170 Comments
User's avatar
teresafbrooks's avatar

Yes, she is inherently in contempt. Shame on her.

Shame on this administration.

Shame on the majority Republican Congress which has, with only several notable exceptions, failed to fulfill their function as a check and balance, to address needs of Americans and to halt the rampant, illegal acts of this criminal administration, which is destroying our government and our alliances.

History will remember. Americans will remember, when we escape the clutches of this dictatorship, justice will prevail.

Expand full comment
93clementine's avatar

Just out of interest, which ‘notable exceptions’ are you referring to? I can’t think of any republicans who have consistently displayed integrity. Massie is stepping up on epstein but that’s about it — and he still votes for all the other abhorrent magat corruption.

There are no courageous republicans. They are, to a member, the worst most disgusting pieces of shite.

Expand full comment
teresafbrooks's avatar

Yes, Massie in this matter only. Point taken.

A few others joined in initial signing of the Epstein discharge (which happened to be useful for them with their base constituents) and I’m glad they did. Otherwise, they have odious records.

( Bacon (NE) speaks out, but isn’t running in 2026.)

Expand full comment
93clementine's avatar

Yep. Greedy opportunists, every one.

Expand full comment
Bill Katz's avatar

How did we lose against a 2nd rate soft spoken mafia wannabe con man whose only goal is money grab and destruction of anything good.

How did we lose? Two words: Joe Biden.

Expand full comment
Pam Birkenfeld's avatar

Bacon, even though he isn’t running again, it’s still cowardly. That’s what I don’t get, why I quit if you are still not going to be brave?

Expand full comment
Cathleen Labate's avatar

Because he has to go back to his home among MAGOTS

Expand full comment
Jon Rosen's avatar

MAGATS please.

Maggots are a much better breed of creature. :-)

Expand full comment
Louise's avatar

Plus, while somewhat off-putting, maggots serve many useful purposes. They consume rotting corpses, for example. It seems that MAGATS prefer simply to leave their corpses putrefying by the side of the road.

Expand full comment
Ruth Sheets's avatar

Jon, and maggots are important to the environment while MAGAs are important only to Trump and themselves.

Expand full comment
Pam Birkenfeld's avatar

as I said, it’s still cowardly

Expand full comment
Ruth Sheets's avatar

Cathleen, yep, those Repubs do have to face the MAGAs even though there are not quite as many as before Trump took office again. I still can't see what those MAGAs are hoping to get with their ignorance, hatreds, and support of people who despise them intensely. Do they like being used? Maybe being used is an acceptable position in life for them. It makes no sense, but supporting a total jerk like Trump is also impossible for me to comprehend; he had nothing to offer anyone but super rich mostly white men and none of his true MAGAs are rich. Maybe they think they should be and should be grateful to dum dum Donnie in case they become rich. That is childish thinking. Maybe the spoiled toddler movement that has overwhelmed Washington, DC, has also spread like a virus to the hinterland and bamboozled people who should know better but would rather not do better.

Expand full comment
james wheaton (Jay)'s avatar

I could not agree more. Republicans in general have been on my "shite" list for a long time. Climate denial and trickle-down economics being two of the major crimes against the American people (and humanity in general) they are all guilty of. There are more. However, with the scourge of Trump 2.0 and the project 2025 cabal, we are going to have to be bedfellows with people we don't like. AFter all, later in WW2, we allied with Russia to defeat Hitler and Hirohito.

Expand full comment
David Piper's avatar

The most incredible part of all this, to me, is that Marjorie Taylor Greene appears to be the most grounded of ALL the republicans. And, that's not to give her a pass on any of the issues where she's "stood out" since she joined the Congress. May God help us over these next three years. (Trump will simply keep pushing boundaries until he is stopped via impeachment - if there are elections in 2026 - or by his term coming to an end)

Expand full comment
JennSH from NC's avatar

Things like impeachment only work to solve problems if those charged with oversight actually do it. Refusing to convict the orange menace for inciting the January 6 insurrection is gross contempt for the country and the Constitution. Then there is the corrupt Supreme Court.

Expand full comment
lauriemcf's avatar

I can't stand her - but at last she found the nerve to stand up to Trump. I wish instead of leaving she would stay and convince others and keep speaking out.

Expand full comment
ELIZABETH Craze's avatar

I hate to see her leave. Everyone standing up to him is either leaving their post or refusing to run for reelection. That is so disturbing that such an idiot with no real plan that he can articulate, has that much power over folks who have so much more brain power than him.

