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House Democrats plan to adopt a National Football League hiring policy and compile a new database of minority job applicants as part of a push to diversity the staffing ranks on Capitol Hill.

Since last years elections, Democratic congressional leaders have been facing pressure from minority staffers, lawmakers and organizations for failing to ensure that a party that draws outsize support from Asian, black, Latino and gay voters also employs such people on Capitol Hill.

In the House, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and her leadership team are set to announce plans on Wednesday to launch the House Democratic Diversity Initiative, a project that will include a full-time staffer responsible for placing minorities in more staff jobs across the caucus.

Shortly after taking office in January, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) made similar changes designed to help Democratic senators identify and hire more minority applicants.

The new House Democratic diversity director, who has not yet been hired, will oversee a database of potential applicants to fill policy and communications jobs that will draw names with insights from outside groups, including Asian, black and Latino staffing organizations, according to Pelosis office.

White men are a minority in the House Democratic caucus, with Asian, black Latino, women and openly gay members outnumbering them, a milestone that occurred over the past decade. The new diversity push for staffing will help our Members build diverse staffs and strengthen our work on behalf of Americans of all backgrounds and perspectives, Pelosi said in a statement announcing the plans, the details of which were shared first with The Washington Post.

Drew Hammill, Pelosis deputy chief of staff and top spokesman, noted that Leader Pelosis office is, without rival, the most diverse office on Capitol Hill. Leader Pelosi has always believed in the importance of leading by example.

Her senior staff includes an Arab American chief of staff, Nadeam Elshami; two deputy chiefs of staff who are gay and female, respectively; a national security adviser, communications director and press secretary who are all black women; and a Latino member services director, according to Hammill. Overall, Pelosi employs 55 people in her leadership and district offices, more than half of whom are women (31). Forty-four percent of her combined staffs (24) are minorities, he said.

Among House Republicans, Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) has no formal policy for his office or his conference requiring the recruitment or hiring of minorities, according to aides. Earlier this year he promoted his longtime aide, Jonathan Burks, to be his chief of staff. There are no diversity hiring requirements among Senate Republicans.

Pelosi and her team tried codifying House-wide diversity rules back in 2010, but they lost the majority and the funding that might come with such changes, aides said. Now, they plan to implement the plans for the caucus amid pressure from outside groups. A series of op-eds and widely circulated social media posts by progressive activists and columnists late last year began drawing attention to the dearth of minority or gay senior staffers.

The new diversity director will work with Rep. Robert A. Brady (Pa.), the top Democrat on the House Administration Committee, who will oversee a new Member Advisory Council that will draw members from the congressional Asian Pacific American, black, Hispanic, LGBT, womens progressive and moderate caucuses, according to Hammill.

The new council will be tasked with setting diversity hiring goals and provide guidance on how offices will implement the Rooney Rule, named for Dan Rooney, the late owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers, who persuaded the NFL to adopt a policy that requires teams to interview minorities for any head coaching or senior football operations positions. Use of the rule does not necessarily result in hiring, but it compels the league to seek out, promote and retain minority talent.

Its not yet clear whether Democrats plan to apply the rule just to senior hires or all job openings.

In January, Schumer adopted the rule for his own office after meetings with minority staffing groups and minority staffers. He also encouraged, but did not require, that other Democratic senators adopt the policy.

Congressional offices are not required to publicly report the demographics of staffers, but groups such as the Congressional Hispanic Staff Association and the Congressional Black Associates have tried in past years to compile reports on the disparities. In a 2010 report, Latinos represented just 6 percent of the congressional workforce. The numbers havent changed much since then.

Francisco Bencosme, a staffer with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who also leads the Congressional Hispanic Staff Association, said that his group has been working with Pelosi and other Democratic leaders to make changes to staffing decisions.

We support the announcement, Bencosme said in a statement, adding later, We believe this initiative can only succeed through a concerted strategy that looks at data collection, transparency, pipeline, retention and outreach holistically.

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House Democrats set to adopt the 'Rooney Rule' in push to diversify staffs - Washington Post

But he also told a packed auditorium that targeting Trump was not enough.

