Rick Lazio? Yeccchhh

I was born in Brooklyn. When I was two, my parents, about to have a second child, decided to move to Long Island, where the schools were supposed to be better. I think that's part of what built Long Island-- a euphemistic way of talking about "white flight." First stop was Valley Stream, basically a walk from the Queens County line and then after a few years to Roosevelt, habit deeper into Nassau County. Roosevelt became one of the first big African-American suburbs and my parents decided to move back to Brooklyn. A few years ago, The Atlantic did an update on a long and much-discussed top-- the state of segregation in the suburbs. "Want to see what segregation looks like in America today? Take a drive on New York's Long Island, one of the most racially segregated portions of the country. I grew up there, and the differences between adjacent white and minority towns can be so sharp it's as if invisible fences divide them. Two villages, Hempstead and Garden City, lie adjacent to one another in Nassau County. Hempstead has a medium household income of $52,000. Garden City's is $150,000. Hempstead, in parts, resembles an inner city-- with bodegas, laundromats, low-rise apartment buildings. Garden City is a suburban idyll, with tree-lined streets, gourmet grocery stores, and large colonial-style homes. Garden City is 88 percent white; Hempstead is 92 percent black and Hispanic (split about evenly). The transition between the two villages occurs within one block, a visual whiplash.

"Long Island is becoming more diverse, Nassau County is becoming more diverse," says John Logan, a Brown University sociologist who has been studying demographics since the 1970s. "But within Nassau County there's been hardly any change in the degree of segregation. The predominantly minority areas are becoming more minority. And the predominantly white areas are staying mostly white... [He] finds that blacks and Hispanics who earn over $75,000 a year live in areas with higher poverty rates than whites who make less than $40,000.

A good way to evaluate these neighborhoods is to look at the elementary schools, which often represent a sub-community of a larger school district. Overall, suburban schools are academically better than city schools. But white suburban schools are better than black and Hispanic suburban schools. "The average black or Hispanic elementary school student attends a school that ranks below the 45th percentile in the state," Logan writes in his paper. The average white student in the suburbs? They attend schools that score above the 60th percentile.

What's true of the schools is true of many of the resources in black suburbs: They are objectively better than those in the city. Poverty rates and crime rates are lower in these communities. "There are reasons why you would move to a predominantly black suburb as opposed to staying in the predominantly black, or black and Hispanic, inner-city poor neighborhood-- it's a step forward," he says. But that does not make up for the fact that, by many measures, blacks and whites are living in different worlds. "I think that's the underlying situation that then becomes the basis for frustration and anger when something happens to spark it," he says.

There has been progress. Black/white segregation has been declining over the years. In 1980, fewer than 6 million blacks lived in the suburbs. Now 16 million do. These numbers are more dramatic for Asians and Hispanics. In solidly middle-class neighborhoods, Logan finds, whites won't leave when minorities move in, like they might have in previous decades. But that is mostly occurring in places with already good public resources. The suburbs are a cornerstone of the American dream. But, for right now, the realization of that dream looks very different in black and white.

Earlier this year, Long Island's top newspaper, Newsday reported that "Nassau County’s white population dipped below 60 percent for the first time in its modern history in 2018, as Latino, African-American and Asian populations across Long Island grew while the number of non-Hispanic white residents continued to decline... The population estimates for July 1, 2018, reflect a decades-long trend that has transformed Long Island from overwhelmingly white to a more diverse place, where Hindu temples and supermercados share the landscape with synagogues and Italian bakeries. Less than 30 years ago, Long Island was more than 84 percent white, according to the 1990 census. In 2018, about 59 percent of Nassau County residents and 67 percent of Suffolk County residents were white, according to the new estimates. Since 1990, the number of white, non-Hispanic residents dropped by nearly 400,000.

Thursday, the New York Times reported that "Well before Rep. Peter King announced that he would retire next year, enough evidence existed that his prospects for re-election on Long Island as a Republican were narrowing. Democrats now outnumber Republicans on Long Island, a once unthinkable development in a traditional conservative stronghold where voters backed every Republican presidential candidate, bar two, from 1900 to 1988… The numbers on Long Island enumerate the challenges for Republicans. In 1996, registered Republicans in Nassau County outnumbered the Democrats, 360,000 to 257,000. By this year, the number of Democrats had rocketed to 411,000. The number of Republicans, by contrast, had dropped by more than 30,000."

Basically there are 5 Long Island congressional districts representing Long Island voters:

• NY-01- Lee Zelden- R (eastern Suffolk Co.)- 75.2% white
• NY-02- Peter King- R (western Suffolk Co., South Shore Nassau Co.)- 62.3% white
• NY-03- Tom Suozzi- New Dem (north shore)- 68.7% white
• NY-04- Kathleen Rice- New Dem (western Nassau Co)- 57.1% white
• NY-05- Gregory Meeks- New Dem (a Queens district with a small piece of southwestern Nassau Co.)- 10.9% white

The second district is looking increasingly shaky for Republicans. The Democrats now have a registration advantage over Republicans, a new development. Obama won it both times, although Hillary lost it to Trump by almost 10 points. Peter King was reelected in recent years because he was Peter King, beloved on the transpartisan super-corrupt Long Island establishment, not because he was a Republican per se. All things being equal, a Democrat is likely to win it in 2020. Rick Lazio begs to differ. He was born in Amityville, in the eastern end of the district, although he represented the North Shore district (now NY-03) for 4 terms in the past--1993 to 2001. He was known as one of Congress' most corrupt members, taking immense amounts of money from Wall Street while serving as chair of the House Banking Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity. To this day, the over $7 million in bribes Lazio took from the banksters is more than any other currently serving House members other than Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy ($9,472,747) and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer ($7,355,624) two other paragons of corruption.

Since King announced he isn't running for reelection, 16 Republicans launched trial balloons, as did half a dozen Democrats. The Democratic Party had already solidified behind Babylon town councilwoman Jackie Gordon, a centrist. The Republicans are looking at a vast array of candidates including Billy Joel's former girlfriend, Islip town councilwoman Trish Bergin Weichbrodt, state Senator Phil Boyle, state Assemblymen Joe DeStephano, Doug Smith, Phil Ramos, Mike LiPetri and Andrew Garbarino, former Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy, current Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone and Lazio. He says he's seriously considering jumping in. "I have lived in this district my entire life. It would be unusual if I didn’t give some thought to the representation of the district. I know these folks well and have been among them my whole life... I won this swing district four times, the last three by 2-1 margins, enjoyed broad-based support of Republicans, Democrats and independents and carried it against Hillary Clinton by nearly 20 points," Lazio said. Except its was a different district then, the North Shore district, not the South Shore District.

Since leaving office, Lazio has worked as a corporate lobbyist, CEO of the Financial Services Forum, and as an executive for JP Morgan Chase.

