WASHINGTON — Navy officials said pressure to increase the number of ships deployed overseas has hurt readiness and training levels, and those problems are getting worse. The officials testified at a congressional hearing on the collisions of two Navy destroyers this summer that claimed the lives of 17 sailors, two from Connecticut.
Elizabeth Esty
Posted inPolitics
GOP congressional candidates willing to swim against political tide
Congressional candidates in Connecticut are bracing for next year’s mid-term elections, which could shift power in the U.S. House and Senate and serve as a referendum on Donald Trump’s presidency. Former State Rep. Dan Carter, 49, who lost a challenge last year to Sen. Richard Blumenthal, is among those testing the waters for a run against Congresswoman Elizabeth Esty.
Posted inPolitics
CT lawmakers prepare for 2018 campaign by raising lots of cash
WASHINGTON — Connecticut’s members of Congress, all Democrats, are preparing for the pivotal 2018 elections by getting a head start in the campaign money race. Rep. Elizabeth Esty, D-5th District, raised more money than any Connecticut member of the House of Representatives in the first six months of this year.
Posted inPolitics
Congressional ball game an act of unity and defiance of violence
WASHINGTON — In this baseball game, the victorious team gave a member of the losing team the winner’s trophy. The Congressional Baseball Game, played 36 hours after a gunman’s attack on Republican lawmakers at their baseball practice, was an effort at unity and an act of defiance in the wake of the shooting.
Posted inPolitics
CT lawmakers react in horror to shootings at GOP baseball practice
Updated at 3 p.m.
Washington – Connecticut lawmakers, for whom gun violence has a personal edge because of the Newtown shootings, reacted with shock and horror at a gunman’s attack on a Republican congressional baseball practice early Wednesday. Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., the House majority whip, was among those shot. The gunman, who was identified as James Hodgkinson of Illinois, also was shot and later died.
Posted inEnergy & Environment
CT environmentalists vow to go it alone after Trump’s Paris exit
WASHINGTON — Connecticut environmental groups and the state’s Democrats decried President Donald Trump’s decision to pull the United States out of the Paris agreement on climate change and vow to keep up their efforts in the state to cut greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.
Posted inMoney, Politics
Trump budget would cut or end food stamps for many in CT
WASHINGTON — Kimberly Hart of New Haven is among more than 400,000 Connecticut residents who depend on food stamps — a program that would be cut under President Donald Trump’s budget, which also shifts some of the responsibility of feeding those in need to individual states.
Posted inMoney, Politics
Trump budget: CT health, education, research hit — defense a mixed bag
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s budget would require Connecticut to drop residents from key social and health programs in the state, and make tough decisions on how to handle other proposed federal cuts to education, housing and the environment. Connecticut’s congressional delegation vowed to fight it.
Posted inPolitics
CT lawmakers call for special prosecutor after Comey firing
Updated on May 10 at 12:06 p.m.
Stunned members of Connecticut’s congressional delegation joined demands for a special prosecutor to oversee the investigation of Russian influence on the 2016 election after President Donald Trump fired James Comey as FBI director Tuesday. “The need for a special prosecutor is now crystal clear,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal.
Posted inHealth, Politics
CT Dems decry House GOP victory on health bill that may stumble in Senate
WASHINGTON — House Republicans on Thursday finally won approval for a health care bill aimed at repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, but the legislation faces an uncertain future in the Senate, which may not be able to take it up for weeks. Connecticut Democrats called the health care bill “appalling” and “immoral” and said the GOP would pay a political price.
Posted inPolitics
This time, Newtown bike riders rolling away from Congress
WASHINGTON — With Donald Trump in the White House and a GOP lock on Congress, the 26 bike riders who roll hundreds of miles every year from Newtown to the U.S. Capitol to honor those slain at Sandy Hook Elementary School decided to change course. Instead of riding to Congress, they were riding away from it Thursday and toward where they believe their message has more resonance.
Posted inPolitics
Larson takes on Social Security, again
WASHINGTON — Rep. John Larson on Wednesday reintroduced a bill that aims to boost both Social Security benefits and the program’s solvency.
Posted inHealth, Politics
As GOP health care plan falters, CT Dems watch and wait
Updated at 9:13 p.m.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and House Republicans are making both threats and promises to try to salvage the GOP health care bill – but the deal-making is all on the Republican side of the aisle, with Connecticut’s all-Democratic congressional delegation sitting on the sidelines.
Posted inHealth, Politics
CT Dems say CBO report shows GOP health plan should be scrapped
WASHINGTON — As soon as the Congressional Budget Office released its long-awaited report Monday afternoon on the impact of the GOP’s American Health Care Act, Connecticut Democrats joined party colleagues in saying the analysis proved the health plan should be scrapped. The CBO estimated the American Health Care Act would result in 24 million Americans losing their health insurance.
Posted inPolitics
CT lawmakers’ guests for Trump’s speech intended to send message
WASHINGTON – Connecticut lawmakers have joined other Democratic colleagues in inviting guests to President Donald Trump’s first address to Congress Tuesday — people who will serve as symbolic rebukes to the new president’s policies. Among them: Constituents from seven Muslim countries that were subject to a presidential travel ban and advocates for public schools and the Affordable Care Act .