Congress is beginning to innovate around how it deliberates in committees and on the floor. These changes are driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has made in-person meetings unsafe and unwise, although many of the proposed modifications require rules changes. We have seen various terms used to refer to how Congress could deliberate — e.g. […]
Will the House come back this week? Will Congress turn on remote deliberations? Is it really 142 days from the end of the fiscal year? There are lots of good questions (et tu, Senate) that we address this week. If we’ve missed something, ask us on Wednesday at 5pm at this virtual panel discussion on Continuity of […]
Congress has been mostly absent as the country fights against the COVID-19 pandemic. Even before the pandemic began, many lawmakers, outside organizations, and former Members of Congress encouraged the legislative branch to instantiate remote deliberations and voting measures in the event of an emergency. We created a timeline of many of the recent key events […]
You may have noticed that you didn’t receive this week’s First Branch Forecast on Monday. This newsletter takes a team to write, and with so much happening last week and over the weekend, I ran out of time to finalize it on Sunday. Here is an abbreviated version. COMING UP THIS WEEK Wednesday at 2 […]
The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released a fantastic report last week analyzing the constitutional rules governing quorum requirements to coincide with last week’s virtual hearing on Continuity of Senate Operations and Remote Voting in Times of Crisis. If you’re not a policy wonk who finds quorum requirements inherently interesting, consider this: Determinations around remote […]
CONTINUITY OF CONGRESS: House of Representatives Activity on remote proceedings for the past week fills two pages on our ongoing timeline. Sunday was not a day of rest, as the New Dems Coalition sent a second letter to House Leadership, urging them to bring a remote voting resolution to the floor no later than May […]
Good morning. The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in 200,000 dead worldwide, including 50,000 deaths in the U.S. and 165 dead in Washington, D.C., with the number of metropolitan cases continuing to increase. Despite the rising toll, the House and Senate held in-person votes this past week, several members of Congress want to reopen the Capitol, and some members ignored safety measures. We […]
TOP LINE The House inches forward on remote deliberations. Speaker Pelosi belatedly flipped her position and now supports a very limited form of remote voting, although it remains to be seen whether she will support restarting the committees and allowing remote deliberations on the floor — and whether she needs to bring members back to […]
A coalition of organizations, including a number of former Members of Congress, held a simulated virtual hearing on April 16, 2020, to illustrate how the House of Representatives or Senate could use technology to hold a remote hearing. The following is my prepared remarks concerning the constitutional and rules questions that might arise concerning such […]
It has been another tough week just about everywhere. We hope you and yours are staying safe. This newsletter is becoming harder and harder to write, but we hope it is helpful as we work together to keep our democracy. CONTINUITY OF CONGRESS We launched a website that gathers all the major resources and developments on […]
Congress must change its rules to temporarily enable Members to vote remotely to ensure continuity of Congress. Where Does Each Member Stand Two Weeks Later? (Update, 04/10/20 11:48am): Two weeks ago, our team compiled a database to keep track of Members in the House and Senate who support emergency remote voting. Support for remote voting […]
TOP LINE It’s been another never-ending week. We hope that you’re staying healthy and staying at home. This issue focuses on continuity of Congress, protecting whistleblowers, mass surveillance, and coronavirus “oversight.” (Hey, if you’re regularly reading our little newsletter, why not subscribe if you have not already? It’s free…)