Rep. Steve King was instrumental in scuttling Republican efforts to find some (any) wiggle room in the immigration debate, doing so with a stream of memorable comments about how brown immigrants are mostly "drug dealers" with melon-sized calves from the gigantic bales of drugs they haul across the border. He is a racist, a xenophobe, a conspiracy theorist, and just generally the sort of person who would in a previous generation spend his life murdering hoboes if he hadn't gotten a cushy government job.
King is being challenged by state Sen. Rick Bertrand, R-Sioux City. Grassley told the Journal he is supporting King in the June 7 primary election.
“I’ve supported Congressman King in his previous elections and I’ve been supporting him in this election," Grassley said in a statement.
I would point to this as further evidence that even so-called "serious" members of the Republican Party have no problem cuddling up to the rankest extremists among them, but this is Chuck Grassley we're talking about. So there you go.
Donald Trump is very unhappy. He's so unhappy he's taken to the op-ed pages of the Wall Street Journal with a rant titled "Let Me Ask America a Question: How has the ‘system’ been working out for you and your family? No wonder voters demand change." Because, as everyone knows, the readers of the Wall Street Journal have totally been screwed by the "system."
In recent days, something all too predictable has happened: Politicians furiously defended the system. "These are the rules," we were told over and over again. If the "rules" can be used to block Coloradans from voting on whether they want better trade deals, or stronger borders, or an end to special-interest vote-buying in Congress—well, that’s just the system and we should embrace it.
Let me ask America a question: How has the "system" been working out for you and your family?
Yes, it's the fault of the "system" that Trump's campaign couldn't have been bothered to find out what the rules were for delegate selection in Colorado. But Trump isn't going to miss the opportunity to conflate his team's screw up into a rallying cry for faux populism: "The political insiders have had their way for a long time. Let 2016 be remembered as the year the American people finally got theirs."
Meanwhile, the RNC is firing back pointing out that it's not their fault the Trump campaign is disorganized and clueless.
The party fought back Friday morning in a memo, arguing that the system is democratic, even if voters don’t directly elect delegates to the convention.
"It ultimately falls on the campaigns to be up to speed on these delegate rules," RNC chief strategist and communications director Sean Spicer wrote. "Campaigns have to know when absentee ballots are due, how long early voting lasts in certain states, or the deadlines for voter registration; the delegate rules are no different. Whether delegates are awarded through a primary, caucus, or convention, this process is democracy in action and driven by grassroots voters across the country."
But that's the system keeping the people down!!! It's, in Trump's words, a "dirty trick" to have rules that campaigns have to follow. The people are pretty darned riled up, too, if the responses to this tweet from RNC Chair Reince Priebus are any indication. Which gives Trump all the encouragement he needs to take this all the way to the convention and to a third-party run, during which he can rail about how the fact that he's missed deadlines for getting on ballots is the system keeping him down. Fun times ahead for the GOP!
House Speaker Philip Gunn (left) and Gov. Phil Bryant had better things to do than talk to a pesky reporter.
House Speaker Philip Gunn (left) and Gov. Phil Bryant had better things to do than talk to a pesky reporter.
If you thought Mississippi’s sweeping anti-LGBT measure was just about targeting people on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, think again. Though it was clearly designed to protect religiously motivated discrimination against lesbian, gay, and transgender individuals, Columbia Law School scholars found it also allows religious objections to be invoked in defense of a wide range of discriminatory acts. Mike McPhate reports:
Among the scenarios described in the report, which was signed by 10 law professors:
• A school mental health counselor could refuse to work with a transgender student
• A government agency manager could require female employees to wear skirts or dresses
• A religious university could fire a single mother working in the cafeteria
In each case, the acting group or individual would only need to profess adherence to any of three religious beliefs specified in the bill: that marriage is between a man and a woman, that sex is reserved for heterosexual marriage, or that gender is determined at birth as male or female.
For some reason Republican Gov. Phil Bryant and GOP House Speaker Philip Gunn didn't return phone calls from the New York Times reporter who wrote the story. Odd.
The LGBT advocacy group Lambda Legal also did an exhaustive review of the law and reached similar conclusions: "The law seeks to allow individuals, private businesses, medical and social services agencies, licensed health professionals, schools, foster and adoptive parents, and even some government actors, to discriminate against LGBT people, including children, and sexually active, unmarried non-LGBT people in wide variety of ways based on these beliefs." You can get more specifics here.
It’s one thing for the GOP to spend years working to take defined pension benefits away from workers still on the job, but at least those who have already retired should be safe. Only that's not the case.
Some 400,000 retirees who worked in the trucking, parcel delivery and grocery supply industries face drastic pension cuts on July 1 as a result of a little-noticed measure attached to a huge end-of-year spending bill passed in December 2014.
