Last Week In Congress: How Cascadia’s U.S. lawmakers voted (March 20th-24th)

Good morn­ing! Here’s how Cascadia’s Mem­bers of Con­gress vot­ed on major issues dur­ing the leg­isla­tive week end­ing March 24th, 2023.

In the United States House of Representatives

POLITICS OVER PARENTS LEGISLATION: The House on March 24th passed the Par­ents Bill of Rights Act (H.R. 5), spon­sored by Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Julia Let­low, R‑Louisiana, to make fed­er­al fund­ing for local ele­men­tary and sec­ondary schools con­tin­gent on them noti­fy­ing a stu­den­t’s par­ents of their rights regard­ing aware­ness and over­sight of the school’s poli­cies, finances, and procedures.

Let­low said: “This bill aims to bring more trans­paren­cy and account­abil­i­ty to edu­ca­tion, allow­ing par­ents to be informed and, when they have ques­tions and con­cerns, to law­ful­ly bring them to their local school boards.”

An oppo­nent, Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Bob­by Scott, D‑Virginia, called the bill “an edu­ca­tion­al gag order across the nation which will pre­vent stu­dents from learn­ing and pre­vent teach­ers from teach­ing.” The vote was 213 yeas to 208 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 6 yea votes, 11 nay votes, 1 not voting

TRILATERAL PARTNERSHIP REPORTBACK: The House on March 22nd passed a bill (H.R. 1093), spon­sored by Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Michael T. McCaul, R‑Texas, to have the State Depart­ment report to Con­gress on State’s imple­men­ta­tion of a tri­lat­er­al U.S. secu­ri­ty part­ner­ship with Aus­tralia and the Unit­ed King­dom that includes coop­er­a­tion for devel­op­ing advanced mil­i­tary tech­nolo­gies. McCaul said the mea­sure “will begin to address numer­ous long-stand­ing chal­lenges in our arms exports to our clos­est allies and poten­tial­ly serve as a roadmap for work­ing with oth­er close allies and partners.”

The vote was 393 yeas to 4 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 14 yea votes, 3 not voting

TAIWAN POLICY GUIDANCE: The House on March 22nd passed a bill (H.R. 1159), spon­sored by Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Ann Wag­n­er, R‑Missouri, to require the State Depart­ment to peri­od­i­cal­ly update its guid­ance to Con­gress regard­ing U.S. pol­i­cy toward Tai­wan. Wag­n­er said changed guid­ance was need­ed giv­en Chi­na’s threats against Tai­wanese inde­pen­dence, and the bill would “ensure the Unit­ed States engages Tai­wan in a way that deep­ens our rela­tion­ship with this impor­tant part­ner.” The vote was 404 yeas to 7 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 15 yea votes, 2 not voting

SUPPORTING ASEAN DIPLOMACY: The House on March 23rd passed the Pro­vid­ing Appro­pri­ate Recog­ni­tion and Treat­ment Need­ed to Enhance Rela­tions with ASEAN Act (H.R. 406), spon­sored by Rep. Joaquin Cas­tro, D‑Texas, to pro­vide var­i­ous legal immu­ni­ties and priv­i­leges to the Asso­ci­a­tion of South­east Asian Nations. A sup­port­er, Rep. Ann Wag­n­er, R‑Mo., said it “will accord ASEAN rep­re­sen­ta­tives in the Unit­ed States the same diplo­mat­ic immu­ni­ties we pro­vide oth­er region­al orga­ni­za­tions, such as the EU or the Orga­ni­za­tion of Amer­i­can States. This is a tan­gi­ble demon­stra­tion of our com­mit­ment to that organization.”

The vote was 388 yeas to 33 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 17 yea votes, 1 not voting

FAILED VETO OVERRIDE ATTEMPT: The House on March 23rd failed to over­ride Pres­i­dent Biden’s veto of a res­o­lu­tion (H.J. Res. 30), spon­sored by Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Andy Barr, R‑Kentucky, to dis­ap­prove of and void a Labor Depart­ment rule issued in Decem­ber 2022 that autho­rized fidu­cia­ries of retire­ment plans to con­sid­er envi­ron­men­tal, social, and gov­er­nance (ESG) issues in their man­age­ment of the plans. Barr said pre­serv­ing the rule would put Amer­i­cans “into less diver­si­fied, high­er fees, and low­er-per­form­ing port­fo­lios at pre­cise­ly the time that we need to max­i­mize finan­cial secu­ri­ty for Amer­i­cans approach­ing retirement.”

A res­o­lu­tion oppo­nent, Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Bob­by Scott, D‑Virginia, said it “sought to nul­li­fy a pop­u­lar and sen­si­ble rule that enabled retire­ment plan man­agers to make ful­ly informed invest­ment decisions.”