"I am often asked by the media and others, 'How did it come about that Donald Trump, the most unpopular presidential candidate in the modern history of our country, won the election?'" Sanders said. "My answer is that Trump didn't win the election -- the Democratic Party lost the election."

Yet the danger for Democrats is that they lose sight of a basic problem the party has faced: the need for a stronger message to energize their base and broaden their reach. The risk for Democrats is that, like the rest of the nation, they become so consumed by the chaos in Washington that they don't devote any attention to cleaning up their own house and preparing for the next set of elections.

So far President Trump's term has given Democrats a massive opening. The choices that he has made about public policy -- deregulating energy and financial markets, draconian health care changes that would leave millions of Americans with less health care coverage, a supply-side tax cut that would most benefit upper income Americans and the utter absence of a serious jobs policy -- have exposed the weaknesses and limitations of "conservative populism."

President Trump's fiery rhetoric belied the history of Republican politics in recent decades, which has not done much to benefit middle- and working-class Americans. Although Trump promised to be different, he is not.

In response to this kind of attack that Republicans are likely to level against them in the years to come, Democrats must make a convincing case that their party actually has something to say about the ongoing economic insecurity that afflicts middle-class communities in a moment of low unemployment.

Some Democrats, such as New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, have tried to build on Sanders' appeal with new policy initiatives such as free higher education.

But state initiatives are not enough. National Democrats need to do more to outline and promote a robust domestic agenda that will reframe the midterm campaigns of 2018 and the presidential campaign of 2020. They have to demonstrate that they are a party that is not, in fact, beholden to big interests, as Sanders has argued, and has a vision that will translate into real economic gains for all Americans.

It will be vital that Democrats take these steps without dismissing the important issues that the party has embraced since the 1960s. Too many critics of the party reflexively blamed "identity" issues such as feminism and civil rights as the reason that Democrats like Hillary Clinton lost. That too would be a big mistake.

Rather than downplay questions such as criminal justice reform or equal pay, Democrats need to work harder to explain to voters why these are not "base" issues and why their agenda better responds to the concerns of the electorate living in red and blue states. They also need to make a more compelling case that only by dealing with issues such as sexism in the workplace or racism in policing can the nation actually craft policies that make all middle- and working-class Americans feel more secure about their futures.

Nor can Democrats leave foreign policy and national security on the sidelines. The problems that existed during President Obama's term -- the growth of ISIS, the expansion of Russian cyber and military aggression, and the turmoil in Syria -- have cost the party considerable support among voters who fear for the stability of the international order. The ease of criticizing President Trump's inchoate and stumbling moves around the globe do not excuse Democrats from coming up with a doctrine of their own.

President Trump has an ability to take up all the oxygen in the room. By the time his era of scandal, controversy and bombast comes to an end, many politicians in both parties won't even remember what they were planning to do when they went to work. The newsrooms are likewise so obsessed with Trump that it becomes extraordinarily difficult to give airtime to anything else.

Democrats can't fell prey to this trap. Otherwise they won't be able to capitalize on this situation and navigate the political and policy challenges that will arise once President Trump is gone.

Historically, political parties thrive when they go through a process of self-examination and learn to better address policies they had ignored at a cost. In the 1930s, Franklin Roosevelt and congressional Democrats put forth a robust vision of using government in response to economic depression that revolutionized the role of the state in American life.

Democrats now face a similar kind of political crossroads. Whether they learn from 2016 and develop a more exciting set of policies, rather than coasting through 2018 on an anti-Trump message, will have as much impact on the party's future as Trump's fate in the months ahead.

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Democrats, take your cues from Bernie Sanders (opinion ...

Senate Democrats on Tuesday continued to assail how Republican leaders are crafting legislation to overhaul the U.S. health care system, calling it legislative malpractice, and are using GOPleaders own statements from years past to make their point.

While Republicanmembers routinely criticize the manner in which Democrats passed the 2010 health care law on a strictly party-line vote, there are stark differences between that process and the current one.

Democrats held a number of public hearings and marathon markups on the legislation before bringing it to the floor for a vote. Republicans, however, have refused to hold public hearings on a bill that would affectnearly one-sixth of the countrys economy and are prepared to bypass the regular committee process and bring the legislation directly to the Senate floor.

