with his hands over Tweeden’s chest as she slept. Tweeden posted the photo on the website of KABC Radio in Los Angeles, where she now works.

“I certainly don’t remember the rehearsal for the skit in the same way, but I send my sincerest apologies to Leeann,” Franken said in a statement. “As to the photo, it was clearly intended to be funny but wasn’t. I shouldn’t have done it.”

Last month, Franken posted on Facebook about the allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, writing of the accusers, “it takes a lot of courage to come forward, and we owe them our thanks.”

Franken is a popular figure on the left, and his aggressive questioning of Attorney General Jeff Sessions in appearances in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee about contacts with Russia resulted in Sessions correcting his testimony. Franken was rumored to have presidential aspirations for 2020.

The allegations come as senators on both sides of the aisle are condemning Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore, a Republican, amid accusations from multiple women that he pursued relationships with teenagers as young as 14 when he was a district attorney in his 30s. At least two women have said he assaulted them then.

Franken’s fellow Democratic senator from Minnesota, Amy Klobuchar, was the lead sponsor on recently passed legislation to mandate sexual harassment training for senators and aides.

[liz-goodwin]

Sessions angrily refutes Dems’ perjury charges

WASHINGTON—Attorney General Jeff Sessions angrily rebutted House Democrats’ suggestions that he had perjured himself in Congressional testimony and on an application form for security clearance on Tuesday.

“I will not accept and reject accusations that I have ever lied under oath,” Sessions said, visibly angry. “That is a lie.”

Sessions testified under oath in October that he was not aware of any Trump campaign official having contact with Russian government officials. Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller’s investigation recently revealed that at least one campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, had contact with Russians and informed Sessions of that. On Tuesday, the attorney general testified that he now recalls Papadopoulos suggesting a meeting between President Donald Trump and high-ranking Russian officials during a Trump campaign round table in March of last year. Sessions said he remembered Papadopoulos suggesting that meeting “after having read the newspaper.”

“After reading his account, and to the best of my recollection, I believe that I wanted to make clear to him that he was not authorized to represent the campaign with the Russian government, or any other foreign government, for that matter,” Sessions said.

Democratic lawmakers grilled Sessions for having to correct his sworn testimony for the second time. Earlier, Sessions failed to disclose his contacts with the Russian ambassador to the United States on an application for security clearance and in testimony in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee in January.

“Either you’re lying to the U.S. Senate or you’re lying to the House of Representatives,” said Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif.

Sessions blamed his executive assistant for informing him he did not have to disclose official meetings with representatives of foreign governments on his security clearance application as a member of Congress. He also again said his initial denials of meetings with Russians was not a lie, because he was answering the question in the context of whether he had “nefarious” meetings to influence the campaign.

“I certainly didn’t mean I’d never met a Russian in the history of my life,” Sessions said.

At one point, he reminded himself that the Democrats had the legal right to question him so closely.

“I guess he can say it’s free speech, he can’t be sued here,” Sessions said of Lieu’s question.

Democrats also criticized the attorney general for repeatedly saying he could not remember events they questioned him about.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., informed Sessions that he had already said he “could not recall” 20 times a few hours into the hearing. Sessions said he could “not recall” whether he had ever spoken to former Trump National Security Adviser Mike Flynn about an alleged plan to extradite a Turkish cleric to Turkey for money, or whether Flynn had told him he was working for the Turkish government.

Sessions blamed the “chaos” of the Trump campaign and a lack of sleep while a surrogate for making it difficult for him to remember meetings and conversations.

“It was a form of chaos every day from day one,” he said.

Sessions also said he also had no memory of Trump foreign policy adviser Carter Page informing him that he was taking a trip to Russia, but that he believes Page’s testimony that he did inform Sessions at the time.

“Am I supposed to stop him from taking a trip?” Sessions asked.

The attorney general downplayed the importance of the foreign policy group he led, which included Page and Papadopoulos.

“We were not a very effective group, really,” Sessions said.

Sessions claimed that he told Papadopoulos not to attempt to represent the Trump campaign to Russians or to other officials when he brought up the possibility. “I pushed back, I’ll just say it that way,” Sessions said.

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[liz-goodwin]

Could Roy Moore become the first U.S. senator expelled since the Civil War?

WASHINGTON — Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., released a statement Monday demanding Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore step aside after another woman came forward and said he attempted to rape her when she was 16 years old.

Gardner, the head of the Senate’s political fundraising arm, said Moore should be expelled from Congress if Alabama votes him into office Dec. 12 despite two women accusing him of sexual assaulting them when they were minors. Three other teen girls said he pursued relationship with them when he was in his 30s, the Washington Post reported.

“If he refuses to withdraw and wins, the Senate should vote to expel him, because he does not meet the ethical and moral requirements of the United States Senate,” Gardner said in a statement. The Colorado Republican who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee endorsed Moore after he defeated Sen. Luther Strange in a primary.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., on Monday also called for Moore to exit the race, saying he believes the women who have accused the former judge of misconduct. A recent poll found that Moore was leading his Democratic challenger Doug Jones by 10 points.