He is currently an executive at alliantgroup, a giant consulting group that helps major companies score tax breaks and other government business.

That resume could give Democrats ammunition to paint Lazio as a corporate and government insider as politics in New York-- and across the country-- take a populist turn.

But Lazio insisted that his business background would be viewed as a plus.

“In my role at alliantgroup I serve as an advocate for small and medium business, cybersecurity, energy efficiency and workforce development,” he argued.

One veteran Long Island Republican, who requested anonymity, called Lazio’s trial balloon “bullshit.”

The Republican bench on Long Island has thinned out after Democrats toppled four GOP incumbents in last year’s state Senate races.

Chuck Schumer Is Already Weeping Over The Loss Of Peter King

Early this morning, Peter King-- first elected to Congress from the south shore of Long Island in 1992-- announced, on his Facebook page, that he won't be running for reelection. The announcement didn't say anything you wouldn't expect from a lock-step Trump enabler. Even though he sits on the Intelligence Committee and is well aware of how guilty Trump is, he announced in his statement that "In the coming weeks and during the next year I intend to vote against President Trump ‘s impeachment and will support the President’s bid for re-election." Many people first heard of his decision via a tweet (above) from Little Chuckie Schmucky. Not familiar with Schmucky? Maybe this little tune will help:




NY-02 shouldn't have been a Republican district all these years. Although Hillary stunk it up with her status quo bullshit agenda, Obama won it both times he ran and the PVI hovered around neutral. After Hillary's dismal showing-- she lost by almost 10 points-- 53.0% to 43.9%, the PVI is now officially R+3. The district won't perform that way with King out of the way. I spoke with the head of the Suffolk County legislature, DuWayne, a former King opponent who has endorsed Gordon. He told me he expects her to win the district, explaining that it was the bipartisan old boys network that kept King in power.

Before this morning's announcement, there were two Democrats running, establishment fave Babylon town concilmember Jackie Gordon (endorsed by EMILY's List and DCCC scam operation End Citizen's United) and local activist Mike Sax. She's already raised $187,941 but I wouldn't be surprised if other potential candidates jump into the race now. In 2018 King was forced to spend $3,175,639 to hold onto his seat. His progressive opponent, Liuba Grechen Shirley, spent $1,948,325. Although both Kirsten Gillibrand and Andrew Cuomo won the district, King was reelected, albeit more narrowly than in previous elections-- 128,078 (53.1%) to 113,074 (46.9%), losing the larger Suffolk County part of the district (D+3) while winning his Nassau home base which performed for him at an R+27 level.

For years, the Long Island political class assumed that his daughter, Erin Sweeney, top Republican on the Hempstead town council, would inherit the congressional seat. But she decided to move to Charlotte, North Carolina and didn't run for reelection.

John Wagner noted in his report for the Washington Post that the 75 year old King is the 20th GOP congressman to bow out of reelection. "King joins a growing number of Republican members of Congress who have announced retirements, resigned or said they will seek another office next year... By comparison, eight Democrats have announced they will not seek reelection."

Even before King announced he was bowing out of Congress, NBC News ran a piece early this morning about how the GOP has lost 100 members since Trump arrived in DC. "Change is a way of life in Washington," reported Dante Chinni. "Politicians come and go at the whims of voters. But even by D.C. standards, House Republicans have seen massive changes during President Donald Trump's administration. This week, as the House impeachment proceedings become public, those changes are going to be front and center. When Trump arrived in the White House in 2017, there were 241 Republicans at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue in the House of Representatives. Today, 100 of them have gone or have announced that they are leaving. That's 41 percent of that original 241 in the 115th House... not congressional seats lost; that's a measure of actual people, the personalities that once roamed the halls of Congress that aren't there anymore. They left for a range of reasons. Some left to take administration appointments, some lost, and some just walked away."

While much is made of partisan flips-- and they are obviously crucial in terms of who controls the House and the Senate-- Congress is ultimately a collection of people, and personalities matter. Personalities frame debates and set up how committees are run. And the House's GOP personalities will define the larger Republican Party when impeachment moves from private to public hearings this week.

The change in the House GOP over the last three years has been especially striking. Compare it to changes in the Democratic House in the same time period under President Barack Obama from January 2009 to November 2011.

...A good number of changes in the Republican House, 36 of them, came through election defeats. But overall, the departures are being driven more heavily by retirements and resignations. Half the Republican House turnover has come via voluntary exit-- 50 departures. And there was a lot of experience on that list.

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan, a 10-term veteran, bowed out on his own. And 10 other Republican members who had served at least four terms in the House retired with their seats remaining Republican. That is, they were not in real danger of losing-- they just walked away and let different people take the reins.

And more departures are likely on the way. We are heading into the holidays and the new year, always a prime time for members to announce that they are not seeking reelection.

Keep these changes in mind this week when the House impeachment trial becomes a public affair. There has been a lot of turnover in the House in the past few years, and not just in terms of partisanship. The president's own party in the chamber looks very different from when he arrived in Washington.

The House Republicans have less institutional memory and more new faces than they did a few years ago-- and those new faces have come to Congress in Trump's Washington. That's likely to have some impact when temperatures and rhetoric rise around impeachment.

Three memorable quotes by Peter King, the right-wing asshole Schumer said he will miss and whose friendship he will always value:

• Just after Michael Jackson's death: "Let's knock out the psychobabble. He was a pervert, a child molester, he was a pedophile. And to be giving this much coverage to him, day in and day out, what does it say about us as a country? I just think we're too politically correct. No one wants to stand up and say we don't need Michael Jackson. He died, he had some talent, fine. There's men and women dying every day in Afghanistan. Let's give them the credit they deserve... I believe I'm articulating the views of a great majority of the American people."

• On the Occupy Wall Street movement: "We have to be careful not to allow this to get any legitimacy. I'm taking this seriously in that I'm old enough to remember what happened in the 1960s when the left-wing took to the streets and somehow the media glorified them and it ended up shaping policy. We can't allow that to happen."

• After the police murdered Eric Garner: "If he had not had asthma, and a heart condition, and was so obese, almost definitely he would not have died from this."

King was a repulsive racist and an all around bigot. Right after the Orlando shooting in a gay club, he termed it a "vicious Islamic terrorist attack" on his Facebook page and said that "the Islamic threat to the United States is greater than at any time since 9/11" and excoriated "leftwing editors at the New York Times and the "liberal ideologies" of the ACLU, stating that both the newspaper and organization were attempting to "intimidate" critics of Islam. He also helped lead the charge against football players peacefully protesting discrimination by kneeling during the national anthem, likening their protest to "Nazi salutes." That's who Peter King-- a corrupt bag of shit-- is. I'm sure he and Schumer will sson meet again in Hell.

Escaping Trump, Escaping Trumpism... Is It Possible?

