Good morning, Congress. This week’s First Branch Forecast is shorter than usual because there’s so much going on that we’re overwhelmed. We’ll catch up on a backlog next week. Here’s the top six things you need to know.

1. MEMBER-DAY HEARING ON THE HOUSE RULES (RSVP TUES)

You know you’ve been waiting for it for two years. The House Rules Committee is holding its Member Day Hearing this Thursday at 1pm to listen to your boss’s ideas to improve the House’s rules, and any Member wishing to testify must submit a request by 5pm today (Tuesday) by filling out this form. If your boss can’t make the virtual hearing, you still can reach out to Rules Committee staff. Looking for ideas? Check out our voluminous recommendations (including our top 13).

2. RUSH TO JUDGMENT

The Judiciary Committee is expected to start four days of hearings on Pres. Trump’s SCOTUS nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, on Oct. 12, with a floor vote anticipated the week of Oct. 26th. The Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Lindsey Graham, had pledged he would vote for the nominee without even knowing who it is. Rubber meet stamp. The untimely nomination is moving forward with unprecedented haste. In the meantime, the Intercept published a memo on options available to Sen. Schumer and Senate Democrats should they seek to bring a more stately pace to the proceedings — i.e., let the next President choose, as most Americans prefer, while Senate Republicans are prepping for Dem tactics that would require at least 51 Republican senators to stay in town to bat down any and all concerns. But, as BGov noted, Sen. Schumer hasn’t done much to delay things … so far. A question: some tactics rely on the House staying in town, so are they still planning on closing up shop at the end of the week?

3. PEACEFUL TRANSITION TO POWER

President Trump once again expressed an unwillingness to commit to a peaceful transition of power and is using additional tactics (like undermining vote by mail and vocal support for vigilantes) that are at odds with a free-and-fair election — and a democracy. The Senate passed a non-binding resolution in support of a peaceful transition of power, and a House resolution is on tap for this week, but even with the ongoing (and likely escalating) efforts to undermine the election results, it’s unlikely that the upper chamber would stand up to President Trump now, especially as it hasn’t done so previously. Meanwhile, the Atlantic is gaming out what happens if Trump refuses to be fired, and Politico describes what happens if the election is kicked to the House. The last time this happened, the political deal killed Reconstruction and led to the widespread enactment of segregation and other Jim Crow laws, whose effects are still felt today.

4. KEEPING THE NEXT PRESIDENT IN LINE?

House Democrats have put forth a partial democracy reform package, the Protecting Our Democracy Act, aimed at fixing a few loopholes in the system that allow for presidential bad behavior. The bill contains measures with wide bipartisan support, like making sure the Executive branch follows Congress’s spending decisions, bolstering IG independence, and requiring Congressional approval for presidentially-declared emergencies that last longer than 30 days. It also strengthens Congress’s ability to enforce subpoenas. Is it enough? No, we think it misses some crucial issues, but it’s a good start.

5. SPENDING?

If everything goes right — I cannot believe I wrote that — the Senate will vote Wednesday, the last day of the fiscal year, to adopt a short term CR through December 11th. We think that is too short-term, as it punts hard questions to the same time-frame that Congress may be looking at a very messy election, but what do we know? House Members voting on the CR had only 30 minutes to review the 115 page bill, which is astonishing. The underlying approps bills will be negotiated now even though the Senate has not passed their bills (to avoid taking hard votes before the election). We haven’t followed the minutia around the next COVID relief bill, although our guess is it will either contain too many concessions or serve as a messaging bill.

6. FIXING CONGRESS

The House Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress unanimously reported another 40 recommendations this past week, bringing the total to 97. This package of recs includes ideas updating the MRA formula, (voluntary) staff pay bands (to address weaknesses in staff pay), restoring OTA, upgrading the Bulk Data Task Force, examining creating a Congressional Digital Service, fixing the House calendar, and more (including congressionally-directed grants). The SCOMC has officially turned into a pumpkin, with only the text of its final report pending, although we hope the House and Senate will find an official way to extend these modernization efforts.

Continue reading “Forecast for September 29, 2020.” →

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 believe Congress must get back to work — safely. But efforts in both chambers to permit remote deliberations did not reach fruition.

There continues to be a pollyannish approach to this pandemic, especially on the part of federal lawmakers. People hold unsupported beliefs: COVID-19 is just like the flu, you don’t need masks, it will burn itself out by summer, it doesn’t strike children, having COVID-19 confers immunity, there will be a vaccine next year, and so on. Some of these beliefs we know are wrong, others are optimistic assumptions.

We won’t know when COVID-19 will end and we have major gaps in our understanding of the disease. Contingency planning includes preparing for a range of possible outcomes, including less optimistic scenarios: what if it causes permanent disability? What if a vaccine takes a long time? Proper planning should also address confounding problems: what if there’s a hurricane? What if a Supreme Court justice dies? What if air travel stops?

Continue reading “Forecast for April 27, 2020.” →