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Stevens Marks End of Senate Career

November 21, 2008

Sen. Ted Stevens (Alaska), the longest-serving Republican in Senate history, said farewell to his colleagues on Thursday, marking the end of a storied career that ended in disgrace.

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Library of Congress Employee Forced to Wait in Cold

November 21, 2008

Minnie Allen has worked in the Library of Congress’ cafeteria for 25 years, arriving each day at about 5 a.m. and opening up the cafeteria early as she waited for her shift to begin at 6.

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Freshman Wastes No Time Getting Into Trouble

November 20, 2008

It’s the first morning of New Member Orientation in the Cannon Caucus Room and Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) — acting as the schoolmarm for the incoming class — is calling out a list of names. The Representatives-elect whose names are announced need to come to the front of the Cannon Caucus Room to “take care of some housekeeping matters,” she says.

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H Street Activist Sees Obama Link

November 19, 2008

On Election Day, Anwar Saleem got up at 5 a.m. and took his sons, ages 18 and 23, to cast votes for Barack Obama, who was vying to be the first African-American president.

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Daschle Ties a Common Thread for Team Obama

November 19, 2008

Washington is abuzz about the number of former aides to President Bill Clinton who have attached themselves to President-elect Barack Obama, wondering what influence they will have as the new administration charts its course.

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Deloitte Picks Up Tom Davis

November 18, 2008

Residents of Northern Virginia’s 11th district will have to make due with the Clerk of the House for the duration of 2008, rather than Rep. Tom Davis (R), who is expected to begin his retirement next week.

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Living a Kid’s Life in FDR’s White House

November 18, 2008

As future first daughters Sasha and Malia Obama prepare for their move to the White House, a new book by Curtis Roosevelt describes what may lie ahead when they enter the presidential spotlight.

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A Monumental Recovery

November 17, 2008

In the five months since he was struck by a car outside his parents’ suburban Maryland home, Capitol Police Officer Aidan Sims has stayed full time in two hospitals and relied on a team of nurses to help him do even the most simple tasks of eating, brushing his teeth and getting dressed.

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Baker Tackles the Hill From the Outside

November 17, 2008

As the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee grilled five hedge fund managers last week, their trade group’s leader, former Rep. Richard Baker (R-La.), was not only missing from the panel, he wasn’t even in the hearing room.

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Emanuel Has His K Street Ties

November 10, 2008

As Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.) prepares to become President-elect Obama’s chief of staff, he won’t just be taking his Rolodex of Capitol Hill contacts.
He will also have a number of K Street allies who expect to have a leg up lobbying a White House that has signaled it will keep influence peddlers at an arm’s length.

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Warner: No Ordinary Frosh

October 30, 2008

WISE, Va. — As he stood outside the Wise County Courthouse smoking a pipe and listening to former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner (D) deliver his stump speech a few evenings ago, one self- described Republican working for the Democrat’s Senate campaign predicted that a few years in Congress would be good for his candidate.

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Dodd Considers Panel Openings

October 30, 2008

Following a disappointing 2008 presidential run that left him with diminished stature in the Senate Democratic Conference, Sen. Chris Dodd (Conn.) is likely to find himself in the enviable position of having his choice of powerful committee chairmanships under a newly emboldened and enlarged majority.

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Van Hollen Weighs Leadership Options

October 30, 2008

Days from an election that could roughly double Democratic margins in the House, Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), the quarterback of the majority party’s campaign push, remains mum about whether he would reprise the role next cycle.

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White House Veterans Populate Team Obama

October 30, 2008

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) is being advised by a long roster of former aides to President Bill Clinton, a sign that the putative outsider would be ready for inside-Washington hardball, in a way that few newly elected presidents have been, should he win on Nov. 4.

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It Was a Teachable Moment

October 28, 2008

A raised arm in her sixth-grade class usually brought a smile to elementary school teacher Tierney Cahill’s face. She loved to engage students in activities and stories that would bring her lessons alive. However, on one such occasion in the fall of 1999, a hand in the air brought on a major change in Cahill’s life when one 12-year-old student asked: “Why don’t you run for office?”