Expand full comment
Jon Rosen's avatar

Personally I'm happy to see Green and others leave. Incumbents are historically very difficult to defeat. Every vacant R seat provides an additional opportunity to convert a seat from R to D and we absolutely need to take back the House and if at all possible the Senate too. It's still going to be difficult given the length and depth of the GOP interference that is likely in the next election but these vacancies help. I am holding out hope for a 6-7 seat swing in the House (which would give Dems a 3-4 seat majority) and a 4 seat swing in the Senate which would give us a very thin 1 seat majority, not enough to pass much legislation let alone override a Trump veto but still enough to keep the GOP troublemakers in check at least somewhat.

Expand full comment
Ruth Sheets's avatar

lauriemcf, the problem for Greene is that she has used up her personal allotment of courage and almost integrity. I am not sure where she found her reserves, but they will run out soon, so it is probably good that she is leaving after her taxpayer paid pension is in place for the rest of her life.

Expand full comment
PeachBlossom's avatar

Quit pinning your hopes on impeachment. It's only effective if the Senate convicts in the trial phase, with at least 60 votes, which would then result in removal from office. And. That. Ain't. Happ'nin' -- even if the Democrats should regain the majority in a future election.

Expand full comment
Jon Rosen's avatar

Indeed... it's actually worse, conviction in the Senate requires 2/3 vote which is 67 votes (not 60). Despite the dewy eyed idealists here (and i love you guys!) there is no way even if there is a Democratic landslide that we will get a 67 seat majority needed to convict in an impeachment. We will be very lucky to get a 1 seat majority in the Senate.

Expand full comment
PeachBlossom's avatar

You're right . . . my bad!

Expand full comment
Ruth Sheets's avatar

Peach Blossom, conviction requires 67 votes in the Senate or 2/3 of the senators present and voting. That is clearly an almost impossible number to get. Mitch McConnell protected his Donnie by encouraging Repubs to vote "no" when afterwards, he stated that Trump was guilty and that the courts should take care of him, which meant nothing would happen to stop his Baby Donnie, and he was right, so Trump could not blame him, which he thought would let him off the hook as far as history goes. I think he was wrong on that one because historians often identify instances of hypocrisy like this one.

Expand full comment
Parker Dooley's avatar

67 votes or "two thirds of the members present."

Expand full comment
lauriemcf's avatar

And, as for those who are "retiring" - how I wish that instead they had the courage and the integrity to stay and speak up and vote against Trump's evil agenda.

Expand full comment
Ruth Sheets's avatar

lauriemcf, alas, that is asking far too much of people whose courage is limited and their integrity mostly out to lunch, permanently !

Expand full comment
Kent Dills's avatar

Well said.

Expand full comment
Dave Dalton's avatar

It appears that Congress has very little authority to force the compliance of a DOJ that controls the mechanics of the ENFORCEMENT of laws that the DOJ itself is breaking. Al Capone giggles at the suggestion that he might order his own knees to be capped

Expand full comment
Julie Coulter's avatar

Thank you for clear explanation of complex situation.

Expand full comment
Marina Oshana's avatar

“Inherent contempt“ has been described as ‘unseemly,’ cumbersome, time-consuming, and relatively ineffective, especially for a modern Congress with a heavy legislative workload that would be interrupted by a trial at the bar.”

Since this Congress has accomplished virtually nothing of a legislative purpose, I cannot imagine how this would be an obstacle.

Expand full comment
Mike Yochim's avatar

I was having the same thought.

Expand full comment
Ron Bravenec's avatar

I just commented on that same sentence.

Expand full comment
Patricia Dempsey's avatar

Absolutely right! I wonder if there's ever been a legislature that has accomplished less. And in another month, we'll no doubt see them kick the can down the road with another CR...And there will still be no resolution of the ACA tax credits. If Trump can spend $4 trillion to give tax breaks to the rich and corporations, they can surely cut that back to $3 trillion and give the tax subsidies that so many will be absolutely lost without. $1 trillion would no doubt fund tax credits for years to come. Consider people undergoing chemo and radiation for cancer treatment... pay the sky high cost of insurance and decide which other household item goes lacking, such as mortgage, food... I think as soon as the year begins and constituents recognize what their representatives have gotten them into, there will be some accountability but I wonder how many will die because they can't afford insurance and therefore wait until it's too late to have necessary screenings, for example. My heart breaks for them.

