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Eric Cantor exits stage right
Two months after a shocking primary defeat, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) officially ended his tenure as House Majority Leader yesterday. He will not, however, remain on Capitol Hill as a rank-and-file member -- the Virginia Republican announced overnight that he's resigning his seat, effective August 18.
Cantor told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that he will resign from Congress early to "make sure that the constituents in the 7th District will have a voice in what will be a very consequential lame-duck session."Cantor asked Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe to call a special election in the district to coincide with the general election expected for November 4, according to the newspaper, allowing the winner to take office immediately rather than with the next Congress in January."That way he will also have seniority, and that will help the interests of my constituents," Cantor added in his interview with the Times-Dispatch. Virginia is losing much of its congressional seniority this year, due to the resignations of Republican Rep. Frank Wolf and Democratic Rep. Jim Moran.
Cantor will be the 10th member of this Congress to resign before the end of the term, slightly less than the 11 members who resigned during the last Congress, but nevertheless a high total by modern standards. It's not yet clear what the Virginia conservative will do next, though it's widely assumed that Cantor will become a very high-paid lobbyist.
But as the former Majority Leader leaves Capitol Hill, it's worth pausing to appreciate Cantor's legacy, such as it is.
Reconciling a contradiction
Even by congressional standards, the mixed message from Capitol Hill this week was jarring. On Wednesday, House Republicans approved a civil suit against President Obama -- the first such suit in American history -- complaining that the White House shouldn't circumvent Congress when making public policy.
Literally one day later, House Republicans killed their own border bill, prompting GOP leaders to issue a statement urging the White House to circumvent Congress.
On msnbc's "Morning Joe," Eugene Robinson asked Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), a close ally to House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), to help reconcile the contradiction. The Republican congressman's response was striking. For those who can't watch clips online:
ROBINSON: There was a contradiction yesterday that I'm still struggling to understand. The leadership statement, when the [border bill] didn't pass essentially said, 'Well, there are plenty of administrative things that President Obama can do and should be doing at the border, and that was a day after the House voted to sue President Obama for taking administrative actions.COLE: (Laughs)ROBINSON: So, how does that square?COLE: Well, I'm not going to disagree with you because it's a point I made myself in conference. Look, you can't say on the one hand that the president's overreaching by acting without legislative authority and direction, and then refuse to give him legislative authority and direction in other areas. So, I don't disagree with what you have to say at all.
Oh. Confronted with the obvious contradiction at the heart of the Republican game plan, it appears the Republican response is effectively, "Yep, our position is incoherent." Good to know. [Update: Even Charles Krauthammer is getting annoyed, telling Fox News viewers yesterday, "It is ridiculous to sue the president on a Wednesday because he oversteps the law ... and then on a Thursday say that he should overstep the law."]
Cole's candor is refreshing, though it also raises the related point about what the president intends to do about the conflicting messages from his far-right friends on Capitol Hill.
GOP tantrum derails ambassadorial nominations
Political scientist Norm Ornstein noted last night that "blocking ambassadors when the world is in turmoil and America's national interest is at stake is simply shameful." Senate Republicans, I think he was speaking to you.
We've been keeping a close eye lately on the vacant U.S. ambassadorial offices around the world, which comes at an unusually awful time. According to the United Nations, there are 193 nations in the world, and of that total, the United States maintains embassies in 169 countries. As of earlier this week, the ambassador's office is currently empty in a fourth of those embassies because the Senate hasn't confirmed anyone.
The Senate Democratic majority was eager to address the problem before Congress left for its five-week break, but in a sad and unnecessary tantrum, the Senate Republican minority had other ideas.
The Senate may not be confirming nominees to posts in a slew of countries before departing for the August recess, but after some procedural maneuvering, the U.S. will be getting a top diplomat in Russia.Senators confirmed the nomination of John F. Tefft by voice vote as the chamber finished evening business after he faced objection to confirmation by unanimous consent earlier in the night.
GOP senators originally blocked a vote on Tefft's nomination to become the Ambassador to Russia, but they eventually changed their mind for no apparent reason. It was a heartening move -- relations with Russia are fairly important right now, as some in Congress might have noticed -- but it doesn't negate the fact that the GOP was far less gracious towards a variety of other nominees who are eager to represent the United States in embassies around the globe.
Take Guatemala, for example, which also happens to be pretty important right now. Colby Itkowitz reported:
Job creation tops 200k for sixth straight month
Given where the economy was in the not-too-distant past, it's hard to be disappointed when the economy adds over 200,000 jobs a month, and yet, given expectations and the last few jobs reports, today's data is a bit of a letdown.
The new report from Bureau of Labor Statistics shows the U.S. economy added 209,000 jobs in July. The overall unemployment rate ticked slightly higher to 6.2% -- still hovering around a six-year low. (This is one of those times when an uptick is good news, not bad, since more people are entering the workforce looking for jobs.)
Once again, public-sector layoffs did not drag down the overall employment figures. Though jobs reports over the last few years have shown monthly government job losses, in July, the private sector added 198,000 while the public sector added 11,000. The latter may not sound like much, but after several years in which that total was negative, it's at least somewhat heartening.
Perhaps most strikingly, the U.S. economy has now added over 200,000 jobs per month for six consecutive months. The last time Americans saw results like these? Way back in 1997.
As for the revisions, May's totals were revised up from 224,000 to 229,000, while June's figures were also revised up, from 288,000 to 298,000. Combined, that's an additional 15,000 jobs.
Overall, this is a good-but-not-great report, though the jobs landscape is nevertheless steadily improving. All told, over the last 12 months, the U.S. economy has added over 2.57 million jobs overall and 2.48 million in the private sector. What's more, July was the 53rd consecutive month in which we've seen private-sector job growth – the longest on record.
