WASHINGTON (AP) – The bipartisan leadership of a special congressional deficit supercommittee has officially announced that the panel has failed to reach an agreement.
Democratic Sen. Patty Murray and Republican Rep. Jeb Hensarling say that despite "intense deliberations" the members of the panel have been unable "to bridge the committee's significant differences."
6. Boehner: War Drawdown Savings Can't Go to Jobs - Friday, November 18, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – With a special deficit-reduction supercommittee floundering, the top Republican in Congress warned Thursday that he won't permit savings from winding down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to pay for President Barack Obama's jobs spending agenda.
7. Obama Urges Debt Panel to Reach for Deal - Monday, November 14, 2011
ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE (AP) – President Barack Obama has urged leaders of Congress' supercommittee to press hard for a deal on slashing the deficit – and not look for an end run around a key enforcement mechanism.
8. Senate Approves Jobs Benefits for Veterans - Friday, November 11, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – A united Senate emphatically approved legislation Thursday intended to help unemployed veterans and companies doing business with the government, endorsing a measure that includes the first small slice of President Barack Obama's jobs plan that is likely to become law.
9. Democrats Dismiss GOP Deficit Offer - Thursday, November 10, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – Members of a special deficit-cutting panel are getting renewed encouragement from their colleagues even as they remain far apart on taxes and cuts to so-called entitlement programs like Medicare.
10. GOP Ponders Tax Options for Debt ‘Supercommittee' - Wednesday, November 09, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – Capitol Hill Republicans say the GOP members of a deficit "supercommittee" are showing flexibility on revenue hikes as the panel heads closer to its Thanksgiving deadline.
11. Congress Sputters on Deficit Cuts, Spending Bills - Wednesday, November 09, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – A sputtering Congress enveloped in an atmosphere poisoned with politics and distrust enters its final weeks of the year struggling to complete a lengthy to-do list on the budget.
12. Deficit 'Supercommittee' Struggles as Clock Ticks - Tuesday, October 11, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – The supercommittee is struggling.
After weeks of secret meetings, the 12-member deficit-cutting panel established under last summer's budget and debt deal appears no closer to a breakthrough than when talks began last month.
13. Obama to Talk Jobs Bill With Top Senate Dems - Friday, October 07, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama will meet with top Senate Democrats at the White House Thursday afternoon to discuss his jobs bill.
The White House says Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sens. Dick Durbin, Chuck Schumer and Patty Murray will attend the meeting, scheduled for 5:30 pm EDT.
14. Members of Deficit-Reduction Panel Meet in Private - Friday, September 16, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – Members of Congress' debt reduction supercommittee said Thursday that their assignment of finding ways to reduce government red ink won't be simple.
Emerging from a private breakfast meeting among the panel's members, Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, told reporters: "We know that it will not be fun. We know it will not be easy, it will not be popular with any current political constituency."
15. Congressional Debt Reduction Panel Kicks Off Work - Friday, September 09, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – In an early show of optimism, Republicans and Democrats on a powerful committee charged with cutting deficits pledged Thursday to aim higher than their $1.2 trillion target, work to boost job creation and reassure an anxious nation that Congress can solve big problems.
16. Debt Panel Members Rake in Health Money - Thursday, September 08, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – The powerful new congressional panel assigned to tame the deficit will have to squeeze Medicare and Medicaid for any chance of success. But health care industries that depend on those programs have invested millions over the years to woo its members.
17. Pelosi Names Final Members to Debt Supercommittee - Friday, August 12, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's appointment Thursday of three Democrats to Congress' new debt-reduction supercommittee completes the roster of a panel whose members are already being tugged in competing directions.
18. Debt Panel Members Prompt Doubts - Thursday, August 11, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – A conservative Texas Republican congressman has been chosen by House Speaker John Boehner to co-chair a powerful new committee tasked to find a bipartisan plan to slash the federal budget deficit by over $1 trillion.
19. New Air Traffic Control System at Crossroads - Wednesday, July 06, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – The Federal Aviation Administration is creating a new air traffic system that officials say will be as revolutionary for civil aviation as was the advent of radar six decades ago. But the program is at a crossroads.
