Letters from Capitol Hill that Members of Congress have written and signed on to lately.
Dec. 04 | HOUSE FLOOR SCHEDULE
On Wednesday, the House will meet at 10:00 a.m. for morning hour and noon for legislative business. First and last votes expected: 4:30 p.m.
Legislation Considered Under Suspension of the Rules:
H.R. 9598 – Office of National Drug Control Policy Reauthorization Act of 2024, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Comer / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 1695 – Strengthening Agency Management and Oversight of Software Assets Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Cartwright / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
S. 709 – Federal Agency Performance Act of 2023, as amended (Sponsored by Sen. Peters / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8717 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 20 West Main Street in Santaquin, Utah, as the "SGT Bill Hooser Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Owens / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8841 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 114 Center Street East in Roseau, Minnesota, as the "Floyd B. Olson Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Fischbach / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8919 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 151 Highway 74 South in Peachtree City, Georgia, as the "SFC Shawn McCloskey Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Ferguson / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8976 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 20 West White Street in Millstadt, Illinois, as the "Corporal Matthew A. Wyatt Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Bost / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 6116 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 14280 South Military Trail in Delray Beach, Florida, as the "Benjamin Berell Ferencz Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Frankel / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 7158 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 201 East Battles Road in Santa Maria, California, as the "Larry Lavagnino Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Carbajal / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 7508 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 1285 Emancipation Highway in Fredericksburg, Virginia, as the "Gladys P. Todd Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Spanberger / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8868 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 609 Portsmouth Avenue in Greenland, New Hampshire, as the "Chief Michael Maloney Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Pappas / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8909 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 82-6110 Mamalahoa Highway in Captain Cook, Hawaii, as the "Army 1st Lt. John Kuulei Kauhaihao Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Tokuda / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9285 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 3913 Leland Avenue Northwest in Comstock Park, Michigan, as the "Captain Miguel Justin Nava Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Scholten / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9322 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 675 Wolf Ledges Parkway in Akron, Ohio, as the "Judge James R. Williams Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Sykes / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9421 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 108 North Main Street in Bucoda, Washington, as the "Mayor Rob Gordon Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Perez / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9549 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 125 South 1st Avenue in Hillsboro, Oregon, as the "Elizabeth Furse Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Bonamici / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9580 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 2777 Brentwood Road in Raleigh, North Carolina, as the "Millie Dunn Veasey Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Ross / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9600 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 119 Main Street in Plains, Georgia, as the "Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Bishop (GA) / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 8641 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 401 Main Street in Brawley, California, as the "Walter Francis Ulloa Memorial Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Ruiz / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9360 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 300 Macedonia Lane in Knoxville, Tennessee, as the "Reverend Harold Middlebrook Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Burchett / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9544 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 340 South Loudon Avenue in Baltimore, Maryland, as the "United States Representative Elijah E. Cummings Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Mfume / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9775 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 119 North Anderson Street in Elwood, Indiana, as the "Officer Noah Jacob Shahnavaz Post Office Building" (Sponsored by Rep. Spartz / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 10065 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 802 North Tancahua Street in Corpus Christi, Texas, as the "Captain Robert E. 'Bob' Batterson Post Office" (Sponsored by Rep. Cloud / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 7507 – To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 203 East 6th Street in Lexington, Nebraska, as the "Bill Barrett Post Office Building," as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Smith (NE) / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 9566 – SHARE IT Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Langworthy / Oversight and Accountability Committee)
H.R. 1088 – Shirley Chisholm Congressional Gold Medal Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Lee (CA) / Financial Services Committee)
S. 91 – Forgotten Heroes of the Holocaust Congressional Gold Medal Act (Sponsored by Sen. Hagerty / Financial Services Committee)
H.R. 6751 – Roberto Clemente Commemorative Coin Act (Sponsored by Rep. Espaillat / Financial Services Committee)
H.R. 7480 – Disabled Veterans Housing Support Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. De La Cruz / Financial Services Committee)
H.R. 3507 – Yes In My Backyard Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Kilmer / Financial Services Committee)
Postponed suspensions:
H.R. 390 – Maurice D. Hinchey Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area Enhancement Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Stefanik / Natural Resources Committee)
H.R. 8219 – Lahaina National Heritage Area Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Tokuda / Natural Resources Committee)
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Dec. 03
Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Sam Graves (R-MO) and Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management Subcommittee Chairman Scott Perry (R-PA) asked the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General to conduct an investigation of incidents in which Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) employees actively avoided homes in disaster areas that displayed political signs and flags associated with the Trump campaign.
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Dec. 03
Congressman Roger Williams (TX-25), led 11 members in a letter to U.S. Department of Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen and Financial Crimes Enforcement Network Director, Andrea Gacki, expressing deep concerns regarding the Beneficial Ownership Information (BOI) reporting requirements under the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), which will impose burdensome regulations on small businesses nationwide.
