Maine

Republican senators up for reelection in swing states have a delicate balance to strike. They need to get almost all GOP voters in their column while reaching out to independents and Democrats. And President Donald Trump does not make that easy.

CQ Roll Call elections analyst and Inside Elections publisher Nathan L. Gonzales explains the politics. For instance, in Colorado, Republican Cory Gardner finds himself up next year in a state increasingly trending Democratic. Inside Elections rates his race a Toss-up.

When it comes to the battle for Congress, fundraising reports can provide clues about who’s in trouble and who’s mounting a strong campaign.

It’s still early in the 2020 cycle, but an analysis of reports for this year’s third quarter in House and Senate races that Inside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzales rates as competitive sheds new light on where donors in both parties are directing their money. The reports were due by midnight Tuesday.

Nearly a year before the 2020 elections, the Senate battlefield continues to take shape. Even though the executive and legislative branches are different but coequal branches of government, their fates are electorally tied together this cycle.

Democrats’ chances of controlling the Senate next Congress dramatically increase with a White House victory because the vice president would act as a tiebreaker, lowering the number of GOP seats the party has to take over. And the party that controls the Senate will determine the success and effectiveness of a new Democratic president or President Donald Trump in his second term.

For 20 years, proponents in and out of Congress have sought the creation of a national museum devoted to women’s history, and a new bipartisan push will likely get the matter a vote in the House this fall.

Last month, a bill to establish such a museum crossed the 290 co-sponsorship threshold that allows for fast-track floor consideration under what is known as the consensus calendar. The measure could be scheduled for a vote by November.

Top Senate appropriators pressed the Federal Aviation Administration chief to respond after a federal investigator found that safety inspectors lacked sufficient training to certify Boeing 737 Max pilots.

Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Jack Reed, D-R.I., the chairwoman and ranking member of the Senate Transportation-HUD Appropriations Subcommittee, asked FAA chief Steve Dickson in a letter Tuesday provide more information about the U.S. Office of Special Counsel’s report and the FAA’s response to it.

The House Democrats’ campaign arm had a parting message as members headed back home for a two-week recess Friday night: A new poll shows more than half of likely voters support opening an impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump.

The poll, commissioned by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and obtained by CQ Roll Call, found voters supported an impeachment investigation by a margin of 54 percent to 43 percent.

The House voted Friday to end President Donald Trump’s national emergency along the southern border, but without a sufficient enough margin to overcome an all-but-certain veto.

With 11 Republicans joining them, 224 Democrats (and independent Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan) voted 236-174 to terminate the emergency, which Trump declared Feb. 15. All of the “no” votes came from Republicans.

A cascade of Democrats facing competitive races backed an impeachment inquiry this week, which likely spurred Speaker Nancy Pelosi to drop her objections to using that word to describe ongoing probes.

Some vulnerable incumbents are not using the “I” word, however, and the Republican-leaning districts they represent help explain why.

Several House members in crucial swing districts rolled the dice this week by supporting an impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump, betting voters will eventually agree that such an inquiry is the best path forward.

The support from members whose victories helped flip the House from red to blue last year may have spurred Speaker Nancy Pelosi to apply the impeachment description Tuesday to ongoing investigations.

As the federal government defends a rule in appeals court Monday prohibiting health care providers who take federal money for family planning services from referring patients to abortion providers, some states that haven’t complied are making plans for continuing without the program.

An 11-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit will hear arguments in San Francisco on Monday about whether the rule should be in effect during court challenges brought by 22 states and family planning providers like Planned Parenthood.