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Maanvi Singh (now), Joan E Greve in Washington and Joanna Walters in New York (earlier)

House votes to hold Bannon in contempt for defying Capitol attack subpoena – as it happened

Steve Bannon in August 2020.
Steve Bannon in August 2020. Photograph: Andrew Kelly/Reuters

Today's politics recap

  • The House voted to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt for defying subpoenas issued by the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection. The matter will now be referred to the justice department, which will have to determine whether to prosecute Bannon, a former senior adviser to Donald Trump.
  • Nine House Republicans joined all 220 Democrats in supporting the contempt resolution. In addition to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, who serve on the select committee, seven other House Republicans – Brian Fitzpatrick, Anthony Gonzalez, Jaime Herrera Beutler, John Katko, Nancy Mace, Peter Meijer and Fred Upton – voted to hold Bannon in criminal contempt.
  • Cheney delivered an impassioned floor speech encouraging her colleagues to vote for the contempt resolution. Pointing to Bannon’s comments on his podcast the day before and the day of the insurrection, Cheney said, “There is no doubt that Mr Bannon knows far more than what he said on the video … The American people deserve to hear his testimony.”
  • Joe Biden emphasized his commitment to fighting for voting rights a day after Senate Republicans blocked Democrats’ Freedom to Vote Act. Speaking at a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of the commemoration of the Dr Martin Luther King memorial in Washington, Biden said of enacting national voting rights legislation, “We have to keep up the fight and get it done.”

– Joan E Greve

The presentation outlining the ex-president’s new company, Trump Media & Technology Group, is rich with hyperbole, but low on detail.

The TRUTH is out there, according to known factualness provider Donald Trump. On Wednesday the former president, who has been banned from the major social media platforms since January, announced that he will be launching his own social media company called Truth Social. Although, in typical Trump style, it’s styled TRUTH Social.

The network, which from the Apple App Store screengrabs looks suspiciously like a clone of Twitter, will open to “invited users” next month and be rolled out to the public early next year. The app is apparently part of a wider media network called Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) that aims to take on the “liberal media consortium”.

“I created TRUTH Social and TMTG to stand up to the tyranny of Big Tech,” Trump said in a statement. “We live in a world where the Taliban has a huge presence on Twitter, yet your favorite American President has been silenced. This is unacceptable.”

Trump’s plans for TMTG are extremely ambitious. Not only does he want to take on Facebook and Twitter, he wants to disrupt Disney, Apple, Netflix, Google and Amazon. How exactly is he going to do that? Good question. The 22-page company presentation outlining TMTG’s vision is rich with hyperbole, but low on detail. Here’s the gist:he TRUTH is out there, according to known factualness provider Donald Trump. On Wednesday the former president, who has been banned from the major social media platforms since January, announced that he will be launching his own social media company called Truth Social. Although, in typical Trump style, it’s styled TRUTH Social.

The network, which from the Apple App Store screengrabs looks suspiciously like a clone of Twitter, will open to “invited users” next month and be rolled out to the public early next year. The app is apparently part of a wider media network called Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) that aims to take on the “liberal media consortium”.

“I created TRUTH Social and TMTG to stand up to the tyranny of Big Tech,” Trump said in a statement. “We live in a world where the Taliban has a huge presence on Twitter, yet your favorite American President has been silenced. This is unacceptable.”

Trump’s plans for TMTG are extremely ambitious. Not only does he want to take on Facebook and Twitter, he wants to disrupt Disney, Apple, Netflix, Google and Amazon. How exactly is he going to do that? Good question.

Here’s the gist:

US border agents engaged in ‘shocking abuses’ against asylum seekers, report finds

Shocking instances of sexual and physical abuse of asylum seekers at the southern US border by federal officers have been uncovered by Human Rights Watch, after a years-long battle to wrestle the information from the Department of Homeland Security under freedom of information laws.