So could Moore be expelled from the Senate if he wins, and what does that entail?

It takes two thirds of the Senate — 67 votes — to expel one of its members, and the body has taken that step just 15 times since the eighteenth century. Fourteen senators were expelled for supporting the Confederacy during the Civil War, according to the Senate’s historians. William Blount, a Republican from Tennessee, was expelled for conspiring with the British to buy Louisiana to drive up his own land prices in 1798. Blount, a signer of the Constitution, refused to attend his own trial in the Senate chamber.

Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on allegations against Roy Moore: ‘I believe the women, yes’ (ABC News)

No senator has been expelled in modern times, in part because those implicated in corruption scandals tend to simply resign before facing the humiliation of an expulsion vote.

If Gardner makes good on his threat to pursue expulsion for Moore and other senators join him, a lengthy ethics investigation would first cloud the first few months of Moore’s time in Washington.

Robert Walker, the former chief counsel of the Senate ethics committees, said in Moore’s case, the Senate Ethics Committee would likely begin to investigate the allegations against Moore and then go through the process of holding hearings, which could take months.

Walker said the ethics committee believes misconduct before a senator is elected is still within its purview for investigation, and age of the decades-old allegations would likely not deter investigators.

“I suspect in this case if there is a proceeding involving Mr. Moore that all sides will want it to be as accelerated as possible consistent with fairness,” Walker said.

After the committee released its findings, the Senate majority leader would then decide whether to hold an expulsion vote.

Though it’s unusual for a senator to be threatened with expulsion before even being elected, it has happened in the past, Walker said. Sen. Roland Burris, who filled Barack Obama’s Senate seat after he was elected president, was threatened with expulsion before he was appointed by Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Then-Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he would not seat Burris.

Reid didn’t follow through on the threat, and Burris served out his term despite ethics investigation during his short time in the Senate.

If Moore is elected and then expelled, he may have a powerful legal argument to make that senators were attempting to deny him his seat entirely, which the Supreme Court has ruled in the past is illegal. A Congressman won his case in 1969 after he was expelled from the House for corruption by saying the expulsion vote was an attempt to deny him the seat altogether instead of booting him out for misconduct once he was in office.

Holding hearings and investigating Moore’s alleged misconduct could ward off that argument, however.

“It may be just a matter of checking your boxes and superficial distinctions,” said Adam Winkler, a law professor at UCLA. “They cannot refuse to seat him, but they can expel him on day one.”

[liz-goodwin]

GOP figures call on Moore to leave Alabama race after allegations of sexual misconduct

Former Alabama Chief Justice and U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore speaks at a rally on Sept. 25 in Fairhope, Ala. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

WASHINGTON—Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and a slew of other Republicans called on Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama to “step aside” if the new allegations that he had sexual contact with a 14-year-old girl — in 1979, when he was 32 — are true.

Less than an hour after the Washington Post’s bombshell report, Republicans were disavowing Moore, who ran as an outsider and defeated the more establishment Sen. Luther Strange, R-Ala., in a recent primary. The special election to fill the seat, previously held by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, is scheduled for Dec. 12.

“If these allegations are true, Roy Moore should step aside for the all the obvious reasons — very disturbing allegations,” McConnell told reporters.

The Post story is based on an account by a woman named Leigh Corfman, now 53. According to the story, she supports Republicans and voted for Donald Trump last year.

McConnell and other Republicans did not specify what would convince them that the allegations are true.

Three other women accused Moore of pursuing them, according to the Post. All four were quoted under their full names by the newspaper, and other witnesses confirmed they shared their stories with them at the time.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, the Senate’s No. 2 Republican who recently endorsed Moore, said the conduct described in the story was “deeply disturbing and troubling.” He said the “next steps” for the race are up to the governor of Alabama and its people.

Asked whether Moore should represent his state, Alabama’s senior senator,  Richard Shelby, replied: “I supported Senator Strange — you all know that.”

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, called the report “horrifying.”

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., released a statement calling upon Moore to step down immediately.

“The allegations against Roy Moore are deeply disturbing and disqualifying,” McCain said. “He should immediately step aside and allow the people of Alabama to elect a candidate they can be proud of.”

Moore denies that he had sexual contact with the 14-year-old and also denies allegations he pursued relationships with other teenage girls while he was in his 30s. “This garbage is the very definition of fake news and intentional defamation,” his campaign said in a statement.

Republican senators have been slow to endorse Moore, with just five — including Cornyn — backing him so far. Moore espouses more extreme views than most U.S. senators, arguing that consensual sex between adults of the same gender should be outlawed and suggesting that the 9/11 attacks could have been punishment for the country distancing itself from God.

The judge made a trip to Washington at the end of last month to court senators, telling reporters in brief remarks that they weren’t telling the truth about him in their newspapers. “I don’t hate people,” he said.