Ted's right-- both on this tragic and shameful, heart-breaking specific and in a more general way. Everything in Trumpworld is sheer bullshit. Friday, Masha Gessen, writing for the New Yorker asserted, rather than questioned, that In the Trump Era, we are losing the ability to distinguish reality from vacuum. Never mind his and his odious regime-- does morality even apply to his supporters? Author of the award-winning book, The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia, she asked how is one to maintain sanity, decency, and a measure of moral courage?

Decent members of the Administration-- is that a thing?-- and congressional Republicans have to ask themselves what is "the best way to try to save the country from Donald Trump: by staying close to him, or by walking away... Is the possibility of moderating the damage done by this Administration worth sacrificing one’s moral principles? Should one protect one’s individual integrity by sacrificing the chance to moderate damage done by this Administration? We can’t possibly know." And what about the rets of us?

The overstimulation of the age of Trump, meanwhile, makes us lose track of time and whatever small sense humans normally have of themselves in history. We forget what happened a month ago. If we look away for a day, we miss news that seems momentous to others-- only to be forgotten, too, in a week. Living in a shared reality with our fellow-citizens is an endless triathlon of reading, talking, and panicking. It creates the worst possible frame of mind for answering vexing moral questions, especially ones that require a choice between two desperately unsatisfying options.

Thinking morally about the Trump era requires a different temporal frame. It requires a look at the present through the prism of the future. There will come a time after Trump, and we need to consider how we will enter it. What are we going to take with us into that time-- what kind of politics, language, and culture? How will we recover from years of policy (if you can call it that) being made by tweet? How will we reclaim simple and essential words? Most important, how will we restart a political conversation? Political discourse was in crisis before Trump-- no wonder Americans of all stripes have become accustomed to using the words “politics” and “political” to denote substance-free transactions in the electoral arena. But, under Trump, it is nearing complete destruction.

Consider the last month’s worth of conversation about Trump and North Korea. Forgetting the President’s “little rocket man” remarks and building on months of denial that Trump had brought the world as close to the brink of nuclear annihilation as it has ever been, politicians, bureaucrats, policy wonks, and journalists have been speaking as though Trump were engaged in actual negotiations with Kim Jong Un. Some deliriously joined him in contemplating the prospect of a Nobel Peace Prize. The voices of a few experts who dared say that nothing had been accomplished yet and expressed doubt that the summit would actually occur were quickly drowned out. The ritual of analysis and anticipation that normally accrues to diplomacy was accruing instead to Trump’s flailing gestures, in the same way that the normal rituals of punditry have accrued to Trump’s tweets, harangues, and inconsistencies, all of which are the opposite of politics. On Friday, the Times’ morning podcast, The Daily, offered up a thoughtful analysis of Trump’s summit-cancelling missive, which was written in the language of a sulking, lovelorn seventh grader. But no sooner was the podcast posted than Trump told the media that he might hold the summit after all.

We are losing the habit, and perhaps the capability, of distinguishing reality from vacuum. This is disorienting in the present and disastrous for the future-- it is the one factor that will make post-Trumpian recovery, when it comes, so difficult. We must pose a bigger question than whether Administration members or congressional Republicans should stay or go, for it’s not only Trump’s appointees or fellow party members who are implicated in the daily insults and damage to our perceptions. We should be asking what each one of us can do to assert a fact-based reality at any given time. The great French thinker and activist Simone Weil had a prescription that she wrote down in her journal in 1933: “Never react to an evil in such a way as to augment it.” A few days later, she added, “Refuse to be an accomplice. Don’t lie-- don’t keep your eyes shut.”

Throughout the twentieth century, writers and thinkers who faced reality-destroying regimes kept producing similar recipes. “Live not by lies,” the Russian dissident novelist Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote. The Czech dissident playwright and future President Václav Havel pondered the predicament of living, unquestioningly, “inside the lie”-- and the uncanny power of stepping outside of it. In our case, stepping outside the lie means refusing-- stubbornly, consistently, incrementally-- to lend credence to the opposite of politics, the opposite of diplomacy, and the opposite of sanity. That would require thinking, reading, and speaking critically: not treating an outburst as though it were politics, a tantrum as though it were diplomacy, and a delusion as though it were aspiration. The good news is that this is not an entirely impossible task.

Among the 40 Republicans retiring (or resigning) from Congress since the advent of Señor Trumpanzee, some are attempting to win higher office-- so far most of them have failed-- and others have been caught up in various scandals, but most just want to get away from Trump. CNN sat down and talked to 3 of them-- Ryan Costello (R-PA), Ileana Ros Lehtinen (R-FL) and Jee Flake (R-AZ). Costello probably wouldn't be retiring at age 41 if his district didn't flip from a PVI of R+2 to D+2. He's a moderate and in a non-wave year could probably have win it-- but not in a wave year. Dull establishment Democrat who will add absolutely nothing to Congress, Chrissy Houlahan, is heavily favored to win. Ryan told CNN that he feels "increasingly, that if you're a member of Congress, they assume that you're not good. They assume that you're not telling the truth. No matter what you do, someone's out there locked and loaded to say something disparaging, false, mean, in an attempt to have other people not like you... No matter what I say or do, I feel all I do is answer questions about Donald Trump rather than health insurance or tax policy. I think it's a very challenging political environment, and when you add on top of that just the demands from a work-family balance, I just felt it was best for me to take stock in my life and have eight months to decide what I'm going to do next rather than, potentially, six weeks." Hillary won his district by a couple of points; under the new boundaries it would have been 10 points.

Ros-Lehtinen's Miami district is the bluest in the country held by a Republican. The PVI is R+5 and Hillary demolished Trump, 58.5% to 38.9%, his worst score in a Republican-held district. Regardless of what she wants to tell herself, Debbie Wasserman Schultz could no longer protect her and the writing was on the wall. She's mortified by Trump's boorishness but is reluctant to say so publicly. Her voting record speaks for itself. She votes with Trump 68.6% of the time, far less than any other Republican in the House other than North Carolina's completely independent ex-Democrat Walter Jones (53.8%).

And then there's Arizona hard core conservative senator Republican Jeff Flake who seems to agree with Trump on a lot-- though not all-- of policy and detests him as a person. "Our debt," he told CNN has increased massively; we're no longer the party of free trade. We've become a party of anger and resentment, and that is not the optimistic vision that I cut my teeth on as a Republican listening to Ronald Reagan or George H.W. Bush or others."

Alan Grayson, who spends a lot more time than many of the candidates and incumbents warning about Trump, mentioned that "We’re roughly at the end of Niemoller’s first couplet":

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— 
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— 
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

"Real life," he added, "is starting to resemble Radio Free Albemuth," Philip K. Dick's dystopian missive set in a society in which a tyrant has been elected president.

