- Joined
- May 25, 2018
- Messages
- 9,113
- Reaction score
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- Location
- Lebanon Oregon
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Liberal
The Senate chameon has again altered his exterior color to blend in with his surroundings ( now he looks like he's sitting on Pelosi's tree limb) and indeed the brief defends an important principle. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/poli...S&cvid=32f088ebecff41ef9add5ab20801541e&ei=20
"... Mitch McConnell is defending Congress’ ability to permit voting by “proxy” when members are absent, a practice adopted by House Democrats at the height of the COVID pandemic despite intense opposition from Republicans. In a brief filed Friday in ftederal court — authored by former Attorney General William Barr — McConnell says that despite his personal opposition to proxy voting, the House and Senate have total constitutional authority to determine the way they conduct business.
“Despite his fierce opposition to proxy voting, Senator McConnell believes it critical that courts nevertheless respect each house of Congress’ power to ‘determine the rules of its proceedings,’” Barr wrote on McConnell’s behalf.
McConnell’s position puts him at odds with the vast majority of House Republicans, who spent years fighting a losing battle in court to overturn the practice, which was initiated in 2020 by then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The House GOP leader at the time, Kevin McCarthy, sued to block the practice but was dealt defeats by two federal courts before the Supreme Court declined to take up the issue.
However, in February, a federal district court judge in Texas ruled that the House’s use of proxy voting violated the Constitution, contending that it requires a majority of members to be physically present to conduct business. The ruling, if upheld by appellate courts, threatens to unravel large and complicated legislative packages adopted with decisive votes cast by absent members."
I absolutely agree with him and Pelosi. SCOTUS has no business deciding how the legislative branch ought to conduct its business or what constitutes a legitimate 'vote' for the US Senate or US House. Those institutions can decide those matters in their own rules consistent with their own past practices, or they may adopt new rules and new practices. For example, the US House in its infinite wisdom, decided to put in an electronic voting system in 1973 following the passage of the Legislative Reorganization Act https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R41862/2 It turns out that the LRA was one very very important reform of past practices that Congress had been using for decades to hide the Committee work on which the institutions depended to avoid transparency. https://congressionalresearch.org/LRA.html
Knowing McConnell, it does not escape his notice, that the 2024 election map, dramatically favored Republican control of the US Senate and for the new majority to function effectively, it is in a Republican Majority Senate's interest that proxy voting be allowed to establish a quorum and to advance the movement of legislation because the majority controls the legislative calender and decides whether to schedule a vote when Republican Congressman X is in town, and when Democrat Senator Y is convulescing post heart surgery.
Still I do believe that SCOTUS has already meddled far too much in the internal affairs of the executive and legislative branches and the process questions that each properly decides on their own.
"... Mitch McConnell is defending Congress’ ability to permit voting by “proxy” when members are absent, a practice adopted by House Democrats at the height of the COVID pandemic despite intense opposition from Republicans. In a brief filed Friday in ftederal court — authored by former Attorney General William Barr — McConnell says that despite his personal opposition to proxy voting, the House and Senate have total constitutional authority to determine the way they conduct business.
“Despite his fierce opposition to proxy voting, Senator McConnell believes it critical that courts nevertheless respect each house of Congress’ power to ‘determine the rules of its proceedings,’” Barr wrote on McConnell’s behalf.
McConnell’s position puts him at odds with the vast majority of House Republicans, who spent years fighting a losing battle in court to overturn the practice, which was initiated in 2020 by then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The House GOP leader at the time, Kevin McCarthy, sued to block the practice but was dealt defeats by two federal courts before the Supreme Court declined to take up the issue.
However, in February, a federal district court judge in Texas ruled that the House’s use of proxy voting violated the Constitution, contending that it requires a majority of members to be physically present to conduct business. The ruling, if upheld by appellate courts, threatens to unravel large and complicated legislative packages adopted with decisive votes cast by absent members."
I absolutely agree with him and Pelosi. SCOTUS has no business deciding how the legislative branch ought to conduct its business or what constitutes a legitimate 'vote' for the US Senate or US House. Those institutions can decide those matters in their own rules consistent with their own past practices, or they may adopt new rules and new practices. For example, the US House in its infinite wisdom, decided to put in an electronic voting system in 1973 following the passage of the Legislative Reorganization Act https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R41862/2 It turns out that the LRA was one very very important reform of past practices that Congress had been using for decades to hide the Committee work on which the institutions depended to avoid transparency. https://congressionalresearch.org/LRA.html
Knowing McConnell, it does not escape his notice, that the 2024 election map, dramatically favored Republican control of the US Senate and for the new majority to function effectively, it is in a Republican Majority Senate's interest that proxy voting be allowed to establish a quorum and to advance the movement of legislation because the majority controls the legislative calender and decides whether to schedule a vote when Republican Congressman X is in town, and when Democrat Senator Y is convulescing post heart surgery.
Still I do believe that SCOTUS has already meddled far too much in the internal affairs of the executive and legislative branches and the process questions that each properly decides on their own.
