Politico

It’s been less than a week, but it seems we’re on chapter 37 of the will-she -or-won’t-she Secretary of State saga.

Bill and Hillary Clinton have apparently turned in all the paperwork the Obama team has requested and the Secretary of State offer is now in a "holding pattern," Talking Points Memo’s Greg Sargent is reporting.

Of course this could all change at a moment’s notice, but if the reports are true, the vetting process may be coming to a close.

[Read more →]

If Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel’s outlook is any indication, President-elect Barack Obama will get along just fine with House Democrats on some of his biggest priorities.

On health care reform and tax code changes, the New York Democrat repeatedly said he’d follow the president-elect’s lead on process and policy because he doesn’t anticipate their being much daylight between himself, the Democratic leadership and the White House once Obama moves in.

“If he picked up a Bush page or a Cheney page by mistake, we’d have a problem,” Rangel told reporters during a Thursday afternoon briefing. “But I don’t see any problem. I can’t begin to tell you young people how lucky I am as an old guy at last to be able to say that I don’t have to convince the president or the administration on principle. I may have big problems in terms of how you do it, but what a relief!”

“Listen, all of this may be exciting for you to try to get me in trouble with the next president,” he told a reporter who asked what he’d think if Obama wanted to do middle-class tax cuts first and wait on raising the income tax rates for the highest brackets. “But I’m going to make it abundantly clear, it’s going to be hard for him to say anything that I’m going to disagree with.”

“It doesn’t bother me that I’m following the direction of the president,” Rangel said at another point, laughing. “What a great honor it would for me” to say he supported Obama to accomplish tax reform.

On the issue of overhauling the health care system, Rangel said it didn’t matter to him if Obama took the lead there, too.

“I would hope that we could find some way that there’s no conflict with Democrats in coming up with a bill that is supported by the White House, the House of Representatives and the Senate.

"Quite frankly I don’t give a damn who comes up with what first,” or however else the process evolves, he said. “How we do it doesn’t matter.”

Rangel said in his opinion, he thinks health care and tax code overhaul should be done on a dual track because he doesn’t think you can tackle an issue as big as health reform — which contains so many tax components — seperate from the other.

That does not preclude the committee looking at tax cuts as a part of a stimulus package, however.

[Read more →]

 What is Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel looking for in the next Treasury Secretary?

“Him sharing with me whether [Henry] Paulson makes any sense at all,” the New York Democrat said when a reporter asked him that very question.

Rangel harshly critiqued the current Treasury secretary’s performance in the current crisis – comments that show just how far Paulson’s star has fallen in Democratic circles.

“It would seem to me that the decisions that he made – makes for the country and therefore the free world are based on his experiences,” mentioning Paulson’s long career at former investment bank Goldman Sachs. “And I don’t see where the guy that’s having his home foreclosed or the persons that are losing their jobs or health benefits are on the Secretary’s agenda at all. And when I say at all, I mean at all.”

“He really doesn’t believe that that is his job at all” to help average Americans, Rangel told reporters at a Thursday briefing. Paulson thinks “that his job is to stabilize the fiscal institutions.”

Rangel said he hopes Obama’s Treasury pick – who Rangel will work closely with on health and tax measures – will give him more confidence that he and his colleagues did the right thing in supporting the $700 billion bailout package Paulson urged them to pass.

[Read more →]

With the larger fight for the chairmanship of the Energy and Commerce Committee over, with Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) emerging the victor, backers of ousted chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) are now scrambling to hold on to their subcommittee chairmanships.

Reps. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) and Gene Green (D-Texas), who pushed hard for Dingell, are sending out letters to their colleagues asking for support in retaining their subcommittee chairmanships in the next Congress, said Green. Rep. Frank Pallone, Green said, has also sent out a similar letter.

"It’s no secret I was part of John dingell’s whip team," said Green, who said that he had hoped to speak to Waxman today but has yet to do so. "I think there has to be some healing and I would hope that we would see that, because there are a number of us who are very serious legislators."

Green noted that despite opposing his bid for the chair, he’s  "worked with Chairman Waxman on a number of other issues and I would hope to continue it."

If there was a wholesale turnover of subcommittee chairman, said Green, the healing process in the caucus would be that much more difficult and could hamper legislative progress. "If there is [such a turnover] I think that will hurt us and that’s the sad part," said Green.

“I am eager to continue in my role as chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations and I am asking my colleagues on the committee for their support," said Stupak in a statement. "I look forward to continuing the important work Chairman Dingell and I began on food and drug safety, FDA reform, security of government laboratories, energy costs, and abuses in our nation’s health care system.”

Patrick O’Connor contributed to this report

[Read more →]

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who took great pains to stay neutral in the divisive fight for the Energy and Commerce chairmanship, praised both lawmakers after the election, despite her sometimes deep differences with the loser, Michigan Rep. John D. Dingell.

“John Dingell is a giant of the Congress and his leadership over the last 28 years as Chairman and Ranking Member of the Energy and Commerce Committee is unsurpassed," Pelosi said in a statement released by her office. "As Chairman Emeritus, John Dingell will continue in his tradition of strong and steady leadership on behalf of all Americans.

And of his successor, Pelosi said, “Henry Waxman will bring to the post of Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee the outstanding leadership he has demonstrated as Chair of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. He has been a longtime leader on health care, drug safety and affordability, and climate change. Under his leadership, the committee and the entire caucus will make progress toward making America energy independent, making health care available to all Americans, and addressing the greatest challenge of our time, global warming."

