Open Congress : Congress Gossip Blog

How the Housing Bill Can Help You

2008-07-23T19:15:00Z

Most of the focus lately on this bill has been on the Fannie and Freddie bailout, but CNN reminds us that its main purpose is to help people who are facing foreclosures. Here’s their guide to what homeowners need to know about using the bill to help them keep their houses.

Leaked Email: DeMint's Blocking our Bailout

2008-07-23T18:30:00Z

Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) has some concerns with the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailout that’s being pushed through Congress, and he’s planning to do what he can to stop it. As has been reported recently, DeMint wants to add an amendment to the bill that would ban the companies from lobbying Congress so as to prevent them from currying favor with politicians on the taxpayers’ dime. Today, Democratic leaders in the Senate sent an email to their business contacts that Rob Bluey at RedState is calling “a direct appeal to K Street lobbyists for help” in staving off DeMint.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) plans to seek a unanimous consent from every senator to pass the bailout bill, which also contains a plethora of housing measures, quickly and without any amendments. He wants to preserve the bill’s delicate balance that, remarkably, prompted President Bush to back off his initial veto threat and to move onto other issues, like gas prices, as soon as he can. DeMint is planing to object to the unanimous consent agreement, setting up a lengthy procedural tango that could delay passage of the bill for several days (or, if he has enough allies, several weeks). And remember, there are a lot of other issues Reid wants to bring to the Senate before their month-long recess begins on August 9th.

Below is the full email sent today to Reid’s business contacts. Bluey at RedState calls it “the latest indication that Democrats are closely aligned with Fannie and Freddie—and apparently willing to go to great lengths to protect them.”

From: Wetjen, Mark (Reid)
Sent: Wednesday, July 23, 2008 1:25 PM
To: majleaderreid-business@democratic-message-center.senate.gov
Subject: Update on housing

If the House passes the housing bill and the Senate receives it today, Sen. Reid is prepared to move to proceed to the measure today, which will be the House message to H.R. 3121 (containing one amendment). While a motion to proceed to a House message is non-debatable, technically the motion still requires a majority vote, unless consent is given to proceed without a vote.

If cloture is necessary – the Republican filibuster record suggests it will be – Sen. Reid could file cloture on a motion to concur with the House amendment today. In that event, the cloture vote would ripen on Friday. If cloture is invoked, the 30-hour clock begins to run from that point in time.

We are informed that Sen. DeMint would like to seek an amendment to the House amendment. While we have not seen Sen. DeMint’s amendment, it’s fair to say that such an amendment could complicate debate and delay passage of the housing bill.

What do you think – is Bluey reading too much behind the lines here, or is Reid rallying allies on K Street to fight off DeMint? Any beltway insiders out there who can vouch for message like this being standard and innocuous operating procedure?

Congress Bans Burmese Gems

2008-07-23T12:14:00Z

Finally, Congress has taken action against the military Junta of Burma. The Block Burmese Jade Act has been pending in Senate since last October, around the time when the military crackdown of protesters was at its worst. The bill will close a loophole that allows American importers to skirt U.S. sanctions and import regime-funding gems from Burma via third-party countries.

Irrawaddy:

Exactly one week after the United States House of Representatives passed the Block Burmese Jade Act, the Senate on Tuesday unanimously approved the bill, which blocks American companies from importing gemstones from Burma and expands financial sanctions against the country’s military junta.

Stopping US sales of these Burmese gems is expected to prevent the Burmese regime from earning hundreds of millions of dollars each year. The bill also makes Burmese regime leaders, military officers and their families ineligible for visas to the United States.

The original version of the bill would have put pressure on Chevron to get out of Burma by ending tax breaks that have fueled its natural gas project there and banning payments to the military junta through any of its joint ventures. But, as Mike Lillis reports at the Washington Independent, the provisions aimed at punishing Chevron were dropped because of objections from lawmakers bowing to the oil company’s influence.

$300 Oil

2008-07-22T14:07:00Z

Rather than promising $2 Gas, Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens went in front of the Senate Homeland Security Committee today and warned of $300-a-barrel oil.

Oil prices will hit $300 a barrel in 10 years if the United States fails to reduce its dependence on foreign imports, billionaire oil investor T. Boone Pickens told U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday.