It’s unclear what will happen to Moore’s candidacy if he seeks to pull out before the special election against Democrat Doug Jones. Alabama law appears to say that it is too late to replace his name on the ballot even if he files a notice of withdrawal, but his votes would not be counted. The state GOP did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

[liz-goodwin]

Republicans explain why they’re retiring: ‘This administration has taken the fun out of dysfunction’

Retiring from congress, from top left to right: Sen Jeff Flake (R-AZ), Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R-NJ), Lamar Smith (R-TX), Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), Rep. Dave Trott (R-MI), Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX), Rep. Dave Reicher (R-WA), Rep. John Duncan Jr. (R-TN), John Duncan Jr. (R-TN), Rep. Pat Tiberi (R-OH), Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN). (Photos: Joshua Roberts/Reuters, Mel Evans/AP, Joel Kowsky/NASA, Carolyn Kaster/AP, Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call via Getty Images, Andrew Harnik/AP, Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call via Getty Images, Jeff Malet/Newscom via ZUMA Press, J. Scott Applewhite/AP, John Minchillo/AP, Jeff Malet/Newscom via ZUMA Press, Joshua Roberts/Reuters)

WASHINGTON — Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., was at a groundbreaking event for a new LG Electronics appliance factory in Clarksville last August when he realized it was time to retire.

“It was a beautiful day, the breeze was blowing, I looked out over the crowd, it was a great day for me,” Corker recalled. “I just knew then that I was not supposed to run for a third term.”

But what finally broke him was a fundraiser at the end of September. “That night I just — it was just over. I just couldn’t do it. Just could not,” he said.

He told Yahoo News he went home, fell asleep at 8 p.m. and woke up at 1 a.m. He let his staff know his decision when he came into the Capitol the next day. “This has been the greatest privilege of my life,” Corker said, but he concluded it’s time to go.

Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) speaks with reporters after announcing his retirement at the conclusion of his term on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., September 26, 2017. (Photo: Aaron P. Bernstein/Reuters)

The powerful Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is one of more than a dozen congressional Republicans who have announced their decision to retire without seeking another office so far this year, a trend that could make it harder for the GOP to hold on to their majorities next year. In the past week alone, three GOP lawmakers have announced their retirements. In contrast, just three Democrats have announced they will retire so far.

And the coast-to-coast wins for Democrats from Washington to Virginia to New Jersey in statewide elections on Tuesday may also spook more Republicans in vulnerable seats, as they ponder jumping ship before a potential wave election.

So far, the number of total departing members is still within historical averages for a cycle, but one source close to House Republicans says another wave of members is waiting to announce their retirements after the New Year. Each GOP retirement in a competitive district helps Democrats in their quest to flip the 24 House seats they need to regain control of at least one part of Washington.

Many of those already heading to the exits have expressed frustration at the current state of play in Washington, where entire Congressional agendas can be scrambled by a single tweet from the new president. Others were turned off by the unexpected ferocity of anger from their constituents over Republicans’ attempts to repeal Obamacare. Still others say they never wanted to make a career out of being in Congress, and are simply ready to move on.

“You’ve got this administration that’s taken the fun out of dysfunction,” Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa., told Yahoo News. Dent is a moderate Republican in a competitive district who’s retiring after more than a decade in his seat. “Just the tweeting every day — outlandish statements, inappropriate comments. We spend much of our time just reacting to those sorts of things instead of focusing on the big policy issues of the day.”

Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa., speaks on Capitol Hill in Washington. Dent, leader of an influential caucus of GOP moderates in the House, announced on March 23, 2017 that he will not seek re-election to an eighth House term next year. (Photo: J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

“It makes it hard to enact a legislative agenda when you spend all your time, so much of your time, just talking about what the president said or tweeted, it makes it hard,” he added.

But Dent concedes some of his frustration precedes Trump and his deafening Twitter account — which the president has used to accuse a cable news host of getting plastic surgery and to feud with senators of his own party, including Corker, who he said could not get elected as a “dog catcher.”

Bob Corker, who helped President O give us the bad Iran Deal & couldn’t get elected dog catcher in Tennessee, is now fighting Tax Cuts….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 24, 2017

“Just doing the basic fundamental tasks of governing has become excruciatingly difficult, from just keeping the government open to preventing a default on our obligations,” Dent said. “That’s made it very hard.”

Rep. Frank LoBiondo, R-N.J., announced his retirement this week, echoing Dent’s concerns and saying the nation has been “consumed” by political polarization and gridlock. “Today a vocal and obstinate minority within both parties has hijacked good legislation in pursuit of no legislation,” LoBiondo, a 12-term congressman, said in a statement.

The departures of Dent, LoBiondo, Reps. Dave Trott, R-Mich., Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., and Dave Reichert, R-Wash., are creating open races in competitive districts.

Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., who announced his plans to retire last month in a blistering speech on the Senate floor urging his Republican colleagues not to be “complicit” in propping up Trump, said he’s also been turned off by Congress’ increasing polarization, where members of different parties are less and less likely to share political risk by tackling big legislation — like tax reform — together.

“Now it’s become, you’re either shirts and skins. You’re either for or against,” Flake said. “There’re far fewer crossover votes, that’s pretty empirical. You can see that. So it’s become different that way.”

