AP
After a chaotic Congress, lawmakers head home to ask voters: How about another term?
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A U.S. Capitol Police officer stands watch as lawmakers leave the House of Representatives after voting on an interim spending bill to avoid a government shutdown next week, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)Read More
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, center, walks with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., left, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., as he arrives for a briefing with lawmakers about the war effort against Russia, at the Capitol in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
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From left, Sgt. Edward Lenz, Commander of Butler County Emergency Services Unit, Patrolman Drew Blasko of Butler Township Police Department, former U.S. Secret Service agent Patrick Sullivan, and Lt. John Herold of Pennsylvania State Police, arrive to testify at the first public hearing of a bipartisan congressional task force investigating the assassination attempts against Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump, at Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
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Chairman Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., left, greets Ranking Member Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo., right, at the first public hearing of a bipartisan congressional task force investigating the assassination attempts against Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump, at Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
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Witnesses stand to be sworn-in from left, Dr. Ariel Goldschmidt, Medical Examiner of Allegheny County, Pa. (appearing virtually), Patrick Sullivan, former U.S. Secret Service agent, Lt. John D. Herold of Pennsylvania State Police, Patrolman Drew Blasko of Butler Township Police Dept. , and Sgt. Edward Lenz of Adams Township Police Department and Commander of the Butler County Emergency Services Unit, during a House Task Force hearing on the July 13, 2024 attempted assassination of Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pa., Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024, on Capitol Hill, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)
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Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., left, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, walks at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
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A U.S. Capitol Police officer stands watch as lawmakers leave the House of Representatives after voting on an interim spending bill to avoid a government shutdown next week, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
BY LISA MASCARO AND KEVIN FREKINGUpdated 9:40 PM GMT+6, September 28, 2024Share
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is off for the campaign season, as lawmakers from one of the most chaotic and unproductive legislative sessions in modern times try to persuade voters to keep them on the job.
The House Republicans led the tumult — painstakingly electing their speaker in a bitter public feud then swiftly booting him from office, something never before seen. But the deeply divided Senate was not immune from the inaction, lumbering through a modest agenda.
Taken together, the lack of big-ticket accomplishments is underscoring a volatile November election season with control of Congress a toss-up.
“The good thing is Congress didn’t allow much to go through law,” said Rep. Ryan Zinke, a former Trump administration Cabinet secretary who is now running for re-election to his House seat in Montana. “But what it didn’t do, either, is it didn’t reach its potential.”
House Republicans blocked not only the Biden-Harris priorities of the Democrats, he said, but “in many ways, we blocked our own agenda.”
The situation the lawmakers find themselves in, particularly the House Republicans trying to preserve their slim majority control, is not academic. The House Republicans now have to face the voters who sent them to Washington on their “Commitment to America” two years ago having come up well short.
New House Speaker Mike Johnson remains upbeat that Republicans will not only stay in control but win more seats to bolster their ranks, but it’s been an uphill slog for him during a tight election year.
“It’s almost impossible,” said Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, adding he would have little patience for hearing out the “idiots” he said Johnson has to contend with in leading a slim four-seat majority.
“You had a group grow up in the House Republican Party who think that voting no and getting nothing done is a victory,” Gingrich said Friday at the Capitol. “You’ve got to find a way to break up this idea that being a nihilist and getting nothing done is a success. It’s not.”
Congress has passed fewer substantive bills than is normal, putting this two-year session on track to be among the least productive sessions ever. The representatives and senators returned to Washington for a brief three-week September work period and essentially punted one of their most important tasks, funding the federal government, for a few more months, to December.
While Congress succeeded in avoiding a federal shutdown — which Johnson said would have been “malpractice” so close to the November election — it left town mid-week, several days earlier than scheduled, as a hurricane bore down on the Southern Gulf states. It won’t return until mid-November.
“Can anyone in America name a single thing that House Republicans have done on their own to make life better for the American people?” asked Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, who is in line to become House speaker if his party wins majority control. “The answer is no.”
