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A former senior official in President Joe Bidens administration and wife of the current U.S. national security adviser is launching a bid for Congress in New Hampshire, where she was born and raised.

Maggie Goodlander, the wife of National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and a former top lawyer in Bidens administration who served as a deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, on Thursday morning announced her candidacy for the open seat in New Hampshires Second Congressional District.

I know how to get things done and deliver for New Hampshire, Goodlander said in a statement. Ill be a workhorse for the people of the Second District and Ill never stop fighting for a freer and more just Granite State.

While not as well known nationally as her high-profile husband, Goodlander hails from a prominent New Hampshire family.

Her grandfather, Sam Tamposi, was a major player in state Republican politics. Her mother, Betty Tamposi, ran for the House in 1988 in the Second Congressional District but lost in the GOP primary.

The announcement is likely to elevate an already high-profile race to succeed longtime Democratic Rep. Annie Kuster in a blue-leaning, but competitive, district in a key general election battleground state.

Goodlander joins a burgeoning field of candidates aiming to succeed the six-term Kuster, who announced in late March that she would retire from Congress rather than seek re-election.

She could face plenty of scrutiny over Biden administration policies both domestic and international over her ties to Republicans, and over her residency. Goodlanders congressional campaign will also likely draw national attention to the New Hampshire race and possibly garner high-profile endorsements.

Goodlander joins a Democratic primary field that includes Colin Van Ostern, of Concord, and state Sen. Becky Whitley, of Hopkinton.

Whitley, a progressive Democrat who represents the Concord area in the State House, has served in the state Senate since 2020 and has pushed back on attempts to limit abortion rights in the state.

Van Ostern, who worked as Kusters campaign manager in 2010 during her first run for Congress, and who later won two terms as a New Hampshire executive councilor before losing in 2016 to Republican Chris Sununu in a race for governor.

Van Ostern launched his bid the day after Kusters retirement announcement and was endorsed by the incumbent a couple of weeks later.

Goodlanders entry into the race could potentially shift the landscape.

Eight Republicans, including 2022 Senate candidate Vikram Mansharamani and Lily Tang Williams, whos making her second straight bid for the congressional nomination, are running.

Goodlanders campaign announcement highlighted her roots in Nashua, the city her family has called home for over 100 years.

A video announcing her campaign also spotlights those roots, with Goodlanders mother explaining that she gave birth to Maggie after voting in Nashua on Election Day.

But for years, Goodlander and Sullivan have spent much of their time in the nations capital because of work.

The couple owns a home in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. While the port city on the New Hampshire Seacoast is located in the states First Congressional District, the geography wont prevent Goodlander from running in the Second District. The U.S. Constitution only mandates that a candidate must reside in the state in which they are running in, not the specific congressional district.

The most recent high-profile example of a Democratic congressional candidate in New Hampshire campaigning in a district outside their residence was six years ago, when Levi Sanders the son of Sen. Bernie Sanders ran in the First District even though he lived in the Second District.

Goodlanders campaign confirmed that the candidate is currently renting a home in Nashua.

In some ways, Goodlanders story mirrors that of Kuster, the woman shes trying to succeed in Congress. Kusters parents were prominent Republicans in New Hampshire, but she ran as a Democrat.

Goodlander, a Yale University and Yale Law School graduate, served as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve and worked as an adviser to late Senators Joe Lieberman and John McCain on the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee.

She also served as a law clerk to Attorney General Merrick Garland during his tenure as chief judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Goodlander married Sullivan nearly nine years ago when he was working as a foreign policy advisor to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her 2016 presidential campaign. The couples wedding, attended by prominent political figures including Clinton, now-Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, was a snapshot of the couples long history in Democratic politics.

Sullivan worked as Klobuchars chief counsel before serving as an adviser on Hillary Clintons 2008 Democratic presidential primary campaign and later on former President Barack Obamas general election presidential campaign.

He served as deputy chief of staff to Clinton during her years as Secretary of State in the Obama administration. After Clinton departed the administration, Sullivan became then-Vice President Bidens top security aide.

Sullivan then served as a top adviser on Clintons 2016 presidential campaign. Four years later, he was one of Bidens first appointments following the 2020 presidential election.