Let's look at Long Island Congressman, Peter King, a conservative in a moderate district who keeps going back and forth on Trump. One day he's saying Trump is "not fit to be president morally or intellectually" and then he's saying he's still supporting him. Peter King may not be as much of a crackpot as the Iowa King-- but he's still a real crackpot. You see this tweet from yesterday?

King's progressive Democratic opponent, Suffolk County legislature chief executive DuWayne Gregory didn't miss the not so subtle racism: "Congressman Peter King is trying so hard to attach himself to Donald Trump that he may need a surgeon to separate himself. To equate silent protestors with Nazis that killed millions of Jews and other Europeans illustrates how out of touch Peter King really is. We desperately need change in Washington when the leaders there do not know the difference between peaceful protesters and mass murderers."

Are we slipping into a dystopian society? Are we there already? Will we make it through to the other side? Will we be OK? Tom Guild is in one of those seats-- in the middle of Oklahoma-- that the DCCC is ignoring. He's probably better off without their interference. He's way too independent-minded and progressive for them. He certainly understands the dystopian society Trump and his enablers are creating in our country. This is what he told me about it yesterday:

Bob Corker is a corporate right wing US Senator from Tennessee, who is in a strong continuous bear hug with the Chamber of Commerce. We disagree on so many things and on so many levels. However, he has had a few moments of clarity commenting on the tragedy of Donald Trump in his role as the POTUS. Corker described the White House as an adult daycare center in a moment of clarity. He then got battered by Trumpists in Tennessee and elsewhere and faded back into the woodwork and rejoined others in the tragic cast of an upcoming book, Profiles in Cowardice. He voted for the Trump anti-working people, anti-middle class, that has blown a huge hole in the deficit and for debt, pro-corporate, and pro-billionaire tax cuts. He has recently resembled more of a rubber stamp for the Donald, instead of a cry in the wilderness expressing anguish regarding 45’s demeanor, dishonesty, and dysfunction.

The GOP establishment is dead. If not deceased, it might as well be dead. They have rolled over for every lie, scheme, policy, attack on American traditions and institutions, and disingenuous dishonest diabolical disaster Trump has rolled out. If they had acted like this in 1974, Richard Nixon (or his progeny) would still be president-for-life and the American Republic would have been dead long ago.

Since the Republicans won’t (with a few exceptions occasionally) stand up for principle or even insist on honesty, that leaves it to the rest of us. There are far too many non-Republicans who are on an ethics-free vacation and not only won’t stand up, but rarely speak out for fear that the Donaldistas will vote them out of office. Or they fear the vicious sleazy presidential tweet that might come their way.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller has the guts of a government mule and possesses an amazing work ethic and all the right scruples, but he could be quickly sacked without notice. Without the moral authority of a report from Mueller, taking the Trumpists out will be difficult. It would then have to happen election by election and incrementally. The Needle and the Damage Done by the time that struggle ends could result in permanent scar tissue and a severe weakening of America’s constitutional republic.

We can speak up. We can act reasonably and within our legal and constitutional framework. We can resist the constant dishonesty and destruction visited on our cherished country and our constitutional traditions. As Garth Brooks sings in The Dance, if we knew how it all would end, we’d miss the dance. We may survive the dance. America may survive. I’m an optimist and put the odds of survival and repairing the Needle and the Damage Done at 53-47%. Predicting the future is a mighty hazardous occupation. For the sake of all that we cherish and hold dear, I hope the hell I’m right!

50 Republicans Are Willing To Push Ryan Over The Cliff To Solve The DREAMers Problem

When going over the new poll from Muhlenberg College of Pennsylvania voters the other day, I noticed question about DACA. It was the most agreed-upon topic in the entire survey 81% of voters favor DACA. That's especially interesting because 40% of voters identified themselves as Republicans. What about other states? I have a feeling that voters in other states-- maybe not Confederate states, but normal states-- feel the same way as Pennsylvania voters. How do i know? "Queen of the hill" rules rarely pass. When it does it enables the House to consider a specified measure without approval from the majority party's leadership.

This week 2 Democrats and 2 Republicans-- Will Hurd (R-TX), Jeff Denham (R-CA), Pete Aguilar (D-CA) and Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-NM)-- have been pushing one through Congress to save the DREAMers from Trump. It would be a slap in the face to the lame duck Speaker, Paul Ryan, and his puppet Rules Committee chair, Pete Sessions. They need 218 votes to override Ryan's opposition and claim they have 240 votes-- 190 Democrats and 50 Republicans. I'd love to see the list of Democrats who have refused to sign on... as well as the Republican who have.

Denham: "We talk a lot about transparency around here and regular order. Well, that’s what we’re doing here today we want to follow regular order and have a debate... [Ryan] can put whatever he wants in the bill. I’m sure with the speaker’s wisdom he will find whatever the president wants and will sign."

Ryan is using Trump as an excuse for opposing a solution. "Our goal," his spokesperson said, "is to get a DACA and border security solution into law, and we certainly don’t want to pursue a strategy that the president won’t sign. Republicans made three good-faith offers during the omnibus negotiations and Democrats declined all of them. We continue to work to find the support for a solution that addresses both border security and DACA."

The next step would be a discharge petition, the equivalent of a vote of no confidence in Ryan, McCarthy and Scalise. The Dallas Morning News reported that something like 124,000 DACA recipients live in Texas. In all, the proposal covers between 800,000 and 1.3 million DACA recipients, all of whom arrived as children before June 15, 2007.

Last September, Trump announced that he would shut the program down as of March 5, arguing that his predecessor didn’t have the authority to grant permanent legal status. He called on Congress to find a permanent solution to protect Dreamers from deportation, but that hasn’t happened.

During budget talks, Trump tried to wrest $25 billion from Congress to build a border wall in exchange for providing DACA recipients a path to citizenship. Few lawmakers supported that idea.

Hurd said he’d likely support one of the four proposals-- a measure by Denham that is expected to include Hurd’s “USA Act.” The bill, which has bipartisan support, would create a permanent solution for DACA recipients and implement border security measures through technology and some “physical barriers.”

...Denham, a Republican, said passing the resolution will allow for “a full debate” of the DACA program, but he noted that Ryan would have the final say in what bills get to the House floor.

“We’re going to continue to show the speaker and the president that the will of the House, the will of people is right here on demanding a vote,” Denham said, adding that he expects the amount of support will catch Trump’s attention.

Ryan pushed aside the possibility of including DACA in February’s budget deal because he said he wouldn’t want “to just risk a veto” from Trump.

In February, the U.S. Supreme Court let DACA stay in place as challenges work through lower courts.

Hurd said his constituents want a secure border and a permanent solution for Dreamers. And he is hopeful that Trump would sign a DACA bill into law.

“Let’s have a permanent legislative fix for over a million young men and women who have only known the United States of America as a home,” he said, adding, “I actually believe the president wants to see this get done.”