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Matthews in 2010: Will He Play Hardball?

October 23, 2008

When ex-Rep. Joe Hoeffel (D-Pa.) ran into television host Chris Matthews recently, Matthews didn’t ask him to play “Hardball.”
Instead, Hoeffel said, Matthews brought up a possible bid for a Pennsylvania Senate seat in 2010.
“He was thinking about it enough to chat with me a little about it when we bumped into each other socially,” Hoeffel recalled.

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Cartoonist Captures Pol Foibles

October 23, 2008

R.J. Matson says he will miss President Bush and Vice President Cheney. In fact, they’ve been two of the cartoonist’s favorite politicians to draw in his 22-year career.
Yet Matson, whose work appears regularly in Roll Call, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the New York Observer, is ready for fresh material.

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Former Florida Rep. Paul Grant Rogers Dies at 87

October 16, 2008

Paul Grant Rogers, a former Democratic Congressman from South Florida, died of lung cancer in Washington on Monday. He was 87.
Rogers served in the House from 1955 through 1978 and was best known for his work on health care issues. A nonsmoker known as “Mr. Health,” Rogers served as chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health and the Environment for eight years.

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Renteria Doesn’t Blend In

October 16, 2008

Amanda Renteria’s parents emigrated from central Mexico in the 1960s to work as fruit pickers in California. They settled in the rural town of Woodlake and raised three daughters. When Renteria, the middle child, was accepted to Stanford University and signed on with the elite school’s basketball team, her small high school was so thrilled that an announcement was made over the intercom system.

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Candidate Gets Very Early Start

October 9, 2008

Rick Hendrix announced his 2010 campaign for Congress a few weeks ago. But his campaign is off to an unconventional start — beginning with the fact that he hasn’t chosen a district to run in yet.

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A Silver Lining in the Endless Analysis of White House Polls

October 9, 2008

Nate Silver knows he won’t be as popular after the presidential election as he is now.
The Chicago-based Silver runs the blog FiveThirtyEight.com, where he collects and analyzes political polls. Thanks to the 2008 presidential election, he is rapidly gaining prominence, averaging more than 250,000 page views a day since he launched the site only eight months ago. The site’s name refers to the number of electoral votes at stake in the White House contest.

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Portrait of a Lady

October 7, 2008

In 2004, Michelle Obama was the wife of a Democratic state Senator in Illinois. When her husband said he wanted to run for the U.S. Senate, she laid out all the reasons he shouldn’t run for another public office. Finally, she conceded, joking, “Maybe you’ll lose.”

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Barkley Slips Into the Picture

October 7, 2008

Is the “Dean of the Senate” staging a comeback? It appears that former Minnesota Sen. Dean Barkley (I) has a chance to get elected to the Senate on the Independence Party ticket in November — or at least drastically affect the results of one of the most hotly contested races in the country.

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It’s All Customer Service

October 2, 2008

Jeff Bjornstad, chief of staff for Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), fills his job with a fierce and infectious energy that one former colleague described as the approach of a “happy warrior.”
Where some chiefs focus on policy issues or outreach, Bjornstad serves more as a coach. His style is to keep the staff informed, motivated and focused on Washington state.

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Ambassador for the Joy of Reading

September 29, 2008

Jon Scieszka grew up the second of six boys in Flint, Mich., and he was the smartest, nicest and best-looking. According to him.
Scieszka, who made his first appearance as National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature at the Library of Congress on Friday morning, told a crowd of Brent Elementary School students that he decided to become an author after an incident in his family’s living room.

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Paulson Prepares Pitch, and Members Listen

September 23, 2008

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson might be the weakened Bush administration’s only hope for selling Congress this week on a historic $700 billion bailout of U.S. financial institutions. But even President Bush’s best — and perhaps sole — economic salesman will test his credibility before a willful Democratic majority that is eyeing the unpopular president’s departure.

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PhRMA Taps Democrat as Its Chief Lobbyist

September 24, 2008

The drug industry’s lobbying giant, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, has tapped Democrat Bryant Hall to serve as the group’s chief Congressional and federal liaison.

