The 2014 election might have been the most expensive midterm ever, and it might have seen some of the most extravagant spending on wall-to-wall advertising ever — but when Election Day had come and gone, there was a surprising amount of money still sitting on the table. The Service Employees International Union PAC reported yesterday… Continue Reading
President Obama is once again facing pushback on an executive branch nomination, but this time it’s coming from his own party. Obama’s nomination of Lazard‘s Antonio Weiss to become the next under secretary for domestic finance at Treasury has raised the ire of the likes of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). Weiss is currently the head…
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This article was cross-posted at TIME.com. The defeat of the Keystone XL pipeline bill in the Senate last month may have been viewed as a blow to Sen. Mary Landrieu‘s re-election bid, but her battle to get the bill passed was warmly received by members of the oil and gas industry, including Keystone’s parent company.…
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What do the bulk of Republican presidential hopefuls share with the two major teachers’ unions in the United States, besides mutual dislike? Turns out there is something: Growing opposition to the Common Core education standards. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) became the latest high-profile Republican to change his stripes and oppose the Common Core on Monday.…
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Still recovering from your Thanksgiving feast? Confined to your relatives’ homes with nothing to do but squabble over religion, sports allegiances (get it together, Pats!), and politics? If it’s the last of those, impress your family and friends with an informed analysis of the 2014 midterms. Here are some key talking points to work in while fixing yourself…
The lobbying effort to allow commercial drone use looks set to take a major hit, with the Federal Aviation Administration planning to issue a series of long-awaited regulations as soon as the end of December. And given what the FAA will be proposing, according to a report this week in the Wall Street Journal, businesses hoping to make use…
The Tea Party Army’s fundraising appeals are not subtle. A recent e-mail sent by the group, a super PAC, warns the reader that when George W. Bush left office, there were 1.8 million Muslims living America, and now there are “close to 7 million.” “This horde of new Muslims may be quiet for now,” the…
When the 114th Congress convenes in January, there will be 84 women in the House — a record number. Yet despite the fact that Republicans had a far better Election Day, it is Democrats driving this trend. In the next Congress, 62 of the House members who are women will be Democrats – about a…
Thanksgiving is a holiday steeped in traditions: watching the Detroit Lions lose, blaming tryptophan for your food coma and making yourself scarce when it comes time to do the dishes.
Vaping is hot. Use of electronic cigarettes is on a steady rise — the overall market value was estimated to be between $1 and $1.7 billion last year. Even the term has achieved the ultimate mark of respectability: “Vaping” was recently named Word of the Year by Oxford Dictionaries. Fittingly, we’ve made this the latest…
The Environmental Protection Agency is supposed to base its major decisions on science — good science. But what is good science and how do you decide it? Since 1978, the EPA has had a science advisory board tasked with helping answer those questions. But, because this is Washington, nothing is ever that simple. Last week,…
As Goldman Sachs prepares for more unwelcome publicity tomorrow at a Senate Banking Committee hearing, these things are certain: The financial giant’s many lobbyists will be working in overdrive, and the company’s million-dollar PAC will be considering writing checks to a host of lawmakers — some of them on the House or Senate Banking Committees.…
Now that the midterms are over, we’d like to take a moment to breathe — and to ask for your help. We process mountains of data on campaign finance, lobbying and lawmakers’ personal finances, slicing and dicing and analyzing the heck out of it. We publish original, award-winning journalism on these topics. And we put…
Senate Democrats successfully blocked a bill Tuesday that would have approved construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. The controversial measure fell one vote shy of overcoming a filibuster, with 59 senators supporting it and 41 opposing. The vote followed the bill’s approval in the House by a much wider margin, with 252 lawmakers voting to advance the pipeline.…
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