Closing summary
We’re closing our politics blog now. Thanks for joining us.
So far there’s no sign of a deal in the Senate over a stopgap funding agreement that would keep the government running. The House passed the measure last night.
Here’s what we’ve been following:
Nancy Pelosi praised Joe Biden and Barack Obama as she reflected on their legislative accomplishments during her time a House speaker. Pelosi, who steps down next month, gave what could be her last press conference in the job.
Republican Florida governor Ron DeSantis indicated he was ready to sign the nation’s most restrictive abortion law, a Texas-style “heartbeat ban” that outlaws the procedure as soon as a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually around the sixth week of pregnancy.
The House voted 233-191 to allow Puerto Rico to hold a vote on becoming the 51st state, a largely symbolic measure because the Puerto Rico Status Act is unlikely to get a hearing in the Senate.
Joe Biden said he’ll be heading to sub-Saharan Africa soon. He was speaking at the conclusion of a summit with African leaders in which he pledged hundreds of millions of dollars for infrastructure, technology and free elections.
First lady Jill Biden says she’s “all in” on her husband running again for the presidency in 2024, according to a report from CNN that says her position is a “tidal shift” from her reluctant feelings of just three months ago.
Two conspirators convicted of terrorism last month in a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor Gretchen Whitmer were sentenced to prison sentences of 12 and 10 years respectively. A third convict is yet to be sentenced.
The state department has announced a new round of sanctions against a number of Russian oligarchs, government officials and their families for enabling president Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
DeSantis back 'heartbeat' abortion ban for Florida
An extreme “heartbeat” abortion ban looks to be coming to Florida after Republican governor Ron DeSantis announced his willingness Thursday to sign such a law.
“I’m willing to sign great life legislation. That’s what I’ve always said I would do,” DeSantis said at a press conference in Fort Lauderdale, reported by the Florida Phoenix.
A heartbeat ban outlaws an abortion once the presence of a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually around the sixth week of pregnancy.
A version of the law, the nation’s most restrictive abortion legislation, took effect in Texas in 2021 after the Supreme Court, which had yet to overturn federal abortion protections, declined to block it.
Rightwinger DeSantis is seen as a likely contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024, and leads in several recent polls of party members.
Despite passing a raft of culture war legislation during his first term of office, including a 15-week abortion ban, DeSantis largely avoided the issue during campaigning ahead of his landslide reelection as Florida’s governor last month.
The Republican supermajority in the Florida legislature means Democrats would be unable to block any new abortion law.
Updated
Free-spirited Arizona senator Kyrsten Sinema raised eyebrows last week when she announced she was leaving the Democratic party to sit as an independent. Now, it seems, she’s also become an independent trader.
An extraordinary article published Thursday by Slate outs the enigmatic Sinema as a prolific seller of goods, especially shoes and clothes, on Facebook Marketplace, enough to rise to the level of a “side hustle”, the magazine says.
Reporter Christina Cauterucci said she exchanged Facebook messages with the politician over the potential purchase of a pair of worn-only-once Badgley Mischka heels ($65, “in perfect condition”).
Digging deeper, she found also for sale: a $215 cycling ensemble, a $25 trucker hat, and a $150 stainless steel watch with a silicone strap.
Within the past six weeks, Cauterucci says, Sinema has “offloaded” a $150 fitness tracker ring, an $80 cycling jersey, and a $500 bicycle travel case.
Longer ago, there were listings on Facebook for “several dozen personal items”, including a $100 pair of sunglasses (“Just too big for my tiny head!!”), two $50 puffer jackets, three $75 pairs of high-heeled boots, a $75 cycling bib, a $60 Lululemon raincoat, several mesh tanks at $55 a pop ($20 off the current retail price), and multiple bikinis, priced between $60 and $70, that ranged from “never worn” to “in great condition”.
Slate is cautious and won’t state outright that it’s definitely Sinema who’s been selling off her worldly goods.
“Would a sitting senator respond within seconds on a weekday morning to a message about her used heels?” Cauterucci wonders.
“Would it be worth her time to photograph a pair of old shoes, write a sales listing, field inquiries from potential buyers, and arrange pickup logistics – all for just $65?”
