The 112th Congress might have to start all over again (The Ticket)

GOP reps regret skipped oath
In a letter to be distributed Friday night, Reps. Pete Sessions and Mike Fitzpatrick apologize to all 433 of their House colleagues for voting after missing out on taking their official oath of office during Wednesday’s opening ceremonies of the 112th Congress. The swearing-in of members of Congress is required by Article 6 of the Constitution, and Republican leaders scrambled to come up with a fix to rectify their invalid votes. Continue Reading Text Size - + reset Politico 44 On Frida...

Apology of the day
Jonathan Allen reports: In a letter to be distributed Friday night, Reps. Pete Sessions and Mike Fitzpatrick apologize to all 433 of their House colleagues for voting after missing out on taking their official oath of office during Wednesday’s opening ceremonies of the 112th Congress. The swearing-in of members of Congress is required by Article 6 of the Constitution, and Republican lea...

Four Democrats vote yes for Obama repeal test vote, two Republicans vote present
Four Democrats vote yes for Obama Repeal test vote, two Republicans vote present Again, don’t be fooled by the so called “conservative” Democrats. There is no such thing anymore. There are over 20 Democrats left in the 112th Congress that voted NO on the original ObamaCare bill, yet only four of them voted yes during today’s test vote. Two Republicans,  pulled an Obama and voted “present.” The two “Republicans” voting present were Rep. Pete Sess...

Missing Congressmen take oath in Washington
In a follow-up to the embarrassing non-swearing-in of Reps. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, and Mike Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., on Wednesday, the House this morning approved a resolution nullifying their votes on six roll call votes, cast when, it turns out, they were still “representative-elect.” Sessions, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, and Fitzpatrick, elected in November after losing after one term in 2006, were at a reception off the House floor in the Capitol Visi...

House Cleans Up After Swearing-In Snafu
As they try to establish their ability to run the House smoothly, the new Republican leadership team obviously could have done without the snafu of two Republican lawmakers missing their swearing in on Wednesday but taking part in floor and committee proceedings anyway. As a result, the House had to vote Friday morning to expunge a series of votes taken Wednesday by Representatives Pete Sessions of Texas and Mike Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, a bit of embarrassing parliamentary cleanup that drew...

GOP finds governing isn't easy
Speaker John Boehner and House Republicans celebrated a historic return to power this week, promising to slash spending, reform Congress and keep in mind that they can be yanked back out of office if they fall out of touch with the public. They also learned just how tough it is to run the House. Continue Reading Text Size - + reset Politico 44 From the substantive to the absurd, the opening week of the 112th Congress provided GOP leaders a series of object lessons in the difficulty of getting...

House GOP fixes it's 'oath problem'
HOUSE GOP FIXES IT'S 'OATH PROBLEM'.... The new House Republican majority ran into some trouble yesterday when it realized two of its members had been conducting official business without having been sworn into office. Today, the chamber cleaned up the mess, but some lingering questions remain. To briefly recap, Reps. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) and Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) missed the official swearing in ceremony, but claim that they raised their hand and took the oath while watching the proceedi...

House Fixes Votes-Without-Oaths Problem
Pete Sessions (Credit: Jonathan Ernst/Getty Images) The House officially took action today to right a wrong committed in the first days of the new Republican House of Representatives. On the very first day of the 112th Congress, three members were missing when Speaker John Boehner administered the oath of office to members-elect. One Democrat, Rep. Peter Defazio (D-OR), had an excused absence because of a meeting in his district about a local Veterans Hospital. Two Republicans just flat-out ...

More Accusations Leveled At Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.)
US Reps. Pete Sessions (R-Tex.), left, and Mike Fitzpatrick, (R-Pa.) raise their hands and recite the oath of office on Wednesday as they watch a television broadcast of speaker of the house John Boehner administering the oath from the House floor, during a reception for Fitzpatrick supporters in the Capitol Visitor Center in Washington. (AP photo/The Intelligencer, David Garrett) WASHINGTON, DC (CBS) — A government Watchdog agency is questioning whether Bucks County congressman Michael Fi...

House Rewrites History for AWOL Members
Yahoo! Buzz The House has the power to rewrite history – at least its own. Members voted Friday to wipe the record clean of votes that Reps. Mike Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Pete Sessions of Texas cast this week without being properly sworn in as members of the 112th Congress. Both Republicans missed the official swearing ceremony on Wednesday because they were attending a reception in the Capitol Visitor Center for Mr. Fitzpatrick’s constituents from Bucks County, Pa. The guidebo...

A compromise on the debt ceiling and another promised-but-meaningless health care vote.
Don't-Tread-on-Meter: Jan. 7, 2011: 14 They wanted an "ObamaCare" Repeal vote, and they'll get an ObamaCare Repeal vote. On Friday, Republicans got the votes to start debating the Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act, for a vote next Wednesday. "They threw out a whole bunch of members of Congress in constitutional Fashion and replaced them with people who took the oath and the pledge to come here to Repeal 'Obamacare,' " explained Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa. "It's pretty simple." Republic...

House Transportation Committee Chair Wont Commit to Defunding Obamacare
Friday, January 07, 2011 By Dan Joseph FILE - In this May 20, 2010, file photo Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.), speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo) Washington (CNSNews.com) - House Transportation Committee Chairman John Mica (R-FL) says that he favors full Repeal of ObamaCare, but would not commit to defunding the bill in its entirety if Repeal efforts fail. CNSNews.com asked Mica this question: “Rep. Steve King of Iowa advocates including language in every a...