At this point, with the year about half over, 2014 is currently on track to be the best year for U.S. job creation since 1999.
Picking up the pieces after the GOP's border fiasco
The Senate hoped to complete a few key tasks last night before the start of Congress' five-week break: pass the bipartisan VA bill, approve funding for the Highway Trust Fund, and vote on an emergency measure to address the humanitarian crisis at the U.S./Mexico border.
Two out of three ain't bad?
With relative ease, the upper chamber did, in fact, pass the measures related to the VA and the Highway Trust Fund. But when it came time to vote on the Senate's version of the border bill, the Republican minority blocked it -- Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) wanted an amendment prohibiting executive orders from President Obama; Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said no, so the GOP refused to allow the legislation to advance.
As for the House, what happens now in the wake of yesterday's fiasco? Their recess has apparently been delayed.
House Republicans are expected to pick up the effort again Friday morning, just as lawmakers prepare to leave Capitol Hill for a five-week recess without passing any funding relief for the southwestern border. Emergency funds are set to run out by the end of August after a flood of unaccompanied minors – some 57,000 have been apprehended at the border since October – strained immigration resources and facilities beyond capacity.
House GOP members will reportedly meet in about an hour on Capitol Hill to "discuss new policy proposals to accompany a $659 million appropriations bill they abruptly yanked from consideration Thursday."
In other words, Republican leaders are still looking for ways to push the bill even further to the right in order to placate rank-and-file GOP lawmakers. If the enticements fall short, members are reportedly prepared to work through the weekend.
At this point, you may be wondering about the point of these efforts. If so, you're not alone.
Cantor's quitting and other headlines
House Republicans scramble (again) to find enough votes to pass the border bill. (The Hill)
We finally have an Ambassador to Russia, although one Republican Senator didn't make it easy. (AP)
Rep. Eric Cantor announces he won't serve out his term. (Richmond Times-Dispatch)
A.G. Eric Holder calls for more transparency about lethal injection drugs. (MSNBC)
Gaza ceasefire unravels quickly. (NBC News)
Justice Ginsburg defends the Supreme Court's decision to void abortion clinic buffer zones. (AP)
Justice Ginsburg wears a more severe-looking lace collar when she reads her dissents. (Yahoo News)
Thursday's Mini-Report, 7.31.14
Today's edition of quick hits:
* The latest from Capitol Hill: "House Republicans plan to delay their August recess to stay in Washington until they have enough votes to pass a bill responding to the border crisis."
* Remember, on the border bill, GOP leaders need 218 votes to advance their own bad bill. As of this afternoon, they were "not even close" to that total.
* Netanyahu's latest warning: "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said on Thursday that he would not agree to any Gaza cease-fire proposal that prevents the Israeli military from completing the destruction of Hamas's tunnel network."
* Ebola crisis: "West African leaders quickened the pace of emergency efforts on Thursday in response to a mounting tally of fatalities from the worst known outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus, canceling travel plans and authorizing measures to combat the disease including house-to-house searches and the deployment of the army and the police."
* A growing controversy in Albany: "In an escalation of the confrontation between the United States attorney in Manhattan, Preet Bharara, and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo over the governor's cancellation of his own anticorruption commission, Mr. Bharara has threatened to investigate the Cuomo administration for possible obstruction of justice or witness tampering."
* Highway Trust Fund: "In the frenetic legislative run-up to the August recess, House lawmakers sent their version of a highway bill back to the Senate after voting to disagree with that chamber's amendment to the legislation."
* He'll be talking like this for the next three months: "President Obama mocked House Republicans Thursday for approving a lawsuit challenging his use of executive action and said it wouldn't deter him from using his powers to advance his agenda. 'It's not very productive, but it's not going to stop me from doing what I think needs to be done in order to help families all across the country,' Obama said."
* Wheaton College: "It isn't easy being a self-described feminist on one of the most famous evangelical campuses in the country, which became even better known when its case against covering some forms of contraception reached the Supreme Court on July 3."
* Five House Republicans opposed yesterday's resolution on their party's anti-Obama lawsuit. How come? Because for these five GOP lawmakers, the lawsuit just wasn't right-wing enough.
CIA apologizes for Senate spying
Several months ago, there was a serious dispute between the Central Intelligence Agency and the Senate Intelligence Committee, with both accusing the other of impropriety. As Adam Serwer summarized, "Senators said the CIA was attempting to hide evidence that proved the torture program was ineffective, while the CIA countered that the staffers had somehow gotten access to information they weren't supposed to see."
As Washington crises go, this one was largely ignored -- it lacked partisan stakes -- but it was deeply important. If, for example, there was reason to believe the CIA spied on Senate offices as part of their dispute, which Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) alleged, it would be scandalous. After all, Congress has oversight authority over intelligence agencies, not the other way around.
Earlier this month, the Justice Department decided to close its inquiry into the matter, concluding not to file charges against anyone, but the matter was hardly resolved. Indeed, today we're learning that the key allegations against the CIA were, in fact, accurate. Meredith Clark reports:
Central Intelligence Agency officials spied on computers used by the Senate Intelligence Committee to investigate whether the CIA used torture in controversial Bush-era detention and interrogation programs, an internal investigation has found.According to CIA spokesperson Dean Boyd, agency director John Brennan apologized to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, and Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Georgia, the chair and vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, respectively.
Remember, when this story first broke in the spring, Brennan dismissed the allegations out of hand. "[W]e wouldn't do that," he said. "I mean, that's, that's just beyond the, you know, the scope of reason in terms of what we would do."
That, we now know, was wrong.