In March 2021, the House voted to extend a deadline for ratifying the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which would formally ban discrimination on the basis of sex and has lingered in a state of limbo for decades. The joint resolution (H.J. Res. 17) passed the House in a 222-204 vote that fell largely along party lines. Four Republicans joined all Democrats in favor of the resolution, which was introduced by Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) and Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.). The House passed a similar resolution in 2020, but the Senate, controlled by Republicans at the time, did not bring it…

Amid broader talks on criminal justice reform, lawmakers moved one step closer to eliminating the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine offenses. In September, the House passed the Eliminating a Quantifiably Unjust Application of the Law (EQUAL) Act (H.R. 1693), which would make the penalties for federal crack cocaine offenses equal to those of powder cocaine offenses. The bill would also apply those changes retroactively, so individuals currently serving prison sentences for crack cocaine offenses could be eligible to have their sentence times reduced. The bill passed in the House by a bipartisan vote of 361-66, receiving unanimous support…

A movement in the U.S. that suggests that race is a social construct used to oppress minority groups is emerging as a fierce point of division among Americans. Many Republicans are pushing new policies to bar public schools from teaching critical race theory (CRT) and the issue has made its way into political campaigns. Originally developed through legal scholarship in the late 20th century, CRT is a concept that aims to explain how discrimination and inequity are woven into laws, policies and systems. Thus, the doctrine states, racism is perpetuated in American culture. The theory argues that racism goes beyond…

In spring 2021, President Joe Biden struck a deal with German Chancellor Angela Merkel to remove U.S. sanctions on a Russian company building a natural gas pipeline from Russia to Germany. While analysts suggested the move was made to protect U.S. relations with Germany, the decision was opposed by both Republicans and Democrats as well as several European countries. The Nord Stream 2 pipeline, constructed by the Russian state-controlled gas company Gazprom, is projected to double natural gas exports into Europe once German regulators certify the recently completed project. The pipeline runs under the Baltic Sea and bypasses Poland and…

As lawmakers negotiated annual government spending bills this summer and fall, federal funding for abortions emerged as a contentious issue. Democrats pushed for the removal of an annual appropriations rider known as the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funding for abortions, while Republicans said they were committed to keeping it on the books. First enacted by Congress in 1976, the Hyde Amendment, named for former Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), means there is no coverage for abortions for Medicaid recipients and those who get health care through other federal programs like the Indian Health Service, Medicare and the Children’s Health Insurance…

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, policymakers instituted a moratorium on evictions, arguing that people needed to stay in their homes regardless of their ability to pay rent to control the spread of the disease and the economic impacts of lockdowns. A Congressionally instituted eviction moratorium, however, expired in July 2020. After Congress failed to pass an extension in time the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) then issued an emergency order keeping the moratoriums in place, citing the Public Health Service Act of 1944. That order proved controversial, pitting the welfare of renters against the potential income loss…

As COVID-19 began to surge again in late summer, so did the debate about mask mandates. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) relaxed its mask guidance in the spring when COVID numbers began to decline amid rising vaccinations. However, the agency reinstated recommendations for individuals, both unvaccinated and vaccinated, to wear masks indoors as cases began to rise again in July as the delta variant spread. The CDC’s guidance amplified the division among Americans about whether the government should be able to dictate safety precautions such as masks. The debate rang loud in Congress, where Attending Physician…

The federal gas tax, which hasn’t been raised since 1993, currently stands at 18.4 cents per gallon. Revenue from that tax funds improvements of U.S. roads, bridges and mass transit systems but has left the government short of all the money needed to keep transportation networks in a state of good repair. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Highway Trust Fund, which is largely funded by the gas tax, could be insolvent by the end of 2022. Now a bipartisan group of senators is proposing raising the federal gas tax to fund infrastructure improvements. Proposals to raise the tax…

The House voted in June to repeal the 2002 Iraq War authorization. The measure repealing the authorization to use military force (AUMF) passed by a vote of 268-161 and received overwhelming support from Democrats and 49 Republicans. The 2002 AUMF allowed the George W. Bush administration to invade Iraq over suspicions that the country was developing weapons of mass destruction. The invasion toppled former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s government but also led to what some have called a “forever war,” with American troops still in the country nearly two decades later. The 2002 AUMF came a year after Congress passed…

A record number of unaccompanied children reached the U.S. border in March 2021, more than the last record set in March 2019. The surge left the Biden administration scrambling to find an immediate solution to house and care for the migrant children and families while balancing its long-term immigration agenda. On his first day in office, President Joe Biden introduced a legislative framework that demonstrated that he would be taking a different approach to immigration issues than his predecessor, former President Donald Trump. Specifically, the U.S. Citizen Act of 2021 would provide an eight-year pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants,…