Flake, who faced a tough primary if he had stayed, also realized many voters want party purity from their representatives — they did not appreciate him speaking out against President Trump on some issues, like immigration or trade.

“The polling certainly said that people valued whether you’re with the president all the time, and accept basically carte blanche, the agenda,” Flake said. “There are things that I agree on, things that I don’t. But I can’t be a rubber stamp for the president.”

The Arizona senator says he sees trouble for the party in some of the retirements coming out of the House.

Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., accompanied by his wife Cheryl, leaves the Capitol in Washington on Oct. 24, 2017, after announcing he won’t seek re-election in 2018. (Photo: Andrew Harnik/AP)

“People like Charlie Dent, Pat Tiberi, I think if they saw a path to actually doing big things, getting things done that need to be accomplished like reining in debt and deficit, good tax policy, they’d probably stay,” Flake said. “But they’re frustrated.”

Tiberi, a Ohio Republican, is resigning before the end of January to lead the Ohio Business Roundtable.

Some Republicans are hoping a policy win on tax reform might reenergize the caucus and convince members eyeing the exits to stay. “It’s all going to hinge on tax reform,” said Rep. Chris Collins, R-N.Y., a Trump ally.

Both Flake and Dent faced tough reelection bids they could have lost, but losing them as incumbents still puts the Republican Party at a disadvantage next year.

“The vast majority of incumbents get reelected even in anti-Washington wave elections, and incumbents on the ballot last year almost all ran ahead of Donald Trump,” says Alex Conant, a GOP political consultant who used to work for Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.

Even some Republicans in safe seats are leaving, citing a change in the atmosphere.

“I got a little bit turned off or soured on the first few months of this year because it just seemed to me that there was more hatred and bitterness in politics,” said Rep. John Duncan, R-Tenn., whose district voted for Trump by 35 points last year. Duncan is retiring after serving 30 years in Congress, in part to spend more time with his grandchildren. “There’s always been some bitterness and some anger and so forth, I know, but it just seemed there was much more of it in those first few months.”

Rep. John Duncan Jr. (R-Tenn.) questions FBI Director James Comey as he testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington D.C. on July 7, 2016, days after the Federal Bureau of Investigation recommended not to prosecute former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for maintaining a private server. (Photo: Jeff Malet/Newscom via ZUMA Press)

“We got more hateful, angry, even obscene phone calls during those first few months all over the health care stuff,” he said. “I don’t know, that was disappointing me.”

Four Texas Republicans —Jeb Hensarling, Lamar Smith, Sam Johnson and Ted Poe — are also retiring from their solidly red seats. Earlier this year, Poe also departed the conservative House Freedom Caucus, frustrated by the lack of legislative progress.

Hensarling said he was retiring because of term limits requiring him to give up the chairmanship of a powerful committee, and because he believes members of Congress should not hang on forever.

“I still kind of believe in the Jeffersonian model of the legislature — you come, you do your service, you go home,” he said.

Corker also says he always envisioned himself as a two-term senator and cites that as his main reason for retiring. But frustration crept into his decision as well. The former mayor and businessman spent time talking to constituents last August and felt discouraged that he was unable to promise them the fiscal reform he originally ran on.

“After every event, I’d get back in the car and I’d go, ‘That wasn’t a very uplifting message, was it?’” Corker recalled. His staff would push him to take a more positive tone.

“A big part of it is, when I ran, I ran on the fiscal issues and I know there’s no chance in the world that we’re going to get serious about the fiscal issues anytime soon,” Corker said. “It’s just the climate’s totally changed.”

Corker, who recently criticized Trump for “debasing” the nation and struggling to tell the truth, did not cite the president as a reason for his retirement.

But the omnipresence of the president may be wearing on some members.

“We used to be able to watch football on Sundays — now the NFL is in a fight with Trump and it’s all politicized,” said Conant, the ex-Rubio consultant. “It’s invaded every part of our life, which I think even for members of Congress is just exhausting.”

_____

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[liz-goodwin]

GOP senators already want changes to House tax reform bill

Senator Marco Rubio, a Republican from Florida, questions witnesses during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on social media influence in the 2016 U.S. elections in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Nov. 1, 2017. (Photo: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON—A handful of Republican senators are already asking for significant changes to the House’s sweeping $1.51 trillion tax reform bill released earlier Thursday that lowers income and corporate tax rates while eliminating some popular deductions.

But overall, Republicans in Congress’ smaller and slower chamber are taking a more deferential tone to the framework than they did on the House’s Obamacare repeal effort six months ago, perhaps signaling the legislation has a better shot at passing in some form.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said he wanted the bill to include a $2,000 refundable child tax credit, a policy that has been endorsed by White House adviser Ivanka Trump. The House bill’s child tax credit currently stands at $1,600 and is not refundable.

