WATCH LIVE: Senate holds vote on crime bill despite DC Council withdrawal

Rachel Schilke

March 08, 04:00 PM March 08, 04:00 PM

The Senate is voting on whether to overturn Washington, D.C.'s criminal code that would lessen penalties for some crimes, including homicide.

The vote comes after Council of the District of Columbia Chairman Phil Mendelson sent a letter to Vice President Kamala Harris withdrawing the criminal code bill from the Senate and saying it would undergo revisions to be resubmitted at a later date.

DC COUNCIL CHAIRMAN WITHDRAWS CRIMINAL CODE BILL TO STALL VOTE

However, Senate leaders said they planned to move forward with the vote shortly after Mendelson's announcement.

"Not only does the statute not allow for a withdrawal of a transmission, but at this point, the Senate Republican privileged motion will be acting on the House disapproval resolution, rather than the DC Council’s transmission to the Senate," a Senate leadership aide said in a statement provided to the Washington Examiner.

Mendelson called the Senate vote "symbolic" and drew on the Home Rule Act as justification for the bill's removal.

GOP lawmakers have been successful in their efforts to overhaul Washington's bill, part of a larger-scale strategy to pressure both President Joe Biden and Democrats to take a tougher approach to crime.

If the bill passes the Senate, it will head to Biden's desk, where it is expected to be signed despite it no longer technically being before both chambers.

The vote will begin at 5:15 p.m. on Wednesday.

Democrats furious with Biden over DC crime bill won't pull support for reelection bid

Cami Mondeaux

March 04, 09:30 AM March 04, 09:30 AM

House Democrats from all corners of the party are rallying behind President Joe Biden ahead of his expected reelection bid, offering him support despite rising tensions stemming from Biden’s decision not to block a GOP-led resolution overturning and overhauling Washington’s century-old criminal code.

Party members in the House have expressed support for Biden’s likely reelection campaign, with many arguing he is the best chance for Democrats to maintain control of the White House in 2024.

HOUSE DEMOCRATS BLAST BIDEN FOR DC CRIME BILL ABOUT-FACE

“I do think he should run; I think he will win,” Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-CA), the No. 3 House Democrat, said during a Punchbowl News event in Baltimore this week. “Time and time again, you know, he was able to deliver with House Democrats, with Senate Democrats, and so I think that he can and should run.”

Aguilar touted some of Biden’s accomplishments during his first two years in office, such as the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill passed in 2021, which has become a key tenet of the president’s legislative agenda. Should Biden launch a second White House bid, he would have the support of the House Democratic Caucus, Aguilar added.

Other Democrats pointed to Biden’s performance in the 2020 election, arguing the voter base he attracted would “come back even stronger in 2024.”

“In those 18 districts that are held by Biden Republicans, he’s the best in terms of his message and how he approaches this,” said Rep. Ann McLane Kuster (D-NH), according to the Hill.

It’s unclear when Biden plans to announce his reelection campaign, although it’s widely expected to happen sometime in April. However, some Democrats are pushing the president to do it sooner, including Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), who leads the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Jayapal’s support comes even after she endorsed Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) in the 2020 election when he ran against Biden for the nomination.

“Nobody’s surprised that Biden was not my choice in the first election for the primary,” Jayapal said during the Baltimore retreat this week. “But the [Progressive Caucus] and the president and his administration have formed an incredibly strong partnership.”

House Democrats are likely to stand firm in their support for the president even after Biden announced earlier this week he would not veto a Republican-led bill seeking to overturn Washington’s revised criminal code — a decision that blindsided and angered several party lawmakers who voted against the measure. The legislation is poised to pass the Senate next week, and without Biden’s veto, it sets the stage for Congress to override local legislation passed by the D.C. Council for the first time in 30 years.

Democrats accused Biden of walking back his previous stance on the issue, pointing to comments the White House made last month that the president opposed the resolution seeking to overturn the criminal code. Biden didn’t tell lawmakers he planned to sign the GOP-led measure until weeks after it passed the House.

“This ain’t it. DC has a right to govern itself, like any other state or municipality. If the President supports DC statehood, he should govern like it,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. “Plenty of places pass laws the President may disagree with. He should respect the people’s gov of DC just as he does elsewhere.”

At least two Democratic senators, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Patty Murray of Washington, said they would vote to overturn the criminal code. That all but guarantees its passage in the upper chamber, where Democrats have temporarily lost their outright majority with the absences of Sens. John Fetterman (D-PA) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). Both are currently out of office due to health problems.