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Dec. 03 | PRESS RELEASE
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs announced it will fund a $1.5 million study on MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD and alcohol use disorder among Veterans. This announcement was made following an August 2nd letter from Representative Jack Bergman (R-MI), Representative Lou Correa (D-CA), and 58 other Members of Congress, in which the lawmakers urged the VA to address the post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and suicide epidemic among Veterans and Servicemembers. The Representatives had implored the Biden Administration to research and make available new and better treatment options like MDMA-assisted therapy for those Veterans and Servicemembers suffering from the invisible wounds of service.
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Dec. 03 | FLOOR REMARKS
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today spoke on the Senate floor paying tribute to longtime friend and Senate colleague Joe Manchin as he bids farewell to the Senate in his retirement. Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed.
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Dec. 03
U.S. Senate Commerce Committee Chair Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Ranking Member Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), and Sens. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), Bill Cassidy (R-La.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), authors of bipartisan bills to protect children online, wrote to House Republican Leaders urging them to pass the Kids Online Safety and Privacy Act (KOSPA) package before the end of the year. The legislation to protect children from increasing harms caused by social media has languished in the House for months after overwhelmingly passing the Senate, 91-3, in July.
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Dec. 03 | PRESS RELEASE
U.S. Senate Commerce Committee Ranking Member Ted Cruz’s (R-Texas) bipartisan legislation, the TAKE IT DOWN Act, today passed the Senate unanimously and now moves to the House for consideration. The TAKE IT DOWN Act, which Sen. Cruz introduced with Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), would criminalize the publication of non-consensual intimate imagery (NCII), including AI-generated NCII (commonly referred to as “deepfake revenge pornography”), and require social media and similar websites to have in place procedures to remove such content within 48 hours of notice from a victim.
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Dec. 03 | FLOOR STATEMENT
U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, spoke on the Senate floor highlighting the urgent need for Congress to pass legal protections for noncitizens who were brought to the United States as children, known as Dreamers, especially as President-elect Donald Trump campaigned on an immigration platform of “mass deportations.”
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Dec. 02
This announcement follows previous proposals by the USPS to consolidate and relocate McAllen and San Antonio mail processing operations to the San Antonio Processing and Distribution Center (P&DC) in 2025 which would have disrupted and delayed mail delivery for South Texans. Congressman Gonzalez, along with Congressmen Joaquin Castro (TX-20), Henry Cuellar (TX-28), and Greg Casar (TX-35), previously urged USPS to reconsider these plans in a letter to Postmaster General Louis DeJoy earlier this year. USPS has not yet made a decision for Corpus Christi relocation plans.
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Dec. 02
Bronx Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) opened a new front in his public war against Gov. Kathy Hochul — calling for an investigation into claims her office rigged a bid to oversee New York’s allegedly fraud-ridden $9 billion home care Medicaid program.
Torres sent a letter to state and federal authorities urging them “to investigate alleged attempts by the Hochul Administration to put the $9 billion CDPAP [Consumer Directed Personal Assistance Program] in the hands of a single out-of-state vendor with a questionable track record and to do so under false pretenses.”
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Dec. 02
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) launched a challenge to top House Judiciary Democrat Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) on Monday afternoon in a letter to Democratic colleagues.
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Dec. 02
U.S. Representative Jason Smith (Mo.), along with members of the Missouri congressional delegation, called on the Biden administration to move quickly to approve Missouri Governor Mike Parson’s request for a major disaster declaration following the severe weather that destroyed homes, businesses, and infrastructure and caused multiple deaths in southeast and south-central Missouri last month. The disaster declaration includes a total of 14 counties, 11 of which are located in Missouri’s 8th Congressional District.
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Dec. 02
Education and the Workforce Committee Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) called on the Biden-Harris administration’s Department of Education to withdraw its proposed rule to "cancel" borrowers’ student loans based on "hardships."
In a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, Foxx outlines the illegality of this latest debt transfer scheme.
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Dec. 02
Congressman Nick Langworthy (NY-23) led members of New York’s Congressional Delegation in sending a letter to New York City Department of Education (NYC-DOE) Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos, demanding answers and accountability for the reported use of “Problem Codes” to flag educators who lawfully declined COVID-19 vaccinations. These codes, originally intended to flag employees for severe misconduct, such as child abuse, are being applied to unvaccinated teachers, resulting in career-damaging consequences.
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Dec. 02 | HEARING THURSDAY
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), today announced that the committee will hold a hearing this Thursday, December 5 at 10:00 a.m. ET titled, “What Is the FDA Doing to Reduce the Diabetes and Obesity Epidemics in America and Take on the Greed of the Food and Beverage Industry?”
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Dec. 02 | FLOOR REMARKS
U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks on the Senate floor regarding outstanding business:
“The Senate has three weeks to complete some of the most important business of the year. And at this late hour, we’ll have to act on legislation that comes to us from the House.