“That’s where it needs to be, that’s where it has to be,” Rubio said of the higher amount.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., said he was unhappy with how the bill treats pass-through business rates, where some business owners can categorize 70 percent of their revenue as personal wages and the other 30 percent as business income that is taxed at 25 percent. The change is meant to prevent wealthy people from avoiding income tax by only paying the new, lowered 25 percent corporate rate.

“The issue with the pass throughs has got to be fixed, it’s not acceptable,” Johnson said.

Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., said his staff was still examining the House bill but that he wants $4 trillion in loophole closures as part of the plan to ensure the tax cuts don’t add to the deficit. He also stressed he wanted the tax rate changes to be permanent.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said she was “pleased” to see the top rate of nearly 40 percent unchanged for income over $1 million, but declined to comment on whether she supported the overall bill until she had time to examine it further. The bill caps mortgage interest deduction at $500,000, which would disproportionately effect homeowners in states like Maine where many people own second houses.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates the corporate tax cuts will cost $2.2 trillion, while various business deduction and exemption eliminations will raise just $1.2 trillion. Overall, House leaders expect the tax plan will cost $1.51 trillion.

Multiple Republican senators called the House bill a “starting point” or “first step”—reminding reporters they will craft their own bill. By and large, the party’s response to the bill was far more positive than in the hours after the House released its Obamacare repeal plan, when many senators were more dismissive of the initial framework. This reflects a general understanding in the Republican caucus that they must deliver on tax reform to avoid losing seats—and donors—in the 2018 midterms.

“We’re going to take them seriously because we want to get it done on the Republican side and the best way to do that is to make sure we are not becoming adversarial,” said Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla. “That has happened before, you know.”

In an interview with a Wisconsin radio host Monday, Speaker Paul Ryan said House leaders had “pre-negotiated” the framework with the White House and Senate, after learning lessons from the Obamacare failure. The House passed a repeal bill while the Senate never managed to.

“I do believe that every American senator understands this, they get this,” Ryan said of the importance of passing tax reform.

But a lot of convincing and negotiation remain ahead. Republican senators were still learning the outlines of the plan Thursday and many were unable to comment on specific provisions.

“He didn’t pre-negotiate it with me!” Sen. John Kennedy, R-Lous., said of Ryan when asked if he knew the outlines of the House tax bill earlier this week.

Each individual GOP senator wields significant power, given that Republicans can only lose two votes and pass a bill if Democrats continue to oppose this tax reform effort. And the effort to sell the plan could get complicated as constituents learn about the elimination of popular deductions needed to pay for the lower income and corporate tax rates.

“I’ve been telling all my constituents, look you gotta understand this is not all gravy, it’s not all cheesecake,” Kennedy told Yahoo News. “To get to the cheesecake you gotta go through the spinach. It’s like a big ole piece of cheesecake with a big ole hunk of spinach on top and you gotta eat the spinach first.”

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[liz-goodwin]

'Are you kidding me?': Terror expert reacts to president's Gitmo idea

A guard tower at the entrance of the U.S. prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. (Photo: John Moore/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — President Trump and his occasional congressional critic Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., were in agreement Wednesday on the U.S. federal court system’s shortcomings when it comes to prosecuting terrorists.

McCain, the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told reporters that the man accused of running over cyclists and pedestrians in an ISIS-inspired terror attack in New York City Tuesday should be sent to the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, instead of facing trial in the United States.

“Take him to Guantánamo,” McCain said of Sayfullo Saipov. “He’s a terrorist and he should be kept there and there is [sic] no Miranda rights for somebody who killed Americans.”

Miranda rights refer to a required warning to criminal suspects that they have a right to remain silent and not incriminate themselves.

Trump told reporters Wednesday that he would “certainly consider” sending Saipov to Guantánamo and suggested U.S. federal courts are not capable of prosecuting terrorists.

“We need quick justice and we need strong justice — much quicker and much stronger than we have right now,” Trump told reporters Wednesday. “Because what we have right now is a joke and it’s a laughingstock. And no wonder so much of this stuff takes place.”

The federal court system, meanwhile, was proceeding on the case. The Southern District of New York’s acting U.S. attorney, Joon H. Kim, announced federal terrorism charges against Saipov Wednesday evening.

Federal courts have taken on the lion’s share of terrorism cases since 9/11, prosecuting hundreds of accused terrorists. Major terror trials have not even officially begun at the military commissions in Guantánamo. The five men accused of plotting the 9/11 terror attack that killed thousands of Americans still do not have a trial date, more than 15 years later, as lawyers and the military judge have gone back and forth for years on pre-trial motions. The trial for the accused plotter of the USS Cole bombing is also mired in delays, with the judge recently sentencing a military defense lawyer to 21 days’ confinement for contempt of court.

President Trump meets with Cabinet officials. (Photo: AP)

“Are you kidding me? Have we gone back in time? Did we not learn any lessons? Really?” Karen Greenberg, an expert on federal terror prosecutions at Fordham University School of Law in New York, said Wednesday of the president’s suggestion.

Greenberg called Guantánamo’s military commissions a “quagmire,” and said Americans will be explaining to their grandchildren why the 9/11 plotters were not tried and convicted.