DuWayne Gregory was speaking for a load of Democratic challenger when he called out Long Island incumbent Peter King yesterday: "Washington DC’s inaction on dreamers is yet another example of King’s ineffectiveness. He serves a sizable immigrant community and that community has gone unrepresented when it comes to their issues and fears. King is a proud supporter of Trump’s border wall and xenophobic policies. King's recent remarks on DACA is more of the same from Republicans in unsafe seats. Pandering to both sides with empty rhetoric is not going to fool any of his voters this time around. This district is ready to flip and he knows it."

The House Intelligence Committee Republicans Screwed America. Can America Screw Them Back?

The Republicans suddenly decided that the investigation into Putin-Gate is over and that Trump and Putin didn't do anything wrong. Pretty horrifying that these people are attempting a white-wash and putting Trump ahead of America. There are 13 Republicans on the House Intel Committee but many of them are in deeply red districts and not really likely to be held accountable for this. Mike Conaway, for example represents TX-11, a district so red that the PVI is R+32. Trump beat Hillary there 77.8% to 19.1%. And that wasn't an aberration of some kind. Romney beat Obama 79.2% to 19.6%. Conaway usually gets reelected with around 80%. There was no Democrat running against him in 2016, 2014 or 2012. This cycle Democrat Virginia Louise Leeder has raised $17,117 to go up against Conaway's $1,536,342 war chest.

Early yesterday morning, Eric Swalwell (D-CA), a member of the committee, was on CNN with Chris Cuomo. He told Cuomo that he hopes "the public gets to see these transcripts (of the hearings). They will see... how much they tried to protect the President when our job was to protect the ballot box." In terms of voter accountability,3 Republicans on the committee are retiring voluntarily-- Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL) , Frank LoBiondo (NJ) and Trey Gowdy (SC). There are 4 other intelligence Committee Republicans who are in severely gerrymandered districts that are considered very safe:

• Rick Crawford (AR-01)- PVI R+17
• Chris Stewart (UT-02)- PVI R+16
• Tom Rooney (FL-17)- PVI R+13
• Brad Wenstrup (OH-02)- PVI R+9

So that leaves 5 who either are or could be vulnerable in November. Voters should focus on defeating these five:

• Will Hurd (TX-23)- PVI R+1
• Peter King (NY-02)- PVI R+3
• Elise Stefanik (NY-21)- PVI R+4
• Michael Turner (OH-10)- PVI R+4
• Devin Nunes (CA-22)- PVI R+8

Will Hurd andPeter King look like they have probably reached the end of their roads, politically. The big fish, of course, would be Nunes-- but, by the numbers, his district is the toughest. Trump beat Hillary there by 10 points... a pretty steep-- albeit not impossible-- climb. The Democratic establishment is behind an uninspiring Republican-lite candidate, Andrew Janz, who venerates the death penalty and an NRA interpretation of the 2nd Amendment. The candidate who could actually beat Nunes is Ricardo Franco, who has a good connection to the voters but who is severely underfunded-- please help him here. "Today I spoke to a Poli Sci class at Fresno State," he told us, "where they are learning about Congress as well as propaganda techniques people use to get elected. Nunes calling local news outlets 'fake news' was a prime example and tonight's headlines did not go over well with them at all. Our local students are smart. Our constituents are smart. However, our youth are particularly keen on sniffing out BS when they see and hear it. Devin Nunes can spin things all he wants, but won't pass through the thorough lens of the students and constituents I talked to tonight. In fact, they sniff it out and reject it from the left as much as the right. Nunes' partisan political games and Dems that fall into the trap turn them off very quickly. You know what they did like speaking about? How for years Washington has been taking from the poor to feed the rich. These students know a statutory corporate tax rate of 20% effectively means zero. They know 'tax cuts for the middle class' are a lie after 5 years. If Mueller doesn't take Nunes down along with Trump, our voters certainly will."

There's also a great choice-- DuWayne Gregory-- in the Democrats' quest to dislodge Peter King on Long Island. King's vote with Nunes could be another brick in that road. DuWayne Gregory, the chief executive of the Suffolk County legislature, ran last time into a Long Island GOP headwind; this time he has the wind at his back. He told us that "King and his Republican cronies on the House Intel committee have failed us. This abrupt decision to shut down the investigation of Russia meddling with our elections created more questions than it answers. It is clear Peter King has not only abdicated his responsibility as a member of Congress, but as an American citizen, as well. This is a fireable offense and the voters on Election Day should do just that." Please consider helping DuWayne finish off King's shameful career by clicking on the congressional thermometer on the right and contributing whatever you can to his campaign. Let's make King and the rest of these guys symbols of this kind of treachery against the country.

Long Island Gets A New Candidate Today-- And Blue America Endorses DuWayne Gregory

A couple of weeks ago DuWayne Gregory was elected to his fifth term as the Suffolk County Legislature’s presiding officer. I met DuWayne a few years ago when he helped me conduct a forum for political science and economics majors at the State University of New York, Stony Brook. This morning he announced that he is running for New York's second congressional district, a seat that's been held by Republican Peter King since 1992. Although Obama won the Long Island district both times he ran (51-48% against McCain and 52-47% against Romney), Suffolk County was Trump territory in 2016. Hillary lost the county to Trump 328,403 (52.5%) to 276,953 (44.3%) and lost NY-02-- which includes part of Nassau County as well-- by slightly worse margins-- 53.0% to 43.9%. The district's voters wanted change and Hillary was seen as the candidate of the establishment and the status quo. Although DuWayne did better than other candidates had against King, he was swimming against the tide in 2016.

This year he feels he's swimming with the tide and probably along with a strong anti-Trump/anti-GOP wave. The district starts at Lake Ronkonkoma, Islandia, Bohemia, Bayport and Sayville in the east and heads west through Islip, Bay Shore, Babylon and Lindenhurst to Amityville, Massapequa and Seaford. This cycle many in the district-- as well as those of us at Blue America who had gotten to know DuWayne over the last couple of years-- were eager to see him in a rematch with King, especially in the kind of political environment of GOP overreach that Trump and Paul Ryan have created. Their tax bill, for example. is absolutely devastating for working families on Long Island. And the voters there know it, despite Trumps' gaslighting and Ryan's bogus claims. Peter King was given a "pass" to vote NO, but all that did was highlight his ineffectiveness as a representative for the district.

The most Hispanic of any of the Long Island districts (23% Latino), many NY-02 residents were shocked when they read that their own congressman sponsored a bill to deny citizenship to natural born Americans if their parents were not U.S. citizens. Nor were they pleased to see him sponsoring a bill that called for English only in government communications. Needless to say, the bigoted King was not a supporter of the comprehensive immigration bill passed by a wide bipartisan majority in the Senate.

