Now that a couple of weeks have passed and the noise has begun to subside, we can take a broader view of what McCarthy’s election suggests about Congress and the state of American politics. The media had it wrong: to equate Mr. McCarthy’s struggles to win the Speakership with political dysfunction is to grossly misunderstand […]
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The Electoral Count Act is fixed: Presid...
It was not easy, but Congress did what it took to prevent another Jan. 6. They rewrote the antiquated 1887 Electoral Count Act, which governs the counting of states’ electoral slates for president. President Joseph Biden approved this overdue reform when he put his name on the hulking Consolidated Appropriations Act in late December. For this, we all should […]
Did a libertarian cost Trump the electio...
Mr. Trump will tell you that fraud cost him the election. Those of us who have analyzed the facts and data almost inevitably come to other explanations: grumpy voters beset with COVID-19 and a crummy economy, high Democratic turnout stoked by Trump’s relentless trolling of the left, GOP voters who were put off by The […]
Can we put to rest the myth that Congres...
Last week, I attended a closed-door event that featured a speech by someone who works in state politics. He held forth quite thoughtfully and exuded an energetic mix of angst and hope for the future of our constitutional republic. The audience was rapt, most likely because we shared his concern about the health of our representative […]
Power of the Purse: Restoring Congress’s
On December 12, 2022, I joined Professor Zachary Courser (Claremont McKenna College), Molly Reynolds (Brookings Institution), and Mark Strand (Congressional Institute) to discuss the grants program that replaced earmarks.
What’s the harm of refusing to concede?
Readers of these Election Reform Q&As may recall that I interviewed the R Street Institute’s Matt Germer about the importance of loser’s consent for our democratic system. In short, our democratic republic exists by the consent of the governed, and that consent is renewed when we hold elections and accept the results. But the gripe “We wuz […]