Outside the Beltway

Organizing protests was the easy part. The hard part for those who would seek to expand gun regulations is yet to come.

President Trump appeared to change positions on several gun control ideas, but he probably doesn’t mean it.

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals rules that existing civil rights laws bar discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Presidents are much more constrained in issuing and rolling back regulations than they or the public think.

A bipartisan group of Senators has proposed a largely reasonable fix to the DACA problem, but its fate remains unclear.

With time seemingly running out, the Senate debate over extending DACA is moving slowly.

Congress seems likely to pass a budget deal today that will massively increase spending, putting to rest once and for all the rank hypocrisy of Republicans when it comes to claims that they are “fiscally conservative.”

The current budget deal expires in six days and Congress doesn’t seem to know what it’s going to do about it.

Democratic norms are eroding.

This is not unreasonable.

While final votes remain to be taken, the Federal Government shutdown effectively ended this afternoon with an overwhelming bipartisan vote to reopen the government, combined with a commitment from Republicans to consider a DACA bill over the next three weeks. What happens next, though, is entirely uncertain.

President Trump called on Senate Republicans to eliminate the legislative filibuster to resolve the government shutdown. That’s not going to happen.

The government is shut down and Washington is playing the usual blame game. In reality, there’s plenty of blame to go around, and one of the guilty parties is the American people.

2017 was quite a year. 2018 promises to be just as interesting.

Republicans passed their tax bill yesterday. What that means for the economy and the 2018 midterms is another question.

Meet Matthew Peterson, a nominee for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia who apparently doesn’t know much about trials.

House and Senate Republicans say they have reached agreement on a final tax bill, and Democrats are engaging in an effort to delay a vote in the Senate until Doug Jones can be seated.

Donald Trump has been President 300 days and the record reveals no real accomplishments and increased dissatisfaction with the job he’s doing.

As a candidate, Donald Trump liked to claim that he only hired the “top people.” and said he would do the same thing as President. So far, it isn’t working out that way.

At least for now, Republicans seem to be giving up on repealing and replacing the PPACA. That’s not going to make the base happy.

Former Trump aide Steve Bannon is declaring war on Republicans in the Senate.

Reports are indicating that President Trump will decertify the nuclear weapons deal with Iran. This would be a foolish and potentially dangerous mistake.

What was essentially the final effort to ‘repeal and replace’ the Affordable Care Act is officially dead.

Yet another lawsuit against yet another controversial Trump Administration policy.