But as if to answer its own questions, Slate points out that it’s Sinema’s name on the Facebook Marketplace listing, it’s her in the profile photo, the seller’s biography says she lives in Phoenix, and she shares one mutual Facebook friend with the reporter who works for the Democratic party.
The clincher, perhaps: The 4.5in, rhinestone-studded stilettoes “look as if they would fit pretty well in Sinema’s wardrobe”.
It’s possible we’ll never know. According to Slate, Sinema’s staff would not confirm or deny the Facebook Marketplace account was hers, and did not respond to fact-checking queries.
Here’s a video clip from Nancy Pelosi’s final press conference, definitely, maybe, as House speaker.
Addressing the media on Thursday morning, Pelosi looked back on some of the main policy accomplishments that took place under her tenure, and praised presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden for getting them done.
“This may be the last time I see you in this way,” Pelosi said.
She said she was particularly proud of the passage of the Affordable Care Act under Obama, which she said brought healthcare to tens of millions previously denied, and this week’s signing of the same-sex Respect for Marriage Act.
Pelosi, a Democrat from California, became speaker in 2007. She will retire next month.
Kevin McCarthy’s travails as he seeks to become House speaker when Republicans take over the majority in January are well documented, no more so than in this latest take by Politico.
The California congressman has been scrambling to attract the 218 votes he needs to take the gavel, and making some pretty unsavory promises to rightwing extremists in his party to get there, if accounts are to be believed.
Politico drills down on the fragile political game behind McCarthy’s maneuvering, the pledges he has had to make, and particularly something called the “motion to vacate the chair”, a potentially hazardous procedure in which any House member would be able to force a vote on deposing a sitting speaker.
There’s horse trading going on between the pro and anti-McCarthy camps among House Republicans over setting a threshold of votes that would be needed for such a motion in exchange for support.
One of McCarthy’s fears is that Democrats could use a motion to vacate in retaliation for his threats to remove prominent opposition congress members Adam Schiff, Eric Swalwell and Ilhan Omar from committees.
Politico likens the haggling to an episode of the TV gameshow The Price is Right. You can read their report here.
House approves Puerto Rico statehood act
In what was largely a symbolic gesture, the House has voted to allow Puerto Rico to decide whether it wants to pursue becoming the 51st state.
The Puerto Rico Status Act passed 233-191 in the chamber, requiring the US territory to hold a vote of its residents on three options, statehood, independence or sovereignty in free association with the US.
But with little to no time left on the Senate calendar, the measure, hailed by outgoing Democratic House majority leader Steny Hoyer, is unlikely to be heard there, sounding its death knell in this current Congress at least.
Statehood for Puerto Rico was supported by the Biden administration. 16 Republicans voted for the bill in a free vote.
A joint statement from bipartisan negotiators of the act said: “Many of us disagree on what that future should look like, but we all accept that the decision must belong to the people of Puerto Rico and to them alone. The Puerto Rico Status Act will grant them that choice.”
Read more:
Charlie Baker, the Republican governor of Massachusetts who will soon step down after choosing not to run for a third term – or for president or any other office as a GOP candidate despite (or perhaps because of) leading a Democratic-dominated state for so long – will be the next president of the NCAA, the largest governing body in US college sports.
“The NCAA is confronting complex and significant challenges but I am excited to get to work as the awesome opportunity college athletics provides to so many students is more than worth the challenge,” Baker said on Thursday, about the job he will start in March, replacing Mark Emmert.
“And for the fans that faithfully fill stadiums, stands and gyms from coast to coast, I am eager to ensure the competitions we all love to follow are there for generations to come.”
As the Associated Press has it, the NCAA has recently been “battered by losses in court and attacks by politicians” and is “going through a sweeping reform, trying to decentralize the way college sports is run”.
“College sports leaders, including Emmert, have repeatedly asked for help from Congress to regulate name, image and likeness compensation since the NCAA lifted its ban in 2021 on athletes being paid endorsers. Now the association will be led by a politician for the first time.”
Baker, the AP says, “graduated from Harvard, where he played on the junior varsity basketball team. That’s the extent of his personal experience in college sports”.