A stash of redacted documents released to the human rights group after six years of legal tussles uncover more than 160 cases of misconduct and abuse by leading government agencies, notably Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and US Border Patrol. The papers record events between 2016 and 2021 that range from child sexual assault to enforced hunger, threats of rape and brutal detention conditions.

Some of the incidents involve alleged criminal activity by federal agents.

Human Rights Watch said that the documents “paint a picture of DHS as an agency that appears to have normalized shocking abuses at the US border. The US should take urgent and sustained action to stop such abuses”.

The newly released documents record a case of alleged child sexual abuse reported by a supervisor in the San Francisco asylum office. An asylum officer interviewed “a young child who was sexually molested by someone we believe to be a CBP or Border Patrol Officer … The young girl was forced to undress and touched inappropriately by a guard wearing green”.

The Border Patrol uniform is green.

Another report recounts an incident in 2018 when a male asylum seeker was detained and taken to a detention center in San Ysidro, California. An officer told the man that “if he gave him sex, he would be set free”, and when the detainee refused “the officer swore at him in English and said that he would be locked up as punishment”.

Read more:

Negotiations are still under way on the Democrat’s social safety net and climate change package – AKA the reconciliation bill.

Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema has reportedly come on board with some key provisions:

Meanwhile Joe Manchin, the West Virginia senator with deep ties to the oil and gas industry, reportedly still remains at odd with his Democratic colleagues.

Axios reports that despite a seemingly friendly meeting with Vermont’s Bernie Sanders, Manchin’s vision for the bill remains in conflict with that of other Democrats.

From Axios:


Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), chairman of a Senate Appropriations subcommittee, described the incident as a “a difference in opinion.”

“Joe said, ‘I’m comfortable with nothing,’ Bernie said, ‘We need to do three-and-a-half [trillion dollars].’ The truth is both of them are in different spots.”

Manchin said, “I’m comfortable with zero,” forming a “zero” with his thumb and index finger, Tester reiterated, saying he believes the West Virginia Democrat can live with himself if the Senate doesn’t pass any of the president’s $2-$3.5 trillion package.

Updated

Climate crisis likely to fuel conflicts over water and migration, US analyses say

The climate crisis is likely to intensify cross-border clashes, aggravate conflicts over water and migration and cause instability, especially in developing countries, in ways that could threaten global security, the Biden administration warned on Thursday.

A clutch of simultaneously released reports by the White House, the US intelligence community and the Department of Defense paint a grim picture of the raft of security and humanitarian disasters that could strike at once as climate disaster continues to set in.

They warn that rising temperatures and extreme physical effects are likely to lead to conflicts over water and to the displacement of tens of millions of people over the next 30 years, including within the US where sea-level rise, drought and wildfires already menace communities.

In one of the more ominous forebodings, US intelligence predicts that new disputes could erupt between countries that seek to protect themselves unilaterally by deploying a strategy known as large-scale solar geoengineering.

Should a country conclude that international efforts to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5C over pre-industrial levels had failed, it might turn to its own use of geoengineering – an attempt to cool the planet by reflecting solar rays back to space through the injection of stratospheric aerosols or other risky techniques.

“Without an international agreement on these technologies, we assess that such a unilateral effort probably would cause blowback,” the intelligence report said.

Read more:

Today so far

That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague, Maanvi Singh, will take over the blog for the next few hours.

Here’s where the day stands so far:

  • The House voted to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt for defying subpoenas issued by the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection. The matter will now be referred to the justice department, which will have to determine whether to prosecute Bannon, a former senior adviser to Donald Trump.
  • Nine House Republicans joined all 220 Democrats in supporting the contempt resolution. In addition to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, who serve on the select committee, seven other House Republicans – Brian Fitzpatrick, Anthony Gonzalez, Jaime Herrera Beutler, John Katko, Nancy Mace, Peter Meijer and Fred Upton – voted to hold Bannon in criminal contempt.
  • Cheney delivered an impassioned floor speech encouraging her colleagues to vote for the contempt resolution. Pointing to Bannon’s comments on his podcast the day before and the day of the insurrection, Cheney said, “There is no doubt that Mr Bannon knows far more than what he said on the video … The American people deserve to hear his testimony.”
  • Joe Biden emphasized his commitment to fighting for voting rights a day after Senate Republicans blocked Democrats’ Freedom to Vote Act. Speaking at a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of the commemoration of the Dr Martin Luther King memorial in Washington, Biden said of enacting national voting rights legislation, “We have to keep up the fight and get it done.”

Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.

Updated

It’s also worth noting that the only House member who did not vote on the contempt resolution was Greg Pence, the brother of former Vice-President Mike Pence.

Greg Pence, who represents Indiana’s 6th congressional district in the House, previously attracted scrutiny for voting against impeaching Donald Trump for inciting the Capitol insurrection.

During the insurrection, rioters chanted “Hang Mike Pence!” over the vice-president’s decision to fulfill his constitutional duty of overseeing the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the election.

Here are the nine Republicans who voted in support of the resolution to hold Steve Bannon in contempt for defying subpoenas from the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection:

  • Liz Cheney of Wyoming
  • Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania
  • Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio
  • Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington
  • Adam Kinzinger of Illinois
  • John Katko of New York
  • Nancy Mace of South Carolina
  • Peter Meijer of Michigan
  • Fred Upton of Michigan

House votes to hold Bannon in contempt for defying Capitol attack subpoena

It is official: the House has voted to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt for defying subpoenas issued by the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.

The final vote was 229 to 202, with all Democrats and nine Republicans supporting the resolution.

The matter will now be referred to the justice department, which will have to determine whether to prosecute Bannon, a former senior adviser to Donald Trump.

Testifying before the House judiciary committee earlier today, attorney general Merrick Garland said the justice department would fairly review any referral sent by the House.

“The department of justice will do what it always does in such circumstances,” Garland told the committee. “We’ll apply the facts and the law and make a decision, consistent with the principles of prosecution.”

House secures votes to hold Bannon in contempt for defying Capitol attack subpoena

The House vote remains open, but the resolution to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt has now gained enough support to pass the chamber.

As of now, 221 House members, including eight Republicans, have voted to hold the Trump ally in criminal contempt for defying subpoenas issued by the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.

However, the vote remains open, so the result is not yet official. If the House passes the resolution as expected, the matter will then be referred to the justice department, which will have to determine whether to prosecute Bannon.

The House vote is still open, but as of now, six Republicans have joined Democrats in supporting the resolution to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt for defying subpoenas from the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.

As a reminder, if the House passes the resolution as expected, the matter will then be referred to the justice department, which will have to determine whether to prosecute Bannon.

House votes on measure to hold Bannon in criminal contempt

The House is now voting on a measure to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt for defying subpoenas issued by the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.

The vote comes after the House completed an hour of debate on the contempt measure, with all but two Republicans denouncing the proposal.

Bennie Thompson, the Democratic chairman of the select committee, accused his Republican colleagues of avoiding the truth and “performing for an audience of one,” meaning Donald Trump.

The blog will be watching the vote closely, so stay tuned.

Adam Kinzinger, the other Republican member of the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection, joined Liz Cheney in endorsing the resolution to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt.

“Steve Bannon went out of his way to earn this resolution before us and now we must approve it,” Kinzinger said of the Trump ally’s refusal to comply with the committee’s subpoenas.

“I have no doubt that Mr Bannon’s scorn for our subpoena is real. But no one — and I repeat no one — is above the law, and we need to hear from him.”

It’s worth noting that Kinzinger was introduced by the Democratic chairman of the select committee, Bennie Thompson, and he delivered his remarks from the Democrats’ side of the House chamber.

During the House debate on the resolution to hold Steve Bannon in contempt, Liz Cheney entered an interesting document into the official record.

Per CNN, the document submitted by Cheney shows that Republican congressman Jim Banks has been sending letters to government officials, such as interior secretary Deb Haaland, seeking information provided to the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.