Many lawmakers bristled at being lumped together with what transpired in their House GOP majority. There was the weeklong fight in January 2023 to elect Kevin McCarthy as House speaker. And the nearly month-long spectacle when a small number of far-right Republicans booted him from the speaker’s office. And failed bills that never got off the House floor.
Those seeking re-election in some of the most hard-fought House districts offered a preview of the conversations they will have with voters.
Rep. Aaron Bean, R-Fla., said he would emphasize his work on constituent services and his voting record.
“I don’t know if you’re going to judge an individual member on how the body does collectively,” said Bean, a freshman. “I don’t think that’s a fair comparison. That is apples to apricots.”
Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., said the House has been a “firewall” against spending.
“What we’ve been able to stop is very significant,” he said.
“We haven’t necessarily gotten everything passed,” he added. “But what we have done is set a template for what needs to be done to fix these problems, whether it’s the border, the economy, national security, investing in our military, cutting taxes, reducing spending.”
Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, who is in a competitive race in New York, pointed to work he has done to secure needed infrastructure money for his district as well as his own various bills. One that passed the House and Senate this past week directs the U.S. Secret Service to protect Donald Trump and other major party presidential nominees by the same standards it does the president.
“So I have a record to run on that I’m certainly proud of,” he said.
Besides, Lawler asked, what about the Senate?
“I mean there’s always a focus on the House,” he said. “But if anybody looked down the hallway, Chuck Schumer and Senate Democrats have done what? What exactly are they running on?”
The Senate, historically a slower-moving body designed that way by the founders, plodded along at an even more leisurely pace this year, staying away from Washington many Mondays and almost all Fridays.
Narrowly led by Democrats under Majority Leader Schumer, the Senate has succeeded in confirming a number of Biden’s judicial nominees, particularly women and people of color, to create a judiciary more representative of the nation. But senators have not been able to land many other big priorities.
In fact, one of the most talked about pieces of legislation in the campaign — the Senate’s bipartisan effort to secure the U.S.-Mexico border and update some immigration laws — collapsed when Trump declined to support it.
“This has been a very, very unproductive Congress,” said Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, mentioning the appropriations bills and a farm bill reauthorization that are stalled. There’s “plenty of blame to go around.”
Oddly, as the Capitol emptied out, it briefly refilled Friday for the 30th anniversary of another Republican milestone — the 1994 Contract with America, the campaign promises that brought Gingrich and his party to power after four decades in the minority.
Two years ago, McCarthy, who was in line to become speaker, gathered House Republicans at a manufacturing plant along the Monongahela River in Pennsylvania to unveil their own “Commitment to America” agenda that gave a nod to the Gingrich era. Rising stars of the GOP, including firebrand Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, were in the front row.
McCarthy, Johnson and many others from today’s House GOP were not around for Friday’s ceremony, with its reception in the Capitol basement.
Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee, who was among the eight Republicans who led the vote to oust McCarthy last year, said this was the House GOP majority’s biggest accomplishment: “Not wrecking the country any further. We don’t need any more laws.”
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Associated Press writer Stephen Groves contributed to this report.
AP
The final day of voting in the US is here, after tens of millions have already cast their ballots
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People stand in line during the last day of early voting, Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)Read More
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Voters line up to vote as a early voting location opened in Carmel, Ind., Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)
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A person walks past a sign during early voting in the general election, Friday, Nov. 1, 2024, in Fall River, Mass. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
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An election worker demonstrates mail-in ballot processing during a media preview at the Philadelphia Election Warehouse, in Philadelphia, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
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A voter fills out their their ballot during early voting in the general election, Friday, Nov. 1, 2024, in Fall River, Mass. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
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People line up to vote at the Chicago Early Voting Loop Supersite in Chicago, Thursday, Oct. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
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Bennett College student Zairen Jackson listens to a fellow student answer a question during a roundtable in Greensboro, N.C., Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Chuck Burton)
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FILE – A Delaware County secured drop box for the return of vote-by-mail ballots is pictured, May 2, 2022, in Newtown Square, Pa. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)
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An elections official sorts counted mail-in ballots on the first day of tabulation, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024, at the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Matt York)
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People wait in line to cast their ballots at an early voting location, Thursday, Oct. 31, 2024, in Blue Springs, Mo. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
BY CHRISTINA A. CASSIDY AND ALI SWENSONUpdated 11:05 AM GMT+6, November 5, 2024
WASHINGTON (AP) — Election Day 2024 arrived Tuesday — with tens of millions of Americans having already cast their ballots. Those include record numbers in Georgia, North Carolina and other battleground states that could decide the winner.