The United States imports nearly 70 percent of its oil and Pickens said the world’s top petroleum-consuming nation would import 80 percent in a decade if it does not aggressively tap its own natural gas and renewable resources.

Pickens has been touring the country pushing a plan under which domestic natural gas supplies would be used to power cars instead of electrical power plants. The federal government and private investors would build a massive wind farm system in the middle of the country from Mexico to Canada to provide electricity.

Industry group the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) has said the Pickens plan could work if the government renews the production tax credit for renewable energy, preferably for longer than a year or two.

Meanwhile, the debate in the Senate today over the bill to curb excessive speculation in oil futures markets has broken down over concern from Republicans who want to offer amendments to increase domestic drilling.

Missed the Boat ...err SCHIP

2008-07-22T13:42:00Z

Why did Congress wait so long to introduce regulations that make it harder for states to insure children under S-CHIP?

CQ:

The Senate parliamentarian delivered bad news Tuesday to Democrats hoping to block a Bush administration directive on children’s health insurance: They were too slow.

Last week, Democrats introduced a “resolution of disapproval” against a directive the administration issued in August 2007. The resolution, had it been introduced earlier in the month it would have been “privileged” on the Senate floor, meaning it could not be filibustered or subject to other dilatory tactics.

But the parliamentarian told the resolution’s sponsors Tuesday, led by Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus , D-Mont. , that because they did not introduce it until July 17, it would not have privileged status under the Congressional Review Act.

$25 Billion Bailout

2008-07-22T11:21:00Z

Well, the plan gives the government authority to throw an unlimited amount of money at Fannie Mae and Freedie Mac, so there’s no way to know for sure how much it will cost. But the experts have a guess.

The Congressional Budget Office has scored the Bush administration’s Fannie and Freddie bailout and estimates that it will cost $25 billion over the next two years. But they also said that there is a good chance – “probably better than 50 percent” – that the plan’s bazooka effect will be enough and the bailout plan wont’t have to be used at all, thus having no costs.

Click here (pdf) for the full letter to House Budget Chairman John Spratt (D-SC).

This Week in Congress

2008-07-22T11:02:00Z

(Cross-posted from Congresspedia, the citizens’ encyclopedia on Congress).

With three weeks left before the August recess, both parties are scrambling to pass something – anything – addressing the two issues at the fore of everyone’s minds and evening newscasts: the housing/mortgage crisis and high gas prices. The former seems to be a broad-based, serious effort that may help the situation, but the latter has devolved into the usual kabuki political theater.

The major housing/mortgage crisis relief bill (CP) may receive final votes in both the House and Senate this week. The Bush administration asked Congress last week to include help for government-sponsored mortgage buyers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the form of a higher credit limit with the U.S. Treasury and the possibility of a government buy-up of their stock. In exchange, congressional Democrats reiterated their support for a $4 billion program to provide funding to local governments to buy up, refurbish and sell foreclosed homes, which President Bush had previously threatened to veto the bill over. Now it’s a question of who blinks first.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) are also each trying to pass their own legislation to address high gas prices. Democrats have decided to target oil speculators through bills like the Energy Markets Emergency Act of 2008 (CP) while also trying to freeze out efforts by Republicans to open the Outer Continental Shelf and Alaska National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. Neither approach is likely to have much effect on gas prices in either the long or short run, however, so at this point both parties are just trying to avoid the wrath of voters and head into the August recess having passed something (or at least have a good story about the obstructionism of the other side).

The House will also likely take up the global aids funding bill (CP) passed by the Senate last week and consider a $1 billion, 10-year plan to systematically inspect and repair the nation’s bridges and tunnels.

For a full list of this week’s committee hearings, see the original post on Congresspedia.

Speculating

2008-07-21T17:33:00Z

Sounds like Senate Republicans are backing off their insistence on drilling and may actually help Democrats pass a bill to crack down on excessive speculation in oil markets.

According to The Hill, the Democrats’ position on this is that if Republicans don’t help them pass the speculation bill, they won’t even consider a vote on drilling as part of a larger energy package in the near future.

Click here for Harry Reid’s rundown of what the oil speculation bill would do.

Party On!