In the letter, Banks identifies himself as one of the Republican members chosen by minority leader Kevin McCarthy to serve on the select committee and criticizes Nancy Pelosi for blocking his appointment.

However, McCarthy pulled all of his nominees from the committee after Pelosi objected to two of the selections, Banks and Jim Jordan. So Banks is not actually a member of the select committee and yet is still claiming that he has a right to information gathered by the panel.

Cheney endorses Bannon contempt measure: Americans 'deserve to hear his testimony'

Congresswoman Liz Cheney, one of just two Republicans serving on the House select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection, encouraged her colleagues to support the resolution to hold Steve Bannon in criminal contempt for defying the panel’s subpoenas.

In her House floor speech during the debate on the resolution, Cheney argued that Bannon’s comments on his podcast the day before and the day of the insurrection were “shocking and indefensible”.

“He said all hell is going to break loose. He said, ‘We are coming in right over the target. This is the point of attack we have always wanted,’” Cheney said.

The Wyoming congresswoman lamented that many of her fellow House Republicans, who have staunchly opposed the committee’s investigation and the contempt measure, “now seem to have forgotten the danger of the moment, the assault on the Constitution, the assault on our Congress”.

“In fact, there is no doubt that Mr Bannon knows far more than what he said on the video. There is no doubt that all hell did broke loose. Just ask the scores of brave police officers who were injured that day protecting all of us,” Cheney said.

She concluded, “The American people deserve to hear his testimony.”

Updated

If the Democratic-controlled House passes the contempt resolution as expected, the matter will then be referred to the justice department, which will have to decide whether to prosecute Steve Bannon for defying congressional subpoenas.

Speaking before the House judiciary committee today, attorney general Merrick Garland said his department would fairly review any referral sent by the chamber.

“The department of justice will do what it always does in such circumstances,” Garland said. “We’ll apply the facts and the law and make a decision, consistent with the principles of prosecution.”

House passes procedural measure to advance Bannon contempt resolution

The House has cleared a key procedural hurdle in approving a contempt resolution for Steven Bannon, after the former Trump adviser defied subpoenas from the select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.

The House approved the rule to consider the contempt resolution in a vote of 221 to 205, which fell mostly along party lines.

The House is now beginning up to one hour of debate on the measure, after which the full chamber will vote on whether Bannon should be held in criminal contempt for defying the committee’s subpoenas.

The blog will be watching the debate closely, so stay tuned.

Updated

The state leadership in Texas has asked the US Supreme Court to leave in place its law banning almost all abortion in the state.

The Associated Press reports that the official message from Texas also told the justices there’s no reason to rush into the case.

The state filed its response Thursday to the Biden administration’s call on the court to block the law, the most restrictive abortion curb in the nation, and rule conclusively this term on the measure’s constitutionality.

The court’s intervention at this early stage, before a federal appeals court has ruled on the law, would be highly unusual but not unprecedented.

In its court filing, Texas defended an order by a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that allowed the abortion law to go back into effect after a lower-court judge put it on hold.

‘In sum, far from being demonstrably wrong, the Fifth Circuit’s conclusion that Texas is likely to prevail was entirely right,’ the state wrote.”

As Guardian US (with The 19th) has reported: On 31 August, there were 17 abortion providers serving at the four locations of the Whole Woman’s Health clinics in Texas. On 1 September – the day that the nation’s most restrictive active abortion law went into effect – there were just eight.

And this report by our Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Jessica Glenza, which outlined: Former Texas solicitor general Jonathan Mitchell, who played a pivotal role in designing the legal framework of the state’s near-total abortion ban, also argued on behalf of anti-abortion group Texas Right to Life that women would still be able to terminate pregnancies if Roe was overturned by traveling to “wealthy pro-abortion” states like California and New York with the help of “taxpayer subsidies”.

“Women can ‘control their reproductive lives’ without access to abortion; they can do so by refraining from sexual intercourse,” Mitchell wrote in the brief.