The early turnout in Georgia, which has flipped between the Republican and Democratic nominees in the previous two presidential elections, has been so robust — over 4 million voters — that a top official in the secretary of state’s office said the big day could look like a “ghost town” at the polls.
As of Monday, Associated Press tracking of advance voting nationwide showed roughly 82 million ballots already cast — slightly more than half the total number of votes in the presidential election four years earlier. That’s driven partly by Republican voters, who were casting early ballots at a higher rate than in recent previous elections after a campaign by former President Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee to counter the Democrats’ longstanding advantage in the early vote.
That included in the parts of western North Carolina hammered last month by Hurricane Helene. State and local election officials, benefiting from changes made by the Republican-controlled legislature, pulled off a herculean effort to ensure residents could cast their ballots as they dealt with power outages, lack of water and washed out roads.
By the time early voting in North Carolina had ended on Saturday, over 4.4 million voters — or nearly 57% of all registered voters in the state — had cast their ballots. As of Monday, turnout in the 25 western counties affected by the hurricane was even stronger at 59% of registered voters, state election board Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell said.
Brinson Bell called the voters and election workers in the hurricane-hit counties “an inspiration to us all.”
Besides the hurricanes in North Carolina and Florida, the most worrisome disruptions to the election season so far were arson attacks that damaged ballots in two drop boxes near the Oregon-Washington border. Authorities there were searching for the person responsible.
The absence of any significant, widespread problems has not stopped Trump, the Republican nominee, or the RNC, which is now under his sway, from making numerous claims of fraud or election interference during the early voting period, a possible prelude to challenges after Election Day.
He has mischaracterized an investigation underway in Pennsylvania into roughly 2,500 potentially fraudulent voter registration applications by saying one of the counties was “caught with 2600 Fake Ballots and Forms, all written by the same person.” The investigation is into registration applications; there is no indication that ballots are involved.
In Georgia, Republicans sought to prohibit voters from returning mailed ballots to their local election office by the close of polls on Election Day, votes that are allowed under state law. A judge rejected their lawsuit over the weekend.
Trump and Republicans also have warned about the possibility that Democrats are recruiting masses of noncitizens to vote, a claim they have made without evidence and that runs counter to the data, including from Republican secretaries of state. Research has consistently shown that noncitizens registering to vote is rare. Any noncitizen who does faces the potential of felony charges and deportation, a significant disincentive.
One case of noncitizen voting was caught during early voting last month and resulted in felony charges in Michigan after a student from China cast an illegal early ballot.
This is the first presidential vote since Trump lost to Joe Biden four years ago and began various attempts to circumvent the outcome and remain in power. That climaxed with the violent Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol to halt certification of the results after Trump told his supporters to “fight like hell.”
Even now, a solid majority of Republicans believe Trump’s lie that Biden was not legitimately elected, despite reviews, audits and recounts in the battleground states that all affirmed Biden’s win. A survey last month from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research showed Republicans remain much more skeptical than Democrats that their ballots will be counted accurately this year.
Seeking to rebuild voter confidence in a system targeted with false claims of widespread fraud, Republican lawmakers in more than a dozen states since 2020 have passed new voting restrictions. Those rules include shortening the window to apply or return a mail ballot, reducing the availability of ballot drop boxes and adding ID requirements.
On the last weekend before Election Day, Trump continued to falsely claim the election was being rigged against him and said a presidential winner should be declared on election night, before all the ballots are counted.