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On a Special Mission

September 17, 2008

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the 39-year-old Washington state Republican, had an uneventful pregnancy in late 2006 and 2007, with the possible exception of a few interesting floor debates and a handful of baby gifts from fellow Members.

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Dem Were the Days

September 16, 2008

It was 1957, and Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Baines Johnson (D-Texas) had sent Joseph Miller to Wisconsin to help three-time failed gubernatorial candidate William Proxmire win a special election for Senate.

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Listen Up, America: Chuck Norris’ Vision

September 16, 2008

Chuck Norris doesn’t sit back and wait for America to fix itself. Chuck Norris tells America what to do, and America listens.
Perhaps this should be the newest fact added to the famed tongue-in-cheek list of information about the actor that includes such silly facts as “Chuck Norris has counted to infinity — twice.” Aside from being a martial arts expert and an actor — and apparently a math whiz — the former “Walker, Texas Ranger” star also counts himself as a history buff and political activist with a deep love of the United States.

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Lobbying: It Ain’t Rocket Science, Web Videos Say

September 15, 2008

Fact: Becoming a successful lobbyist takes years of cultivating contacts on Capitol Hill, donating money to Members’ coffers and learning the ins and outs of policy.
Or does it? Lobbyist Elvis Oxley, the son of former Rep. Mike Oxley (R-Ohio), and a team from Villanova University’s School of Business have put together a series for the do-it- yourselfers out there.

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Fudge Tapped for Jones Seat

September 15, 2008

Cleveland-area Democrats have picked a protégé of the late Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-Ohio) to follow in her footsteps.
The Cuyahoga County Executive Committee nominated Warrensville Heights Mayor Marcia Fudge today to take the late Congresswoman’s place on the Nov. 4 ballot in the heavily Democratic 11th district.

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Cantor Peddles an Agenda

September 11, 2008

Virginia Rep. Eric Cantor, the Chief Deputy Whip for House Republicans, this week unveiled his own GOP agenda aimed at middle-class voters, a plan he hopes Republican Members and candidates will rally behind between now and Election Day.

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Lieberman All Alone in Senate

September 10, 2008

Sen. Joe Lieberman (ID-Conn.) returned to the Senate this week as an outsider, and the independent-minded lawmaker says he is comfortable with his status in the Senate and among his colleagues.

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Reviving the Smithsonian

September 10, 2008

Since taking over as secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, G. Wayne Clough has taken 19 trips to Capitol Hill to meet with lawmakers. He’s started thinking about fundraising, in part for the $2.5 billion maintenance backlog that he’s inherited. And he’s been working on ideas for the future of the institution.

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A Lobbyist Does Double Duty While in St. Paul

September 4, 2008

David Norcross’ convention experience is unlike that of almost any other lobbyist.
He is not here in the Twin Cities to shepherd clients. He’s not here to play host at private functions. Instead, Norcross, a partner with Blank Rome’s Washington, D.C., office, has two official roles at the Republican National Convention.

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Politics, Baseball Intersect in St. Paul

September 4, 2008

Four years ago, St. Paul, Minn., residents gave Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) a narrow victory over President Bush — a margin of 18 bobblehead dolls, to be precise.
The “Bobblelection” was a pre-election promotion by the St. Paul Saints, an independent professional baseball team partially owned by actor Bill Murray. The promotion invited fans to vote by choosing the figurine of their candidate of choice.

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Dole’s Absence Noted

September 4, 2008

The darling of the 1996 Republican National Convention, Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.) is AWOL from the Xcel Energy Center this week, forced to defend her once-safe seat in a come-from-nowhere race back home and dispatching her husband to the Twin Cities to mingle with Tar Heel State delegates.

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Defying the Numbers, Gilmore Presses On

September 4, 2008

Despite polling and fundraising numbers that show him badly trailing his Democratic opponent, former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore (R) expressed optimism Tuesday night about his chances of winning a U.S. Senate seat this fall.

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Kirk ‘Not Really’ at Convention

September 3, 2008

Targeted Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) parachuted into the Twin Cities earlier this week, hosting a Monday discussion on energy issues before catching the first ride out of town later that day in what could be a political blessing from Mother Nature.