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☆ Top talkers: These 20 lawmakers spoke the most on the House and Senate floors during the 117th Congress, including Rep. Buddy Carter and Sen. Marsha Blackburn
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-26 | by ( Nicole Gaudiano | Oma Seddiq | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Some lawmakers delivered dozens of floor speeches during the 117th Congress, C-SPAN's tracking showed. Most members don't usually hang out on the House or Senate floor to hear their colleagues' speeches. These House members spoke the most on the House floor during the 117th Congress. "It is my duty to use the House Floor as a vehicle to share their views, needs, and successes. That's because the Senate floor is typically where leaders make announcements to their members on legislation and nominations, among other topics.

WASHINGTON, Dec 23 (Reuters) - The Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives on Friday passed a $1.66 trillion government funding bill that provides record military funding and sends emergency aid to Ukraine, hours before a midnight deadline. "The bipartisan funding bill advances key priorities for our country and caps off a year of historic bipartisan progress for the American people," Biden said. While some of the work was done in a bipartisan manner, that was not the case with Friday's $1.66 trillion funding bill, opposed by House Republican conservatives and some Senate conservatives. They have threatened to oppose any legislation introduced by any of the Senate Republicans who supported the bill. [1/4] The U.S. Capitol is seen as Congress continues work on passing a $1.66 trillion government funding bill in Washington, U.S., December 21, 2022.

[1/2] The U.S. Capitol is seen as Congress continues work on passing a $1.66 trillion government funding bill in Washington, U.S., December 21, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin LamarqueWASHINGTON, Dec 22 (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives on Friday will vote on a $1.66 trillion government funding bill that provides more money for Ukraine's defense, restricts the Chinese-owned TikTok app and reforms presidential election certification, a top Democrat said. 2 House Democrat Steny Hoyer said the lower chamber would not take up the legislation until Friday morning as it performed some final legislative actions to pass it. "As soon as we get the document ... we will proceed as quickly as possible," he said on the House floor. House Republicans wanted to delay negotiations on the full-year legislation until early next year, after they take the majority.

☆ Upset the sun sets so early? Blame the House for not voting to make daylight savings time year-round.
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-19 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

The House could have voted this year to make daylight savings time permanent. The chair of the relevant House committee told Insider he still wants to find "consensus" on the issue. "It's polarizing as hell," Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a key sponsor of the bill, told Insider at the Capitol in December. "I'm just trying to reach a consensus," he told Insider at the Capitol. "The problem is, half the people want standard time, others want daylight [savings time], others don't want to change it at all."

The bill already passed the Senate and now goes to President Joe Biden for his signature. “In removing Taney’s bust, I’m not asking that we would hold Taney to today’s moral standards,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said on Wednesday while advocating for the statue’s removal. Figures like Taney belong in history textbooks and classroom discussions, not in marbled bronze on public display of honor.”A similar effort in 2020 that passed the House aimed to remove Taney’s bust from the Capitol along with monuments honoring Confederates. That bill, however, was eventually stalled by Senate Republicans who argued that states should decide which statues they’d like to display in the Capitol. A statue of Taney was previously removed in 2017 from the grounds of the Maryland State House.

☆ Congress approves removing statue of Supreme Court chief justice who wrote Dred Scott decision
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-14 | by ( Zoë Richards | Zoë Richards Is The Evening Politics Reporter For Nbc News. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

The House passed a bill Wednesday that would remove from public display at the U.S. Capitol a statue of Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Taney, who wrote the 1857 Dred Scott decision that defended slavery and denied the citizenship of Black Americans. Roger B. Taney (1777-1864), former chief justice of the Supreme Court. The House overwhelmingly passed the measure a few months later in a 305-113 vote, but it did not advance in the Senate. A statue of Taney, who lived in Maryland, was removed from Maryland's State House grounds in 2017. Congress in recent years has taken similar actions to remove other statues from the Civil War era.

☆ House Democrats reject a rules change that could've empowered junior members amid concerns about aging leadership
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-13 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

"Six years is a pretty long time," Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia told Insider at the Capitol earlier this month. "I'm not for term limits," House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told Insider during a briefing with reporters at the end of November. "I'm not taking a position on any single rules proposal that is before the House Democratic Caucus," he said. Another prominent young lawmaker — 33-year-old Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York — has also been vocal in her criticism of the system. "Whatever the mechanism is, we need to have more opportunities for people to bring their leadership to bear in different places," she told Insider.

WASHINGTON — The House passed legislation Thursday that enshrines federal protections for marriages of same-sex and interracial couples. Thirty-nine House Republicans supported the legislation Thursday and one voted present. The revisions to the bill meant the House had to vote again after passing an earlier version in July. It reflects the rapidly growing U.S. public support for legal same-sex marriage, which hit a new high of 71% in June, according to Gallup tracking polls — up from 27% in 1996. In the Senate, 12 Republicans voted with unanimous Democrats to pass the bill, which sent it back to the House.