In his own communications to Long Islanders, Duwayne stresses his own record of inclusion and vows to go to Washington "to fight for fairness for all Americans by working to bring about justice reform" and to "ensure that no one is treated differently because of their race or economic status when it comes to our justice system." He's one veteran who has every intention of going to Washington to ensure that "the problems with the VA never happen again to our war veterans" and to "work to provide quality healthcare to every veteran in need."

Over all, his outlook leads in a very different direction from King's. His concerns are about fighting for the middle class, not maintaining a status quo for the very wealthy and for corporate special interests. His goals are to be part of the congressional team that will increase the minimum wage, guarantee college affordability, increase child care credits, provide tax credits for healthcare providers and fight for good-paying jobs. When he was endorsed by New York's Working Families Party, Long Island Political Director Emily Abbott noted that "DuWayne has put politics aside to get things done for working families. Washington needs people like DuWayne Gregory who will fight to ensure that all of Long Island’s families and small businesses have a fair shot to succeed." DuWayne is a strong advocate for Medicare-For-All.

Peter King's antiquated perspective on women doesn't work in NY-02, not in 2016. He voted against equal pay for women and his anti-choice extremism belies his claims to be a "moderate." Moderates, unlike King, don't oppose women's choice even in cases of rape and incest. "The disparity of pay between men and women doing the same work is unjustifiable and I'll never forget when I'm in Congress that my constituents don't want any part of that," DuWayne told us. "Nor will I ever countenance the government coming between a woman and her doctor or her minister or whomever she choses to consult about her intimate health matters. My opponent talks about government getting off the backs of our people. I don't know how he squares that with his extreme positions on women's choice and his shameful, ideological vote to defund Planned Parenthood."

DuWayne reacted strongly when King voted for TPP Fast Track Authority. He would have rejected it. "I have serious concerns about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which was largely negotiated in secret. The nations set to sign on to this agreement represent 40% of the world’s GDP. A trade deal of that magnitude deserves to be rigorously debated and amended in Congress, so as to ensure strong protections for American jobs. By sacrificing the power to make changes to this deal, Congress is sacrificing its power to help shape it."

This morning DuWayne told me that "the call for vigorous new leadership in Washington is loud and the enthusiasm for change is inspiring." He added that Trump has degraded America's moral authority while Peter King remained silent. "We deserve a passionate champion for the issues we all care about-- cutting taxes, protecting our environment, and preserving the American Dream... "I hear it from my neighbors and from friends across the country; people are tired of the nonsense, the lies and the failures of Trump’s administration, and the politicians in Washington who let it happen. We know the swamp hasn’t been drained-- it’s deeper and dirtier than ever. And we know that it’s because politicians like Peter King aren’t doing their job."

Last year we had a mobile billboard driving up and down the district and we'd like to step up our participation in DuWayne Gregory's campaign for 2018. We are eager for suggestions from Blue America members and DWT readers. Meanwhile, a remembrance of 2016:

Is The DCCC Pepared To Help Turn Long Island Blue Again? Or Not?

I was born in Brooklyn and I went to high school there but in between (and afterwards) I lived on Long Island, first in Nassau County and later in Suffolk County. I have Long Island in my DNA-- and God knows I want to see Peter King out of office in my old neighborhoods. The Lovin' Spoonful may have been a NYC band but no one on the Island in the mid-'60s thought so. Their music was our music and I was so happy to share that music in the clip above for the Blue America DuWayne Gregory billboard truck last cycle. And you can't imagine how badly I want that truck out on the roads again-- from Massapequa, Amityville, Lindenhurst, Babylon, Bay Shore, Islip, all the way to Nicholas Road where I once shared a house with 6 women and entertained the Jefferson Airplane before their first East Coast concert. Last year it really would have been magic for DuWayne to beat Peter King-- especially with the DCCC abandoning him completely. Although Obama won it both times he ran, King beat Hillary in King's blue-trending district by nearly 10 points-- 53.0% to 43.9%. Was she ever the wrong candidate for that Nassau-Suffolk district! King was reelected 181,506 (62.1%) to 110,938 (37.9%). He spent $1,307,660 to DuWayne's $372,792. This cycle King already has $2,703,782 cash on hand. But in wave elections huge cash advantages by incumbents are largely meaningless.

Blue America has been begging DuWayne to run again. Last week he was reelected to his county legislative seat with an eye-popping 72% of the vote-- and against Chris Madden, a Republican recruited and heavily backed by King. His legislative district encompasses almost the whole eastern half of NY-02 and DuWayne won 52 out of the 55 election districts including even deep red parts ofAmityville and Copiague. DuWayne is known outside of his own part of the district because he's the presiding officer of the Suffolk County legislature. 

This cycle the DCCC claims it isn't going to ignore NY-02 like it did in 2016. Writing for Newsday, Emily Ngo reported that "The seat held by 13-term Republican Rep. Peter King was added Thursday to the Democratic list of districts the party views as vulnerable enough to flip in the 2018 midterm election. New York’s 2nd Congressional District is considered safely GOP in major race rating systems such as the Cook Political Report, but its designation by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee as in-play comes on the heels of Democratic victories Tuesday in the Nassau County executive and Hempstead Town supervisor races." And, don't forget that last May progressive activist and Berniecrat Christine Pellegrino won a red legislative district right in the heart of King's district (Massapequa, Babylon, West Islip and West Bay Shore). Romney had beaten Obama in that Assembly district and last year Trump eviscerated Hillary with a 23 point margin there. But Pellegrino beat conservative sociopath and Trumpist Tom Gargiulo 5,590 (57.89%) to 4,049 (41.93%). She ran on an unadulterated progressive platform-- none of the Republican-lite bullshit the DCCC tells all of its candidates to run on.

In the past DCCC chairman-- and King crony-- Steve Israel has done everything he could to protect King's seat. Israel is finally gone from Congress, but-- alas-- still influential at the DCCC. He's already dug up a horrifying candidate for the Democrats who would never be able to beat King, tsunami or no tsunami, Tim Gomes. This guy doesn't know if he wants to be a Democrat or Republican and keeps switching his party registration back and forth. This year he's trying the Democrat label. He doesn't have any policy positions on his website, usually a good indication of a bad candidate. But he loaned his campaign $1 million in the first quarter. (He's raised another $39,750 from real people since then.) There's also some self-entitled carpetbagger from the City-- Liuba Grechen Shirley-- in the race. No one in the district knows anything about her or Gomes. And neither would be a good bet to beat King.

DuWayne still seems interested. I think if he gets any kind of a signal that the DCCC won't undercut him by supporting the Republican self-funder pretending to be a Democrat, he'll run-- and win, both the primary and the general.

Is The DCCC Letting Peter King Off The Hook Without A Fight Again?