2008-07-21T12:39:00Z

Over at the Sunlight Foundation blog, Paul Blumenthal notes that Congress is already going back on the lobbying disclosure requirements they enacted as part of their big ethics reform bill. Their revisions will make it easy for lobbyists to fund parties for lawmakers without having to disclose any information.

Coburn's Captives

2008-07-21T12:14:00Z

(Updated below)

Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has single-handedly blocked dozens – perhaps as many as 100 – bills from being approved by the Senate. When the 110th Congress convened in January 2007, he circulated a letter (pdf) to his colleagues outlining a set of criteria bills must meet in order for him to allow them to come to the floor. Since then, no matter how popular or needed a bill is, if it doesn’t meet his criteria, he puts a hold on it and effectively blocks it from being taken up.

At this point, just about every member of the Senate has had a bill that they care deeply about blocked by Coburn. That’s why Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is preparing to hold a vote on a “Coburn Omnibus”: legislation that will contain between 40 and 80 of the blocked bills. The idea is that by combining all of these popular bills into one giant omnibus, there will be a little something in it for almost every senator, and together they will all work to bypass Coburn’s objections.

Here’s a very abbreviated list of the blocked bills that will likely be included:

S.757 – Breast Cancer and Environmental Research Act of 2007

A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act to authorize the Director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences to make grants for the development and operation of research centers regarding environmental factors that may be related to the etiology of breast cancer.

S.1183 – Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Act

A bill to enhance and further research into paralysis and to improve rehabilitation and the quality of life for persons living with paralysis and other physical disabilities, and for other purposes.

S.1382 – ALS Registry Act

A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for the establishment of an Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Registry.

S.1810 – Prenatally and Postnatally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act

A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act to increase the provision of scientifically sound information and support services to patients receiving a positive test diagnosis for Down syndrome or other prenatally and postnatally diagnosed conditions.

H.R.985 – Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2007

To amend title 5, United States Code, to clarify which disclosures of information are protected from prohibited personnel practices; to require a statement in nondisclosure policies, forms, and agreements to the effect that such policies, forms, and agreements are consistent with certain disclosure protections, and for other purposes.

S.647 – Lewis and Clark Mount Hood Wilderness Act of 2007

A bill to designate certain land in the State of Oregon as wilderness, and for other purposes.

S.2034 – Copper Salmon Wilderness Act

A bill to amend the Oregon Wilderness Act of 1984 to designate the Copper Salmon Wilderness and to amend the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act to designate segments of the North and South Forks of the Elk River in the State of Oregon as wild or scenic rivers, and for other purposes.

S.2344 – Internet Safety Education Act of 2007

A bill to create a competitive grant program to provide for age-appropriate Internet education for children.

S.1117 – Vision Care for Kids Act of 2007

A bill to establish a grant program to provide vision care to children, and for other purposes.

S.2983 – Runaway and Homeless Youth Protection Act

A bill to amend the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act to authorize appropriations, and for other purposes.

S.898 – Alzheimer’s Breakthrough Act of 2007

A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act to fund breakthroughs in Alzheimer’s disease research while providing more help to caregivers and increasing public education about prevention.

S.1551 – Comprehensive Tuberculosis Elimination Act of 2007

A bill to amend the Public Health Service Act with respect to making progress toward the goal of eliminating tuberculosis, and for other purposes.

S.2511 – Bulletproof Vest Partnership Grant Act of 2008

A bill to amend the grant program for law enforcement armor vests to provide for a waiver of or reduction in the matching funds requirement in the case of fiscal hardship.

S.535 – Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act

A bill to establish an Unsolved Crimes Section in the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, and an Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Investigative Office in the Civil Rights Unit of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and for other purposes.

S.840 – Torture Victims Relief Reauthorization Act of 2007

A bill to amend the Torture Victims Relief Act of 1998 to authorize assistance for domestic and foreign programs and centers for the treatment of victims of torture, and for other purposes.

S.2020 – Tropical Forest and Coral Conservation Reauthorization Act of 2007

A bill to reauthorize the Tropical Forest Conservation Act of 1998 through fiscal year 2010, to rename the Tropical Forest Conservation Act of 1998 as the “Tropical Forest and Coral Conservation Act of 2007”, and for other purposes.

UPDATE: More details on the Coburn Omnibus are available today. Click here for a pdf from Coburn that lists all the bills that will be included. And here’s a 14-page statement from Coburn.