We are in the midst of one of the greatest acts of legislative malpractice Washington has ever seen. Senate Republicans are squirreled away behind closed doors, writing a bill they wont let the public read, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumertold reporters Tuesday. They dont want the American people to see how poorly they would do under this bill.

The New York Democratcited critical comments Vice President Mike Pence, then an Indiana congressman,made after the 2010 health care law passedaboutthe process used by Democrats.

He said, American people deserve time to read this and every member of Congress ought to commit to reading the bill. Today, no member of Congress can read the bill because we dont know what it is, Schumer said, just moments before Pence and his security detail passed behind the Democratic leader. The comments of House Speaker Paul D. Ryanand Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnellassailing the 2009-2010 effort as a rush job were trotted out as well.

While Republicans continue to charge ahead on their overhaul effort, leadership spent a notable portion of their weekly press conference Tuesday defending the current process.

McConnell a vocal critic of the tactics used by Democrats to pass the 2010law attributed the lack of public hearings to the fact that both parties have been dealing with the issues surrounding the U.S. health care system for the past seven years.

We know a lot about the subject, we know how complicated it is. Nobody is hiding the ball here. Feel free to ask anybody anything. But theres been gazillions of hearings on this subject, the Kentucky Republican told reporters afterthe weekly GOP policy lunch. Well let you see the bill when we finally release it.

Other Republican leaders said the open process for the legislation would begin once it reaches the chamber floor for a vote.

Now we hear them complaining about transparency. The Republican Senate bill under reconciliation will go to the Senate floor and be open for amendments. It will be an open amendment process, said Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, chairman of the Senate Republican Policy Committee.

Meanwhile, several GOP senatorssaid Monday they were unaware of key policy details that were under consideration. Fifteen Republican senators on Tuesday traversed up Pennsylvania Avenue for a lunch meeting with President Donald Trump and Pence on health care.

At the start of the lunch, Trump said he wanted the Senate to pass a bill to repeal and replace former President Barack Obamas signature domestic policy achievement as soon as we can do it. He predicted the Senate will eventually pass a phenomenal bill that will feature a great health care plan that will be far better than the Obama-era law.

John T. Bennett contributed to this report.

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Democrats Decry 'Legislative Malpractice' on Health Care - Roll Call

Some, such as California Rep. Maxine Waters, have explicitly called for impeaching the President. Others, like Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, have merely mentioned the possibility, with Gabbard saying last month that she was studying the impeachment process.

Impeachment requires the support of a majority of members of the House of Representatives. No Republicans have publicly voiced support for impeaching Trump. CNN's KFile is, however, keeping a running count of Democratic lawmakers who have talked about impeachment. That count, which includes those who discussed impeachment prior to Comey's firing, is currently at 26, 24 members of the House, Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal, and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Independent Sen. Angus King of Maine, who caucuses with Democrats, has also said impeachment is possible.

California Rep. Maxine Waters: Waters has been talking about impeachment for months, most recently telling MSNBC's Chris Hayes on Thursday that "The President needs to be impeached." Waters also suggested in the interview that Trump could be charged with "obstruction of justice" for saying that the FBI's Russia investigation was a factor in his decision to fire Comey.

"If the President is found to have done this to circumvent this investigation, to thwart to the efforts to get the bottom of this, I think this is going to be an impeachable offense," Green said. "He's really treading in some very dangerous waters. This is unusual for this kind of thing to happen in the United States of America."

"Impeachment will happen if handful of Republicans in Congress join Dems to put country above party. Or in 2019 after Dems win the House," Huffman tweeted at 1:51 a.m. on Friday morning.

"It may well produce another United States vs. Nixon on a subpoena that went to United States Supreme Court," he said. "It may well produce impeachment proceedings, although we're very far from that possibility."

"On the issue of impeachment, I am doing my homework," Gabbard said at the Hilo, Hawaii, event. "I am studying more about the impeachment process. I will just say I understand the calls for impeachment, but what I am being cautious about and what I give you food for thought about is that if President Trump is impeached, the problems don't go away, because then you have a Vice President Pence who becomes President Pence."

Texas Rep. Shelia Jackson Lee: Jackson Lee first raised the possibility of impeachment in March after President Trump made unfounded claims that he had been wiretapped by the Obama administration.