Expand full comment
JK's avatar

Meanwhile the Supreme Court has been aiding and abetting the White (Christo-Nationalist) House power grab to castrate Congress, not that there were any Republican balls there to begin with. So much for the Roberts Cabal "originalism," meaning the Founders were actually crypto-monarchists, who knew?

Expand full comment
SPW's avatar

This needs to happen for so many reasons. These Representatives have started this battle with Bondi and Patel who should be held accountable. This entire rotten regime will continue to delay and steamroll over the rule of law until someone forces them to stop.

Expand full comment
Ed Nuhfer's avatar

Bondi and Patel started this battle by placing themselves above accountability and what in the time of the pre-Roberts' Supreme Cult was recognized and respected as "rule of law."

I will be pleasantly surprised if the "someone" who "forces them to stop" comes out of this Congress. The "Representatives" are products of a system in which two parties have pressured their faithful not to hold their own elected accountable, no matter how corrupt.

The elected of BOTH parties in this Congress funded an ICE federal police larger than the armies of most nations and larger than the USMC to create the weapon now being used by Bondi and Patel to form a police state—a military force now occupying our cities, neighborhoods, and homes that the Constitution forbade the existing federal military to do. So the "Representatives" created their own occupying army without calling it an army..

Does anyone seriously believe that members of one of these two parties did not realize what they were creating, who they were handing this to, and upon whom it was going to be unleashed? ICE is doing EXACTLY what these "Representatives" funded it to do.

Expand full comment
IanWilliams's avatar

Yes - the Democrats are just as stupidly, abhorrently guilty of being enablers of the fascist state. All of it should be dismantled - all the crap built since 9-11 - DHS, TSA, ICE - the lot.

Expand full comment
Ed Nuhfer's avatar

Finger-pointing and snarky speeches are not governance, but that seems to be what these parties DO to distract from their NOT having the courage to do what citizens recognize desperately needs to be done.

Expand full comment
Jim (Bombguy24)'s avatar

It does make one wonder. I find it hard to understand why the Dems are not using this crisis to begin work on a better set of legislative proposals that will serve to correct many of the identified flaws in the various policies. Folks need to understand that the next Congress (if it is free of MAGA) will have to reconstruct many of the agencies severely damaged or destroyed. I'm personally not too keen on hearing leadership (Pelosi in this case) basically saying "vote for the Bill now. You can read it later on your own." Dems have an opportunity here that will be wasted if they wait until after the 26 elections. There are changes that can be made to various policies that guide federal programs. Democrat representatives in Congress should identify them now, get the public support, and make the changes part of the reconstruction rather than waste even more time.

Expand full comment
Jon Rosen's avatar

You are greatly overstating the power of a 2027 Congress. Unless some miracle occurs the BEST the Dems can hope for is very small majorities in both the House and Senate (and that is not a slam dunk by any means).

That means any veto by Trump will most likely hold since 2/3 of BOTH houses are required to overturn a veto.

So don't expect the 2027 Congress, even if the Dems win both, to be able to run roughshod over Trump. At best we will have another two years of stalemate, but given the alternative that's still something we should fight for

Expand full comment
Jim (Bombguy24)'s avatar

To clarify, I expect nothing from the 2027 Congress. What I would like to see is an honest, expansive review of the policies and programs that were curtailed or cancelled by Trump's administration, before they are reinstated by a future Congress. I simply suggest Dems look for opportunities to identify/improve/repair the known flaws in those policies/programs now rather than after. It would save time and, hopefully, regain some measure of trust from the public.

Expand full comment
Dave Dalton's avatar

Ed Nuhfer. “Supreme Cult”. Bravissimo

Expand full comment
Jack Jordan's avatar

Indeed. As SCOTUS emphasized in Watkins v. United States in 1957, “[t]he public is, of course, entitled to be informed concerning the workings of its government.” “Congress” clearly has “the power” to “inquire into and publicize corruption, maladministration or inefficiency in agencies of the Government.” “That was” literally “the only kind of activity described by Woodrow Wilson in Congressional Government when he wrote: ‘The informing function of Congress should be preferred even to its legislative function.’ ” “From the earliest times in its history, the Congress has assiduously performed an ‘informing function’ of this nature.”