Vice President Kamala Harris urged voters not to fall for Trump’s tactic of casting doubt on elections. The Democratic nominee told supporters at a weekend rally in Michigan that the tactic was intended to suggest to people “that if they vote, their vote won’t matter.” Instead, she urged people who had already cast ballots to encourage their friends to do the same.
Through four years of election lies and voting-related conspiracy theories, local election officials have faced harassment and even death threats. That has prompted high turnover and led to heightened security for election offices and polling sites that includes panic buttons and bullet-proof glass.
While there have been no major reports of any malicious cyberactivity affecting election offices, foreign actors have been active in using fake social media profiles and websites to drum up partisan vitriol and disinformation. In the final weeks, U.S. intelligence officials have attributed to Russia multiple fake videos alleging election fraud in presidential swing states.
On the eve of Election Day, they issued a joint statement with federal law enforcement agencies warning that Russia in particular was ramping up its influence operations, including in ways that could incite violence, and likely would continue those efforts well after the votes have been cast.
Jen Easterly, the nation’s top election security official, urged Americans to rely on state and local election officials for information about elections.
“This is especially important as we are in an election cycle with an unprecedented amount of disinformation, including disinformation being aggressively peddled and amplified by our foreign adversaries at a greater scale than ever before,” she said. “We cannot allow our foreign adversaries to have a vote in our democracy.”
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The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Swenson reports on election-related misinformation, disinformation and extremism for The Associated Press.
AP
Georgia high court says absentee ballots must be returned by Election Day, even in county with delay
Updated 5:13 AM GMT+6, November 5, 2024
ATLANTA (AP) — Thousands of voters in Georgia’s third-largest county who received their absentee ballots late will not get an extension to return them, the state’s highest court decided on Monday.
Cobb County, just north of Atlanta, didn’t mail out absentee ballots to some 3,400 voters who had requested them until late last week. Georgia law says absentee ballots must be received by the close of polls on Election Day. But a judge in a lower court ruled last week that the ballots at issue could be counted if they’re received by this Friday, three days after Election Day, as long as they were postmarked by Tuesday.
The Georgia Supreme Court ruling means the affected Cobb County residents must vote in person on Election Day, which is Tuesday, or bring their absentee ballots to the county elections office by 7 p.m. that day.
The high court ruling instructs county election officials to notify the affected voters by email, text message and in a public message on the county election board’s website. And it orders officials to keep separate and sealed any ballots received after the Election Day deadline but before 5 p.m. Friday.
Board of elections Chair Tori Silas said the board will comply with the Supreme Court order, but it’s still up in the air whether ballots received after Election Day will be counted. The order only addressed a motion for a stay, so election officials will have to wait for the court’s final ruling to see whether votes received after Tuesday will be counted, she said in a statement.
To deliver the ballots on time, election officials in Cobb County were using U.S. Postal Service express mail and UPS overnight delivery, and sending the ballots with prepaid express return envelopes. The Board of Elections said that more than 1,000 of the absentee ballots being mailed late were being sent to people outside of Georgia.
Silas last week blamed the delay in sending out the ballots on faulty equipment and a late surge in absentee ballot requests during the week before the Oct. 25 deadline.
The original ruling extending the deadline stemmed from a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of three Cobb County voters who said they had not received absentee ballots by mail as of Friday.
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Elon Musk is pledging to give away $1 million a day to voters for signing his political action committee’s petition backing the Constitution. The giveaway by the Donald Trump supporter is raising questions among some who say it’s a violation of the law.Read More
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America PAC lawyer Chris Gober speaks with members of the media ahead of a hearing at a City Hall courtroom in Philadelphia, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
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Elon Musk speaks before Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally at Madison Square Garden, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
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Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner arrives for a hearing at a City Hall courtroom, in Philadelphia, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
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America PAC lawyer Chris Gober speaks with members of the media ahead of a hearing at a City Hall courtroom in Philadelphia, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
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Elon Musk speaks before Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally at Madison Square Garden, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
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Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, third from right, arrives for a hearing at a City Hall courtroom, Thursday, Oct. 31, 2024, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
BY MARYCLAIRE DALEUpdated 4:19 AM GMT+6, November 5, 2024Share
Follow live: Updates from AP’s coverage of the presidential election.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The $1 million-a-day voter sweepstakes that Elon Musk ‘s political action committee is hosting in swing states can continue through Tuesday’s presidential election, a Pennsylvania judge ruled Monday.