☆ The effort to ban members of Congress from trading stocks is mostly dead — at least for now
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-06 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Time has largely run out in this Congress to ban lawmakers from trading stocks. On Monday, he told Insider in a statement that he would "keep pushing to get this debated on the floor and get it passed." Democratic senators formed a working group, with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer's blessing, to draft legislation to ban stock trading among lawmakers. In the Senate, Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts told Insider that it was "not yet" time to declare the effort dead, pointing to ongoing discussions. "I support a stock ban for members of Congress," he told reporters in September.

☆ Congress is about to get a little bit younger, with lawmakers' median age dropping by two-and-a-half years
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-04 | by ( Walt Hickey | Annie Fu | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

On January 2, the median member of Congress will be 61.7 years old. On January 3, when the 118th Congress takes over, the median member will be 59.2 years old. Indeed, on the last day of the current 117th Congress, the median member will be 61.7 years of age, the oldest on record. On the first day of the 118th Congress, there will be 107 members over the age of 70. Assuming current membership holds, the median age of Congress will be 61.1, as of December 1, 2024 — just short of the current Congress' advanced age.

WASHINGTON — Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., beat back a leadership challenge on Thursday and will remain among the top House Democrats in the next Congress. Clyburn had faced a last-minute, surprise challenge from Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., for assistant leader, the No. 4 post, but the latter dropped his bid moments before the vote and endorsed Clyburn, members leaving the closed-door vote said. Cicilline’s decision means that Clyburn, 82, will remain in leadership at a time of generational change for the party. As assistant leader, Clyburn will serve alongside a new leadership slate.

[1/7] U.S. Rep. Hakeem Jefferies (D-NY) walks on the day of House Democratic leadership elections on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., November 30, 2022. The vote by Jeffries' fellow Democrats also marked the rise of a younger generation of leaders in the 435-member House and the end of the Nancy Pelosi era. In 2007 she became the first woman to be elected House speaker. Jeffries, a 52-year-old New Yorker, will hold the position of House Democratic leader for the 118th Congress that convenes on Jan. 3. Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he was not surprised that Jeffries, a fellow Brooklynite, was chosen.

4 position in House Democratic leadership. “I would be honored and humbled to have your support and to be able to join Hakeem Jeffries, Katherine Clark, and Pete Aguilar as part of the new generation of House leadership,” Cicilline wrote. From 2011 to 2019, he had served as assistant Democratic leader and also worked as the chair and vice chair of his caucus. Several younger Democrats were upset and surprised by Clyburn's decision to run for a leadership position. Another younger Democratic member who is supporting Cicilline said Wednesday, "I think it’s pretty ridiculous that Nancy had to leave.

☆ U.S. House Democrats set to elect Hakeem Jeffries as first Black party leader
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-30 | by ( Richard Cowan | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

Jeffries, a 52-year-old New Yorker, is running for House Democratic leader for the next two years. If he is elected as expected during closed-door voting, he would become the first Black person to hold a top party leadership job in the House or Senate. "Meaningful policymaking and public engagement opportunities should be robustly distributed regardless of length of service," Jeffries wrote in a letter to fellow Democrats. Running for election as part of Jeffries' team are Representative Katherine Clark, 59, who is seeking the No. 2 Democratic whip job, and Pete Aguilar, 43, vying for Jeffries' current job of Democratic caucus chairman.

WASHINGTON — House Democrats will elect their new leadership team Wednesday morning, ushering in a younger generation of leaders after Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer decided to step aside after Democrats narrowly lost the majority this month. In recent years, younger, equally ambitious and talented Democrats looking to climb the leadership ladder discovered they had nowhere to go but out. Democratic Caucus Chair Xavier Becerra took an appointment as California's attorney general and then was named by President Joe Biden as health and human services secretary. Others, including Steve Israel of New York, who led both House Democrats' campaign arm and communications shop, opted for retirement. “The House Democratic Caucus is at its best when everyone has an opportunity to be on the playing field, playing the right position," he said.

☆ House Democrats elect Rep. Hakeem Jeffries as leader, the first Black person to lead congressional caucus
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-30 | by ( Scott Wong | Ali Vitali | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

House Democratic Caucus Chair Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) departs a leadership election meeting with the Democratic caucus in the Longworth House Office Building on Capitol Hill November 30, 2022 in Washington, DC. WASHINGTON — House Democrats elected their new leadership team Wednesday, ushering in a younger generation of leaders after Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer decided to step aside after Democrats narrowly lost the majority this month. Jeffries' top deputy will be Rep. Katherine Clark, D-Mass., 59, a progressive who served under Jeffries as vice chair of the Democratic Caucus and rose to assistant speaker this Congress. Rounding out the trio of new leaders is Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., 43, a Congressional Hispanic Caucus member and former mayor who was elected Democratic Caucus chairman — the role Jeffries has held for the past four years. Of the current "Big Three" Democrats, only Clyburn, the current majority whip, has opted to stay in leadership in the new Congress.

It would not bar states from blocking same-sex or interracial marriages if the Supreme Court allowed them to do so. A similar, but not identical, bill passed the House of Representatives earlier this year with support from 47 Republicans and all Democrats. The House would need to approve the Senate version before it is sent to President Joe Biden to sign into law. In June, the Supreme Court overturned the nationwide right to an abortion, undoing 50 years of precedent. In a concurring opinion, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the court should consider reversing other decisions protecting individual freedoms, including the 2015 ruling on gay marriage.