The vote was 219 yeas to 200 nays, with a two-thirds thresh­old required to over­ride the veto. The thresh­old was not met and the veto was sustained.

Cas­ca­dia total: 6 yea votes, 11 nay votes, 1 not voting

In the United States Senate

GORDAN GALLAGHER, U.S. DISTRICT COURT JUDGE: The Sen­ate on March 22nd con­firmed the nom­i­na­tion of Gor­dan P. Gal­lagher to be a judge on the U.S. Dis­trict Court for Col­orado. A fed­er­al mag­is­trate judge in the dis­trict since 2012, Gal­lagher had pre­vi­ous­ly been a prac­ti­tion­er at his own law firm and a pros­e­cu­tor for Col­orado’s gov­ern­ment. A sup­port­er, Sen­a­tor Michael F. Ben­net, D‑Colorado, cit­ed Gal­lagher’s “stel­lar rep­u­ta­tion in Col­orado and near­ly 25 years in ser­vice to oth­ers.” The vote was 53 yeas to 43 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 4 yea votes, 2 nay votes

GRAHAM AMENDMENT TO REVOCATION OF FORCE AUTHORIZATION BILL: The Sen­ate on March 22nd reject­ed an amend­ment spon­sored by Sen. Lind­sey Gra­ham, R‑South Car­oli­na, to a bill (S. 316) that would have repealed the 2002 autho­riza­tion of use of mil­i­tary force against Iraq and replaced it with an autho­riza­tion to use mil­i­tary force against mili­tias in Iraq that are sup­port­ed by Iran. Gra­ham said the new autho­riza­tion would “tell the Shi­ite mili­tias: You come after our troops, we are com­ing after you.”

An oppo­nent, Sen­a­tor Tim­o­thy Kaine, D‑Virginia, said a new autho­riza­tion was unnec­es­sary because the exec­u­tive branch already had ample pow­ers under arti­cle II of the Con­sti­tu­tion to take mea­sures against the militias.

The vote was 36 yeas to 60 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 2 yea votes, 4 nay votes

LEE AMENDMENT TO REVOCATION OF FORCE AUTHORIZATION BILL: The Sen­ate on March 23rd reject­ed an amend­ment spon­sored by Sen­a­tor Mike Lee, R‑Utah, to a bill (S. 316) that would have stip­u­lat­ed that no future autho­riza­tion of use of mil­i­tary force could extend beyond two years.

Lee said that by exer­cis­ing Con­gress’s prop­er con­trol of mil­i­tary action, the amend­ment would “ensure that all Amer­i­cans have a voice in mat­ters of great impor­tance, espe­cial­ly when it comes to mat­ters of war and peace, and that no pres­i­dent has the pow­er his­tor­i­cal­ly reserved for mon­archs, despots, and tyrants.”

The vote was 19 yeas to 76 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 1 yea vote, 5 nay votes

RISCH AMENDMENT TO REVOCATION OF FORCE AUTHORIZATION BILL: The House on March 23rd reject­ed an amend­ment spon­sored by Sen­a­tor James E. Risch, R‑Idaho, to a bill (S. 316) that would have con­di­tioned repeal of the 2002 autho­riza­tion to use mil­i­tary force against Iraq on assur­ances that repeal would not harm U.S. abil­i­ty to detain ter­ror­ists. Risch said the con­di­tion sought to put the U.S. in “as strong a posi­tion as we pos­si­bly could when we are in deten­tion or lit­i­ga­tion” against sus­pect­ed ter­ror­ists. An oppo­nent, Sen­a­tor Tim­o­thy Kaine, D‑Virginia, said it was unnec­es­sary because no ter­ror­ists were being detained under the 2002 autho­riza­tion. The vote was 41 yeas to 52 nays.

Cas­ca­dia total: 2 yea votes, 4 nay votes

Key votes ahead

The House is plan­ning to take up Steve Scalise’s “Low­er Ener­gy Costs Act” (H.R. 1) a bad bill that seeks to pre­vent the exec­u­tive branch from act­ing to pre­vent the destruc­tive prac­tice of frack­ing (hydraulic frac­tur­ing). Read more about this leg­is­la­tion here. The House is also expect­ed to con­sid­er the PRC Is Not a Devel­op­ing Coun­try Act, the Stop Forced Organ Har­vest­ing Act of 2023, and the Under­sea Cable Con­trol Act, which won’t be as controversial.

The Sen­ate will resume con­sid­er­a­tion of S.316 (above), which would final­ly repeal the autho­riza­tions for use of mil­i­tary force against Iraq. Votes are expect­ed on a set of six Repub­li­can amend­ments to the bill.

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