Lee went further in late March at an event for the National Newspaper Publishers Association.

Lee also raised the possibility of impeaching Trump during a commencement address at Texas Southern University this week, according to local Fox26 News in Houston.

California Rep. Nanette Diaz Barragn: Barragn raised the possibility of impeachment at a town hall in her district on May 15.

"Every day there's something new, the more I smell impeachment," Barragn said.

Barragn's office told CNN's KFile she wasn't directly calling for impeachment.

California Rep. Ted Lieu: Lieu said on May 16 that Democrats would follow the facts following reports that former FBI Director James Comey wrote in a memo that President Donald Trump asked him to end the investigation of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.

"As an American I hope impeachment does not happen," Lieu added. "That is never good for a system of government, but we do have to follow the facts and the investigation where it leads. Certainly impeachment is possible. Obstruction of justice was in fact the first article of impeachment during Richard Nixon's tenure."

Maine Sen. Angus King: King, an Independent who caucuses with the Democrats, told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on May 16 that the possibility of impeachment was getting closer.

"If indeed the President tried to tell the director of the FBI who worked for him that he should drop an investigation, whether it was Michael Flynn or whether it was some investigation that had nothing to do with Russia or politics or the election, that's a very serious matter," King said.

"If these allegations, senator, are true, are we getting closer to the possibility of yet another impeachment process?" Wolf Blitzer asked.

"Reluctantly, Wolf, I have to say yes, simply because obstruction of justice is such a serious offense," King responded.

Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal: Jayapal released a statement in response to the May 16 Comey memo news saying, "If true, Donald Trump's attempt to influence and intimidate the FBI Director James Comey to block an investigation is a textbook definition of obstruction of justice and it would be an impeachable offense."

Massachusetts Rep. Stephen Lynch: Lynch said on May 17 it would be grounds for impeachment if the President attempted to interfere with an FBI investigation into Michael Flynn.

"May be grounds, absolutely," Lynch said on local public radio when asked about impeachment.

Lynch added if the President interfered with an ongoing investigation "for a corrupt purpose," then "this would be an impeachable offense."

Tennessee Rep. Steve Cohen: Cohen said his "belly" wants to go forward with impeachment but his brain is saying wait for more facts.

New York Rep. Adriano Espaillat: Espaillat retweeted a tweet citing comments from CNN contributor David Gergen, who said, "I think we're in impeachment territory."

A spokeswoman for the congressman confirmed he was calling for Trump's impeachment.

"Rep. Espaillat is calling for Trump's impeachment. He will be talking about this issue later this evening on the House floor, likely around 6pm," his spokeswoman said.

Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings: In an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer on May 16, Cummings said obstruction of justice by the President would be an impeachable offense.

"CNN is reporting that this memo that was written by the FBI Director James Comey, says, among other things, 'I hope you can let this go,'" Blitzer said. "The New York Times says the memo also says, 'I hope you can see your way clear of letting this go, Michael Flynn go, he is a good guy. I hope can you let this go.' Is that, potentially, impeachable if it is an obstruction of justice?

"I think we have to look into it further, Wolf. But I would think so," replied Cummings.

Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline: Cicilline said if the President obstructed justice, it would be grounds for impeachment.

"These are very, very serious allegations," Cicilline said in an interview with WJAR on May 17. "No one in our country is above the law, including the President of the United States. And if in fact he attempted to impede or prevent an investigation and obstructed justice, that is a basis for removal from office."

"Let's be clear: In the past, there has been strong bipartisan agreement that obstruction of justice is an impeachable offense," she said. "That's not a Democratic position or a Republican conviction, it is a bipartisan position. And if the facts that are currently alleged are proven, then we should take the next step."

New York Rep. Yvette Clarke: Clarke tweeted on May 17: "We have to remove @realDonaldTrump from the White House as soon as possible. #Impeach45"

Originally posted here:
A running list of Democrats who have discussed impeachment

WASHINGTON U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday denounced as a "detestable lie" the idea he colluded with Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, and he clashed with Democratic lawmakers over his refusal to detail his conversations with President Donald Trump.

Sessions, a senior member of Trump's Cabinet and an adviser to his election team, had a series of tense exchanges with Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee during about 2-1/2 hours of high-stakes testimony as they pressed him to recount discussions with the Republican president.