Congressional rebuke and looming Biden veto cement ESG as major political conflict

Zachary Halaschak

March 03, 07:00 AM March 03, 07:00 AM

President Joe Biden’s first veto won't involve immigration, inflation, crime, or foreign policy — rather, it will relate to a three-letter acronym that is rapidly gaining political salience: ESG.

ESG, which is shorthand for environmental, social, and governance, has evolved from being a somewhat obscure investment philosophy several years ago to a huge consideration in the corporate world today. This week Congress handed Biden a bipartisan (though barely) rebuke of the ESG movement and teed up his first presidential veto — showing just how big of a flashpoint it has become and portending the bigger role it will play in the 2024 elections.

MANCHIN AND TESTER VOTE WITH GOP ON ESG MEASURE, SET TO FORCE FIRST BIDEN VETO

While most of the pushback to ESG has come at the state level, particularly from Republican state treasurers and attorneys general, the latest opposition is at the national level.

With support from centrist Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Jon Tester (D-MT), the Senate narrowly voted this week to roll back a Labor Department rule that allows retirement plan managers to weigh ESG matters when making investments. The White House said Biden will veto the resolution, meaning that the rule isn’t expected to go away despite the desire of Congress.

Still, the rebuke from congressional Republicans and a few Democrats has pushed the issue to center stage. Riley Moore, an anti-ESG crusader and West Virginia’s state treasurer, said that the legislation and veto set the stage for the debate to play out on the public stage entering the 2024 elections.

“This is just getting going, this is just the tip of the iceberg — I think you’re going to see a lot more federal action on this,” Moore, who is also running for Congress in 2024, told the Washington Examiner on Thursday. He added that if he is elected, he will continue to push against ESG at the federal level.

Those who support further integrating ESG into investment decisions and finance more generally see it as a way that the private sector can affect social change, such as by limiting climate change by discouraging investment in fossil fuels. Republicans see the growing push as an attempt to distort the free market and, in some respects, even culture through capital and influence.

The conflict is likely to play out on the presidential campaign trail.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is seen as a Republican front-runner in 2024, launched a broadside against ESG earlier this year. DeSantis is pushing Florida to prohibit the use of ESG in all investment decisions at the state and local level, ban state and local entities from any consideration of ESG in the contracting process, and block state and local governments from weighing ESG when issuing municipal bonds.

One presidential candidate, 37-year-old entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, has tethered much of his campaign entirely to fighting ESG. He has bashed so-called “woke capitalism” and has been preaching about restoring self-governance.

“You can say ‘woke’ until you're blue in the face,” Ramaswamy told the Washington Examiner this week. “I'm proud of the foot soldiers who have taken on this cause, but as much as they're trying to catch up on this issue — it's a complicated issue, sorting this out for themselves — one of my roles has been to really explain it to them.”

Moore said that former President Donald Trump, who is also running in 2024 after being defeated by Biden in 2020, was “ahead of the curve” on ESG and created the conditions for the upswell in pushback it is receiving today. He noted that the Labor Department rule driving headlines today was an attempt to roll back Trump-era restrictions on fiduciaries’ ability to consider ESG factors when choosing investments.

“Just to be fair here, Trump certainly — his administration — did something about this a while ago,” Moore said, who has endorsed Trump’s latest presidential run.

Reaching beyond just the political realm and into a bit more of the cultural realm, ESG has also entered the national lexicon through the efforts of media juggernauts like Twitter CEO and Tesla founder Elon Musk. Musk has used his newly acquired social media company to bash ESG in front of his 130 million followers.

“The S in ESG stands for Satanic,” Musk said in January.

“I am increasingly convinced that corporate ESG is the Devil Incarnate,” he said last year. “ESG rules have been twisted to insanity,” he opined in another missive.

And the growing discussion about ESG is evidenced by growing search traffic interest in the topic. Google Trends, which tracks attention to various search topics, shows that the phrase has skyrocketed in popularity over the past decade and really started to take off in 2021.

It is unclear when Biden will sign his first presidential veto blocking Congress from rolling back his administration’s ESG rule, but what is clear is that the issue isn’t going away anytime soon for current elected officials and those aspiring for leadership roles in 2024 and beyond.

Jeremy Beaman contributed to this report.

Republicans could force Biden’s first veto with fights over ESG and DC crime law

Samantha-Jo Roth

March 01, 04:00 AM March 01, 04:00 AM

President Joe Biden could be close to issuing the first veto of his presidency as Republicans in Congress mount a campaign to challenge two Biden regulations and a bill to block a new crime law in the District of Columbia.

