Beer, boofing, and devil’s triangle: Kavanaugh offers explanation to RI senator
“I like beer,” said Supreme Court hopeful Brett Kavanaugh when Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse asked if his high school “ralph club” referred to alcohol-induced vomiting. “Do you like beer, Senator?” the potential justice then shot back at Whitehouse. “What do you like to drink?” It wasn’t the only time Kavanaugh, visibly angry throughout the […]
Breakfast with Sheldon Whitehouse
You wouldn’t know it by watching him work the crowd waiting for a breakfast table in Newport, but Sheldon Whitehouse, Rhode Island’s junior senator who is facing re-election this year, says he’s uncomfortable in the public spotlight. “In the world of people in politics, way shyer than average,” is how he described himself over breakfast […]
Pat Fontes wants a world without war, so she’s challenging Sheldon Whitehouse
Pat Fontes, a stalwart of the local antiwar movement, used to support Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. “I did not vote for Obama but I voted for Sheldon Whitehouse,” she told me in a recent interview. Now the 81-year-old peace activist is making her first-ever run for elected office by challenging Rhode Island’s junior senator in this […]
Flanders spams public sector employees seeking campaign cash
When Republican U.S. Senate candidate Bob Flanders was the state-appointed receiver for cash-strapped Central Falls in 2012, the affluent East Greenwich resident infamously offered municipal employees a haircut or a beheading in balancing the city’s budget. As such, public sector workers probably won’t prove to be a major source of support for Flanders, a small […]
Bob Flanders doesn’t think community college is college
Republican Bob Flanders had some nice things to say about Bobby Nardolillo yesterday, his now-former opponent in the GOP primary for a U.S. Senate seat who dropped out of the race yesterday. “He is a dedicated public servant with a bright future,” Flanders said of Nardolillo in a tweeted statement. Before Nardolillo dropped out, Flanders […]
Cicilline holds the line for Dreamers, rest of RI delegation supports budget deal
Congressman David Cicilline held the line for Dreamers, voting – in contrast to the rest of the Rhode Island delegation – against the bill to fund, and effectively re-open, the government today. “We should be staying here and working around the clock to get this work done, rather than kicking the can down the road […]
Jack Reed, Jim Langevin and the defense industry
A couple months back, I was emailed by South County activist Jonathan Daly-LaBelle, who wanted to know if I’d seen Rep. Jim Langevin’s press release announcing the rationale behind his recent yes vote on a nearly $700-billion Pentagon budget. It “is really quite disturbing,” Daly-LaBelle wrote. No argument from me on this one. Langevin has […]
Does Langevin really support a single-payer healthcare system?
I was skeptical last September when I heard word that Congressman Jim Langevin, Democrat of Rhode Island’s Second Congressional District, had decided to cosponsor the House single-payer health insurance bill, H.R.676 – the Expanded & Improved Medicare For All Act. I’d been in contact with the congressman’s office on the issue earlier in the year […]
RI delegation denounces Trump’s tax plan
Rhode Island’s all-Democratic Congressional delegation is none-too-pleased with Trump’s tax plan that seems poised to reach his desk today or tomorrow. “Republicans just pulled off one of the biggest cons in the history of American politics,” said Congressman David Cicilline. Senator Jack Reed went almost as far, saying, “It is an historic transfer of wealth […]
How the GOP tax plan would hurt Rhode Island
The Republican tax proposals would ill-serve Rhode Island in a variety of ways, said federal, state, and local officials who have been busy studying the copious and potentially crippling ramifications either the House or Senate bill could have on life in the Ocean State. The effects range from increased economic inequality, cuts to the social […]
Sheldon Whitehouse grills Facebook, Twitter, Google on Russian hacking
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse co-chaired a subcommittee hearing yesterday that shed new light on the extent to which Russian operatives used social media to turn American voters against one another in the run up to the 2016 election. “We are trying in the Subcommittee to lay out the Kremlin playbook on election interference generally,” Whitehouse told […]
Cicilline legislation would provide view into Trump’s swamp
Congressman David Cicilline’s new bill won’t actually drain the swamp out of Trump Administration, but it could give America a better glimpse at that ecosystem. It’s called the DRAIN The Swamp Act, or the Determining if Regulatory Actions are in the Interest of the Nation or the Swamp Act, and it would require “agencies to […]
Langevin moves left again, votes against limiting abortions
Langevin voted against H.R. 36, a bill that would prevent abortions after 20 weeks instead of the 24. In the past, Langevin has supported this limitation.
Langevin supports Medicare for All, Reed is only holdout
After being pressed hard by constituents, Congressman Jim Langevin announced today he too supports Medicare for All. “After much deliberation,” said Langevin in a prepared statement, “I have determined that this is a policy worthy of serious consideration, so I have decided to cosponsor the Medicare for All Act.” “I have long said the Affordable Care Act is […]
RI congressional delegation split on Medicare for All
When it comes to Medicare for All, Rhode Island’s congressional delegation is split down the middle. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and Congressman David Cicilline both cosponsor such bills in their respective chambers, while Senator Jack Reed and Congressman Jim Langevin are both still undecided. Whitehouse made news recently as an early cosponsor of Vermont Senator Bernie […]
Whitehouse explains Medicare For All, prospects for bills passage
“It’s to provide the opportunity to people who are not eligible for Medicare to never-the-less join Medicare and have all the advantages of reliability, efficiency, and security of Medicare,” said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, describing the Medicare For All bill he will be cosponsoring in the coming days. “At this point, it’s pretty aspirational,” he said. […]
Sheldon Whitehouse cosponsors Bernie Sanders’ Medicare For All legislation
Rhode Island will have a signature on Senator Bernie Sanders’ much-anticipated Medicare For All bill set to be introduced on Wednesday as Senator Sheldon Whitehouse will be a cosponsor. “It’s time we had a real conversation about creating a national health plan,” Whitehouse said in a statement released today. “We have come a long way […]
Jim Langevin on Trump, Russia, Mueller, and Clinton
Congressman Jim Langevin addressed a town hall forum in Narragansett for almost two hours before talking to me about President Donald Trump’s sanity, the Russian investigation, what would happen if Bob Mueller were fired, if he’s thinking about impeachment, and if Hillary Clinton should have won. Below is the totality of our conversation. BP: I […]
Langevin wants to work with GOP, South County wants Medicare for All
Speaking to a modest crowd at a constituent forum at Narragansett Town Hall, Congressman Jim Langevin told a cautionary tale of failing to seek bipartisan consensus. “I’m the first to acknowledge the Affordable Care Act was not perfect when we passed it,” he said, recalling a time when Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress and […]
Reed questions Comey: RI Senator participates in history hearing
Rhode Island Senator Jack Reed played a role in history today. As an ex officio member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Rhode Island’s senior senator got to ask questions of former FBI Director Jim Comey at his highly anticpated hearing before the Committee today concerning his termination and its relationship to Russian meddling in the […]
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