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Senate foreign relations committee Chairman John Kerry and the State Department have canceled Sen. Jim DeMint's plans to meet interim Honduran President Roberto Micheletti on Friday. The trip, which DeMint was going to make with three members of the House, would have flouted a White House ban against direct contact with the leaders of the June military coup. While the White House seeks to pressure the interim government through isolation, DeMint and other conservatives have defended the coup, which the Honduran miltary claims was necessary to prevent then-President Manuel Zelaya from rewriting the country's constitution. DeMint, R-S.C., and his fellow...

Democrats are now 'soft favorites' to take the House, according to an analysis by University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato and his team. The latest periodic installment of Sabato's 'Crystal Ball' newsletter handicapping congressional the elections shifts 17 House races in the direction of Democrats. Race-by-race rankings are moving several GOP incumbents into the tossup category. Among them are Texas Rep. John Culberson, Illinois Rep. Peter Roskam, Indiana Rep. Steve Chabot, and Iowa Rep. David Young.

Senators urge president to enforce provisions 'as enacted and intended' Leading Democrats are taking aim at the Obama administration for its opposition to newly passed legislation that aims to bolster the U.S.-Israel economic relationship and combat boycotts of Israel, according to a statement issued this week. The Obama administration announced that it opposes portions of a bipartisan trade bill that would strengthen economic ties between the U.S. and Israel and force trade partners to sever ties with backers of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, an anti-Israel movement that seeks to economically isolate the Jewish state. President Barack Obama...

(Washington, DC) Republicans in the House of Representatives have banded together to ensure a cooperative debate on strategy and party disagreements before House GOP conference chairwoman Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) can try to help House Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) take Rep. John Boehner (R-OH)’s ’s soon-to-be-vacated job as House Speaker, and instead force a special extended conference meeting that can now happen without McMorris Rodgers’ approval. The debate is enabled by Rep. Peter Roskam (R-IL), who was circulating a letter to his colleagues calling for debate on the Speakership process. At least 50 fellow GOP members have...

Politico scored a journalistic coup with its exclusive 2014 profile on Lois Lerner, the former IRS official at the center of the agency's targeting of conservative groups. But a former Illinois lawmaker who said Politico contacted him repeatedly that year with questions regarding claims he was targeted by Lerner in the mid-1990s has been left wondering why the news group chose to ignore his documented dealings with the former federal official. "I was shocked," Al Salvi told the Washington Examiner's media desk, describing what he characterizes as several "lengthy" interviews with Politico reporter Rachael Bade. Lerner went after his 1996...

The Nuclear Iran Deal that is at the epicenter of a Congressional battle and the focus of so much attention for months is not actually any deal at all, as not one of the parties, including any representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran, has signed the Agreement. This morning, Sept. 18, Cong. Mike Pompeo (R-KS-04) sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry. In that letter Pompeo informed the Secretary that while reviewing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (Nuclear Iran Deal), he noted that there are no signatures on the so-called final Agreement. Without signatures, there can...

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) is furious that House GOP leadership is considering holding a vote on a resolution of disapproval of President Barack Obama’s nuclear arms deal with the Islamic Republican of Iran under the terms of the Iran deal constructs put forward in legislation approved earlier this year from Sens. Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) and Ben Cardin (D-MD).

House Republican leaders are delaying a vote on the Iran nuclear deal scheduled for Wednesday because of a rebellion from rank-and-file conservatives. The House was to hold a procedural vote to begin 11 hours of debate on a resolution disapproving the deal at 1 p.m. Instead, they will gather at 4 p.m. to discuss strategy. "We will continue the conversation on Iran from this morning and discuss strategy for the rest of the week," a GOP leadership aide said. The House subsequently went into recess shortly after noon once leadership called off the procedural vote. GOP leaders had to change...

Today’s vote has now been delayed and the House GOP caucus will meet at 4 p.m. to find a way forward because John Boehner once again miscalculated the degree of support he had in his own caucus .Members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus are demanding that the Obama administration send side deals between Iran and international nuclear inspectors to Congress as part of the Iran deal now under consideration. Opponents of the deal have argued that the clock on congressional consideration of the deal has not even begun until these side deals are submitted. Rep. Peter Roskam (R-Ill.) has...

Mike Pompeo and David B. Rivkin Washington Post ..... "But the president has not given Congress a key side agreement between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). This document describes how key questions about the past military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear program will be resolved, as well as the precise operational parameters of the verification regime to which Tehran will be subject."

