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The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) misled Congress on the number of veteran deaths in its health care system, adding to a growing list of untruths that VA has told congressmen trying to investigate the scandal-plagued department. The House Committee on Veterans Affairs, chaired by Republican Rep. Jeff Miller, is the latest victim of VA’s dishonesty. VA provided the committee an April 7, 2014 fact sheet purporting to show all of the cases of delays and preventable veteran deaths it oversaw in its gastrointestinal care in the last fifteen years. “As a result of the consult delay issue VA discovered...

One House Republican decided his colleagues needed a little inspiration, so he sent every one of them a new Bible. Rep. Steven Palazzo (R-MS) sent a letter as well, telling each of his House and Senate colleagues that the “best advice comes through meditating on God’s Word” and that the Holy Bible could “help guide you in your decision-making.” …

On Thursday, House Republicans failed to pass a piece of legislation related to the border crisis. The commentariat in Washington roundly criticized the House Republican leadership. On Friday, instead of trying to ram through a piece of legislation, the House GOP found consensus among its members and passed the legislation. The commentariat roundly criticized the GOP for passing something that could not make it out of the Senate. Never mind that the Senate had already fled Washington. The Wall Street Journal editorial page assailed conservatives, Ted Cruz, Jeff Sessions, and the House GOP for bringing to the public’s attention to...

Editors Note: The MSM continues to react to the turning point in the immigration debate that occurred last week in DC. We reprint here.Don’t be confused about what happened in the House of Representatives on Friday: It was a huge win for the far right, a major victory for Ted Cruz, an embarrassment for John Boehner, and, potentially, a pivotal moment that will make future dealings between the White House and congressional Republicans, if you can possibly believe it, far worse than they’ve been already. What happened, as you probably know, is that Boehner had a bill ready to go...

The filing of a lawsuit against the president of the United States by the House of Representatives is an historic event which will clarify the legislative process defined by our Constitution. Those who denounce it as political posturing are afraid of losing it. Those who see it as one party against the other don’t understand it. Those who care about rule of law will embrace it. In short, the suit asks the judicial branch to settle a dispute between the executive branch and the legislative branch, having to do with which is authorized by the Constitution to make and change...

Meet the Press featured a segment this Sunday that illustrates the planted liberal axioms that dominate our political culture. The topic was Congress’s failure to “get anything done” this term. NBC News’s chief White House correspondent, Chuck Todd, set the stage: New polling from NBC News, the Wall Street Journal, and Marist . . . shows that three out of four voters agree that Congress hasn’t done much this year . . . And guess what? The public’s right. Congress hasn’t been productive. In fact, this Congress . . . is on track to be the least productive in...

Michael Steele thinks House Speaker John Boehner needs to keep closer tabs on Sen. Ted Cruz. The former Republican National Committee chairman on Monday poked fun at reports that some House Republicans changed their minds on crucial border legislation last week after meeting with Cruz, the Texas Republican and tea party icon. “For John Boehner, whenever any of his members says, ‘Hey, I’m about to have pizza and beer with Ted Cruz,’ he should be concerned,” Steele joked. “Really look at the calendar and see if there’s a vote coming up,” he said, adding that Cruz “undermined” GOP leaders. Steele...

Members of Congress are losing patience with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. In a sharply-worded letter, Democrats and Republicans who’ve led House efforts to advance U.S.-Turkish relations warned Erdogan last week about what they considered to be his anti-Semitic comments. They told him he risked damaging ties between the U.S. and Turkey. …

Blackburn told TheBlaze that 356 bills made it through the House and are languishing in the Senate. Additionally, according to the congresswoman, 98 percent of those bills were passed with bipartisan support. She also pointed out that 200 of the bills were passed in the House with unanimous support from the entire chamber and more than 100 were passed with 75% support of House Democrats. To make her point that the House is working, but the Senate is where the obstruction exists, Blackburn printed all of the bills that the House has passed and stacked them on a desk with...

In a suburb of our nation’s capitol, I learned that most kids’ fathers were not Marine Corps fighter pilots, but mine was. My dad told me that when I was born, he was deployed overseas to hunt down communist aviators and to rain down terror on America’s enemies by lighting Ho Chi Minh’s soldiers on fire. My dad had this patented-daring side that often made light of dark subjects and traumatized morally superior Americans like Jane Fonda. But my dad’s equally austere side taught me to respect the danger, sacrifices, and valor of warriors who have served our country honorably....

A monumental opportunity has presented itself as Julian Castro, former mayor of San Antonio, takes over as the new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and Congress looks ahead on the critical issue of housing finance reform. After years of tepid growth and false starts, leaders in Washington have the opportunity to give housing finance reform a shot in the arm. This reform is readily achievable even in today’s log-jammed Congress, as there is bipartisan consensus that the most prudent reforms would accomplish three essential goals: appropriately and strategically wind down Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in a way...