Joe Manchin pumps brakes on imminent spending package framework deal

Another dip on the Capitol Hill roller coaster as latest reports have conservative Senator Joe Manchin telling reporters he thinks there won’t be an outline deal agreed on the heart of the Build Back Better legislation by tomorrow - despite growing expectations that that had been in reach.

Joe Manchin at the US Capitol on Tuesday this week.
Joe Manchin at the US Capitol on Tuesday this week. Photograph: Elizabeth Frantz/Reuters

“This is not going to happen anytime soon,” Manchin told reporters following him around in Washington, DC, noting that “good progress” was being made, as intense negotiations continue, but there is still a lot of detail to be sorted out, Reuters has just reported.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sounded optimistic earlier that there could be a framework deal announced as early as tomorrow. But the Democratic human road block from West Virginia appears once again to be standing in his party’s way.

Congressional Democrats are trying to thrash out the size and nature of the flagship spending package, aiming for it to be passed in the Senate on a simple majority vote via the reconciliation process.

Originally priced at $3.5tn, the moderate nub of Manchin and Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema are instrumental in moves to beat down the top line of wide-ranging investments to expand social programs and attack climate change to less than $2tn at this rate - possibly minus a major element to reduce emissions targets to reduce global heating.

Updated

'We have to keep up the fight and get it done,' Biden says of voting rights legislation

Joe Biden condemned Republican efforts to enact voting restrictions, describing such attempts at voter suppression as “un-American”.

The president was speaking one day after Senate Republicans blocked Democrats’ Freedom to Vote Act from advancing, dealing another blow to Biden’s hopes of enacting national voting rights legislation.

“We have to keep up the fight and get it done,” Biden said in his speech at the Dr Martin Luther King memorial. “I know the stakes. You know the stakes. This is far from over.”

Biden added that his administration was also working to confront “the deep stain on the soul of the nation: hate and white supremacy”.

The president drew a historical line from America’s shameful enslavement of African people to Ku Klux Klan terrorism to the 2017 neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville and the deadly Capitol insurrection on January 6.

“The through line is that hate never goes away,” Biden said. “It only hides.”

Joe Biden reflected on Congress’ failure to pass police reform legislation as he spoke at the Dr Martin Luther King memorial in Washington.

The president had hoped to sign the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act by the one-year anniversary of Floyd’s murder at the hands of a white Minneapolis police officer, but that deadline came and went in May.

“I know the frustration we all feel that ... meaningful police reform in George’s name has still not passed Congress,” Biden said.

But the president committed to continuing to work to pass the bill, saying, “The fight’s not anywhere near over.”

Speaking at the Dr Martin Luther King memorial in Washington, Kamala Harris emphasized the need to enact national voting rights legislation, as Republican-led legislatures across the country approve voting restrictions.

The vice-president, who has been named as the Biden administration’s point person on voting rights, was speaking one day after Senate Republicans blocked Democrats’ Freedom to Vote Act from advancing.

“We should not have to keep fighting to secure our fundamental rights,” Harris said. “But fight we must. And fight we will.”

House speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke before Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the dedication of the Dr Martin Luther King memorial in Washington.

The Democratic speaker recounted how she was in the nation’s capital for the March on Washington in 1963 but could not stay for King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech because “I had to leave to go get married.”

Pelosi said it was “such an occasion to see so many people converging on Washington, DC,” including her beloved late colleague John Lewis, the civil rights icon who died last year.

Pelosi quoted King’s words, saying, “Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of America’s children.”

Updated

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have arrived at the memorial for Dr Martin Luther King at the Tidal Basin in Washington.

The president and the vice-president will soon deliver remarks to mark the tenth anniversary of the dedication of the memorial. Stay tuned.

Senator Joe Manchin has addressed a report that he considered leaving the Democratic party if his demands for the reconciliation package were not met.

Speaking to reporters on Capitol Hill today, the West Virginia denied threatening to leave the party, per CBS News.

