First Run News

Senate Majority Leader MORE (D-N.Y.) had tried to get consent Thursday to pass a House bill that requires the use of paper ballots and includes funding for the Election Assistance Commission. It passed the House 225-184 with one Republican voting for it. But McConnell objected, saying Schumer was trying to pass “partisan legislation.”  “Clearly this request is not a serious effort to make a law.

The House passed a two-year budget deal Thursday that lifts the debt ceiling and boosts government spending by $320 billion. The legislation would suspend the debt limit through July 2021 and increase spending caps for the next two years, putting the U.S. on track to add an estimated $1.7 trillion to the deficit over the next decade when compared with the billions in automatic spending cuts that would otherwise kick in. Lawmakers passed the package in a 284-149 vote.

Several rank-and-file Democrats in the House are feeling deflated over former special counsel MORE's public testimony, with some blaming the media and their own party for overhyping hearings they say fell short of expectations. While many Democrats publicly heralded Mueller’s testimony before the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees as a resounding success, some privately expressed disappointment in his, at times, shaky performance, the brevity of his answers and the lack of a big moment that would have shifted the electorate's sentiment on whether MORE