Last Week In Congress: How Cascadia’s U.S. lawmakers voted (January 6th-10th)

Good morn­ing! Here’s how Cascadia’s Mem­bers of Con­gress vot­ed on major issues dur­ing the leg­isla­tive week end­ing Fri­day, Jan­u­ary 10th.

In the United States House of Representatives

ASSERTING CONGRESSIONAL CONTROL OVER WAR WITH IRAN: The House on Jan­u­ary 9th vot­ed, 224 for and 194 against, to require the Trump admin­is­tra­tion to obtain advance con­gres­sion­al approval for mil­i­tary actions against Iran or its proxy forces except when there is an immi­nent threat to the Unit­ed States, its armed forces or its territories.

The mea­sure (House Con­cur­rent Res­o­lu­tion 83) invoked the 1973 War Pow­ers Res­o­lu­tion, which asserts the pow­er of Con­gress to declare war under Arti­cle I of the Con­sti­tu­tion. Under the Viet­nam-era law, pres­i­dents must noti­fy Con­gress with­in forty-eight hours when they send the U.S. mil­i­tary into com­bat, then with­draw the forces with­in a spec­i­fied peri­od unless Con­gress has declared war against the ene­my or oth­er­wise autho­rized the action.

Democ­rats said the mea­sure will have priv­i­leged sta­tus in the Sen­ate and be eli­gi­ble for pas­sage by a major­i­ty vote there.

But Repub­li­cans called it non-bind­ing. The war pow­ers law has nev­er been suc­cess­ful­ly used to end hos­til­i­ties abroad. Last year, the House and Sen­ate invoked it to end America’s mil­i­tary involve­ment in Yemen’s civ­il war, but were turned back when Pres­i­dent Trump suc­cess­ful­ly vetoed the measure.

Thomas Massie, R‑Kentucky., said: “This vote isn’t about sup­port­ing or oppos­ing Pres­i­dent Trump.… [It] is about exer­cis­ing our con­sti­tu­tion­al author­i­ty. More impor­tant­ly, it is about our moral oblig­a­tion to decide when and where our troops are going to be asked to give their lives.”

Don Bacon, R‑Nebraska, said the res­o­lu­tion “is designed to embar­rass our pres­i­dent in front of the world and, in real­i­ty, gives com­fort to Iran’s lead­er­ship. It weak­ens Amer­i­ca and embold­ens our enemies.”

A yes vote was to send the mea­sure to the Senate.

	Vot­ing Nay (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Russ Fulcher Not Vot­ing (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Mike Simpson
	Vot­ing Aye (4): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzanne Bonam­i­ci, Earl Blu­me­nauer, Peter DeFazio, Kurt Schrader Vot­ing Nay (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Greg Walden
	Vot­ing Aye (7): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzan Del­Bene, Rick Larsen, Derek Kilmer, Prami­la Jaya­pal, Kim Schri­er, Adam Smith, and Den­ny Heck Vot­ing Nay (3): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Jaime Her­rera-Beut­ler, Dan New­house, and Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers

Cas­ca­dia total: 11 aye votes, 5 nay votes, 1 not voting

REGULATING CANCER-LINKED “PFAS” CHEMICALS: Vot­ing 247 for and 159 against, the House on Jan­u­ary 10th passed a bill (H.R. 535) that would give the Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency one year to des­ig­nate a class of chem­i­cals known as “PFAS” for cov­er­age by the fed­er­al Super­fund law (for­mal­ly known as the Com­pre­hen­sive Envi­ron­men­tal Response, Com­pen­sa­tion, and Lia­bil­i­ty Act of 1980), which requires aban­doned tox­ic sites to be cleaned up and impos­es retroac­tive legal lia­bil­i­ty on those respon­si­ble for the pollution.

The des­ig­na­tion would require cleanup actions near scores of mil­i­tary bases and man­u­fac­tur­ing sites through­out the Unit­ed States where PFAS com­pounds have leached into ground­wa­ter and drink­ing water.

But they would join a long list of Super­fund sites await­ing remediation.

The bill also would require the EPA to set stan­dards for PFA air emis­sions and lev­els in drink­ing water and test all PFAS com­pounds with­in five years, and it would bar new com­pounds from the marketplace.

“PFAS” stands for per­flu­o­roalkyl and poly­flu­o­roalkyl substances.

They are com­po­nents of fire-fight­ing foam used at air­ports and mil­i­tary instal­la­tions as well as non­stick cook­ware; per­son­al-care prod­ucts includ­ing floss and make­up; house­hold items includ­ing paints and stains; water-repel­lent cloth­ing and car­pet­ing; and oth­er every­day products.

There are more about 7,800 PFA com­pounds, some of which the Food and Drug Admin­is­tra­tion (FDA) has approved for use in food pack­ag­ing and med­ical devices, oth­ers of which are linked to extreme­ly seri­ous health con­di­tions includ­ing kid­ney, liv­er, tes­tic­u­lar and pan­cre­at­ic can­cers; infer­til­i­ty; weak­ened immune sys­tems and impaired child­hood development.