The provision in question goes after those whose retirement is funded through the Central States Pension Fund. That fund is projected to run low in a decade, a situation that would normally be addressed by the government’s Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation, which acts as an insurance plan for failing pensions. It’s there specifically so that workers don’t suffer when companies fail to make necessary contributions to funds or fund investments turn south. Only in this case, the 2014 bill makes sure that the government won’t step in. Instead, the bill slashes payouts from the fund.
James Lambert, 69, a former trucker, from Randolph, Ohio, was told his $2,200 monthly pension payment would be slashed to $1,200.
Bob Berg, 61 … was informed that his monthly payment would drop from $3,000 to $2,200.
And Judy Weeks, 62, ... would drop from $3,000 to $1,258.
These aren’t exactly princely sums. The highest payout originally meant getting by on $36,000 a year. But if you’ve planned your life around that payment, only to find it cut to $14,000 a year … That’s not just tough, that’s being thrown into poverty. In many cases it probably means being thrown out of a home. So how did such a bill get passed in the first place?
Today is the deadline established by the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 for Congress to have passed a budget resolution. That Congress hasn't passed one is by no means a precedent. It's a difficult process for a non-binding result. But it's big symbolic deal, one that both House Speaker Paul Ryan and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said would be their highest priority. But the difference this time around, with this round of failure, is how we got here.
Let's start with the president's budget, and the Republicans' unprecedented refusal to hold a hearing on it. No matter how ugly things ever got between President George W. Bush and Nancy Pelosi's House or Harry Reid's Senate, they respected the office of the president, the process, and the fact that it was their damned job to do it.
Then there's the utter chaos that has descended in the House, leading to stories like this:
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans are about to blow through a statutory deadline to pass an annual budget, a major embarrassment for Speaker Paul Ryan that raises questions about his stewardship of the House despite his high profile on the national stage. […]
"You know me, I want to pass a budget," said the Wisconsin Republican, his party's 2012 vice presidential nominee. "I think we should pass a budget and we're still talking with our members on how we can get that done."
Yet success looks unlikely as the same tea party lawmakers who ousted Ryan's predecessor, John Boehner, rebel against a bipartisan spending deal Boehner cut with President Barack Obama last fall before leaving office. "It's better to do no budget this year than a bad budget," Heritage Foundation President Jim DeMint said in an interview, echoing the sentiments of many conservatives in the House. Boehner himself, despite his troubles with the hard-liners in his caucus, met the budget deadline each of the five years of his speakership.
First off, so-called "religious liberty" is alive and well in this country. In fact, GOP lawmakers are frantically trying to ensure that religionists still have the special right to openly and explicitly discriminate against people they don't agree with—which is exactly what all these anti-LGBT "religious freedom" bills are about.
But that's not the way Ted Cruz told it during an MSNBC town hall Thursday in which he was asked about North Carolina's calamitous HB2 law. In response, Cruz argued that "political correctness" had bullied businesses into condemning the law. (Actually, that's just the free market at work, Ted.) Then Cruz mourned the way good ol' religious ideals used to "unite" us before diversity intruded upon them. From the MSNBC transcript:
CRUZ: One of the saddest things we've seen is the retreat of the Democratic party from religious liberty. It wasn't too long ago, couple of decades ago, religious liberty united us all. I mean, it used to be the Democrats and Republicans, we might disagree on marginal tax rates.
Yep, it's a real loss now that people have awoken to the fact that "religious liberty" has become an umbrella term for targeting people with whom social conservatives disagree. It's not new, it's just a revived form of discriminating in the name of religion. Religion has never been a good reason to discriminate and it’s still not.
The American prison system is massive. So massive that its estimated turnover of $74 billion eclipses the GDP of 133 nations.
In many areas—especially areas where other parts of the economy are weak—towns and cities have actively courted the construction of big prison complexes and expansions of local jails, treating the incarceration of thousands of fellow Americans as dependable source of income. Of course, like any other industry, competition for those jobs can be fierce.
County officials across Mississippi are warning of job losses and deep deficits as local jails are being deprived of the state inmates needed to keep them afloat. The culprit, say local officials, is state government and private prisons, which are looking to boost their own revenue as sentencing and drug-policy reforms are sending fewer bodies into the correctional system.
And that’s not even the worst of it. What happens if… if… what happens if we actually lock up fewer people!
It's Thursday, April 15 and Day 62 since Justice Antonin Scalia died and Mitch McConnell laid down his Supreme Court blockade: no meetings, no hearings, no votes on his replacement, and Day 30 since President Obama named Merrick Garland to be Scalia's replacement. What's the Senate doing today instead of considering the Supreme Court nominee? Getting ready for Monday.
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The #Senate stands adjourned until 3:00 PM Monday. The Senate will resume consideration of HR636, vehicle for the FAA Reauthorization Act.
What they're not doing, besides considering Garland's nomination, is passing a budget resolution today, the deadline imposed by the Congressional Budget Act of 1974. So much for Republican governance.