However, he acknowledged that he had discussed switching his party affiliation to independent if his stances ever became “an embarrassment” for Joe Biden and fellow Democratic lawmakers.

“That’s the only thing was ever discussed. No one accepted that, and I just said, ‘I’ll make that offer, if you need it,’” Manchin said.

If Manchin did switch his party affiliation to independent but continued to caucus with Senate Democrats, the party would maintain control of the upper chamber.

Pelosi insists reconciliation bill will be 'fully paid for,' despite Sinema's demands

This is Joan Greve in Washington, taking over for Joanna Walters.

During her press conference, Nancy Pelosi also addressed reports that Democratic senator Kyrsten Sinema, a crucial vote to get the reconciliation package passed, has voiced criticism of proposals to raise taxes on high-income Americans and corporations.

Sinema’s complaints have raised concerns that the reconciliation package will not be fully paid for, which has been a pivotal selling point for moderate Democrats.

“The bill will be fully paid for, and the matter is in the hands of our chairs of the finance committee and the ways and means committee,” Pelosi said.

Asked if Sinema has conveyed that position to her, the speaker said, “Her position is well known.”

Updated

Bannon 'had specific knowledge' about Capitol attack before it happened – Pelosi

The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, is covering several major topics that are competing to be top of agenda on Capitol Hill for the Biden administration.

Pelosi is looking forward to the House voting this afternoon to advance to the next stage of holding former Trump aide Steve Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress, over his defiance of the subpoena issued by the House select committee investigating the run-up to and day of the insurrection at the US Capitol by extremist supporters of Donald Trump. She characterized the storming of Congress on 6 January as an act of “domestic terrorism” and an attempt to “interfere with the peaceful, constitutional transfer of power” to the election winner Joe Biden. “Steve Bannon had specific knowledge about the events before they occurred” and has a lot of evidence “relevant to the attack”, she said, which the committee needed to get to the bottom of in order to “find out the truth” about the insurrection.

Meanwhile, Pelosi said Democrats on the Hill are “making great progress” towards agreeing the framework of the (rapidly shrinking but still huge) social spending bill at the heart of the Biden administration’s Build Back Better legislative agenda relating to infrastructure, social benefits and the climate crisis.

On climate action, Pelosi said “the point is to reach the goals, the emissions goals of a reduction by 50% by 2030, we have a responsibility not just to meet but to beat the Paris [climate accord of 2015] goals [keeping global heating to no more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels] and help poor countries with technology and assistance to help them meet their goals ... they are paying a big price.”

Frantic negotiations are taking place over how to meet climate goals since West Virginia senator Joe Manchin said he would not support the climate action policy currently at the heart of the $3.5tn spending bill being chewed over by the House. Pelosi hopes for agreement on the bill framework by House Democrats by tomorrow.

Updated

The House judiciary committee chairman, Jerry Nadler, signaled in the way he just addressed the witness, attorney general Merrick Garland, that Democrats on the committee are very keen to talk about voting rights, with the New York congressman talking of voting access being “under steady assault” in the US right now.

Nadler brought up the disastrous (for those keen on upholding maximum access to voting rights in America) 2013 supreme court decision, which the Guardian has called:

One of the most consequential rulings in a generation in a case called Shelby county v Holder. In a 5-4 vote, the court struck down a formula at the heart of the Voting Rights Act, the landmark 1965 law that required certain states and localities with a history of discrimination against minority voters to get changes cleared by the federal government before they went into effect.

It’s hard to overstate the significance of this decision. The power of the Voting Rights Act was in the design that the supreme court gutted – discriminatory voting policies could be blocked before they harmed voters. The law placed the burden of proof on government officials to prove why the changes they were seeking were not discriminatory. Now, voters who are discriminated against now bear the burden of proving they are disenfranchised.

Immediately after the decision, Republican lawmakers in Texas and North Carolina – two states previously covered by the law – moved to enact new voter ID laws and other restrictions. A federal court would later strike down the North Carolina law, writing it was designed to target African Americans “with almost surgical precision”.

