“In a vintage return to his confrontational style, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) indicated that Republicans could seek to block a Democratic president from filling the vacant Supreme Court seat indefinitely,” Politico reports.
Said Cruz: “There will be plenty of time for debate on that issue… There is certainly long historical precedent for a Supreme Court with fewer justices.”
“I call him the Jewish LBJ.”
— Sen. Al Franken (D-MN), quoted by the Washington Post, on Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY).
“Evan Bayh spent substantial time during his last year in the Senate searching for a job in the private sector, even as he cast votes on issues of interest to his future corporate bosses, according to the former Indiana lawmaker’s 2010 schedule,” obtained exclusively by the Associated Press.
“A 2007 law requires senators to file a disclosure with the secretary of the Senate within three days of beginning negotiations for private-sector employment. But after the law went into effect, the Senate Ethics Committee defined negotiations as employment discussions that occur after a job offer has been made.”
New York Times: “Speaker Paul Ryan says he has had it with Republicans and Democrats sharing power, complaining that it breeds dysfunction and prevents major accomplishments.”
“In contrast, Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, says those periods when the parties split control of Congress and the White House are the ideal time to get big things done.”
“One of these Republican leaders — their differing views shaped by their individual experiences and the characteristics of their chambers — is likely to get an opportunity to prove his political theory correct next year.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said that the Senate will take up an expected veto override of legislation that lets families of 9/11 victims sue Saudi Arabia in U.S. courts before breaking for the elections, The Hill reports.
The Senate had been expected to leave town this week, but McConnell said it was “safe to say” that the Senate would be in town next week.
“A major criminal-justice overhaul bill seemed destined to be the bipartisan success story of the year, consensus legislation that showed lawmakers could still rise above politics and take on a serious societal problem,” the New York Times reports.
“Then the election got in the way. With Donald J. Trump demanding ‘law and order’ and Senate Republicans divided on the wisdom of reducing federal mandatory minimum sentences, the effort that began with real promise stalled, and now its Senate authors acknowledge there is virtually no chance for action on the measure this year.”
“The U.S. Senate is on track to work the fewest number of days since 1956, a fact that Democrats seized on Wednesday to attack the chamber’s Republican leadership,” McClatchy reports.
“Senators returned last week to Washington after a seven-week break. Another recess could come as early as the end of this week or next, freeing embattled senators to return to the campaign trail in their states.”
Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) “says Democrats should move to curtail the filibuster if they win the White House and Senate in November only to run up against persistent use of the tactic by Republicans,” the New York Times reports.
Said Reid: “Unless after this election there is a dramatic change to go back to the way it used to be, the Senate will have to evolve as it has in the past. But it will evolve with a majority vote determining stuff. It is going to happen.”
Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA), the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, “appears to have softened his stance on holding confirmation hearings for Merrick Garland, President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court,” the Huffington Post reports.
“Grassley said in May the Senate should not consider a nominee until the day the next president is sworn in. But… he said he could change his position and hold a hearing between the November election and Inauguration Day if Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton wins the White House, and a majority of senators convinced him to do so.”
Said Grassley: “If we have the election, and there was a majority of the Senate changed their mind about doing it in the lame duck, as opposed to January 20, I don’t feel that I could stand in the way of that. But I don’t think I can promote that idea.”
“Well first of all, I can just tell you about Mitch, I don’t know of anyone else that’s running for majority leader. Nobody wants the job.”
— Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), quoted by the Tampa Bay Times, dodging a question on whether he would support Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) as majority leader.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) “left the door open for Democrats to potentially use a procedural tactic to force a vote on Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland,” The Hill reports.
Said Reid: “We have a couple of options, and we’re deciding when to do that and if we should do it — when and if. I’ve been in touch with some of my senators during the break to determine that.”
Former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) was recently playing a version of The Newlywed Game during a cruise when he was asked to guess his wife’s answer to the most unusual place they have ever “made whoopee,” according to the Boston Globe.
“His first answer? On a golf course…. Then he guessed an airplane, to which his wife responded that everyone’s done it on an airplane — that’s not unusual. The passenger said Brown’s final answer — his US Senate office — really got the crowd going, especially when Brown turned to the audience and quipped, ‘That’s right, and you all paid for it!'”
Brown later claimed he was just joking.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) “cut the legs out from a bipartisan effort to keep suspected terrorists from buying guns,” The Hill reports.
“In doing so, McConnell, a master of the Senate’s arcane rules, provided cover for vulnerable Republicans who wanted to be seen as supporting the effort, but did not want to cross the National Rifle Association.”
New York Times: “The solution was a procedural maneuver by which the majority leader, Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, scheduled the bill for a vote on a motion to table it. By voting not to table it, Republicans could keep it alive without advancing or defeating it outright — putting it in a sort of legislative purgatory.”
“If anybody can get his senators to all agree to go over a cliff and kill themselves, that’s pretty good. Boy, I will tell you that guy has a lot more sway with his caucus than I ever had. If I ever suggested something as absurd and bizarre as that to my caucus, they would revote and kick the hell out of me out of the caucus. I mean, really.”
— Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), quoted by the New York Times, on Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) effort to prevent even a hearing for Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) attended a confidential dinner with more than 20 top conservatives to plan his comeback as a movement leader in the mold of Ronald Reagan, The Hill reports.
“Ted Cruz’s associates insist he’s returning to the Senate as the same uncompromising, hell-bent conservative he’s always been. But one thing is different, and it’s glaring: The senator who made enemies with fellow Republican senators and bragged about it to voters now wants to play nice — or at least his version of nice — with his colleagues,” Politico reports.
“And the first step to improving his rancorous relationships, the Texas senator’s allies say, will be to help them keep their Senate seats. The freshman senator wants to return to the campaign trail this fall as a conservative surrogate for Republicans aiming to turn out the GOP base, they say.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to USA Today about Cruz: “I would say he has maybe one follower on a good day.”
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) accidentally published an op-ed in the Deseret News claiming that his meeting with Judge Merrick Garland didn’t change his mind about delaying action on the nomination until after the presidential election, the Washington Post reports.
The problem: Hatch hasn’t even met with Garland yet.
The article was removed from the Deseret News website but remains available in a Google database.
Politico: “Robert Barnett, the Washington superlawyer who negotiated approximately $1.3 million worth of book deals for Marco Rubio, has been hired by the U.S. senator to handle what Barnett describes as a crush of job offers ahead of his retirement from elected office in January.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
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