Month: April 2018

Forecast for April 23, 2018.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW
~Monday’s committee vote on Pompeo’s nomination sets the stage for Gina Haspel at CIA. She led efforts to destroy gov’t records (videos of torture) to stop disclosure to Congress and the public. The CIA is selectively declassifying records (and tweeting) to rehabilitate her on her involvement w/ torture.

~Will A.G. Sessions be asked about a secret 7-page legal justification for Syria, or all the secret OLC opinions, when he testifies?

~Why is House Armed Services Committee breaking precedent and holding closed, classified roundtables with the Service Chiefs instead of public budget hearings? Continue reading “Forecast for April 23, 2018.” →

Demand Progress 2017 Donor Disclosures

We are pleased to announce that we have published a list of organizations and individuals that provided $50,000 or more in funding to Demand Progress/ Demand Progress Action in 2017. In prior years we published our IRS tax forms (2014, 2015), but we wanted to add an additional measure of transparency.

We believe that an important aspect of evaluating a political message is knowing who is paying for it. Money can have both direct and indirect effects on the positions organizations take — or do not take — and knowing where the money comes from can help make it possible to evaluate the message. We believe that all non-profits should have to disclose their donors above a certain threshold. Continue reading “Demand Progress 2017 Donor Disclosures” →

Transparency Provisions Inside the FY18 Appropriations Law

1_Aq7GuiYrB1MzgkYX19AjbgThe recently-signed omnibus spending law contains transparency provisions intended to make our federal government just a little more open and accountable. They include: creating a hub for the reports that explain each agency’s federal spending request; a first step towards opening up federal court orders for everyone to read without charge; creating a central repository for reports by the federal Inspectors General; and making reports by the Congressional Research Service available to everyone.

While all these measures are important, the hardest fought is public access to CRS reports. CRS provides non-partisan unbiased explanations of policy matters before Congress, and they make it easier for all of us to have conversations based on the facts.

Continue reading “Transparency Provisions Inside the FY18 Appropriations Law” →

Forecast for April 16, 2018.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS WEEK

  • Responding to US military strikes on Syria: What is Congress’s role (CRS AUMF explainer) and will the administration release its secret 7-page opinion authorizing the action?
  • S. Judiciary tees up a special counsel debate on Thursday, which will ripen if Trump removes senior DOJ officials.
  • Is the government well run? OGR will look into IG-identified management problems at a Wednesday OGR hearing.
  • House leg branch and FSGG approps hearings will address the very nature of how Congress and the Judiciary work (including Tuesday’s public testimony), plus there’s an opportunity to quiz OMB’s Mulvaney, who oversees federal information policy (and more).
  • The FOIA Advisory Committee will vote on its recommendations on Tuesday. Read the draft report.

Continue reading “Forecast for April 16, 2018.” →