“The scope of what, frankly, the right could do, in a pre-Shelby world was very limited. Now it’s not so limited,” said Bryan Sells, a voting rights attorney in Georgia. “If I’m a Republican political consultant or strategist, the options that are available to me are now wider than they used to be ... It made it more advantageous to tinker.”

But it’s becoming clear that Republicans on the panel don’t want to talk about this and, based on what Jim Jordan and Steve Chabot, both Ohio congressmen, have said so far, they want to talk about raging educational policy wars over who should have greater say about what children are taught in schools – the school/education authority or the parents.

It’s going to be a lively hearing. Nancy Pelosi is holding her weekly press conference on Capitol Hill now, so we’ll tune into that, too, and see what the House speaker has to say.

Updated

The appearance of attorney general Merrick Garland in front of the House judiciary committee is underway.

There was initial chaos with a spat between chair Jerry Nadler (Democrat of New York) and Republican Jim Jordan, but Garland is speaking now to give his opening remarks.

We will bring you any prominent points that emerge, but if you want to follow the entire hearing live, you can watch it here.

Outrage over the lack of progress on voting rights legislation to protect voting access, specifically for Black voters, continues – and Joe Biden is in the spotlight.

There is fury from grassroots group Black Voters Matter, founded by LaTosha Brown, which was instrumental in getting out the Black vote in Georgia in the November 2020 presidential election and, in particular, in the Senate runoff races that followed.

“Again, these voter suppression bills are not about voter fraud, they’re about historic Black voter turnout. We need action from the Senate. We need more than just words from @POTUS, voting rights need to be a priority. We need to pass federal legislation to protect the vote,” Black Voters Matter posted on Twitter.

Stacey Abrams, who narrowly lost the contest to become governor of Georgia and has campaigned hard to get out the vote in her state and uphold voting rights, was also key in the 2020 election and the Senate runoff races.

She tweeted outrage at Republicans blocking yesterday what she called “widely popular legislation”.

Meanwhile, the advocacy group Common Cause, which acts as an unofficial watchdog on government action and supports wider voting rights, had a number of pointed comments.

And, a little earlier, this:

Updated

NAACP's Ifill on dangers of voting rights legislation stalling

There is furious reaction to stalled attempts to protect voting rights in the US with new laws at the federal level, in the face of determined and brazen efforts by some Republican-led states to suppress the scope to vote, in particular affecting Black voters in non-urban and/or low income communities.

US Senate Republicans once again blocked voting rights legislation yesterday.

My colleague Sam Levine writes:

The bill, the Freedom to Vote Act, would impose significant new guardrails on the American democratic process and amount to the most significant overhaul of US elections in a generation. It would require every state to automatically register voters at motor vehicle agencies, offer 15 consecutive days of early voting and allow anyone to request a mail-in ballot. It would also set new standards to ensure voters are not wrongfully removed from the voter rolls, protect election officials against partisan interference, and set out clear alternatives people who lack ID to vote can use at the polls.

Sherrilyn Ifill, law professor and president and director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, responded on MSNBC. She said she was part of a non-partisan organization, but pointed out there was no getting away from the fact that “not a single Republican” in the Senate was prepared even to support debating the bill, let alone voting on it. And with filibuster rules requiring 60 Senate votes, Democrats in the 50-50 Senate were not able to advance the bill.

“[They were] unwilling to even have the conversation about expanding voter access, and we have seen in states like Florida and Georgia and Texas what is happening in terms of voter suppression laws that have been passed ... restrictive laws targeted at Black and brown voters over the objections of almost every Democrat in those legislatures.

“That doesn’t change what it is...the reality of what we are dealing with is no different than the reality of what Black voters were dealing with in 1964 and we don’t look back at the great voting rights effort and the Selma march and say the Democrats were doing this or the Republicans were doing that, we look back and recognize that voter suppression was being perpetuated and advanced to keep fellow citizens from being able to vote and participate in the democratic process today.”