Asked about the Guantánamo military commission’s poor track record thus far, McCain conceded the system is dysfunctional.

“It doesn’t work well, but it beats the hell out of Miranda rights,” the senator said.

But Miranda rights can be suspended under a “public safety exemption,” Greenberg said, if authorities make the case that the suspect needs to be questioned about other possible attacks before he or she is notified of the right to remain silent. That occurred in 2009 during the questioning of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the failed “underwear bomber,” who tried unsuccessfully to detonate explosives on a flight to Detroit on Christmas Day.

“Miranda rights have not gotten in the way of these very high-profile, potentially dangerous cases in the past,” Greenberg said.

Trump campaigned on promises to fill Guantánamo with terror suspects and told his supporters at rallies that “torture works.” But so far, the president has not sent anyone to the military prison, and no new detainee has arrived there since 2008. No one has ever been transferred from U.S. soil to Guantánamo, and doing so would set off a constitutional legal battle that would likely need to be resolved by the Supreme Court.

Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU, released a statement Wednesday saying that sending the suspect to Guantánamo would be illegal.

“Sending Saipov to Guantánamo or treating him as an ‘enemy combatant’ would violate due process and the rule of law,” Romero said.

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[liz-goodwin]

‘Are you kidding me?’: Terror expert reacts to president’s Gitmo idea

A guard tower stands at the entrance of the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, also known as “Gitmo” on Oct. 23, 2016 at the U.S. Naval Station at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. (Photo: John Moore/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON—President Donald Trump and his occasional Congressional critic Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., were in agreement Wednesday on the U.S. federal court system’s shortcomings  when it comes to prosecuting terrorists.

McCain, the chair of the Armed Services Committee, told reporters that the man accused of running over cyclists and pedestrians in an ISIS-inspired terror attack in New York City Tuesday should be sent to the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba instead of facing trial in the United States.

“Take him to Guantanamo,” McCain said of Sayfullo Habibullaevich Saipov. “He’s a terrorist and he should be kept there and there is no Miranda rights for somebody who killed Americans.”

Miranda rights refer to a required warning to criminal suspects that they have a right to remain silent and not incriminate themselves.

Trump told reporters Wednesday that he would “certainly consider” sending Saipov to Guantanamo and suggested U.S. federal courts are not capable of trying and prosecuting terrorists.

“We need quick justice and we need strong justice—much quicker and much stronger than we have right now,” Trump told reporters Wednesday. “Because what we have right now is a joke and it’s a laughingstock. And no wonder so much of this stuff takes place.”

The federal court system meanwhile was proceeding on the case. The Southern District of New York’s acting U.S. Attorney, Joon H. Kim, announced federal terrorism charges against Saipov Wednesday evening.

Federal courts have taken on the lion’s share of terrorism cases since 9/11, prosecuting hundreds of accused terrorists. Major terror trials have not even officially begun at the military commissions in Guantanamo. The five men accused of plotting the 9/11 terror attack that killed thousands of Americans still do not even have a trial date, more than 15 years later, as lawyers and the military judge have gone back and forth for years on pre-trial motions. The trial for the accused plotter of the USS Cole bombing is also mired in delays, with the judge recently sentencing a military defense lawyer to 21 days’ confinement for contempt of court.

President Trump meets with Cabinet officials. (AP)

“Are you kidding me? Have we gone back in time? Did we not learn any lessons? Really?” Karen Greenberg, an expert on federal terror prosecutions at Fordham University School of Law in New York, said Wednesday of the president’s suggestion.

Greenberg called Gitmo’s military commissions a “quagmire,” and said Americans will be explaining to their grandchildren why the 9/11 plotters were not tried and convicted.

Asked about the Guantanamo military commission’s poor track record thus far, McCain conceded the system isn’t working well.

“It doesn’t work well, but it beats the hell out of Miranda rights,” the senator said.

But Miranda rights can be suspended under a “public safety exemption,” Greenberg said, if authorities make the case that the suspect needs to be questioned about other possible attacks before he or she is notified of the right to remain silent. That occurred in the questioning of the failed “underwear bomber” in 2009, who tried and failed to detonate explosives on a flight to Detroit on Christmas Day.

“Miranda rights have not gotten in the way of these very high profile potentially dangerous cases in the past,” Greenberg said.

Trump campaigned on promises to fill Guantanamo with terror suspects and told his supporters at rallies that “torture works.” But so far, the president has not sent anyone to the military prison, and no new detainee has arrived there since 2008. No one has ever been transferred from U.S. soil to Guantanamo, and doing so would set off a Constitutional legal battle that would likely need to be resolved by the Supreme Court.

Anthony Romero, the executive director of the ACLU, released a statement Wednesday saying sending the suspect to Guantanamo would be illegal.

“Sending Saipov to Guantánamo or treating him as an ‘enemy combatant’ would violate due process and the rule of law,” Romero said.