Linda Livingstone, president of Baylor in Texas and chair of the NCAA board, said Baker had “shown a remarkable ability to bridge divides and build bipartisan consensus, taking on complex challenges in innovative and effective ways. These skills and perspective will be invaluable as we work with policymakers to build a sustainable model for the future of college athletics.”
Futher reading:
In something close to a policy announcement – a scarce feature of a 2024 presidential run that has so far featured little of anything, particularly polling success – Donald Trump has promised to stop government “impeding the lawful speech of American citizens”, should he retake the White House.
In a video shared with the New York Post (a Murdoch-owned tabloid though not the source of support it used to be), the former president said: “I will sign an executive order banning any federal department or agency from colluding with any organization, business or person to censor, limit, categorize or impede the lawful speech of American citizens. I will then ban federal money from being used to label domestic speech as mis- or disinformation.”
As the Post put it:
The 76-year-old Trump made the pledge as part of a broader ‘free speech’ platform … vowing also to impose a seven-year ban on former FBI and CIA workers handling private-sector US consumer records.
Trump said he would fire bureaucrats deemed to have engaged in censorship, “directly or indirectly, whether they are the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, the FBI, the DOJ, no matter who they are”.
He also said: “If any US university is discovered to have engaged in censorship activities or election interferences in the past, such as flagging social media content for removal of blacklisting, those universities should lose federal research dollars and federal student loan support for a period of five years, and maybe more.”
Free speech, or a particular rightwing version of it, is of course the much-discussed topic of the day at Twitter, where the site’s new owner, Elon Musk, is dedicated to the concept to the extent of reinstating Trump’s account – though Trump has not yet returned to tweeting.
Trump, the Post reports, thinks this month’s ‘Twitter Files’ releases have “confirmed that a sinister group of Deep State bureaucrats, Silicon Valley tyrants, leftwing activists, and depraved corporate news media have been conspiring to manipulate and silence the American People.”
“The censorship cartel must be dismantled and destroyed – and it must happen immediately.”
Meanwhile:
Interim summary
We’ve reached lunchtime on a busy day in US politics, which includes ongoing discussions in the Senate on approving a short-term funding measure to keep the government open for at least another week.
We’re hoping to learn more this afternoon.
Also happening today:
Nancy Pelosi has been speaking of her “pride” in a number of legislative achievements during what could be her final press conference as House speaker. She paid tribute to Joe Biden and Barack Obama.
Biden says he’ll be heading to sub-Saharan Africa soon on the first visit there of his presidency. He was speaking at the conclusion of a summit with African leaders in which he pledged hundreds of millions of dollars for infrastructure, technology and free elections.
Two conspirators convicted of terrorism last month in a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor Gretchen Whitmer were sentenced to prison sentences of 12 and 10 years respectively. A third convict is yet to be sentenced.
First lady Jill Biden says she’s “all in” on her husband running again for the presidency in 2024, according to a report from CNN that says her position is a “tidal shift” from her reluctant feelings of just three months ago.
The state department has announced a new round of sanctions against a number of Russian oligarchs, government officials and their families for enabling president Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
Biden announces Africa visit
Joe Biden will soon visit sub-Saharan Africa, he announced on Thursday. It came at the conclusion of a three-day summit with African leaders in which he announced hundreds of millions of dollars in investment in the continent for infrastructure, technology initiatives and supporting free elections.
A day earlier, the president said he was “all in” on strengthening US relations with African countries, which was why he had sent many of his top advisers there, including secretary of state Antony Blinken, treasury secretary Janet Yellin and commerce secretary Gina Raimondo.
“I’m looking forward to seeing you in your home countries,” Biden told the leaders of 49 African countries on Thursday about what will be the first visit there of his presidency other than a brief stopover in Egypt last month, the Associated Press reported.
He did state which countries he will visit or when the trip will happen.
Biden on Thursday pledged $165m in US funding to support peaceful, credible elections in Africa next year as his administration looked to underscore the importance of fair voting in countries where it sometimes has been blighted by violence.
Pelosi 'proud' of achievements as Speaker
Nancy Pelosi has given what she suggests will be her final press conference as House speaker, telling reporters this is “maybe the last time I see you in this way”.