The upcoming rally at the U.S. Capitol against the U.S. nuclear agreement with Iran is still on - and has gained much momentum despite the fact that President Obama has secured enough support in the Senate to prevent Republican forces from blocking it. Some star power is involved. The speaker’s roster for the event on Wednesday afternoon now includes Republicans Sen. Ted Cruz, Reps. Jim Bridenstine, Louie Gohmert, Steve King, Mike Pompeo, Ted Yolo; Donald Trump, broadcasters Glenn Beck and Mark Levin, American Conservative Union chairman Matt Schlapp, Citizens United founder David Bossie, Mort Klein, president of the Zionist Organization...

The Senate signed a "blank check" when it overwhelmingly endorsed the emerging Iran nuclear deal last week, and Rep. Mike Pompeo thinks the House can do better, he tells Newsmax TV. "We can do a much more robust piece of legislation," Pompeo, a Kansas Republican, said Monday on "The Steve Malzberg Show." "[One] that really does, in fact, prevent the administration from signing for a deal which lifts . . . sanctions without any evidence that Iran has actually adhered to anything that they've agreed to. "That's what perplexes me . . . They've now signed a blank check ....

Congressman Takes No [Bleep] From Obama Quin Hillyer Sophomore U.S. Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Kansas, graduated first in his class at West Point, graduated from Harvard Law School, had a hugely successful career in the aerospace industry, and also has a think-tank background. He may be a seriously rising star. Anyway, he put out a self-explanatory press release that is a beauty to behold. Today, White House Spokesman Jay Carney asked during a press briefing what Congressman Mike Pompeo, R-Kansas, would say to defense workers facing furlough because of the President’s sequester plan. The following is his statement: “Mr. Carney doesn’t...

House Republican leaders are facing a revolt by GOP lawmakers over plans to vote on a measure to disapprove of the Iran nuclear deal. Speaker John Boehner and other GOP leaders got an earful Wednesday morning from lawmakers who say President Barack Obama has not disclosed so-called "side deals" between the International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran, and therefore is crosswise with the law that gives Congress review power over the accord. GOP leaders are likely to change their approach Wednesday, and are now considering a vote on Rep. Peter Roskam's (R-Ill.) resolution that would delay a disapproval vote because...

Faced with a potential mutiny on a procedural vote to bring up a disapproval resolution on the Iran nuclear agreement, House GOP leadership is considering delaying the anti-deal vote and taking up different legislation stating that the president has not held up his side of the bargain. GOP leaders emerged from the Republican Conference’s weekly meeting Wednesday morning expressing some uncertainty about whether they should proceed with the anti-deal resolution. “We had a very healthy conversation with our members this morning,” Speaker John A. Boehner told reporters. “Certainly some interest amongst the ideas offered by [Rep. Mike] Pompeo and [Rep....

Robert S. Wistrich, who died suddenly last week, was considered the foremost scholar of anti-Semitism, which he called “the longest hatred,” one that appears to be metastasizing in the current era. Writing about Nazi anti-Semitism ruffles no feathers within academia and other elite circles. Mr. Wistrich, however, had been warning that “anti-Semitism has undergone a process of growing ‘Islamicization,’ linked to the terrorist holy war against Jews and other non-Muslims with its truly lethal consequences.” This “new” anti-Semitism,” he added, targetsIsrael, the only state with a Jewish majority: “the collective Jew.” “New” is a relative term: It was 40 years...

Move to eliminate all U.S. funding for diplomacy with Iran Congressional leaders have begun pressuring their colleagues to cut off all U.S. funding for the ongoing talks with Iran over its contested nuclear program as the Obama administration rushes to hash out the details of a deal in the coming months, according to multiple sources and a letter that will be sent next week to appropriators in the House of Representatives. With the deadline approaching, congressional Republicans have been exasperated by the Obama administration’s efforts to prevent them from having any oversight over the deal.

“Reinvigorating the leadership” is how one senior House staffer described the ascendency of Steve Scalise, the Louisiana Republican who won a first-ballot victory for the position of GOP whip. The staffer went on to portray Scalise as not a member of the Washington establishment. Indeed, Scalise is a former chair of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), the conservative caucus in the U.S. House. He has had a meteoric rise, and he is someone to be reckoned with. Scalise’s win follows Kevin McCarthy’s first-ballot victory for the GOP majority-leader slot. And here’s something I did not know: As whip, Scalise gets...

Rep. Roskam (R-IL) answered the following question to TellDC: What is going on to happen with potential contempt charges today against Lois Lerner in your House Ways and Means committee? (02:42)

A Republican congressman is calling for the federal government to hire a full-time watchdog for ObamaCare, amid ongoing concerns about fraud and mismanagement. Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., introduced a bill on Thursday that would create a "Special Inspector General for Monitoring the Affordable Care Act (SIGMA)." He told Fox News the position is needed to follow the money. "There's very specific criteria that the special inspector general is required to produce and follow up on," Roskam told Fox News. "But the point is it needs to be done holistically and in a larger context. It's just a common sense approach...