[liz-goodwin]

Republicans to unveil tax reform next week, revealing plan's winners and losers

WASHINGTON — House Republicans will unveil their tax reform proposal next week, finally revealing the winners and losers of the sweeping plan to reshape the tax code they’ve vowed to pass before the end of the year.

The plan has been wrapped in secrecy, with Republicans disclosing only that they will attempt to lower income tax rates for every American and pay for them through closing unspecified loopholes. The proposal also is expected to substantially lower taxes on corporations. GOP leadership and President Trump have stressed repeatedly that the reforms will primarily benefit the middle class, but they’ve refused to define what income range constitutes a middle-class family.

“It is difficult to just pick numbers for that,” House Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady said earlier this week, citing the variations in the cost of living in different states.

Republicans also haven’t said whether the plan will have a fourth, higher tax bracket for wealthier Americans, or how they plan to meet the concerns of Republican lawmakers from high-tax states like New York and California, whose constituents would be harmed by eliminating the federal tax deduction for state and local taxes. The House barely passed a budget Thursday afternoon that paved the way for tax reform, as 20 Republicans defected, mostly over the state and local tax issue.

“I don’t think my district should be subsidizing the rest of the country to get a tax cut,” Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., one of the Republicans who voted against the budget, told Yahoo News this week.

King’s district swung from supporting President Barack Obama in 2012 to Trump last year. “The people who voted him are the people who are going to get murdered on this,” King said.

Brady said he is working on a compromise on the state and local tax issue.

The tax reform proposal has been kept so secret that even some Republican members of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee say they do not know its details.

“The problem is that Ways and Means has somewhat been kept out of the loop with details,” Rep. Jim Renacci, R-Ohio, told Bloomberg. (Renacci is a member of the committee.) “There are still a lot of hurdles to get it done.”

Some senators have also noted that President Trump has not been clear about what he wants on tax reform, prompting fears he could criticize the plan once it’s released.

“There were no details about anything, really, from my perspective,” Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., said of the president’s meeting with Republican senators Tuesday.

Trump disparaged the House’s Obamacare repeal bill as “mean” after lawmakers passed it last spring, scrambling efforts by senators to write their own bill. Ryan joked in a press conference Thursday that he wasn’t worried the president would pan the tax plan on Twitter — because Trump will be in Asia next week.

Given the plan’s details have been held closely among a small group of lawmakers, Republicans will face a barrage of feedback from constituents and from special interests once it’s released. Negative reactions from constituents could spook them and set back the timeline.

“Right now, they’re trying to include a lot of things that politically just are not going to fly,” Alex Conant, a GOP consultant with Firehouse Strategies, told Yahoo News. “When members see how unpopular some of these provisions are — especially the 401(k) changes or the huge corporate tax cuts — it’s going to give them pause.”

President Donald Trump has warned that he would not support changing the amount of money Americans can contribute tax free each year to their 401(k) retirement accounts. That tax break “works,” he has said. But House Speaker Paul Ryan and Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady both refused to rule out the possibility that they will attempt to change the 401(k) rules.

There will be NO change to your 401(k). This has always been a great and popular middle class tax break that works, and it stays!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 23, 2017

Polling has also shown that cutting taxes for corporations and for wealthy Americans is broadly unpopular, while middle-class taxes are popular. Trump has said repeatedly in speeches about tax reform that he doesn’t want the plan to benefit wealthy people like him, but the White House’s own blueprint for reform appears to favor the rich.

Many GOP lawmakers also say it’s important to give a cut to all Americans, including the richest among them.

“I don’t think we ought to demonize the wealthy,” said Sen. John Kennedy, R-La. “The America I was raised in treated people who were successful financially as role models, not as devils.”

Despite the many remaining issues, Republicans are united on one thing — that they must pass tax reform if they want to have a shot at holding onto their legislative majorities next year.

“Failure is not an option,” said Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La.

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[liz-goodwin]

Jeff Flake announces retirement in dramatic anti-Trump speech

Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., announces he will not seek reelection. (Photo: Senate TV via Reuters)

WASHINGTON — Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., announced he will not be seeking reelection next year in a scorching speech on the Senate floor suggesting that President Trump and his brand of conservatism is a mortal danger to the United States.

Without ever naming the president directly, Flake shamed his colleagues for their “complicity” in participating in a new political coarseness that starts from the top and has trickled down, endangering American institutions of democracy in the process.

“We must never meekly accept the daily sundering of our country — the personal attacks, the threats against principles, freedoms and institutions, the flagrant disregard for truth or decency, the reckless provocations, most often for the pettiest and most personal reasons, reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with the fortunes of the people that we have all been elected to serve,” Flake said.

“There are times when we must risk our careers in favor of our principles,” Flake told his colleagues. “Now is such a time.”

Flake, who wrote a book earlier this year that was critical of Trump, faced a tough primary challenge from the right to defend his Senate seat in Arizona. Trump, angry over his criticism, and his former adviser Steve Bannon, were planning to back his opponent. “Great to see that Dr. Kelli Ward is running against Flake Jeff Flake, who is WEAK on borders, crime and a non-factor in Senate. He’s toxic!” Trump tweeted in August.