At his best Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., made short work of a Democrat-friendly law professor testifying before Congress, even offering him some “free litigation advice.” The former prosecutor turned congressman was surgical in his questioning of Professor Charles Tiefer, who was brought before the House Judiciary Committee as an expert witness by Democrats — Tiefer has a history of being of service to the Democratic Party, according to The Blaze. “Professor Tiefer, would you seat a juror who referred to your client as an obscene body part?” Gowdy asked in his opening question.

House of representatives of the 113th Congress Alabama District Name Party Room Phone Committee Assignment 1 Bonner, Jo R 2236 RHOB 202-225-4931 Appropriations 2 Roby, Martha R 428 CHOB 202-225-2901 AgricultureArmed ServicesEducation and the Workforce 3 Rogers (AL), Mike R 324 CHOB 202-225-3261 AgricultureArmed ServicesHomeland Security 4 Aderholt, Robert R 2369 RHOB 202-225-4876 Appropriations 5 Brooks, Mo R 1230 LHOB 202-225-4801 Armed ServicesForeign AffairsScience, Space, and Technology 6 Bachus, Spencer R 2246 RHOB 202-225-4921 Financial ServicesJudiciary 7 Sewell, Terri A. D 1133 LHOB 202-225-2665 Financial ServicesPermanent Select Committee on Intelligence Alaska District Name Party Room Phone Committee Assignment At Large...

House Republicans expressed confidence Friday that they would win passage of a revised $694-billion measure to provide emergency funds for the border crisis, but only after making the package tougher on immigrants and adding more money for border state governors, namely Texas' Rick Perry. Whether the two-bill package can pass the House, however, remained uncertain as Democrats largely opposed it and conservatives inspired by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas still had objections. After failing to muster enough support for an earlier package on Thursday, House Speaker John A. Boehner postponed lawmakers' August break, which was scheduled to begin Friday....

My friend Vaughn posted this on his Facebook timeline. Can someone explain why congress needs to take a break in August. It is not like they have done anything to earn a break.Oh wait! I forgot they need to go home to stay in touch and listen to the people they represent. Oh wait! They don’t listen to those people. Oh wait! They need to go home to cash the checks from the people they do listen to, you know the corporations, billionaires and lobbyists. We have continually returned the same corrupt, owned, elitist group to office year after year. We are the...

House Speaker John A. Boehner was always expected to have trouble passing emergency funds for the crisis at the Southwestern border -- but Republican Sen. Ted Cruz made his job impossible. Cruz, the hard-line Texas Republican, has been working behind the scenes to stir up conservative opposition to a House GOP plan to approve $659 million to secure the border and handle the flow of 57,000 migrant youths. And it worked. Amid disarray, House GOP leaders canceled Thursday's vote after it was clear they did not have the votes. The senator's handiwork lighted up the telephone lines in the Capitol...

You may not have heard much from Senator Ted Cruz lately, but on Thursday, he came back with a force in blowing up House Republicans’ bill to address the border crisis. Make no mistake, House Speaker John Boehner—and the rest of the Republican establishment—still have a big Ted Cruz problem. And it’s only going to get bigger as the 2016 presidential election approaches. As it stands now, Cruz has successfully persuaded a block of House Republicans to vote against the House GOP’s border bill, forcing Boehner to pull the legislation from the docket. The situation is still fluid. The House...

Over the past two years, the Obama administration has published hundreds and hundreds of rules — on how wheelchairs should be stowed aboard U.S. aircraft, how foreign trade zones should be regulated, how voting assistance should be provided for U.S. citizens overseas, and so on. There’s a problem, however: Technically speaking, these and some 1,800 other regulations shouldn’t be in effect because they weren’t reported to Congress as required. Yet there is little that lawmakers or the courts can do about it. The situation illustrates the obscure, Byzantine process used to create federal regulations — and how easily it can...

In June, President Barack Obama sent a letter to Congress asking for help to address the surge of illegal crossings at the Texas-Mexico border. Among other items, Obama asked Congress to grant him the legal authority "to exercise discretion in processing the return and removal of unaccompanied minor children from non-contiguous countries like Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador." The administration blamed a 2008 anti-human-trafficking law signed by President George W. Bush for preventing officials from promptly deporting minors not eligible for asylum. House Republicans were happy to oblige. Speaker John Boehner maintained that voters would not accept spending more money...

he House has voted to sue President Obama over his various unilateral executive actions. No doubt all will be shocked to discover it was a party line vote. Obama’s response was typical, he wishes Republicans would “stop just hatin’ all the time.” Anyone who opposes a President who ignores the Constitution is “hatin’.” Worse still, Republicans are mad because Obama is just doing his job. Not the job as defined by the Constitution, which requires the President to enforce the laws passed by Congress. Rather Obama refers to the job as he imagines it wherein he issues dictates and everyone...