Last May there was such a big hubbub when progressive activist Christine Pellegrino won a red legislative district right in the heart of Peter King's Long Island congressional district (Massapequa, West Babylon, Babylon Village, West Islip and West Bay Shore). Romney had beaten Obama in that Assembly district and last year Trump eviscerated Hillary with a 23 point margin there. But Pellegrino, a full-fledged Berniecrat, beat conservative sociopath and Trumpist Tom Gargiulo 5,590 (57.89%) to 4,049 (41.93%). She ran on an unadulterated progressive platform-- none of the Republican-lite bullshit the DCCC tells all of its candidates to run on. And her victory was said to bode well for the Democrats to finally oust Peter King in 2018. So... as 2018 approaches, people are starting to wonder... what happened with that?

NY-02, which covers much of southern Long Island and includes chunks of both Nassau and Suffolk counties, went from a PVI of R+1 in 2015 to R+3 this year, but it is still very swingy and appears ready to swing back-- for the right candidate. Obama won the district both times he ran, but last year the voters gave Trump a stunning 53.0 to 43.9 win over Hillary. At the same time, Peter King was reelected 171,915 (62.4%) to 103,643 (37.6%) for DuWayne Gregory, the head of the Suffolk County legislature. DuWayne spent $372,792 to King's $1,307,660 and the DCCC refused to get involved in the race. This year, after his experience with the DCCC, Gregory-- easily the best shot the Democrats have for replacing King, seems more than reluctant to jump in again.

Instead, we have 3 candidates who know one in the district knows or cares about. Tim Gomes doesn't know if he wants to be a Democrat or Republican and keeps switching his party registration back and forth. This year he's trying the Democrat label. He doesn't have any policy positions on his website, usually a good indication of a bad candidate. And he loaned his campaign $1 million in the first quarter. (He's raised another $39,750 from real people since then.) Mike Sax seems to want to pass himself off as the progressive-- "the Randy Bryce of Long Island" without understanding anything about who Randy Bryce is-- but everyone I asked in the district (where I used to live) sees him as a nice guy who's a little looney. Liuba Grechen Shirley behaves like she's entitled to be congresswoman. But she just moved back to the district to run for Congress after living in New York City for 15 years. Everything I've read about her indicates a candidate reeking of inauthenticity, the opposite of what voters are looking for. No one knows any of them and they will have to work hard in the communities that make on NY-02 to give King a real race. I don't think Peter King could have picked a better contingent of candidates to guarantee his own reelection if he had selected each of them himself.

I'm also hearing that Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone might jump into the race. I don't know about that. He aspires to be governor and I don't think he sees a congressional seat as helpful towards achieving that ambition. He'd at least be a plausible candidate. I bet if Ben Ray Lujan or Pelosi called DuWayne Gregory and apologized for screwing him last time and promised not to do it again, he'd run again. I didn't ask him because those two would rather lose NY-02 again-- and forever-- than ever do anything like that. It's how their "leadership" works and explains why King will be in Congress in 2019 even if there is a mammoth anti-Trump tsunami next year.

Some Republicans Are Trying To Deny They Were Backing The TrumpCare Catastrophe

Sunday, Texas conservative Ted Poe resigned from the Freedom Caucus because of TrumpCare. He was for it. The Caucus was, by and large, against it. Maybe Poe was afraid of Trump's wrath but that is odd in a Houston area district that wasn't especially pro-Trump. Romney won Poe's district with 63%, around the same that McCain won it with. Trump only managed 52.4%. And had Trumpcare been enacted into law-- and Poe never made any bones about voting for it-- 26,054 of his constituents would have found themselves without health insurance. His district includes Montrose, one of the biggest and most vibrant LGBT communities in America, but the DCCC has never once given Poe a serious challenge to reelection. So he knows he can behave like a dirt-bag with alacrity. So far he has no opponent for 2018.

Over the weekend, conservative columnist Andrew Sullivan speculated that Trump has-- finally-- had it... or rather the American public has had it with Trump and his vile kakistocracy. "Trump still shows alarming potential as a would-be tyrant, contemptuous of constitutional proprieties, and prone to trashing every last norm of liberal democracy," he warned. "But he is also beginning to appear simultaneously as a rather weak chief executive, uninterested in competent management or follow-through, bedeviled by divisions within his own party, transfixed by cable news, and swiftly discrediting himself by an endless stream of lies, delusions, and conspiracy theories." And with no credibility left, at least not, according to Sullivan, "among sane people." Sullivan also warned the Republicans that the midterms aren't going to be kind to them in 2018.

A president hobbled domestically by his own party’s divisions and the opposition’s new energy may be tempted-- Putin-like-- to change the subject in a way that vaults him back to popularity. A foreign altercation from which he will not back down? A trade war? A smidge likelier, I’d say, is an over-the-top response to an inevitable jihadist terror attack in a major American city. A demagogue loses much of his power when he tries to wrestle complicated legislation through various political factions, in the way our gloriously inefficient Constitution requires. He regains it with rank fear, polarization, and a raw show of force. Heaven knows what the Constitution will look like once he’s finished.

The other possibility is that Trump really does at some point realize he’s sinking fast and decides on a hard pivot. He wants to win and be loved, and if he keeps losing and becomes more widely loathed with his current strategy, it’s by no means out of character for him to recalibrate. He could use the possible failure of Trumpcare to feed Paul Ryan to the Breitbartians, and reach out to Democrats on a tweaked Obamacare and infrastructure package. He could dump Bannon the way he dumped Manafort and bullshit his way through all the inconsistencies (the one thing he remains rather good at). He could wrest himself like Kong on Skull Island from the giant lizards and become the tribune of the forgotten men and women he wants to be, and combine nationalism and protectionism with, er, socialism, like his heroine Marine Le Pen. He could finally realize the potential he has thrown away so far, and become an American Perón.

The only snag with this strategy, of course, is that he could hard-pivot only to find himself a Kong who’s alienated from the GOP and obstructed by the emboldened Dems, a rogue, bleeding president without a party, marooned on his own island of polarized irrelevance.

The Times' Alexander Burns reported over the weekend that the ignominious collapse of TrumpCare amidst disastrous polling numbers and internal Republican Party in-fighting is leaving the bill's supporters "in a political jam back home". He mentioned, as examples, two very vulnerable Republicans. "John Faso of New York negotiated a side deal for his state in exchange for backing it. Mike Coffman was the lone Colorado lawmaker to endorse the bill, while his Republican neighbors agonized and stalled."

But with the collapse of the legislation on Friday, such Republican representatives now have nothing to show for their trouble. They ventured far out on a political limb, only to watch it disintegrate behind them. And when they run for re-election next year, they may have to defend their support for a politically explosive bill that many Republicans backed only reluctantly, and that never came close to reaching the president’s desk.

The fiasco in Washington is already rippling at home: Back in their districts, there are early signs of backlash against these lawmakers, including from constituents who voted Republican last November.