Leading Republicans other that those named “Trump” or “Cruz” so want a viable alternative to the crazy town race currently under way. Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, just crushed their dreams. The story goes that Ryan would make a more mainstream, palatable Republican presidential candidate.
He’s not like crazy billionaire Trump and unlikeable weasel Cruz, right? Um, riiiight. Turns out Paul Ryan isn’t exactly a sane, establishment Republican, he just has the reputation of being one. He’s the guy who wants to hack away at the social safety net in service of Ayn Rand, though he now cloaks that in bogus budget-speak. Ryan is smart enough to not wade into the current GOP insurrection and can wait until the dust settles to once again play the part of the sane, level-headed savior.
Just like it is mind-blowing that Ted Cruz has become the more acceptable “establishment” Republican, it’s equally amazing that Paul Ryan is now considered anything but a budget hack who wants to blow up as much of government as possible. (Albeit with a more telegenic blue-eyed smile on his face.) No telling who will be the next possible fallback, supposedly sane, alternative to Trump or Cruz. Enjoy the cartoon!
●NY State Senate: On Tuesday, voters will go to the polls for a hotly-contested special election to replace ex-state Senate Republican leader Dean Skelos, who was recently found guilty on corruption charges. Obama carried this Long Island seat 54-46, but Republicans still do well downballot here.
If Democrats take this seat, they'll have a nominal 32-31 majority. However, five Democrats belong to the Independent Democratic Conference, which is still allied with the GOP. The group infamously caucused with the Republicans and allowed Skelos to continue to run the Senate in 2012, even though the GOP had a minority of the seats then. A sixth senator, Simcha Felder, also caucuses with the GOP even though he continues to identify as a Democrat. Still, a pickup will give Team Blue a better chance to flip the state Senate in November and have actual control of the chamber.
The candidates are Democratic Assemblyman Todd Kaminsky, a former federal prosecutor (and a grand-nephew of comedian Mel Brooks), and Republican Chris McGrath, a personal injury lawyer and a former head of the local bar association. Kaminsky is out with a spot that emphasizes his work fighting corruption and securing a tax cut. Kaminsky also recently received a high-profile endorsement from Bill Clinton. McGrath has also been emphasizing corruption and taxes, specifically attacking New York City legislative leaders. Both contenders are well-funded: As of April 4, Kaminsky held a small $296,000 to $282,000 cash-on-hand edge.
This race will coincide with both parties' presidential primaries, which could make turnout unpredictable. Democrats frequently have trouble bringing their voters out for special elections, but the Hillary Clinton-Bernie Sanders fight will help turn out more casual voters. However, Republicans have been disproportionately turning out for their presidential race. More Republicans showed up for the presidential primary earlier this month in Democratic-leaning Wisconsin, which helped them keep control of a state Supreme Court seat.
Unlike in Wisconsin, the candidates' party affiliations will be listed in the state Senate race, which could encourage voters who are only interested in the presidential fight not to just skip over this contest. However, as Dlines points out, there's one weird quirk. Registered Democrats and Republicans in SD-09 will be offered two different ballots, one with their party's presidential candidates and one with the state Senate contenders; anyone who shows up on Election Day who isn't registered with one of the two major parties will only receive the state Senate ballot.
Voters participating in both contests will need to put their presidential ballot in the machine marked "President," while the state Senate ballots will go in the "State Senate" machine. This arrangement could definitely confuse people who only showed up for the presidential race and lead to some extra drop-off.
We’ve all experienced the Thursday that Feels Like a Friday. Today’s a Friday that feels like a Saturday. The kids are off from school, so they’ll be rattling around in the background some, as Greg and I review the debate that happened while I was at the mall.
But as always, we’ll take seriously our responsibility to leave you brimming with entertaining stories and insights for your weekend socializing!
Provided all of you are going to a fart joke convention tomorrow, that is.
There are thousands of you downloading the podcast and listening to the show live each day, five days a week. That’s about 20 shows each month, so on a per-show basis, mere pocket change from each listener is all it would take to turn this from a pleasant pastime into something my family wouldn’t shake their heads and sigh about.
Give it some thought, won’t you? Thanks!
Did you happen to miss our last LIVE show? You can catch it here:
We begin today’s roundup with Dan Balz’s analysis of yesterday’s Democratic debate:
Thursday’s debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders offered a revealing window into the current state of the Democratic campaign and a look at two candidates who have reached the limit of their patience with each other.
What started out many months ago as a relatively civil contest, in which both Sanders and Clinton seemed to resist negative attacks, has descended into the kind of competition that raises questions about how easily the party will come together once a winner has been crowned.
New York long has had a reputation for brawling politics, and the debate more than met that standard. Ahead of Tuesday’s crucial primary, the two presidential candidates staged the most acrimonious forum of their increasingly nasty campaign.