Was Mike Fitzpatrick Holding An Illegal Fundraiser While He Missed His Swearing-In? Inquiring Minds Want To Know
Yes, the moneychangers are back! And by the way, Mike Fitzpatrick isn't a "freshman" -- he was the Incumbent Bucks County PA congressman who was ousted by Patrick Murphy, and then beat him again in the mid-terms. So no, this isn't a little mistake made by a newbie: News broke today that two House members, Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) and freshman Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), may not have actually been properly sworn in to the House yesterday. They were at the Capitol Visitors Center--and just ...

Fitzpatrick Misses Swear In, Votes Invalidated
Today, members of the U.S. House voted 257-159 to retract votes cast by Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick and Pete Sessions before the congressmen were properly sworn into the 112thCongress. Fitzpatrick, who represents parts of Bucks, Montgomery, and Philadelphia Counties, and Sessions missed the official swearing in ceremony that took place this past Wednesday because they were attending a reception for Fitzpatrick’s Bucks County supporters.  The reception took place at the Capitol Visitor Cente...

The Health Care Repeal Rorschach
Any post about the GOP's efforts to Repeal Health Care reform this week should begin with the following caveat: Health care reform will not be repealed, not ever, so long as Democrats control the White House and half of Congress; so this is a symbolic vote and an academic debate. That said, a letter today from the Congressional Budget Office summarizing the effects of repealing the Health Care law offers an important glimpse into how Republicans and Democrats think differently about entitlements...

Two Republicans Voted Before They Took Oath
Friday, January 07, 2011 By Larry Margasak, Associated Press Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, attends a meeting of the House Rules Committee on Capitol Hill on Thursday, Jan. 6, 2011. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) Washington (AP) - It only took two days for majority Republicans in the House to suffer their first embarrassment. Two of their members, including the House Republican campaign chairman, voted a half-dozen times in Wednesday's opening session before they were sworn in. Reps. Pete Sessio...

House votes to clean up mess made by two lawmakers who botched swearing-in
Reporting from Washington — A day after conducting the first-ever reading of the U.S. Constitution on the House floor, the chamber's lawmakers voted Friday to clean up a procedural mess caused by two Republicans who violated the Constitution on their first day in the new Congress. A series of early votes cast by Reps. Pete Sessions of Texas and Mike Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania will be scratched from the record, according to the resolution passed Friday morning on a largely party-line vo...

Leftovers - January 7, 2011
House Republicans had a rough first week in the majority. The Economy added more jobs in 2010 than it did during the entire Bush Administration. After his 2008 debacle, Rudy Giuliani is reportedly considering a run for the White House. Rep. Steve King loses out on the chairmanship of the Immigration subcommittee. In related news, King appears not to know what "mendacity" means. GOP Budget Chairman Paul Ryan knows that Congress has to raise the Debt ceiling. Reps. Pete Sessions and Mike Fit...

Gates goes after military health care
WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Robert Gates is betting that the nation’s frustration with a ballooning Deficit will allow him to trim the Military’s $50 billion-a-year Health Care system. Gates’ proposal, announced this week, would raise fees only on military Retirees under the age of 65, who presumably have access to Health Care in their civilian jobs and haven’t seen a rate increase in more than 15 years. But Gates has tried and failed to push similar proposa...

Gates Goes after Military Health Care
Friday, January 07, 2011 By Anne Flaherty, Associated Press Washington (AP) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates is betting that the nation's frustration with a ballooning Deficit will allow him to trim the Military's $50 billion-a-year Health Care system. Gates' proposal, announced this week, would raise fees only on military Retirees under the age of 65, who presumably have access to Health Care in their civilian jobs and haven't seen a rate increase in more than 15 years. But Gates has tried...

Abramoff Banned From Government Work
Speaker John Boehner (right) and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor arrive on Jan. 6 for their first joint news conference in the Capitol since Republicans took control of the House. They addressed issues such as the National Debt and their plan to Repeal the Health Care overhaul law that was passed last year. Whether you're looking for a new job or looking to hire the perfect Candidate, turn to RCJobs.com — the job board from the Newspaper of Capitol Hill since 1955. Receive daily coverag...

House OKs fix for non-sworn members
Published: Jan. 7, 2011 at 1:59 PM Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, was one of two lawmakers who voted this week without having been sworn in. (UPI Photo/Patrick D. McDermott) WASHINGTON, Jan. 7 (UPI) -- The U.S. House of Representatives approved a resolution Friday to fix a problem created by two Republican lawmakers who voted before being sworn in. National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Pete Sessions of Texas and Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., both cast votes Wednesday and Thursday de...

Watchdogs want 'oathgate' investigation of GOP lawmaker who missed swearing-in
Two government watchdogs are calling for an ethics investigation into the reception a House Republican held in the Capitol while the 112th Congress was being sworn in on Wednesday. The Campaign Legal Center and the Sunlight Foundation said Friday that the Office of Congressional Ethics should look into whether Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) violated House rules by soliciting Campaign Contributions for his swearing-in ceremony. Fitzpatrick and Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Tex.), the House GO...

Republicans patch over constitutional snafu
Call it a constitutional do-over. Two days after they took control of the House, Republicans on Friday had to clean up the mess left when two of their members failed to properly take the oath of office, even though they had been voting and conducting business as if they had. Rep. Pete Sessions, Texas Republican and a member of the GOP leadership, and freshman Rep. Michael G. Fitzpatrick, Pennsylvania Republican, were not in the House chamber when new Speaker John A. Boehner administered the oath...

Friday Morning Coffee: It's A Snow Day.
Good Friday Morning, Fellow Seekers. Well, it took her a while, but Mother Nature finally got around to dumping a light coating snow on our Commonwealth's seat of government. Schools were delayed. Traffic was snarled. But undeterred, we called upon our New England upbringing, threw a couple of extra copies of "Going Rogue" on the wood stove, strapped on our mukluks, hitched up the dogsled and set out for Capitol Ideas World HQ with nary a backwards glance. And just like a certa...