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Dec. 02 | SENATE LEGISLATION
U.S. Senator Susan Collins, a senior member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, and Senator Joe Manchin (I-WV) introduced the Improving Access to Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Act. This bipartisan legislation would create a pilot program to allow Medicare to reimburse for treat-in-place EMS services for certain medical issues, which would expand access to these critical health services, especially in rural communities, while reducing unnecessary emergency room visits and expenses.
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Dec. 02 | STATEMENT
Congresswoman Yvette D. Clarke (NY-09) released the following statement:
“I was honored to join the bipartisan Congressional delegation to Barbados over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. As a daughter to Jamaican immigrants and representative of a large Caribbean-American population within my district, I am committed to fostering and enhancing the vital economic partnership between the United States and the Caribbean.
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Dec. 02 | STATEMENT
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries released the following statement after Rep. Grijalva announced he will not seek re-election as Ranking Member of the Natural Resources Committee:
Raúl Grijalva has spent his entire career fighting for historically underrepresented communities and the least, the lost and the left behind. For a decade, Rep. Grijalva served as Co-Chair of the Progressive Caucus where he championed efforts to grow the middle class, expand access to high-quality health care and fix our broken immigration system.
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Dec. 02 | STATEMENT
Today, Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Ken Calvert (CA-41) issued the following statement regarding the recently released Defense Department audit:
“We have a responsibility to the American taxpayer to use every defense dollar effectively to strengthen our national security. This 7th failure of the Department of Defense to achieve a clean audit undermines this commitment. I don’t want to hear about progress, I want a clean audit as soon as possible. I will continue to push the Department and military services to take seriously the responsibility to achieve a clean Pentagon audit. I appreciate the hard work of the Marine Corps, who remain the only military service to achieve a clean audit opinion.”
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Dec. 02 | OVERSIGHT REPORT
From the Office of the Inspector General
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Dec. 01
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) sent the following letter to Senator John Thune (R-SD), incoming Republican Senate Leader, reiterating Senate Democrats commitment to their constitutional duty to provide advice and consent for all of the incoming president’s nominations and urging the Senate to exercise this most critical responsibility:
In a new letter, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) pressed incoming Republican Leader John Thune (R-SD) to work with Senate Democrats in a bipartisan fashion to review each of the incoming president’s nominations and offer advice and consent.
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Nov. 27 | OVERSIGHT REPORT
From the Inspector General of the Department of Defense
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Nov. 26
U.S. Representative John Rose (TN-06) led a letter to Secretary Gina Raimondo urging the Department of Commerce to finalize robust tariffs on Indian ceramic tile imports. The tile manufacturing industry, which has a direct presence in the Upper Cumberland, has been negatively impacted by the unfair and uncompetitive trade practices of Indian tile exporters, threatening good-paying manufacturing jobs in Tennessee.
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Nov. 26 | 4,300 NEW JOBS
U.S. Senators Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) and U.S. Representatives Teresa Leger Fernández (D-N.M.), Melanie Stansbury (D-N.M.), and Gabe Vasquez (D-N.M.) praised a $500 million investment from the CHIPS and Science Act for Intel’s Rio Rancho facility.
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Nov. 22
In a bicameral letter led by U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Representatives Chris Smith (R-N.J.), Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), and Claudia Tenney (R-N.Y.), 112 Members of Congress asked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to investigate and report on the amount of federal funding that has been awarded to abortion providers—including Planned Parenthood—over the past three years:
“We are writing to request updated information on federal funding for Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs), Planned Parenthood Federation of America, International Planned Parenthood Federation, MSI Reproductive Choices, and four domestic abortion providers,” the lawmakers wrote.
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Nov. 18
U.S. Representatives John Garamendi (D-CA-08), Chrissy Houlahan (D-PA-06), and Garrett Graves (R-LA-6) sent a letter to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Acting Director Robert Shriver requesting that OPM take various measures to make it easier for Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCV), who are employed through the federal government after their service, to access the benefits they’ve earned by successfully completing their Peace Corps service. Rep. Garamendi is the only currently-serving Returned Peace Corps Volunteer in Congress (Ethiopia, 1966-1968). Reps. Garamendi and Graves (R-LA) co-chair the bipartisan Congressional Peace Corps Caucus.
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Nov. 18 | STATEMENT
As U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal took to the podium Monday at the celebratory opening of the $43 million Residences at Mill 8, Thomas Erb kept his eye in his watch and his ear to the sky.
It was nearly noon. And Erb, president of Electric Time Co. of Medfield, was the contractor who repaired and restored the building’s signature clock with its 10-foot dials that caps the 110-year-old building but hadn’t told time in decades. The friendly bells had fallen silent to neglect.
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