3 mins read

Geothermal energy package coming to House floor

The House is expected next week to consider a measure intended to help speed up permitting of geothermal projects on public lands. The legislation includes portions of six bills from Republicans and Democrats that the House Natural Resources Committee approved in March. The bills had bipartisan backing in committee, and their placement on the suspension […]

6 mins read

Senate panel releases NIL bill, plans hearing

The top lawmakers on the Senate Commerce Committee released a bill Wednesday aimed at addressing the myriad issues with college athletics stemming from its largely ungoverned name, image and likeness era. In a call with reporters, a Republican Commerce Committee aide said the panel plans to hold hearings and mark up the “Protect College Sports […]

5 mins read

NDAA mark unveiled by House Armed Services Committee chairman

The House Armed Services Committee chairman released on Tuesday a proposed $1.15 trillion fiscal 2027 National Defense Authorization Act that emphasizes bolstering America’s defense industry. The so-called “chairman’s mark” from Rep. Mike D. Rogers, R-Ala., would authorize almost $1.15 trillion for the base-budget part of President Donald Trump’s record $1.5 trillion defense proposal for fiscal […]

7 mins read

Hantavirus, Ebola highlight political division over disease

The Trump administration’s shake-up of the United States’ public health apparatus in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic has public health experts concerned about the country’s ability to respond to emerging disease outbreaks like hantavirus and Ebola. Whether that’s a concern for Congress, however, often depends on the member’s party — a reaction that should […]

5 mins read

Funds to combat child exploitation added to reconciliation bill

The Homeland Security Department would get a new influx of funding to investigate child exploitation cases, including to identify victims of sexual abuse material online, under the GOP budget reconciliation bill.  The $108.5 million added in a substitute amendment Tuesday would support hiring additional investigators and forensic analysts within the department. The roughly $72 billion immigration […]

5 mins read

GOP senators push for challenge to House maps in Democratic states

Senate Republicans used a hearing Tuesday to push the Trump administration to file lawsuits challenging congressional maps in California, Illinois and other Democrat-controlled states in the wake of a Supreme Court decision rolling back the Voting Rights Act. The hearing comes weeks after the Supreme Court’s six-justice conservative majority in Louisiana v. Callais overturned a […]

3 mins read

Former Rep. Barney Frank dead at 86

Former Rep. Barney Frank, the first member of Congress to voluntarily announce he was gay, who rose to lead the House Financial Services Committee at a seminal moment in American economic history, died Tuesday night. He was 86. The progressive Frank had among the sharpest wits of members of the House and was known at […]

7 mins read

Tensions over prediction markets dominate Senate hearing

Senators at a Commerce Committee panel hearing aired concerns Wednesday about rapidly growing prediction markets, appearing largely unswayed by industry arguments that they are not a form of betting subject to state regulation.  Members of the committee’s Consumer Protection, Technology and Data Privacy Subcommittee were in agreement at a hearing that sports “event contracts” on prediction […]