20. Senators Concerned by Photo ID Requirement to Vote - Thursday, June 30, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – Sixteen Democratic senators want the Justice Department to look into whether voting rights are being jeopardized in states that require photo identification in order for people to vote.
21. Obama: Talks on Entitlements 'Have Already Begun' - Friday, February 18, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama said Wednesday that difficult debates on how to address the costs of Social Security and Medicare are "starting now," even though his 2012 budget blueprint lacked any major changes to the large benefit programs.
22. Bill Clinton Races to Help Democratic Candidates - Monday, October 25, 2010
WASHINGTON (AP) — Bill Clinton, out of the Oval Office for nearly a decade and once considered a political liability, is campaigning for Democratic candidates at a pace no one can match, drawing big crowds and going to states that President Barack Obama avoids.
23. Fearing Rout, Obama, Dems Reach to Female Voters - Friday, October 22, 2010
SEATTLE (AP) — In a last-ditch effort to prevent electoral disaster, President Barack Obama and Democratic allies are vigorously wooing women voters, whose usually reliable support appears to have softened.
24. Obama Says Elections Will Set Nation's Future - Friday, October 22, 2010
SEATTLE (AP) — Practically ordering cheering supporters to vote, even though he's not on the ballot, President Barack Obama declared Thursday that the Nov. 2 congressional elections will set the direction of the nation "for years to come."
25. Stimulus Spending Looms Large in Midterm Contests - Thursday, October 21, 2010
DENVER (AP) — A photo of President Barack Obama hangs on the wall in CoraFaye's Cafe, a short walk from the Denver museum where Obama signed into law the most sweeping U.S. economic package in decades in an attempt to put people back to work and end the worst downturn since the Great Depression.
26. Obama Says Recession Recovery to Take Few Years - Thursday, August 19, 2010
SEATTLE (AP) – A campaigning President Barack Obama said Tuesday it will take a few years to dig the nation out of the recession, warning impatient voters that any candidate promising faster results "is just looking for your vote."
27. Senate Approves Jobs Bill to Stop Teacher Layoffs - Friday, August 06, 2010
WASHINGTON (AP) – Legislation long sought by Democrats to save the jobs of up to 300,000 teachers, police and other public workers passed the Senate on Thursday.
The 61-39 vote – to be followed by a rush vote next week in the House – should come in time for many school districts to revisit decisions to lay off teachers before the new school year.
28. Obama Team Draws Sharp Questions on US Budget - Wednesday, February 03, 2010
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama's $3.8 trillion budget outline drew bipartisan fire from U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday, with Republicans complaining it does not address deficits soon enough and raises taxes too much. Democrats balked at some of Obama's spending cuts.
29. Senate Votes to Allow Guns on Amtrak - Thursday, September 17, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Senate voted Wednesday to permit passengers on the Amtrak passenger railroad to transport handguns in their checked baggage.
The proposal, approved by a 68-30 vote, seeks to give Amtrak riders rights comparable to those enjoyed by airline passengers, who are permitted to transport firearms provided that they declare they are doing so and that the arms are unloaded and in a securely locked container.
30. Gov’t Sees Loan Defaults, Foreclosures Rise - Friday, April 03, 2009
The number of troubled loans backed by the government’s mortgage insurance program is rising as economic problems mount, and lawmakers are worried taxpayers will be stuck with the final bill.
U.S. Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., warned Thursday that the Federal Housing Administration is a “powder keg” waiting to explode, and said Congress and the Obama administration shouldn’t place a greater financial burden on the already strapped agency.
31. Republicans Block Boost for Road Building - Wednesday, February 04, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate Republicans on Tuesday blocked Democrats from adding $25 billion for highways, mass transit, and water projects to President Barack Obama's economic recovery program.
32. HUD Secretary Quits Amid Housing Crisis - Tuesday, April 01, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) - HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson, his tenure tarnished by allegations of political favoritism and a criminal investigation, announced his resignation Monday amid the wreckage of the national housing crisis.