She’s been reflecting on some of the successes of her tenure, and paying tribute to Joe Biden and Barack Obama for most of them, from the passing of the Affordable Care Act to this week’s signing of the same-sex Respect for Marriage Act.
Pelosi said she was “proud” to have her signature below Biden’s on that law:
He has been a remarkable president. He has a record that is so outstanding, and for such a short period of time as well.
People compare him to Lyndon Johnson, to Franklin Roosevelt, but I’d remind you all that Roosevelt had 319 Democrats in the House, President Biden 222, whatever it is, and even fewer now.
She went on to list many of the items of legislation she was most proud of, under Biden’s leadership:
Passing the American rescue plan, getting vaccines at arms, money in pockets, children back to school and people safely back to work, the bipartisan infrastructure law, building roads, bridges, ports and water systems…
Bringing people together, not projects that divide communities but bringing people together, and this such a source of pride, putting justice and equity front and center.
Of her regrets, the inability to pass comprehensive gun reform saddened her, she said. Speaking one day after the 10th anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting that killed 20 elementary school children and six adults, she said:
We won’t relent until the job is done, until we can have background checks, and have banned assault weapons.
Pelosi doesn’t leave office until early next month, and didn’t rule out speaking with the media again, particularly if there’s a resolution to threat of a government shutdown.
The speaker says she’s optimistic that a “bipartisan, bicameral” omnibus spending deal will pass next week to keep the government funded for a year.
Whitmer kidnap plot conspirators sentenced
Two men who forged an early alliance with the leader of a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor Gretchen Whitmer were sentenced Thursday to lengthy prison terms for assisting him before the FBI broke up the scheme in 2020.
Pete Musico was given a minimum term of 12 years and his son-in-law Joe Morrison got 10 years, the Associated Press reports.
A third person, Paul Bellar, was awaiting his sentence at the same hearing in Jackson county.
They were convicted in October of providing material support for a terrorist act, which carries a maximum term of 20 years, and two other crimes.
Musico, 45, Morrison, 28, and Bellar, 24, were members of a paramilitary group known as the Wolverine Watchmen.
Musico and Morrison will be eligible for parole after serving their minimum sentences. The maximum they can held in prison would be 42 years under state law.
Read more:
There are “big announcements”, and others are not so big. The internet was having fun on Thursday with this latest one from former president Donald Trump, a man who never knowingly undersells any potential money-making venture.
Trump’s latest wheeze, which he trailed heavily on his failing Truth Social network over the last 24 hours, casts himself as the superhero central figure in a new “digital trading card collection”.
For only $99, customers can acquire non-fungible tokens (NFTs) of Trump dressed in a variety of “hero” outfits, including a shiny red bodysuit and cape; as an astronaut; a racing car driver and football player, and so on.
Just when you thought this grifter couldn't humiliate himself any more than he already has, there's this. THIS is what the big announcement was. pic.twitter.com/npsjPNYpBA
— John Kiriakou (@JohnKiriakou) December 15, 2022
Trump is adamant they will sell out “I believe very quickly”, and offers those who pay the chance to win one of several prizes, including dinner with him in Miami; lunch at his Florida resort Mar-a-Lago; a round of golf with the “world’s worst cheat”; signed photographs etc.
Unsurprisingly, the internet was quick to react, with a series of tweets raging from incredulity to outright mocking.
“Just when you thought this grifter couldn’t humiliate himself any more than he already has, there’s this,” says author and CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou.
Now that my beautiful NFT apes are all worthless, I need a new place to invest my money. These Trump trading cards may be just what the doctor ordered. pic.twitter.com/tojlGEHkER
— Mark R. Yzaguirre (@markyzaguirre) December 15, 2022
Trump's "major announcement" turns out to be a series of $99 NFTs that are ugly even by the usual NFT standards. pic.twitter.com/f6r80q2PgB
— Will Sommer (@willsommer) December 15, 2022
HAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHHHAHAHAH#MajorAnnouncement https://t.co/MIiEnF0kEg pic.twitter.com/6JPjimoMcw
— Lesley Abravanel 🪩 (@lesleyabravanel) December 15, 2022
i am going to acquire this Donald Trump NFT because it is the everyday looking version of him that we all know and love pic.twitter.com/zVnAS3H6xk
— Matt Binder (@MattBinder) December 15, 2022
The state department has unveiled a new round of sanctions against Russian oligarchs and others it says are enabling the country’s president Vladimir Putin in his war in Ukraine.
