House GOP Investigating IRS Focus on Tea Party Groups

Updated 5:52 pm | House Republicans are seizing on the IRS admission that personnel improperly targeted tea party groups for scrutiny, with Speaker John A. Boehner drawing a connection to abuses of the past.

“The admission by the Obama administration that the Internal Revenue Service targeted political opponents echoes some of the most shameful abuses of government power in 20th-century American history,” Boehner said in a statement Friday.

Rep. Charles Boustany Jr., is leading the push through his role as chairman of the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Oversight. The Louisiana Republican has already sent a letter to acting IRS Commissioner Steve Miller seeking all agency correspondence relating to the exact terms “conservative,” “tea party” and “patriot.”

Boustany noted that the Ways and Means panel already has an investigation under way.

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House GOP Seizes On Kermit Gosnell Abortion Trial

The high-profile trial of a Philadelphia abortion doctor charged with killing four babies and a Virginia woman has had rank-and-file House Republicans looking for legislative action, and now leadership is also starting to weigh in.

In a Thursday afternoon press release, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va. praised two committee chairmen for earlier this week demanding answers from officials in all 50 states regarding what they are doing to combat late-term abortions, such as those that may have taken place at Kermit Gosnell’s clinic. Full story

Cantor Sets Ambitious House Agenda for May

(Chris Maddaloni/CQ Roll Call File Photo)

The Keystone XL oil pipeline, Securities and Exchange Commission regulation, student loan rates and pediatric medical research will be among the first orders of legislative business in the House when Congress returns from a weeklong recess.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., issued a memo on Friday laying out the Republicans’ legislative agenda for May. Congress is expected to be busy during the three weeks it will be in session before members take another short recess the week of Memorial Day. Cantor also promised another vote to repeal Obamacare.

Though Cantor doesn’t mention it in his memo, an immigration overhaul will no doubt dominate lawmakers’ attention as it moves forward in both the House and Senate.

The memo from Cantor to members of the House Republican Conference can be viewed after the jump.

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About That Health Care Bill Revolt

Much was made last week when House Republican leadership failed to garner enough support for legislation that would have stripped funding from one Obamacare program to shore up another.

There they go again, the D.C. commentariat uttered, in reference to the GOP leadership’s inability to corral their rebellious conservatives and move a bill that was intended to show the voting public not just what Republicans are against — in this case, the Affordable Care Act — but what they are for. The legislation proposes to divert up to $3.7 billion from the Affordable Care Act’s Prevention and Public Health Fund to bolster the Pre-Existing Conditions Insurance Plan, which is facing implementation difficulties.

But the real story behind what appeared to be a typical GOP leadership problem of inability to build a consensus was the debate the House majority has been having with itself over how to handle Obamacare as implementation of the law accelerates between now and the 2014 midterm elections. As I reported, there is an honest philosophical disagreement over the best way to make voters realize, from the point of view of the Republicans, just how bad Obamacare is now that full implementation is under way. Full story

Cantor Sells Dems’ ‘Cave’ to Build Support for FAA Fix

Cantor is seeking to build support among Republicans for the FAA fix. Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer, right, announced on the House floor Friday that he opposes the bill. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

Is House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., concerned that his conference might reject a bill that empowers the Federal Aviation Administration to work around the sequester and halt the air-traffic-controller furloughs that have been causing those annoying flight delays?

The Senate cleared similar legislation Thursday evening before leaving town for a weeklong recess and even included in the package language deeming any similar bill passed by the House as automatically approved by the Senate. Passing this legislation, sponsored by Rep. Tom Latham, R-Iowa, would appear to be a no-brainer for House Republicans, who have long argued that the sequester does not have to significantly affect critical government services if President Barack Obama applies the cuts smartly.

House Republicans have previously supported legislation that would grant Obama the power to do just that — a proposal that was rejected by both Senate Democrats and the administration until fear materialized of angry flight-delayed tarmac voters. So it was curious that Cantor, in a “Dear Colleague” letter to House Republicans announcing plans for a Friday floor vote on Latham’s FAA fix, urged support for the bill by citing CQ Roll Call reporter Steven T. Dennis’ tweet offering the following analysis:

Make no mistake, this FAA fix is a complete, utter cave by Senate Democrats and, if signed, by the White House.

— Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) April 26, 2013

Cantor in his letter adds that “this is a sentiment expressed in other press reports over the last 12 hours, including, Politico: ‘Democrats blink first on aviation‘ and Chicago Tribune: ‘White House Scrambles For Damage Control.’”

Read Cantor’s letter below: Full story

Boehner Violates Hastert Rule Again

The House approved a bill Tuesday without the support of a majority of the Republican Conference, about one month after Speaker John A. Boehner sought to assure his conference that he intended to observe the “Hastert rule.”

The bill, which expands the government’s ability to buy land to protect historical battlefields at a projected cost of $50 million, passed under suspension of the rules, 283-122, with 101 Republicans supporting the bill and 122 voting against it. The Hastert rule, named for former Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., calls for GOP leadership to only allow bills to pass that have secured “a majority of the majority” of the House Republican conference.

Dan Holler, a spokesman for Heritage Action for America, which issued a “key vote” against the bill, said, “Americans of all political stripes agree something has to change, and that Republicans can lead that change if they are willing to reject status quo in Washington. Violating the Hastert Rule to pass $46 million in battlefield pork won’t get the job done, though,” he said. “Last night’s vote was a missed opportunity.”

Although the top members of House GOP leadership voted for the bill, including Budget Chairman Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, several of the lower tier members of leadership, including Oregon Rep. Greg Walden, the National Republican Congressional Committee chairman, and Oklahoma Rep. James Lankford, the Policy Committee chairman, voted “no.”

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McConnell’s Obamacare Tax Repeal Stalls in House

House Republicans appear unlikely to move a repeal of Obamacare’s medical device tax as a standalone bill, according to multiple GOP sources.

This could disappoint Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. The Kentucky Republican is lobbying House GOP leaders — both publicly and privately — to act in the wake of the Senate’s overwhelming, though nonbinding, bipartisan vote to repeal the tax, which functions as a key funding mechanism for President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act. That vote, passed as an amendment to the nonbinding fiscal 2014 budget resolution, was 79–20 for repeal, with 33 Democrats voting in favor.

“The House is not ready to send any tax vehicle to the Senate right now,” a Republican lobbyist with relationships on both ends of Capitol Hill said.

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The New GOP: Kids Before Conventions

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s latest effort at a new-look Republican Party will come in the form of a bill that would fund pediatric research in an unconventional way, the Virginian’s office announced Tuesday.

The Kids First Research Act would repurpose federal money used to finance the Democratic and Republican political conventions and publicly finance presidential campaigns and would instead use the resources to fund research into autism and other childhood diseases.

“Instead of spending millions of taxpayer dollars for presidential campaigns, these funds will be better spent helping find cures and treatments for pediatric diseases and disorders like autism,” Cantor said in a statement.

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RSC Members Vote Against Own Budget

House Democrats tried an old legislative trick intended to embarrass Republicans but fell short when the GOP defeated the upstart Republican Study Committee budget on Wednesday.

Democrats voted “present” on the measure, meaning Republicans had to supply all the votes to either pass or defeat the RSC budget. The bill failed on a 104-132 vote, with 171 members voting present.

Still, Democrats succeeded in one respect: They forced Republicans to vote down their colleagues’ bill. In fact, 61 members of the RSC voted against the budget produced by the group, whose authors boast that it would balance the budget within five years. Some of those included House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia, GOP Conference Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington, Budget Chairman Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin and Chief Deputy Majority Whip Peter Roskam of Illinois. Full story

Cantor Moving Legislation Aimed at Rehabing GOP Brand

(Chris Maddaloni/CQ Roll Call File Photo)

With House Republicans taking fire from every angle, including inside their party, for failing to connect their philosophical principles to voters’ everyday concerns, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor is taking action.

With the blessing of the leadership team and top GOP committee chairmen, the Virginia Republican is spearheading a host of legislation that is somewhat remarkable both in what it does, and does not, attempt to address. In the traditional sense, these bills are not focused on reducing the deficit, shrinking the national debt or limiting the size and scope of government. They are focused on using Washington’s power levers to influence public policy.

That effort began last week with the introduction of the SKILLS Act, legislation aimed at improving job training. Whether House Republicans handled the roll out of the SKILLS Act to maximize the public relations aspect of the bill is another story. The introduction was drowned out by coverage of the continuing resolution, an East Coast snow storm and Sen. Rand Paul’s, R-Ky., filibuster. But Cantor made clear that there is more to come on this front. Full story