Lawmakers plan to utilize a congressional tool that rescinds recently finalized rules with a simple majority vote in both chambers and the signature of the president. The repeal of Washington's crime law, meanwhile, also cannot be filibustered. With multiple Democrats facing tough reelection prospects in 2024, the GOP is poised to win enough support to send the measures to Biden's desk.

The Republican-controlled House on Tuesday voted to undo a Biden administration rule that allows retirement plans to consider environmental, social, and corporate governance, or ESG, in their investment decisions. The Senate could take up the measure as soon as Wednesday.

The Republican joint resolution, which declares Biden's rule “shall have no force or effect,” would ensure that plan managers only consider financial returns and not other factors like environmental pollution and employment policies.

NEARLY 50 SENATORS INTRODUCE CHALLENGE TO BIDEN ESG INVESTING RULE

Republicans consider the Biden rule part of what they describe as “woke capitalism,” while Democrats insist the regulation is agnostic and neither a requirement nor a recommendation.

“Retirement plans should be solely focused on delivering maximum returns, not advancing a political agenda,” said Rep. Andy Barr (KY), the Republican who introduced the resolution in the lower chamber.

Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN), who introduced the Senate version of the measure, is optimistic about its chances for passage.

“I think we could get a couple of votes that we weren’t expecting from Democrats, but we may not even need them,” he said on Tuesday.

The senator is advancing the resolution under the Congressional Review Act, which bypasses Senate rules requiring 60 senators to pass most legislation. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) has already signed on as a supporter of the bill.

Ordinarily, Republicans would have to find one more Democrat to have enough votes, but with Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) absent as he undergoes treatment for depression, Republican senators appear to have enough support to put the resolution up for a vote.

The Biden administration has warned that the president “will veto” the measure if it is sent to his desk.

“The President will continue to deliver for America’s workers. If the President were presented with H.J. Res. 30, he would veto it,” the White House said in a statement on Monday. “The rule reflects what successful marketplace investors already know — there is an extensive body of evidence that environmental, social, and governance factors that have material impacts on certain markets, industries, and companies."

Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) previewed how a Biden veto will be used against the president and Democrats at large.

“Joe Biden is giving the middle finger to middle-class Americans who are concerned about the return on their retirement funds,” Barrasso told reporters on Tuesday. “He is more committed to his climate change agenda and his pipe dream than he is the American dream from hundreds of millions of Americans."

Next up in both chambers could be a CRA resolution on the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers’ “waters of the U.S.” regulation. Republicans have criticized the new rules, claiming they are overly restrictive for farmers and ranchers.

Republicans on Capitol Hill recognize the legislative push will likely fail once it reaches the White House but believe it can serve as an important messaging tool, especially ahead of the 2024 elections, and shows bipartisan agreement on GOP priorities.

“It’s not going to drive much policy because the president will veto anything he doesn’t like,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND), speaking to reporters on Tuesday. “Of course, it’s political but it’s still important.”

Republicans are also moving closer to blocking changes to the District of Columbia’s criminal code that would reduce penalties on a variety of criminal offenses, including carjacking.

Since the District of Columbia is not a state, Congress is able to veto any law approved by Washington voters or the government. The new policy comes as crime in the district has increased, making it a ready-made fight for congressional Republicans who have been drawing attention to crime across the country as a political issue.

Vulnerable Democrats, fearing they will be labeled as soft on crime, may end up voting for the measure. Manchin become the first Democrat on Monday to join Republicans in agreeing to overturn the law.

Most Democrats, however, oppose striking down the Washington law, arguing local officials should be able to make their own laws free from congressional influence.

“We Senate Democrats care about D.C. political autonomy and also care a lot about the safety and security of D.C. residents,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) told reporters on Tuesday. “As you know, it’s a privileged motion, it could happen next week, and there will be a vote shortly thereafter.”

The White House has expressed its opposition to the bill, but the president has yet to issue a direct veto threat.

The dispute is a result of a decision by the D.C. Council to override the veto of Mayor Muriel Bowser (D). Despite her opposition to the bill, Bowser has said she opposes Congress overturning the law.

In a letter last week, the D.C. Council defended the measure, writing that “the District of Columbia has the right to self-govern as granted to us under the Home Rule Act.”

“Any changes or amendments to the District’s local laws should be done by the elected representatives of the District of Columbia. As those representatives, we alone are accountable to the voters of the District of Columbia,” the letter said, adding, “Just as Congress does not interfere in the local matters of other states, we compel you not to interfere in our matters.”

Senate Republicans are aiming to hold a vote on the measure as early as next week.