See more here:
On the Trail: Democrat Maggie Goodlander jumps into race to succeed Kuster - Concord Monitor

U.S. Rep. Scott Perry (R., Pa.) is facing criticism after he reportedly called the Ku Klux Klan the military wing of the Democratic Party in a closed-door briefing for lawmakers on antisemitism Tuesday, according to CNN.

Perry also appeared to defend the so-called great replacement theory the racist, white nationalist belief that white people are being purposely replaced by minorities and immigrants in the United States and Europe, CNN reported. Perry added that migrants entering the country have no interest in being Americans.

Audio of the comments, which Perry reportedly made during a House Oversight Committee members briefing about The Origins and Implications of Rising Antisemitism in Higher Education were obtained by CNN.

Perry, an ally of former President Donald Trump and the former leader of the House Freedom Caucus, is running for reelection in Pennsylvanias 10th Congressional District, which includes Dauphin County and parts of Cumberland and York counties. Democrat Janelle Stelson, a former local news anchor, is challenging him in the November general election.

Asked for comment Wednesday about the leaked audio, Perrys office released a statement:

Once again, the radical Left twists facts in order to silence conversation about its own crimes and Bidens intentional failures to enforce laws and close or regulate our borders, Perry said. My point is proven yet again: when the Left loses an argument, it debases and smears instead of engaging in debate on merits.

According to the audio as reported by CNN, Perry said, The KKK in modern times, a lot of young people think somehow its a right-wing organization when it is the military wing of the Democratic Party. Decidedly, unabashedly, racist and antisemitic.

Although the KKK was founded by Democrats in 1865, it became an extra-legal terror organization that was never the wing of any political party, said Matt Jordan, director of the Pennsylvania State University News Literacy Initiative, which helps students and citizens distinguish reliable journalism from the noise that often overwhelms and divides us, according to its website.

Perrys statements repeated tropes about the KKK and replacement theory that are sticky narratives, according to Jordan widely circulated, debunked ideas that politicians use to garner media attention and to rile their base.

Replacement theory is real Perry said, according to CNN. They added white to it to stop everybody from talking about it.

While Perry said during the briefing he is happy to accept people that are here legally, pointing to his ancestors who migrated to the United States, he has an issue with migrants that are un-American, according to the audio recording.

What is happening now is were importing people into the country that want to be in America but have no interest in being Americans, and thats very different and to disparage the comments is to chill the conversation so that we can continue to bring in more people that we never met that are un-American, Perry said, according to the recording.

The great replacement theory is misinformation with fascist resonance, Jordan said. You replace white voters with brown-skinned immigrants to denigrate and corrupt the blood of our country, is how people think, he added. Tucker Carlson and others use it. Its deployed with great effect in the right-wing media echo system.

And, Jordan said, theres not a shred of evidence that migrants here without documentation can vote, though Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson recently have promoted a bill to prevent non-citizens from voting.

The briefing for lawmakers this week was intended set up to discuss the District of Columbias response to the pro-Palestinian protests and encampments on college campuses. House Republicans have advocated for racking down on the demonstrations and have attempted to unify against antisemitism, according to CNN.

Perrys remarks this week werent the first controversial comments hes made recently.

At the conservative Pennsylvania Leadership Conference in Camp Hill last month, Perry referenced transgender students in school locker rooms and said, If you say something about it, the FBI will likely list you as a domestic extremist.

Thats a common talking point among conservatives. Jordan, of Penn State, said that amplifying the anti-trans moral panic is a feature of far-right politicians worldwide. To say the FBI will violate your First Amendment rights and put you on a list of extremists is pure paranoid fantasy.

Perry also claimed that the Biden administration is out to grab up peoples gas stoves. Thats an inaccurate assessment of health and climate concerns about gas appliances thats nonetheless repeated endlessly on conservative talk radio, experts say.

When Perry recycles these well-worn, culture-war talking points, hes attempting to use moral panic to fire up conservative Republicans enough to make sure they vote, Jordan said.

Its when the strategic use of misinformation becomes disinformation, Jordan said. Rhetoric used to knowingly fool people.

Read more:
Scott Perry links the KKK to the Democratic Party - The Philadelphia Inquirer

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Two political consultants agreed to plead guilty to charges that they conspired with U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar to launder more than $200,000 in bribes from a Mexican bank, according to recently unsealed court documents that show the consultants are cooperating with the Justice Department in its case against the Laredo Democrat.