Flake joins fellow Republican Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., in retiring from the chamber. Trump spent much of Tuesday morning tweeting insults at Corker, who told TV reporters earlier that the president had trouble with the truth and he regretted supporting him. Among other things, Trump mocked Corker as “Liddle” and said he was “incompetent.”

Flake lamented these petty insults in his speech, telling his colleagues Republican that they have lost their way. He called Trump’s behavior “reckless outrageous and undignified” and warned Republicans that indulging in scapegoating and petty resentments would lead them to become the minority party soon enough.

“Such behavior does not project strength because our strength comes from our values,” the senator said. “It instead reflects a corruption of spirit and a weakness.”

Flake also expressed bewilderment that traditional Republican values of free trade, immigration, limited government and free markets have been set aside, and that Republicans like him face a “narrower and narrower path” to election.

The Arizona senator said he felt a responsibility to speak up for future generations. “It is often said that children are watching — well they are. What are we going to do about that? When the next generation asks us, why didn’t you do something about this? Why didn’t you speak up? What are we going to say?”

Flake prodded his colleagues to admit that the president would not change.

“Mr. President, I rise to say ‘enough,’” he said. “With respect and humility I say we have fooled ourselves enough that a pivot to governing is right around the corner. a return to civility and stability right behind it. We know better than that.”

He also despaired of the president’s effect on foreign relations.

“Despotism loves a vacuum and our allies are now looking elsewhere for leadership,” Flake said. “Why are they doing this? None of this is normal.”

After Flake’s speech, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., rose to say he regretted that he was retiring, and praised him as a team player who would be sorely missed.

[liz-goodwin]

GOP senators back Obamacare stabilization as Trump sends mixed messages

The Healthcare.gov website is seen on a computer screen Wednesday. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

WASHINGTON — Twelve Republican senators signed onto a bill that would stabilize the Obamacare individual markets despite mixed messages from President Donald Trump about whether he was happy with the legislation or not.

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., the chair of the Senate committee that oversees health care, announced Thursday that eleven of his GOP colleagues had agreed to be cosponsors to the bipartisan deal he hammered out with Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.

The deal restores billions of dollars of cost sharing reduction payments to insurance companies that Trump abruptly announced he would cut off last week, sparking fears of a 20 percent increase in premiums and some insurers fleeing the markets altogether. It also gives back $106 million in outreach funds to boost enrollment in the individual marketplaces where millions of Americans buy insurance that Trump slashed. In exchange, Democrats budged on flexibility for states, allowing catastrophic “copper plans” to be sold to all age groups and speeding up the process by which states can get waivers to offer different kinds of plans to consumers.

Democrats also produced 12 cosponsors for the legislation, but it’s likely that many more members of their caucus would vote for the bill if it made it to the floor. Garnering more Republicans votes is trickier, however, as several GOP lawmakers have said they believe the bill isn’t conservative enough, including the leader of the House Republican Study Group, Rep. Mark Walker, R-N.C. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., is working on a competing proposal that he says would offer states more flexibility to win over conservative support.

“What’s conservative about creating chaos so that millions can’t buy insurance?” Alexander asked on the Senate floor.

On Tuesday, the president appeared to signal support for the bipartisan deal, saying it was a “short term” solution until Obamacare could be repealed entirely. Alexander told reporters that the president likes the bill. Wednesday morning, however, Trump tweeted that he could “never support” bailing out insurance companies, scrambling things on Capitol Hill.

I am supportive of Lamar as a person & also of the process, but I can never support bailing out ins co's who have made a fortune w/ O'Care.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 18, 2017

As the president’s tone shifted, so did Republicans senators. Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., a member of GOP leadership, said Tuesday that the deal “ may be the best way to go forward” until an Obamacare repeal could be passed. By Wednesday, however, he told reporters the agreement had “stalled out.”

Senator Lamar Alexander, a Republican from Tennessee and chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, speaks during a hearing in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Oct. 19, 2017. (Photo: Zach Gibson/Bloomberg via Getty Images

On Thursday, Trump’s tone changed again. He told reporters in the Oval Office he had “great respect” for Alexander and Murray and hoped they would come up with a “short term solution” to the problem. “What I did say though is, I don’t want the insurance companies making any more money than they have to,” Trump added.

“I like people working on plans at all times,” the president said.

The Republicans backing the legislation include holdouts to former Obamacare repeal efforts such as Sens. John McCain of Arizona, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine. Also backing the plan are Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Bill Cassidy, R-La., who created their own version of Obamacare repeal and replace that they are trying to pass next year.

“I talked to him last night, I think he’s very open minded to continuing CSRs if he can get a good deal,” Graham said of Trump’s support for payments to insurers. “Here’s what I told him: If Graham-Cassidy were passed tomorrow it’d be two or three years before it’s implemented. In the meantime, you’ve got to keep the system afloat.”

It’s still unclear if and when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., will bring the bill to the floor for a vote. Open enrollment for the Obamacare individual markets begins Nov. 1.