Ifill went on to say that some of the media finds it too convenient to talk about voting rights struggles now in partisan terms:

“And not to confront the racial discrimination that lies at the heart of it. But the voting Right Act talks about Black voters having the right to elect their candidate of choice, it doesn’t say who that candidate is or what party they belong to ... the maps that are being drawn ... voter suppression laws that are being passed are targeted very specifically at Black and brown voters and that’s the conversation we need to be having ... that is the sign that white supremacy still remains a critical flaw in our democracy ... it has come to take down our entire democracy.”

Updated

Former Republican secretary of state Condoleezza Rice shocked many when she said on ABC that it was “time to move on” from investigating the 6 January Capitol attack when extremist supporters of Donald Trump stormed Congress in an effort, ostensibly, to stop lawmakers from certifying Joe Biden’s election victory.

Rice told The View yesterday that she wept as she watched rioters breaking into the Capitol and stalking the halls, attacking police officers, invading the chambers and looking for lawmakers and staff to hurt.

“I thought: ‘I study countries that do this. I didn’t think it would happen in my own country,’” she said and the Washington Post reported.

She said the attack “was wrong” but then said of the ongoing House investigation into the background to the insurrection, and what the Trump White House, aides and Republican lawmakers knew and did in the run-up and on the day, that it was time to move on.

The Post points out:

[Rice’s] comments were a response in agreement to remarks Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) gave on Tuesday. McConnell told reporters it was time for lawmakers “to be talking about the future and not the past,” referring to the discussion about false claims of election fraud pushed by Trump and his allies, which ultimately led supporters to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6. McConnell said the issue should no longer be of concern...

Nevertheless, the House’s Jan. 6 committee is moving ahead on the investigation into the insurrection. Over the past few weeks, lawmakers subpoenaed organizers of the pro-Trump rallies that preceded the riot and several former Trump advisers. Among them was Stephen K. Bannon, who last week refused to comply with the subpoena. The committee unanimously voted Tuesday to hold the former adviser in contempt.

Updated

House to vote on holding Steve Bannon in contempt over Capitol attack evidence

Good morning, US politics live blog readers, on a big day in a crucial week in Washington for Joe Biden’s administration there is a lot going on, so tune in as we bring you all the developments in short order.

Here’s are some of the main items on the docket today:

  • The House is due to vote this afternoon on whether to recommend the prosecution of Steve Bannon, former top aide to Donald Trump, for criminal contempt of Congress for defying the subpoena issued by the bipartisan select committee investigating the insurrection at the US Capitol on 6 January by extremist Trump supporters. If, as expected, the House votes to do so, the next stage involves federal prosecutors, as part of the Department of Justice (DoJ), deciding whether to prosecute. The House vote follows the unanimous select committee vote two days ago.
  • US attorney general Merrick Garland will testify in front of the House judiciary committee from 10am ET and can expect questions from members of Congress on taking actions over defiance of Jan 6 committee subpoenas (also issued to other former top aides of Trump). Garland will also be asked about DoJ efforts - unsuccessful so far - to stop the Texas abortion ban.
  • Frantic negotiations between Joe Biden, top staff and members of Congress to reach a deal on an outline agreement to pass the flagship Build Back Better legislation package, amid a mix of acrimony and determined optimism (a heady Capitol Hill cocktail). Biden is racing to find a way to preserve his climate action agenda ahead of going to Scotland next week to represent the US at the Cop26 United Nations climate crisis summit.
  • The fall-out continues from the failure of Democrats to advance voting rights legislation, after Senate Republicans again blocked a sweeping voting rights bill yesterday day, a move that will significantly increase pressure on the Biden administration to do away with the filibuster.
  • Vice-President Kamala Harris heads to Virginia to campaign for Democrat Terry McAuliffe who is neck-and-neck with his Republican rival for the governorship of that state in next month’s gubernatorial election.
  • Donald Trump is launching a social media platform. Yep.

Updated

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