Cuellar, a powerful South Texas Democrat, was indicted with his wife Imelda on charges of accepting almost $600,000 in bribes from Azerbaijan and a Mexican commercial bank, Banco Azteca. The indictment, unsealed last week, accuses Cuellar of taking money from the bank in exchange for influencing the Treasury Department to work around an anti-money laundering policy that threatened the banks interests. Cuellar allegedly recruited his former campaign manager, Colin Strother, and another consultant, Florencio "Lencho" Rendon, to facilitate the payments, according to court records.

Rendon and Strother both struck plea deals with the Justice Department in March, in which they agreed to cooperate in the agencys investigation of the Cuellars. They each face up to 20 years in prison and six-figure fines for charges of conspiracy to commit money laundering.

The plea deals, which were first reported by the San Antonio Express-News, allege that Cuellar first asked Strother to meet with Rendon in February 2016 to participate in a project to test and certify a fuel additive made by a Mexican company so that it could be sold in the United States. Rendon told Strother he would pay him $11,000 a month for the project, $10,000 of which Strother would pass on to Imelda Cuellar, according to the plea agreements.

Rendon paid Strother a total of $261,000 from March 2016 through June 2019, more than $236,000 of which Strother then paid to Imelda Cuellar, the documents allege. Strother concluded the project was a sham, according to his plea deal, because neither Rendon nor Imelda Cuellar did any legitimate work. Strother understood that the true purpose of the payments was to funnel money to Henry Cuellar without the Laredo Democrat having to reveal it in his annual financial disclosures.

Cuellar has asserted his innocence, releasing a statement Friday in which he said his actions were consistent with the actions of many of my colleagues and in the interest of the American people. He faces charges of bribery, money laundering and working on behalf of a foreign government.

Cuellar, a member of Congress since 2005, has considerable influence in Washington thanks to his long tenure and his spot on the powerful House Appropriations Committee. He was the top Democrat on the subcommittee that oversees funding for homeland security, a position he automatically forfeited under a House Democratic rule that requires a committee chair to step down if they are indicted on a crime carrying a possible prison sentence of more than two years.

As part of their plea agreements, Rendon and Strother agreed to testify before a grand jury or in any other judicial or administrative proceeding when called upon to do so by the United States. Each also agreed to turn over all documents in his possession or under his control relating to all areas of inquiry and investigation.

Rendons plea agreement also outlines the origins of the alleged bribery scheme, citing a series of 2015 meetings allegedly orchestrated by Cuellar at which Rendon and Banco Azteca executives discussed U.S. regulatory issues that were hampering the banks efforts to facilitate remittances, or the transfer of money from Mexican workers in the United States to their relatives in Mexico.

Soon after, Rendon allegedly signed a contract that would pay him $15,000 a month to provide strategic consulting and advising services for an unnamed U.S.-based media and television company that shared common ownership under a Mexican conglomerate with Banco Azteca, according to Rendons plea documents.

Rendon would then send Strother $11,000 of the monthly payments, keeping $4,000 for his own consulting firm, with the understanding that Strother would keep $1,000 for himself and forward the remaining $10,000 to Imelda Cuellars company, according to the court records. Rendon and Henry Cuellar allegedly never discussed having Rendon, Strother or Imelda Cuellar perform any work in relation to the contract, according to the plea agreement, which led Rendon to conclude that the contract was a sham and part of a scheme devised to funnel money from the bank to Henry Cuellar.

In its indictment of Henry Cuellar, the Justice Department alleged that the Laredo Democrat in exchange for accepting bribes agreed to advise and pressure officials in the executive branch to set up mechanisms that would help cross-border transactions crucial to Banco Aztecas business.

He also allegedly tipped off the banks vice chairman about a bill that would temporarily bar the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau from making new regulations on the payday lending industry. Cuellar then coordinated with a U.S.-based subsidiary of the Mexican bank on language in defense of the bill, according to the indictment. The subsidiary was a payday lending company.

The indictment said Cuellar and his wife used the bribe money to cover credit card payments, taxes, car payments, dining and shopping, including $12,000 on a custom gown. It also said one of the Cuellars adult children assisted in the creation of the sham shell companies used to launder funds. The Cuellars have two adult children: Christy and Catie.