Shortly before Pelosi’s announcement Thursday that she was stepping down, Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff signaled he would not run for House leadership and would focus his efforts on a future Senate bid instead. 2 leadership post, Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal of Washington decided to run for another term leading her caucus of roughly 100 House liberals. Aguilar originally had his eyes set on the assistant leader position, but Clyburn’s move forced him to run for caucus chair. 4 and Democratic Caucus chair will move up to No. That left Rep. Joe Neguse, 38, who had been campaigning behind the scenes for months for caucus chair, as the odd man out.

☆ Outgoing Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer says the 'biggest change' he's seen in his congressional career is 'how confrontational Republicans have become'
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-26 | by ( John L. Dorman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Steny Hoyer spoke about his time in leadership as he prepares to hand over the reins. He lamented the "confrontational" nature of some Republicans in the chamber in a Washington Post interview. Hoyer is stepping down from leadership, but will remain in the House in January 2023. "I think the biggest change in the institution is how confrontational Republicans have become," he told the newspaper. "That's the biggest change," Hoyer said, while also pointing to the events of January 6, 2021.

As House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said herself, quoting scripture on the House floor Thursday: “For everything there is a season — a time for every purpose under heaven.”For Pelosi, the season to be leader of House Democrats has passed. She’ll continue to represent San Francisco while serving as an invaluable source of guidance and resolve for the next generation of House Democratic leaders. At 82, Pelosi is a historic figure, of course: the first female House speaker and one of the strongest speakers, if not the strongest, that America has ever seen. Yet as a minority in a GOP-run House, Democrats won’t be able to rack up accomplishments like they did in the last two years. There were calls for Pelosi to step aside in 2010 when Democrats lost 60 House seats — a true wipeout.

"For me, the hour has come for a new generation to lead the Democratic Caucus that I so deeply respect," Pelosi, 82, said in her floor speech. “Pelosi and Hoyer showed a lot of grace in stepping aside,” one younger Democratic lawmaker told NBC News. Meg Kinnard / AP fileAguilar said Friday he is now running for Democratic Caucus chairman. Under that scenario, Aguilar's caucus chair role would move up to No. But with Clyburn going for the assistant job and Aguilar entering the race for caucus chair, Neguse could find himself the odd man out.

WASHINGTON — New York Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the fourth-ranking House Democrat, said Friday that he will run to replace House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as the party's leader after Republicans took back control of the chamber in last week’s midterm elections. The ascension of the 52-year-old Jeffries to minority leader would also represent generational change. Clark, 59, announced a bid for Democratic Whip, while Aguilar, 43, is running for Democratic Caucus Chair. Congressional Black Caucus Chair Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, said Thursday she was confident that the powerful bloc of more than 50 Black lawmakers would line up behind Jeffries. “I’m very comfortable saying I believe that every member of the Congressional Black Caucus would vote for Hakeem Jeffries,” Beatty told reporters Thursday.

☆ Hakeem Jeffries announces bid to succeed Nancy Pelosi as House Democratic leader
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-18 | by ( Bryan Metzger | Kayla Gallagher | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York has officially announced his bid to become House Democratic leader. Pelosi announced Thursday that she will not seek re-election to a leadership role but will stay in Congress. He has served as the leader of the House Democratic Caucus since 2019 and has long been seen as an heir to Pelosi. If selected to lead his party, Jeffries, who is 52, would create a massive generational shift in the House's democratic leadership. "The time has come for a new generation to lead our magnificent House Democratic Caucus," said Pelosi.

☆ Nancy Pelosi to announce her future plans Thursday after Democrats lose House
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-17 | by ( Https | Media-Cldnry.S-Nbcnews.Com Image Upload Newscms Jonathan-Allen-Circle-Byline-Template.Jpg | Jonathan Allen | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

WASHINGTON — Nancy Pelosi, the first female speaker of the House, will announce plans for her future in a speech on the House floor Thursday, a spokesman said. The speaker’s plans are still unclear, but a source told NBC News that she took home two different versions of the speech she plans to deliver. "We’re all waiting for white smoke from the Vatican," one senior Democratic lawmaker told NBC News. Clyburn said Thursday he plans to stay in Democratic leadership no matter what Pelosi does. Asked about Pelosi's role leading the caucus over the last two decades, Clyburn told NBC News, “She has done absolutely great.

[1/3] U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) wields the gavel as she presides over the House of Representatives approving two counts of impeachment against U.S. President Donald Trump in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., December 18, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File PhotoWASHINGTON, Nov 17 (Reuters) - U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi will announce on Thursday whether she will step down as Democratic leader of the chamber, a day after Republicans were projected to have won control of the House in the midterm elections. Pelosi, an 82-year-old liberal from California who is the first woman to hold the powerful job of speaker, has been under pressure during the past few years from younger House Democrats to yield power. House Democrats are set to vote on their leaders on Nov. 30. She became speaker again in 2019 when Democrats rode a wave of opposition to then-President Donald Trump to win control of the House and was re-elected as speaker in November 2021.

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