[Read more →]

House Republican Leader John A. Boehner didn’t have a vote in the contentious race for chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, but that didn’t stop him from leveling a pretty harsh assessment of the result.

"This decision sends a troubling signal from a Majority that has promised to govern from the center," Boehner said in a statement from his office.

Republicans on both sides of Capitol Hill privately lauded the outcome because the elevation of a more liberal Henry Waxman will make it easier for the GOP to target the Democrats’ newly-elected chairman with partisan labels. But most believe Waxman will be much harder for them to work with than his more moderate predecessor.

"They moved away from Chairman (John) Dingell (D-Mich.) because he is committed to approaching energy and environmental issues in a manner that protects American jobs," Boehner continued. "It is a disturbing sign that the leaders of the next Congress will be making decisions based not on what is best for the country, but for well-funded special interests whose priorities are far different from those of the vast majority of Americans."

And, of course, Boehner had to take a shot at card-check, the Democrats’ legislation to ease union-organizing requirements by allowing labor leaders to forgo a secret-ballot election. "Ironically, the decision (to replace Dingell) was made in a secret ballot election – a process that Democrats want to end in workplaces across America to help one of those special interests."

Full statement after the jump.

Continue reading post…

[Read more →]

The Democrats’ ability to expand the playing field for a second consecutive election — and not just play defense in the seats they picked up in 2006 — was a big part of their success in the last election, according to Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

In a memo to colleagues on Thursday, Van Hollen wrote that "expanding the playing field from purple and pink to red and deep red districts was critical to our success this cycle.

"Despite the NRCC’s pre-election spin that Democrats couldn’t hold and win seats that President Bush carried, the reality is that we are competing in and winning traditionally Republican seats, particularly in the suburbs," Van Hollen wrote. "Of the 24 districts that Democrats won this cycle, George Bush won 21 in 2004 by an average of 54 percent and many were carried by Sen. McCain."

These statistics don’t bode well for congressional Republicans, who have watched their numbers erode in back-to-back elections. That may explain the pledge yesterday by Texas Rep. Pete Sessions, the newly elected chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, to recruit candidates and raise money in traditionally Democratic seats; after all, Republicans need to reverse the trend just to nibble away at the Democrats’ expanded majority.

Statistically, the DCCC saved $15 million by reserving advertising early; doubled its spending on get-out-the-vote efforts — spending $18 million in 60 districts after spending $9 million in 35 districts in 2006; developed a new reporting system that allowed them to track voter contacts more closely; and made person-to-person contacts with 35 million voters — 21 million through get-out-the-vote drives.

These contacts and organizational strength paid particular dividends in the suburbs, helping the party’s efforts in those districts.

Van Hollen also went out of his way to thank members of the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and folks who helped with recruitment and the Frontline Program for the most competitive seats.

[Read more →]

Incoming White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said President-elect Barack Obama wants to work with Republicans, saying the new chief executive will "welcome their ideas" on how to resolve the ongoing financial crisis the country faces.

Emanuel met today with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and the entire GOP leadership from that chamber for about 30 minutes, and is currently huddling with House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (Ind.). A one-on-one session with House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) will follow the Pence meeting.

Emanuel noted that he personally had spoken to almost two dozen Republicans in the last two weeks to tell them that the new administration is serious about bipartisan cooperation.

"We welcome their ideas and their concepts," Emanuel told reporters after his meeting with McConnell and other Senate Republicans. "It’s challenging times economically. The middle class is working harder, earning less and paying more. The challenges facing the country require that people of both parties work together to solve those problems."

"I told them that I welcome their ideas, be that in their area of education, health care, taxes, energy policy, national security," Emanuel added. "Give us those ideas, because we are formulating what we’re going to do in the Obama administration."

Sen. John Ensign (Nev.), chairman of the Republican Policy Committee, said Emanuel demonstrated "a really good attitude about wanting to work with us" in his meeting with Senate Republicans, but noted there were no detailed policy negotiations during their conversation with Obama’s new top aide.

Even as Emanuel was huddling with Republicans, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) were announcing that Congress may return to session in early December to work out an auto-industry bailout package, something House and Senate GOP leaders refused to agree to this week.

On a personal note, Emanuel said he had made no decision on when he will resign his own House seat. More than 20 potential candidates have been mentioned for that seat. "You will be the first to know," Emanuel told the Crypt when asked when his resignation will occur.

Since he is still a House member, Emanuel attended a closed-door session of House Democrats this week, and he retains a hideaway on the first floor of the Capitol, which is where he is meeting with Cantor and Pence now.

[Read more →]

If things don’t work out for Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, he could still find a career as a scribe covering Congress. He’s got the breathless lede down.

"In the minds of the media, Congress can operate at one of two speeds: either way too slow or much too fast," Frank said at a press conference today called to discuss the prospects of a bailout for the auto industry. 

"If we were to pass this right away I could write the stories for tomorrow: ‘In a rushed, barely-examined commitment of many, many more taxpayer dollars, Congress today leapt into an abyss,’" Frank dictated. 

A reporter told him his offering sounded pretty good.

"I waive copyright," said Frank. 

[Read more →]

Is Colombia free trade back on the table?

While the conventional wisdom is that an Obama administration would be loathe to deal with the free trade deal, Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel just said at an afternoon briefing that everything he’s heard from Obama’s close advisers is that President-elect Obama thinks "he could handle that and get it passed" when he took over the White House.

[Read more →]