💣 The Disastrous 118th Congress - MAGA Mike Johnson Saved by Shadow Speaker Hakeem Jeffries

[p0rtia]

As others have pointed out, it was the bellicose excrescence herself, Miss Nancy, who brought up the subject of her own rape.

Quite the rhetorical trick, there.

One wonders what depths of depravity the next crop of ethics-free Republican candidates will manage to sink to.

[Resume18]

Whatever one might think of George Conway, or the idea of ownage, he was certainly adjacent to that in his tweet.

[RTH10260]

Some background on Mike Johnson revived

Who Is Konstantin Nikolaev? Putin Ally Behind Mike Johnson Campaign Donation

Published Feb 16, 2024 at 8:09 AM EST
Updated Feb 23, 2024 at 1:12 PM EST

News of money previously given to House Speaker Mike Johnson's congressional campaign by Russian nationals has re-emerged after the Republican rejected a $95 billion foreign aid bill passed in the Senate.

In 2018, a group of Russians were able to donate to Johnson's bid for the Louisiana seat he eventually won as the money was funneled through the Texas-based American Ethane company.

While American Ethane was co-founded by American John Houghtaling, at the time it was 88 percent owned by three Russian nationals—Konstantin Nikolaev, Mikhail Yuriev, and Andrey Kunatbaev. Nikolaev is known to be a top ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

A spokesperson for Johnson previously assured in 2018 that the campaign returned the money that was given to them by American Ethane once it was "made aware of the situation." There was no indication that Johnson's campaign team willfully broke federal law, which makes it illegal for a campaign to knowingly accept donations from a foreign-owned corporation, a foreign national, or any company owned or controlled by foreign nationals.



https://www.newsweek.com/who-konstantin ... on-1870600.

MTN Texas Paul comments

[Dr. Ken]

[AndyinPA]

Going in the right direction.

More:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics ... r-BB1jM2Pf

WASHINGTON Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., who announced last fall he would not seek re-election, said Tuesday he will resign from Congress at the end of next week, further shrinking the GOP's already razor-thin majority.

"Today I am announcing that I will depart Congress at the end of next week," Buck said in a statement. "I look forward to staying involved in our political process, as well as spending more time in Colorado and with my family."

His departure will cut the House Republican margin to 218-213; Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., will still have two votes to spare before needing Democrats to govern.

Buck is a member of the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus, but he made a name for himself in Washington for frequently breaking with his party on major issues.

[Kendra]

Dana Bash had an interview with him on CNN this morning. Sounds like he's pretty frustrated with this congress and he wants to find some place where he can work to find better candidates to put forward, all down the line.

[sugar magnolia]

Will there be a special election or will the Gov appoint someone to his seat?
If Boebert runs in a special election will she have to resign her current seat first, or only if she wins?

[AndyinPA]

I think he said special election would be June 25.

[Dr. Ken]

I think he said special election would be June 25.

Yes. This puts her in a bind. She was going to run to replace him anyway. But she would now have to resign her seat to run in the special election. Running would cause her to miss votes that she would need to campaign on. But if she doesn't run she may risk losing her seat right now in her current district and losing any chance at his seat in nov

[MN-Skeptic]

Here's a thread about the open seat -

Aaron Fritschner
@Fritschner

Ken Buck represents CO-4; Lauren Boebert, who represents CO-3, is running to replace him. If Boebert wins a special election to replace Buck she'll have to resign CO-3, creating a new vacancy. But if she doesn't run in the special she risks losing her chance to remain in Congress

Colorado law requires the Governor to schedule a special election if a vacancy in the congressional delegation occurs more than 90 days before the general election, and Ken Buck says he is resigning next week. Boebert has to make a quick decision here, and imo it’s a tough one

The other candidates running to succeed Buck will all immediately shift their campaigns to focus on the special election, the winner will be consolidating local party support in CO-4. It’s a red seat and the incumbent will be locked and loaded in November to run for a full term

BUT running for the seat will require Boebert to miss a lot of votes as she campaigns in the district, the primary is competitive. If she wins, she has to resign her current seat, creating a new vacancy. This is a big big headache for House GOP leadership and their small majority

In response to a tweet pointing out "Nominees are chosen by the party," Fritschner adds:

Oh this is totally right, that’s my foolish mistake and a major point bc his resignation totally changes the CO-4 primary process. You figure depending on who/how they choose the nominee for the special will very likely also be the nominee for the full term in November’s general.

[p0rtia]

[AndyinPA]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/12/politics ... index.html

Many Republicans plan to skip the House GOP retreat as they grumble about both the location and the idea of spending time with one another, with tensions still running high inside the party in the wake of their unprecedented speakership drama.

Fewer than 100 Republicans have RSVP’d to attend the retreat, which is less than half of the entire conference, according to a GOP source familiar with the attendance sheet.

The retreat is scheduled to take place Wednesday and Thursday in West Virginia.

Publicly, Republicans have cited a litany of reasons for not attending: from having to tend to reelection races to scheduling conflicts. GOP Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina, for example, is scheduled to appear on “Real Time with Bill Maher” later this week. Meanwhile, when asked if he was attending, GOP Rep. Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota told CNN: “No way, I have to run for governor.” And Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee quipped: “I don’t retreat, I move forward! I got a farm to run.”

But privately, some Republicans have complained about the venue choice. Sources said Speaker Mike Johnson selected the Greenbrier Resort because it was “family friendly,” in a break from past retreats which have taken place in sunny Florida – the preferred location of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

[keith]

Hey yòu havent paid me for that popcorn. I own the monoply ya know.

But you are a good person, so I'll let it slide this time.

[p0rtia]

Hey yòu havent paid me for that popcorn. I own the monoply ya know.