...National Republicans, still reeling from their unexpected defeat, expressed hope that health care might fade as an issue before the congressional elections in 2018. With more than a year and a half until voters next pass judgment on the Republican-controlled Congress, party leaders say they have plenty of time to record victories on issues like a tax code overhaul and infrastructure spending. Mr. Trump and Speaker Paul D. Ryan indicated on Friday that they did not intend to revisit health care in the near future.

But Republican strategists also acknowledged that they would probably have to give extra help to vulnerable members of Congress who supported the health care bill. Corry Bliss, the chief strategist for the Congressional Leadership Fund, a “super PAC” backed by Mr. Ryan, said the group would go out of its way to protect lawmakers who backed the bill. “We are committed to helping advance the legislative agenda of House leadership,” Mr. Bliss said on Saturday. “Of course we are going to give preferential treatment to friends and allies.”

By contrast, Mr. Bliss noted that the group had cut off funding to Representative David Young of Iowa, a Republican who opposed the health care bill.

It is unclear whether voters’ anger over health care will be enough help Democrats win a majority in the House next year.

The Democratic candidates we talked to since the bill imploded last week don't seem unclear at all. Katie Hill, for example, is running against a wishy-washy, scared-of-his-own-shadow Republican, Steve Knight. Last cycle, the DCCC forced some guy from outside the district on local Democrats and while Hillary won the blue-leaning district 50.3% to 43.6%, Knight won reelection over the hapless DCCC shill, 112,768 (54.2%) to 95,296 (45.8%). Katie is working on doing a lot better. We asked her how to characterize the differences between herself and Knight on Ryan's health care plan. "From my perspective, it was a terrible plan right from the start," she told us. "Out of party loyalty and an apparent lack of concern for his constituents who would lose coverage, Knight acted like the proposal had merit. He refused to take a real public stand one way or the other, so the fact that he didn't have to actually vote on it must have been a huge relief to him. Nonetheless, we know that he has not been standing up to say that all of his constituents deserve and need affordable health care. I promise to do that if I'm elected to replace him. Even though the ACA is still intact, we have a long way to go to really fix our health care system. I'm ready to fight for that in Congress. True leaders are more than just people who vote for or against what their party leadership tells them to. Unfortunately, Congressman Knight has not demonstrated his own core values that are not dependent on party lines. Folks in the Antelope Valley, Simi Valley and Santa Clarita expect and deserve real leadership, not someone who is afraid of standing up to the party establishment and special interests that back them. I will make the district I grew up in proud that they sent a local woman to Congress to make real change happen for the people in our communities and our country."

Darrell Issa and his most important constituent

Doug Applegate nearly beat Darrell Issa in the San Diego area last year. He's determined to finish the job in 2018. It didn't help Issa any that he kept wavering on the bill every time he got tugged in one direction or another. "It was an embarrassing week for Congressional Republicans," Applegate told us, "but it was even more embarrassing for Darrell Issa. When TrumpCare was first written, protests erupted at Issa’s office and Issa said he would vote no. But when Donald Trump sat down with Issa and asked him to support a bill that would cause 24 million Americans to lose health insurance, Issa flip flopped and supported it. I guess we know where Darrell’s true loyalty lies."

Voters on the South Shore of Long Island are trying to persuade DuWayne Gregory to run against Peter King again this year. King's dilly-dallying around the whole healthcare issue didn't endear him to anyone on either side of the contentious issue. DuWayne, who's the Presiding Officer of the Suffolk County Legislature told us that "King did the politically cowardly thing in regard TrumpCare; he tried to conceal his position from his own constituents. He instructed his staff to tell any callers that he was leaning no then after hundreds of calls, he changed that to "undecided." And yet, it was reported that during President Trump's visit to Capitol Hill to meet with GOP lawmakers he pointed out King saying they had grown up near each other in Queens. King was quoted afterwards as saying that "it would be difficult to vote no" after being singled out like that. Peter King's district was slated to be one of the worse affected by the AHCA with nearly 82,000 constituents to have lost insurance. Trumpcare was a disaster for those on Medicaid, also allowing insurers off the hook for providing maternity care, prescription drugs, mental health and more egregious provisions. Look at this; it's what they wanted to deny coverage for:

"Peter King and the New York State Republican delegation had negotiated an added bonus for New York State county governments by attempting to shift the cost of Medicaid to the state. This provision was labeled an attack on New York by Governor Cuomo. Worse yet, preliminary estimates of this, New York only, provision would have cost Suffolk County over $100 million. To think Peter King would have voted against the interests of millions of Americans and thousands of his own constituents simply because Trump recognized him is embarrassing and failure as a leader."

We introduced you to Dr. Jason Westin early in the month. He's a progressive candidate-- and a cancer specialist-- running against John Culberson in a district Hillary won 48.5% to 47.1% (after Romney beat Obama there 59.9% to 38.6%. He told me today that "Congressman Culberson knows that his district (TX-07) will be targeted by the DCCC and other groups as a pickup opportunity if the right candidate emerges for 2018. As a savvy career politician, he recognized that taking a position on the TrumpCare bill would open him up to criticism from his left or his right. He showed his true colors by taking no public position, despite his having co-sponsored H.R. 277 on January 4th, 2017, a much harsher 'root and branch' repeal of the Affordable Care Act. Surprising no one, he told local press after the bill was withdrawn that he 'absolutely' was supporting TrumpCare. The voters of TX-07 deserve a representative who will be honest, explain and not hide their vote, and be open to feedback. As my team says, we will 'Repeal and Replace' Culberson on 11/06/18."

You want to be sure a Republican was sincere about not supporting Ryan's horrific TrumpCare mess, look at the records. For example, mainstream, libertarian-leaning North Carolina conservative Walter Jones wrote a long piece for his constituents on his official house website where he explains why he would vote against TrumpCare. "Over the past two and half weeks," he wrote, "over 1,000 Eastern North Carolinians of all political stripes have contacted my office. Well over 90 percent are opposed to the bill. I asked for this job to represent the people of Eastern North Carolina, and they have spoken clearly. Furthermore, there are many aspects of the bill that deeply trouble me because of their potential effects on Eastern North Carolina and rural America. For example, the bill discriminates against as many as 7 million American veterans by making them ineligible to receive tax credits provided in the bill. It would also result in low-to-middle income seniors paying dramatically higher premiums. For instance, a 64-year old making $26,500 a year would see their annual premium jump from $1,700 to $14,600. It’s time to scrap this flawed bill and start over. Go out across the country, gather people’s input, and use an open, public process to thoughtfully craft a bill that delivers the relief the American people need." 

Compare Jones' clear, forthright, well-reasoned statement of opposition to the deceitful mumbo-jumbo that spewed out of crooks like Issa, King, Culberson and Knight.