The Cuellars allegedly negotiated the agreement with Banco Azteca around the same time they were setting up a scheme to accept payments from Azerbaijans state-run oil and gas company, which were also laundered through fake consulting contracts to shell companies owned by Imelda Cuellar, according to the indictment.

In exchange, Henry Cuellar allegedly pushed U.S. policy that favored Azerbaijan, an oil-rich former Soviet country that borders Iran and Russia on the Caspian Sea. That included adding language to defense spending legislation to prioritize ties to countries in the region, including with Azerbaijan, and working to kill legislation prioritized by members who supported Armenian interests, the indictment alleges.

Azerbaijan had been engaged in a long-running border dispute with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave made up of largely ethnic Armenians, until Azerbaijan forcibly retook control of the territory last year. Cuellar coordinated with Azerbaijani diplomats to eliminate legislation that would finance land mine clearing in Nagorno-Karabakh in 2017, according to the indictment, which cited text messages between Cuellar and a diplomat.

After news of the indictment landed, Cuellar affirmed that he still plans to seek reelection in November. Two Republicans, Navy veteran Jay Furman and rancher Lazaro Garza Jr., are facing off in a May 28 runoff to decide the GOP nominee in Cuellars district, which stretches from the border to the San Antonio suburbs.

The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan election forecasting site, updated its rating for the district from likely Democratic to lean Democratic in response to Cuellars indictment. Cuellar, often ranked ideologically as the most conservative Democrat in the U.S. House, won reelection in 2022 by 13 percentage points, though Democratic gubernatorial candidate Beto ORourke carried the district by a narrower 5-point margin.

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Two political consultants plead guilty in Henry Cuellar bribery case - The Texas Tribune

New York state Sen. Timothy Kennedy, a Democrat, has won the Empire State’s special election to fill retired Democratic Rep. Brian Higgins’s seat in Congress, according to a projection from Decision Desk HQ.

Kennedy defeated Republican Gary Dickson in New York’s 26th Congressional district for the seat, which was expected to stay in Democratic hands — but the race still drew scrutiny as the GOP grapples with a razor-thin majority.

Both candidates were picked by local party officials to be their respective nominees for the special election. Kennedy will serve out the rest of Higgins’s unexpired term. 

Higgins resigned from Congress this February after nearly two decades in the House, citing growing dysfunction and the “slow and frustrating” pace of progress in D.C., and now serves as president and CEO of Shea’s Performing Arts Center in Buffalo. The longtime lawmaker was among a number of House members who announced they wouldn’t seek reelection amid frustration with chaos on Capitol Hill. 

The New York district runs along the Niagara River, including the cities of Buffalo and Niagara Falls. A 2022 mass shooting in Buffalo prompted Kennedy to champion gun safety legislation in the New York state Senate. 

Dickson, the GOP contender in Tuesday’s special election, was the first Republican elected as a town supervisor in decades in West Seneca. 

Kennedy will finish the rest of the year in Higgins’s seat – but the Democrat is also on the November ballot to take on a full term in the House, according to the New York State Board of Elections. 

The election comes as former President Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is on trial in Manhattan. In the first of Trump’s four criminal indictments to go before a jury, he faces felony charges of falsifying business records in connection with a hush money payment made during the 2016 cycle. 

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Democrat wins special election for Rep. Brian Higginss seat in New York - The Hill

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Speaker Mike Johnson. Photo: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

House Democratic leadership on Tuesday confirmed what has long been rumored: If Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) introduces a motion to oust Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), they will help kill it.

Why it matters: It could be the nail in the coffin for Greene's motion to vacate, which has already struggled due to a lack of Republican support.

What they're saying: "We will vote to table Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's Motion to Vacate the Chair," Jeffries and his deputies, Reps. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) and Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), said in a statement.

By the numbers: Just two right-wing House Republicans have signed onto Greene's motion to vacate, enough to remove Johnson only if virtually every Democrat voted with them.

Between the lines: There's also significant discomfort among Democrats with the idea of again joining the GOP's right flank to topple a speaker.

The bottom line: "From the very beginning of this Congress, House Democrats have put people over politics and found bipartisan common ground with traditional Republicans in order to deliver real results," the Democratic leaders said.

Go deeper: Democrats throw Johnson a lifeline on motion to vacate

Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional context and comment from House Democratic leadership.

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House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries vows to save Mike Johnson from MTG's motion to vacate - Axios