As Justice Blackmun re-emphasized in a concurring opinion in Nixon v. Adm’r of Gen. Servs. in 1977, “Congress has a broad power ‘to inquire into and publicize corruption, maladministration or inefficiency in agencies of the Government.’ ”

Expand full comment
Margaret MacKenzie's avatar

Thomas Massie may seem the hero of the day regarding the Epstein files, but after a Wikipedia read, I’ve found him to be one hot mess of awful libertarian ideology.

Yes, he was *that* member of Congress who sent a Christmas card with the photo of his family holding semi-automatic weapons. He was the only member of Congress to vote against Iran sanctions, and he wasn’t quite sure Bashar Al-Assad was a bad guy after all. His legislative record goes against almost everything I support.

Is this one of those “my enemy’s enemy is my friend” scenarios? What a long strange trip this year has been.

Expand full comment
Kathy Balles's avatar

Thomas Massie is the reason we have aphorisms like “Politics make for strange bedfellows.”

Expand full comment
Al Keim's avatar

Yeah we're all getting f...'d

Expand full comment
Jon Rosen's avatar

Yeah Massie and MTG, two real "peaches" in this godawful pudding. Ugh. But even Lincoln understood that you can't always get what you want.

Expand full comment
Derek Smith's avatar

If I remember correctly, Boebert also had a Christmas card with her kids holding assault rifles and long guns. There were several others.

Expand full comment
Margaret MacKenzie's avatar

Birds of a feather

Expand full comment
Judith Gibbons's avatar

Thank you Joyce it’s uplifting to learn from you and why do Both Congress reps not put forth

Inherent Contempt.

The DOJ has not complied with the law. Where is the first step toward upholding the law ?

Expand full comment
Jack Jordan's avatar

Although, as Joyce said, the DOJ "can (and almost always does when the executive branch is concerned) decline to prosecute a criminal contempt," the federal law that governs criminal contempt proceedings (Rule 42 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure) provides a remedy when the DOJ helps obstruct justice:

"The court must request that the contempt be prosecuted by an attorney for the government, unless the interest of justice requires the appointment of another attorney. If the government declines the request, the court must appoint another attorney to prosecute the contempt."

Expand full comment
Pam Birkenfeld's avatar

That would be interesting!

Expand full comment
Louise's avatar

IMO it's way past time to start playing hardball with this administration! There's too much corrupt money floating around there. While a $5000 per day fine sounds nice...a number of days in jail are far more likely to concentrate the mind of Pam Bondi and her little cadre of venal misfits. Lock her up.

Expand full comment
Talia Giordano's avatar

This is going to be a battle, but one that will not only expose trump (…”this will hurt my friends!) and Bondi, the most corrupt AG of our time, but finally get justice for the long suffering victims.

Much as I dislike Massie, I have to give him credit for pursuing this issue like a bulldog and for reaching across the aisle to Ro Khanna to present a united Congressional front.

Expand full comment
Mark Shields's avatar

*”few” should be “fine”…?

Yes, thanks for making the considerations of this course clear!

Expand full comment
Jay Jay Eh's avatar

Thanks, I didn’t get it.

Expand full comment
Hubert Thomason's avatar

It’s definitely worth a shot.

Expand full comment
Solange Kellermann's avatar

What heavy Congressional work load? The House has done very little besides argue/scream at each other and protect Trump. Yeah, that's a heavy load to carry ... morally.

Expand full comment
jane's avatar

Thank you, Professor Vance.

Expand full comment
James Towner's avatar

Well, for what it is worth, this citizen holds the entire administration in the HIGHEST contempt.. so, that is my vote.

Expand full comment
Sandy S's avatar

Yep! I'm with you James! What more evidence do we need?!?!? They all need to be gone!!!! ASAP!!

Expand full comment
Kathi Ruel's avatar

Your last paragraph is interesting re: Inherent Contempt would take too much time (I am paraphrasing) and would interfere with Congress’s heavy legislative work load. Under Johnson, next to no work has been done. The Dems are blocked on every reasonable measure they have tried to advance. It is mind boggling and beyond infuriating. That SOB (among soooo many others) HAS TO GO.

Expand full comment
ANNE GREEN's avatar

It's not like the current Congress is undertaking to carry a heavy workload.

Expand full comment
Marilyn Joyce's avatar

Time to make our calls!! Our voices need to be heard loud and clear!

Expand full comment
Barry Lockard's avatar

Excuse me, but I thought inherent contempt was what the general public has towards the Congress!

Expand full comment