Media

"The House voted yesterday to delay consideration of a trade agreement with Colombia, despite fierce opposition from the Bush administration and accusations by Republicans that Democrats were subverting long-standing laws on such pacts."

Today, the House General Counsel filed a motion for partial summary judgement with the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia.

Motion for partial summary judgment, memorandum of points and authorities, statement of uncontested facts, and declaration (pdf) >>

Proposed order (pdf) >>

Dems fault Bush on executive privilege

Laurie Kellman, Associated Press - April 10, 2007

This morning Jackie Speier was sworn in on the House floor to fill the 12th district seat of California vacated by the passing of former Congressman Tom Lantos.

Rep. Speier: "Madam Speaker I was struck by something while I was campaigning for this seat. A public servant is never more in tune with her constituents than when she is first running for the office. While holding over 60 community meetings across my district this year, the most common question was: when will we get out of Iraq? It was asked by votes across the spectrum -- veterans, students, parents, the prosperous, the middle class, those still working towards their piece of the American dream..."

The House has just passed a rule to suspend the requirement that the Colombia Free Trade Agreement be considered within 90 legislative days by a vote of 224-195-1 -- giving Congress the prerogative in scheduling a vote. This change is necessitated by the President's partisan actions. Instead of working with Congress on the economic concerns of the American people, on Tuesday, the President took the unprecedented step of sending up the Colombia Trade deal without following established protocols of Congressional consultation. His actions were political and counter-productive. This rule would remove the fast-track timeline for the Colombia free-trade agreement -- simply returning to Congress the rightful constitutional role in scheduling consideration of measures.

"Whether we're talking about rebuilding the infrastructure of America, or whether we're talking about investments in an innovation agenda, our commitment is to competitiveness to keep America number 1, and that innovation begins in the classroom. We have to have a strong commitment to the education of our people, whether we're talking about tax credits for our energy bill, which we passed here and would immediately create jobs. If we don't make these investments, our projects will have to discontinue. But many more are ready. The projects are in the pipeline."