They include Vladimir Olegovich Potanin, a former deputy prime minister of the Russian federation and Potanin’s wife Ekaterina Viktorovna Potanina and their two adult children.
Today, the United States is taking sweeping actions against major actors in Russia’s financial sector, governors in Russia, and proxy authorities installed in Ukraine by the Kremlin. https://t.co/SvHTaz8S1t
— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) December 15, 2022
Also on the list are five directors of Russian railways, and about 40 members of the Russian government and certain family members, both in Russia and installed by the Kremlin as “proxy authorities” in Ukraine.
“The US is committed to working alongside our allies and partners to further impose severe consequences on President Putin and his enablers for Russia’s unconscionable war against Ukraine,” the state department said in the statement.
Read more:
More migrants may be released into the US to pursue immigration cases when Trump-era asylum restrictions end next week, the homeland security department is warning, according to the Associated Press.
Democratic Texas congressman Henry Cuellar says customs and border protection officials told him as many as 50,000 migrants could be waiting at the US southern border for the scheduled 21 December termination of the policy.
A federal judge in Washington ordered the ending on that date of Title 42, under which migrants have been denied rights to seek asylum more than 2.5m times on grounds of preventing spread of Covid-19.
The AP has reviewed a homeland security document dated Tuesday that says the department is reporting faster processing for migrants in custody on the border, more temporary detention tents, staffing surges and increased criminal prosecutions of smugglers.
But the seven-page document included no major structural changes amid unusually large numbers of migrants entering the country, and more expected when Title 42 ends.
Cuellar, who has clashed with the Biden administration over immigration, said in an interview that authorities plan to admit those seeking asylum who go through ports of entry, but return to Mexico those who cross illegally between official crossings.
Read more:
Nancy Pelosi will shortly host one of her final press conferences as Speaker.
On Wednesday, the House honored its long-serving, first woman Speaker with the unveiling of a portrait, an oil-on-canvas by artist Ron Sherr of the California Democrat wielding the gavel for the first time, in January 2007.
Today, the House unveiled its portrait of Nancy Pelosi, the first woman to serve as Speaker of the House. #HouseCollection https://t.co/l1TR6fCQfS pic.twitter.com/Wpl3GGOm4y
— U.S. House History (@USHouseHistory) December 14, 2022
It’s the end of the road for the bust in the US Capitol of a supreme court judge who wrote a slavery ruling that helped pave the pathway to the civil war. Martin Pengelly reports:
The US House of Representatives voted on Wednesday to remove from the Capitol a bust of Roger Taney, the supreme court justice who in 1857 wrote the Dred Scott decision, justifying slavery and denying that Black people had rights any “white man was bound to respect”.
If the new measure is signed into law by Joe Biden, the bust will be removed from outside the old supreme court chamber and replaced by a bust of Thurgood Marshall, the first Black justice.
The measure that passed the House by voice vote was reduced from one which would also have removed statues of Confederates who fought the civil war to protect slavery and which was re-introduced in the aftermath of the Capitol riot of 6 January 2021, when Trump supporters carried Confederate flags into the Capitol.
On Wednesday, Zoe Lofgren, a House Democrat from California, said she would have preferred to remove Confederate statuary too, but to remove the Taney bust was literally about “who we put on a pedestal”.
“The United States Capitol is a beacon of democracy, freedom and equality,” said Lofgren, a member of the January 6 committee. “What and who we choose to honor in this building should represent our values. Chief Justice Taney … does not meet the standard.”
The Dred Scott case concerned an enslaved man who lived in Illinois and the Louisiana territory, where slavery was forbidden, then with his wife sued for freedom when taken back to Missouri, a state where slavery was legal.
The court ruled 7-2 for Scott’s enslaver, John Sandford, an army surgeon.
Taney wrote that Black people “had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit”.