Mary Gay Scan­lon, D‑Pennsylvania, said: “The fact of the mat­ter is that the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment has known about the dan­gers pre­sent­ed by PFAs for years. The chem­i­cal indus­try has known for even longer and, unsur­pris­ing­ly, has fought tooth and nail against efforts to reg­u­late their dis­tri­b­u­tion and use.”

Deb­bie Lesko, R‑Arizona, said: “I don’t hear my Demo­c­ra­t­ic col­leagues here talk­ing about the PFAS chem­i­cals that are help­ing peo­ple,” such as devices that plug holes in infants’ hearts. She said the bill “cre­ates an unre­al­is­tic con­di­tion that EPA must require man­u­fac­tur­ers and proces­sors to test each chem­i­cal in the entire PFAS class.a task that will be enor­mous­ly expen­sive and time-consuming.”

A yes vote was to pass the bill.

	Vot­ing Nay (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Russ Fulcher Not Vot­ing (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Mike Simpson
	Vot­ing Aye (4): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzanne Bonam­i­ci, Earl Blu­me­nauer, Peter DeFazio, Kurt Schrader Vot­ing Nay (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Greg Walden
	Vot­ing Aye (8): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzan Del­Bene, Rick Larsen, Derek Kilmer, Prami­la Jaya­pal, Kim Schri­er, Adam Smith, and Den­ny Heck; Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Jaime Herrera-Beutler Vot­ing Nay (2): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Dan New­house and Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers

Cas­ca­dia total: 12 aye votes, 4 nay votes, 1 not voting

PROTECTING FETUSES FROM PFAS: Vot­ing 187 for and 219 against, the House on Jan­u­ary 10th defeat­ed a Repub­li­can-spon­sored motion spec­i­fy­ing that “the unborn child” be includ­ed in the “vul­ner­a­ble pop­u­la­tions” pro­tect­ed from PFAS in H.R. 535 (above) sec­tions con­cern­ing the Safe Drink­ing Water Act.

Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers, R‑Washington, said the act “already iden­ti­fies preg­nant women as an at-risk group. How­ev­er, there is not just one, there are two peo­ple at risk, the preg­nant woman and the unborn child.”

Deb­bie Din­gell, D‑Michigan, called the amend­ment unnec­es­sary because the bill suf­fi­cient­ly pro­tects vul­ner­a­ble populations.

A yes vote was to adopt the motion.

	Vot­ing Aye (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Russ Fulcher Not Vot­ing (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Mike Simpson
	Vot­ing Aye (1): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Greg Walden Vot­ing Nay (4): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzanne Bonam­i­ci, Earl Blu­me­nauer, Peter DeFazio, Kurt Schrader
	Vot­ing Aye (3): Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Jaime Her­rera-Beut­ler, Dan New­house, and Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers Vot­ing Nay (7): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzan Del­Bene, Rick Larsen, Derek Kilmer, Prami­la Jaya­pal, Kim Schri­er, Adam Smith, and Den­ny Heck

Cas­ca­dia total: 5 aye votes, 11 nay votes, 1 not voting

In the United States Senate

SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATOR JOVITA CARRANZA: Vot­ing 86 for and 5 against, the Sen­ate on Jan­u­ary 6th con­firmed Jovi­ta Car­ran­za, the Unit­ed States trea­sur­er since June 2017, as admin­is­tra­tor of the Small Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion, replac­ing Lin­da McMa­hon, who resigned in April 2019.

After a career of near­ly three decades with UPS, Car­ran­za served as deputy SBA admin­is­tra­tor under Pres­i­dent George W. Bush from 2006–2009. Car­ran­za, 71, was raised in Chica­go as the child of immi­grants from Mexico.

Ben­jamin Cardin, D‑Maryland, said: “In near­ly 30 years at UPS, where she began as a part-time pack­age han­dler, Trea­sur­er Car­ran­za became the high­est rank­ing Lati­na in the his­to­ry of the com­pa­ny… I am opti­mistic that [she] can be the leader and advo­cate that SBA and Amer­i­can small busi­ness­es need right now.”

No sen­a­tor spoke against the nominee.

A yes vote was to con­firm Carranza.

	Vot­ing Aye (2): Repub­li­can Sen­a­tors Jim Risch and Mike Crapo
	Vot­ing Nay (2): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tors Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley
	Vot­ing Aye (2): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tors Maria Cantwell and Pat­ty Murray

Cas­ca­dia total: 4 aye votes, 2 nay votes

Key votes ahead

The House will take up mea­sures con­cern­ing age dis­crim­i­na­tion in the work­place and stu­dent loan for­give­ness dur­ing the com­ing week of Jan­u­ary 13th, while the Sen­ate will vote on judi­cial and exec­u­tive branch nom­i­na­tions and pos­si­bly a mea­sure restrain­ing the admin­is­tra­tion’s actions against Iran.

Edi­tor’s Note: The infor­ma­tion in NPI’s week­ly How Cas­ca­di­a’s U.S. law­mak­ers vot­ed fea­ture is pro­vid­ed by Votera­ma in Con­gress, a ser­vice of Thomas Vot­ing Reports. All rights are reserved. Repro­duc­tion of this post is not per­mit­ted, not even with attri­bu­tion. Use the per­ma­nent link to this post to share it… thanks!

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