"You raised your right hand here today and said you would solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth," Democratic Senator Martin Heinrich said. "Now you're not answering questions. You're impeding this investigation."

Sessions refused to say whether he and Trump discussed FBI director James Comey's handling of an investigation into possible coordination between Trump's campaign and Russia during the election campaign before the president fired Comey on May 9.

He declined to say whether Trump expressed concern over Sessions' decision in March to recuse himself from the Russia investigation, and he refused to say if Justice Department officials discussed possible presidential pardons of individuals being looked at in the probe.

Democratic Senator Ron Wyden told Sessions, "I believe the American people have had it with stonewalling. Americans don't want to hear that answers to relevant questions are privileged."

"I am not stonewalling," Sessions replied, saying he was simply following Justice Department policy not to discuss confidential communications with the president.

Sessions' testimony did not provide damaging new information on any Trump campaign ties with Russia or on Comey's firing, but his refusal to discuss conversations with Trump raised fresh questions about whether the White House has something to hide.

Last week, Comey told the same Senate committee that Trump had fired him to undermine the FBI's investigation of the Russia matter.

Sessions had recommended that Comey be fired, and Trump's decision prompted critics to charge that the president was trying to interfere with a criminal investigation. Sessions on Tuesday defended his involvement in Comey's firing despite recusing himself from the Russia probe.

Senator Angus King, an independent, questioned Sessions' legal basis for refusing to answer questions after Sessions said Trump had not invoked executive privilege regarding the conversations.

Executive privilege is a power that can be claimed by a president or senior executive branch officials to withhold information from Congress or the courts to protect the executive branch decision-making process.

Sessions said it would be "inappropriate" for him to reveal private conversations with Trump when the president "has not had a full opportunity to review the questions and to make a decision on whether or not to approve such an answer."

'APPALLING AND DETESTABLE LIE'

Sessions' clash with the Democratic senators was the latest chapter in a saga that has dogged Trump's first five months as president and distracted from his domestic policy agenda including major healthcare and tax cut initiatives.

"The suggestion that I participated in any collusion or that I was aware of any collusion with the Russian government to hurt this country, which I have served with honor for over 35 years, or to undermine the integrity of our democratic process, is an appalling and detestable lie," Sessions said.

"I have never met with or had any conversation with any Russians or any foreign officials concerning any type of interference with any campaign or election in the United States. Further, I have no knowledge of any such conversations by anyone connected with the Trump campaign."

U.S. intelligence agencies concluded in a report released in January that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an effort to interfere in the election to help Trump in part by hacking and releasing damaging emails about Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

Russia has denied any such interference, and Trump has denied any collusion by his campaign with Moscow.

Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation in March after revelations that he had failed to disclose two meetings last year with Russia's ambassador to Washington, Sergei Kislyak.

In his testimony on Tuesday, Sessions addressed media reports that he may have had a third previously undisclosed meeting with Kislyak at Washington's Mayflower Hotel last year.

Sessions said he did not have any private meetings and could not recall any conversations with any Russian officials at the hotel but did not rule out that a "brief interaction" with Kislyak may have occurred there.

Sessions, a Republican former senator, was an early supporter of Trump's presidential campaign. But there has been tension between the two men in recent weeks because Trump was annoyed that Sessions recused himself from the Russia probe.

Sessions said on Tuesday he did not recuse himself because he felt he was a subject of the investigation himself but rather because he felt he was required to by Justice Department rules.

(Reporting by Julia Edwards Ainsley and Patricia Zengerle; Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu, Richard Cowan, Andy Sullivan, Amanda Becker, Warren Strobel, Steve Holland, David Alexander and Mohammad Zargham; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

WASHINGTON U.S. President Donald Trump has given Defense Secretary Jim Mattis the authority to set troop levels in Afghanistan, a U.S. official told Reuters on Tuesday, opening the door for future troop increases requested by the U.S. commander.

WASHINGTON U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Tuesday a policy of engagement with Cuba has financially benefited the island's government in violation of U.S. law, further fueling expectations that President Donald Trump this week will roll back parts of former President Barack Obamas opening to Havana.

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Sessions angers Democrats with refusal to testify on Trump conversations - Reuters