Read the full story:
Report: First lady 'all in' on new Biden presidential run
In what CNN is calling “a tidal shift”, Jill Biden has reportedly reversed her opinion about Joe Biden running again for the White House and is now “all in”.
The network published a report Thursday citing anonymous sources in the East Wing who say that after reluctance just three months ago, the first lady “has begun to say the quiet part out loud”.
Friends, CNN says, have “noticed a change” in Jill Biden’s demeanor since Democrats performed better in November’s midterms than expected, and has developed new enthusiasm for remaining in the White House, even though a flurry of recent events have left her “exhausted”.
Joe Biden is 80, and the first lady is 71.
The Bidens will discuss the issue “over the holidays”, the president said last month, telling reporters “watch me” at a press conference following the midterms when asked if he would be a candidate.
“I think everybody wants me to run, but we’re going to have discussions about it,” Biden said at the time, indicating that he would sit down with his family over the holiday period and announce his decision “early next year”.
If he does run and win, Biden would be 82 when sworn in for his second term, and be the oldest president in history. Politico reports that it’s been a touchy subject for the president. “You think I don’t know how fucking old I am?” he reportedly said to one ally earlier this year.
Voters, however, appear to have little appetite for a rematch between Biden and Donald Trump for the presidency in 2024, a poll released Wednesday found.
Roughly six in 10 Republicans, and the same margin in the Democratic party, don’t want their respective 2020 nominees to run again, according to the CNN poll conducted by SSRS.
Shelby: Government funding negotiations 'only $25bn apart'
It’s been barely two months since the Senate last passed a short-term spending fix to avert a government shutdown, yet here we are again today.
Senators will on Thursday take up what has become something of a regular fixture in US politics as they discuss a one-week spending bill passed by the House on Wednesday to keep the government funded until 23 December.
And, as always, bipartisan politics are playing a role, even though Republican Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has indicated he’s open to a long-term deal that many of his colleagues in the House have opposed.
Chuck Schumer, the Democratic majority leader, has his eyes on an appropriations package of roughly $1.7tn to fund an entire year, and a one-week extension before Friday’s deadline would avoid a partial government closure and provide breathing space for a compromise.
According to the Associated Press, Richard Shelby, the Republican senator for Alabama leading the negotiations, says the two sides are only about $25bn apart overall, and had agreed over an $858bn spend on defense.
McConnell said Wednesday night:
If a truly bipartisan full-year bill without poison pills is ready for final Senate passage by late next week, I’ll support it for our armed forces.
Otherwise, we’ll be passing a short-term continuing resolution into the new year.
Unsurprisingly, Republicans in the House want to stamp their own mark on things, given they take over control of the chamber in early January.
Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House minority leader vying for the Speaker’s gavel, points out that the two senators leading the negotiations, Shelby and Democrat Patrick Leahy of Vermont, are retiring and won’t still be around to be answerable for their work.
And No 2 House Republican Steve Scalise opposes the $1.7tn proposal saying it’s a sign “Congress failed to do its job”, even though, according to the AP, many Republican senators feel that blocking a long-term deal would reflect badly on the party.
But for today at least, it’s all about a short-term fix. Hopefully the picture will become clearer as the day moves on.
Good morning politics blog readers. The early order of business in the Senate today is finding a way to keep the government funded, if only for a week.
Senators will take up the one-week spending bill passed by the House on Wednesday, a short-term fix that, if also passed in the upper chamber, would avert a shutdown and keep the government machine ticking until 23 December.
It would also give Democratic majority leader Chuck Schumer breathing space to work on a $1.7tn fiscal year package, but Republicans are not happy about it. A clearer picture could emerge today.
Here’s what else we’re watching:
Nancy Pelosi is scheduled to give one of her final press conferences as House speaker at 10.45am.
Joe Biden is meeting African Union leaders in Washington DC to discuss US political and business ties with the continent. It’s unclear if he will talk to the press.
The House convenes shortly to discuss collective bargaining rights to Veterans’ Association health care workers. Statehood for Puerto Rico is also up for discussion.
Survivors of mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas; and Newtown, Connecticut will testify at a morning hearing of the House subcommittee on crime, terrorism and homeland security.
