Advocacy

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Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Announcements and Statements, Uncategorized, Advocacy, Announcements, Blog posts

Statement on Vote on May 10, 2022 to Allow House Staff to Unionize

By DanielSchuman May 11, 2022 2 min read

“Today’s vote to allow House staff to unionize portends a significant advance in the working conditions for congressional staff and is a high point in efforts to restore Congress’s strength as a robust institution capable of working on behalf of the American people,” said Daniel Schuman, policy director, Demand Progress. “In the wake of a […]

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Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Advocacy, Announcements, Blog posts, Reports & Analysis

Statement on House Unionization Vote + Establishment of Minimum Wage

By DanielSchuman May 6, 2022 3 min read

“Today is a proud moment in congressional history and portends a significant advance in the working conditions for congressional staff,” said Daniel Schuman, policy director of Demand Progress, a non-governmental organization focused on strengthening our democracy that has led a broad coalition to advocate for the right of congressional staff to unionize and pushed for […]

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Accountability and Oversight, Announcements and Statements, Advocacy, Blog posts

New Office of Legal Counsel Transparency Bill Would End Secret Law by OLC Opinion

By DanielSchuman March 17, 2022 3 min read

Senator Duckworth, along with Senator Leahy, just introduced the Demanding Oversight and Justification Over Legal Conclusions Transparency Act (DOJ OLC Transparency Act), a bill to require the Department of Justice to publicly disclose all Office of Legal Counsel opinions, with appropriate exceptions for classified material. Demand Progress has long advocated for such transparency, and applauds […]

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Accountability and Oversight, Congressional Security, Advocacy, Blog posts

Make U.S. Capitol Police IG Reports Publicly Available Online

By DanielSchuman January 6, 2022 2 min read

Federal inspectors general routinely publish their findings online. This helps hold federal agencies to account by creating public and internal pressure to address the concerns raised by the IG and creating a record should they fail to fix problems. However, the Capitol Police Inspector General is one of a handful of IGs that withholds their […]

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Accountability and Oversight, Advocacy, Blog posts

Put Senate Bills and Amendments Online Before Votes

By DanielSchuman December 9, 2021 2 min read

The public does not have real time access to bills and amendments as they are considered on the Senate floor. This week, Demand Progress, Lincoln Network, and a coalition of 41 other organizations and 15 experts sent a letter to Senate leadership requesting the Senate publish bills and amendments online while they are still under […]

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Accountability and Oversight, Modernization, Uncategorized, Advocacy, Blog posts

Senate Personal Offices Now Allowed a Staffer With TS/SCI Clearance

By DanielSchuman November 16, 2021 3 min read

Every senator will now be able to designate one aide as eligible to apply for a TS/SCI clearance according to an announcement made by Sen. Schumer and reported by Politico. Clearances give staffers the ability to review matters deemed classified by the Executive branch. Senator Murphy is a long-time champion of this change, which had […]

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Accountability and Oversight, Appropriations, Advocacy, Blog posts

Video: Demand Progress Webinar on FY 2022 Appropriations Public Witness Testimony

By DanielSchuman April 30, 2021 2 min read

Demand Progress hosted a webinar on Friday, April 30 to hear from presenters who otherwise would have testified in person before the appropriations subcommittees on improving government transparency and accountability. This webinar was moderated by Taylor J. Swift, policy advisor for Demand Progress. The timestamps for each presenter are included below.

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Congressional Security, Coalition Letters, Advocacy, Blog posts

An Open Congress Cannot Be Fenced Off

By DanielSchuman February 15, 2021 4 min read

Demand Progress, the Lincoln Network, and a coalition of organizations wrote to legislators this week to express our concern and strong opposition to the proposed permanent fencing surrounding the U.S. Capitol. On January 6th, insurrectionists successfully breached security and stormed the U.S. Capitol with lawmakers, employees, essential workers, and journalists inside. In the aftermath of […]

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Appropriations, Congressional Security, Advocacy, Blog posts

Recommendations for the FY 2022 Security Supplemental (including on the U.S. Capitol Police)

By DanielSchuman February 11, 2021 2 min read

Congress is expected to enact a “security supplemental” appropriations bill to address the aftermath of the Trump insurrection on January 6. In advance of that legislation, we compiled recommendations for items to include in the supplemental. They are informed by our experiences studying Legislative branch operations over the last decade, including several years of research […]

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Appropriations, Coalition Letters, Advocacy, Blog posts

Increase Congress’s Funding by 10% Says Bipartisan Coalition of Good Government Organizations

By DanielSchuman February 2, 2021 6 min read

For decades, Congress has undercut its ability to meet its Constitution obligations by providing itself inadequate resources to meet its legislative, constitutional, and oversight responsibilities. Discretionary Executive branch resources, and power, on the other hand, have grown at more than double the rate of the Legislative branch. In addition, Congress has been driven to rely […]

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Modernization, Advocacy, Announcements, Blog posts

The Constitution Annotated in 2020

By DanielSchuman September 17, 2020 2 min read

For the first time since 2009, I don’t have to write a blogpost or letter calling on the Library of Congress to make its legal treatise, the Constitution Annotated, available online in a usable format. Last year, the Library finally published that document online as HTML. For those unfamiliar, the Constitution Annotated is a legal […]

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