Members of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma are advocating to have a delegate from the tribe seated in Congress in this legislative session. They point to the 1835 Treaty of New Echota, which provided members of the Cherokee Nation with $5 million and land in Oklahoma in exchange for several million acres of their ancestral homeland east of the Mississippi River. That treaty also included a right to have a delegate from the tribe in the U.S. House of Representatives, a right that so far has never been exercised. In the fall of 2022, the U.S. House Committee on Rules…

As millions of Americans moved to virtual work in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, so too did members of the U.S. House of Representatives. The move was designed to allow lawmakers to continue working on behalf of their constituents without putting Capitol staff or other lawmakers at risk from the virus. However, some in Congress now say that the danger has passed and that it’s time to lift proxy voting rules, saying it hinders the legislative process. While the Senate continued to require members to show up in person throughout the pandemic, the House passed a temporary resolution…

Momentum is building to eliminate the U.S. Senate’s filibuster rule. The tactic, which dates back to the beginnings of the Senate, requires 60 votes to end debate on a bill and advance to a final vote, essentially meaning that most bills require more than a simple majority vote to pass. Increasingly, however, the filibuster has become a tool used by the minority party to stall or block the legislative agenda of the majority party. For example, Senate Republicans used the filibuster several times in 2021 to block voting rights legislation. That’s prompted increasingly serious discussion among leading Democrats — including…

For the second time this summer, President Obama used his weekly radio and video address to push for passage of legislation to require public disclosure of who funds political advertising. On Saturday, September 18, he said that Congress has a responsibility to act, even if it’s too late to have an impact this election season.

Despite the Senate’s failure to pass the DISCLOSE Act last July (Congressional Digest, September 2010), the bill’s supporters aren’t giving up on the campaign finance measure. In fact, the bill was the subject of President Obama’s weekly radio address to the Nation on August 21, in which he vowed to “continue to fight for reform and transparency.”