Common Pleas Court Judge Angelo Foglietta — ruling after Musk’s lawyers said the winners are paid spokespeople and not chosen by chance — did not immediately explain his reasoning.
District Attorney Larry Krasner, a Democrat, had called the process a scam “designed to actually influence a national election” and asked that it be shut down.
Musk lawyer Chris Gober said the final two recipients before Tuesday’s presidential election will be in Arizona on Monday and Michigan on Tuesday.
“The $1 million recipients are not chosen by chance,” Gober said Monday. “We know exactly who will be announced as the $1 million recipient today and tomorrow.”
Chris Young, the director and treasurer of America PAC, testified that the recipients are vetted ahead of time, to “feel out their personality, (and) make sure they were someone whose values aligned” with the group.
Musk’s lawyers, defending the effort, called it “core political speech” given that participants sign a petition endorsing the U.S. Constitution. They also said Krasner’s bid to shut it down under Pennsylvania law was moot because there would be no more Pennsylvania winners before the program ends Tuesday.
Young also acknowledged that the PAC made the recipients sign nondisclosure agreements.
“They couldn’t really reveal the truth about how they got the money, right?” Summers asked.
“Sounds right,” Young said.
In an Oct. 20 social media post shown in court, Musk said anyone signing the petition had “a daily chance of winning $1M!”
Summers grilled him on Musk’s use of both the words “chance” and “randomly,” prompting Young to concede the latter was not “the word I would have selected.”
Young said the winners knew they would be called on stage but not specifically that they would win the money.
Musk did not attend the hearing. He has committed more than $70 million to the super PAC to help Trump and other Republicans win in November.
“This was all a political marketing masquerading as a lottery,” Krasner testified Monday. “That’s what it is. A grift.”
Lawyers for Musk and the PAC said they do not plan to extend the lottery beyond Tuesday. Krasner said the first three winners, starting on Oct. 19, came from Pennsylvania in the days leading up to the state’s Oct. 21 voter registration deadline.
Other winners came from the battleground states of Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina and Michigan. It’s not clear if anyone has yet received the money. The PAC pledged they would get it by Nov. 30, according to an exhibit shown in court.
More than 1 million people from the seven states have registered for the sweepstakes by signing a petition saying they support the right to free speech and to bear arms, the first two amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Krasner questioned how the PAC might use their data, which it will have on hand well past the election.
“They were scammed for their information,” Krasner said. “It has almost unlimited use.”
Krasner’s team called Musk “the heartbeat of America PAC,” and the person announcing the winners and presenting the checks.
“He was the one who presented the checks, albeit large cardboard checks. We don’t really know if there are any real checks,” Summers said.
Foglietta presided over the case at Philadelphia City Hall after Musk and the PAC lost an effort to move it to federal court.
Krasner has said he could still consider criminal charges, as he’s tasked with protecting both lotteries and the integrity of elections.
Pennsylvania remains a key battleground state with 19 electoral votes and both Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris have repeatedly visited the state, including stops planned Monday in the final hours of the campaign.
Krasner — who noted that he has long driven a Tesla — said he could also seek civil damages for the Pennsylvania registrants. Musk is the CEO and largest shareholder of Tesla. He also owns the social media platform X, where America PAC has published posts on the sweepstakes, and the rocket ship maker SpaceX.
Dale covers national legal issues for The Associated Press, often focusing on the federal judiciary, gender law, #MeToo and NFL player concussions. Her work unsealing Bill Cosby’s testimony in a decade-old deposition led to his arrest and sexual assault trials.
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