But you are a good person, so I'll let it slide this time.

Screenshot 2024-03-12 at 8.19.05 PM.png (258.97 KiB) Viewed 597 times

[Dr. Ken]

Hey yòu havent paid me for that popcorn. I own the monoply ya know.

But you are a good person, so I'll let it slide this time.

Screenshot 2024-03-12 at 8.19.05 PM.png

I got my dune popcorn bucket ready

[Kendra]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics ... 60f4&ei=28

Hampered by infighting and bogged down with funding negotiations, Mike Johnson, the speaker of the House of Representatives, has been dealt another blow as a number of his Republican colleagues indicated they won't attend a House GOP retreat.

The annual retreat, used to discuss policy and hold debates, is scheduled to take place at the Greenbrier Resort on Wednesday and Thursday in West Virginia and will be the first with Johnson at the helm. But there will be empty of seats at the resort, as a number of Republicans have rejected their invitations, some publicly and some privately, according to reports.

[raison de arizona]

Utah Senator @MittRomney says the current MAGA Congress is the MOST UNPRODUCTIVE Congress in US history.

Do YOU agree?

[RTH10260]

House votes to force TikTok owner ByteDance to divest or face US ban
CEO of China-based company says vote is ‘disappointing’ and that it will do all it can to protect the platform

Kari Paul and Helen Davidson
Thu 14 Mar 2024 02.47 CET

The House of Representatives passed a bill on Wednesday that would require the TikTok owner ByteDance to sell the social media platform or face a total ban in the United States.

The vote was a landslide, with 352 Congress members voting in favor and only 65 against. The bill, which was fast-tracked to a vote after being unanimously approved by a committee last week, gives China-based ByteDance 165 days to divest from TikTok. If it did not, app stores including the Apple App store and Google Play would be legally barred from hosting TikTok or providing web hosting services to ByteDance-controlled applications.

Shortly after the vote, TikTok’s chief executive, Shou Zi Chew, said the vote was “disappointing” and that the company would do “all we can” to protect the platform, including “exercising legal rights”.

Chew said TikTok had invested to keep data safe and the platform free from outside influences.

“This bill gives more power to handful of other social media companies, who will also take billions of dollars out of the pockets of creators and small businesses,” he said in a video message. “It will put more than 300,000 American jobs at risk and will take away your TikTok.”

The vote in the House represents the most concrete threat to TikTok in an ongoing political battle over allegations the China-based company could collect sensitive user data and politically censor content. TikTok has repeatedly stated it has not and would not share US user data with the Chinese government.

Despite those arguments, TikTok faced an attempted ban by Donald Trump in 2020 and a state-level ban passed in Montana in 2023. Courts blocked both of those bans on grounds of first amendment violations, and Trump has since reversed his stance, now opposing a ban on TikTok.

Prior to the vote, China’s ministry of foreign affairs spokesman, Wang Wenbin, accused the US of “hegemonic” practices, “when one could not succeed in fair competition”.

“In recent years, though the US has never found any evidence of TikTok posing a threat to the US’s national security, it has never stopped going after TikTok,” he told a regular press briefing on Wednesday.

“The US’s bullying acts disrupt normal international trade order and will eventually backfire.”

The treasury-led Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) in March 2023 demanded ByteDance sell their TikTok shares or face the possibility of the app being banned, Reuters reported, but no action has been taken.



https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... k-bill-ban

[noblepa]

Does CO law require her to resign to run in this special election? I don't believe that there is any federal law that requires this.

If there is a CO law, it must have an exemption for incumbents running for re-election, but, it can be argued that she is not running for re-election, but is running for a new office by changing districts. So, why isn't she required to resign from Congress to run for a new district?

Come to think of it, how could such a law be constitutional? Term limit laws have been struck down on the grounds that they create a new qualification for the House or Senate seats, and that such qualifications are hard-wired in the Constitution and can only be changed or added to via an amendment.

Wouldn't a law saying that candidates can't currently hold a different federal position be construed as an additional qualification for the office?

[raison de arizona]

Does CO law require her to resign to run in this special election? I don't believe that there is any federal law that requires this.

If there is a CO law, it must have an exemption for incumbents running for re-election, but, it can be argued that she is not running for re-election, but is running for a new office by changing districts. So, why isn't she required to resign from Congress to run for a new district?

She doesn't have to resign to run for the regular election, but she would need to resign for the special election, since it would overlap her current service. Is my understanding.

Mean you can't be a pimp and a prostitute too, er, I mean you can't represent both the 3rd and 4th district simultaneously.

[bob]

She doesn't have to resign to run for the regular election, but she would need to resign for the special election, since it would overlap her current service. Is my understanding.

And if Boebert did run in the special election for C0-4, and won it, she'd have to resign her CO-3 seat before assuming the CO-4 seat.

Meaning, CO-3 would then be vacant, and there would be a net loss of a Republican vote (until the special election for the now-vacated CO-3 seat). And Boebert fears she'll be blamed for that net loss in the House.

[Slim Cognito]

I bet whomever explained it to her had to use very...small...words.

[Ben-Prime]

I bet whomever explained it to her had to use very...small...words.

Bold of you to assume it wasn't a picture-book explanation.

[Slim Cognito]

I hope it wasn't a pop-up book

[raison de arizona]

They're retreating from their retreat! Apparently Pastor Mike's sermons aren't going over well.
https://x.com/trygveolson/status/176876 ... 81379?s=20

New: The already “abysmal” turnout to the GOP retreat worsened Thursday as some members started leaving early in the middle of it

Asked if the retreat was helpful, a member said: “They should have opened the casino.”

On the retreat w/@riley_rogerson