September 9, 2024

The Top Line

Here we are again. Over the next few weeks Congress will be at a performative peak, working hard to draw contrasts between the parties, distinctions among the factions, and assail the opposing party’s marquee candidates in any way possible. This is in stark contrast from what we can expect in December, when members are the farthest they can possibly be from an election and all the pent-up legislative energy will be channeled into a few must-pass bills.

In the background are the tectonic shifts of our political system transforming into a new configuration and a series of slips and jolts as political actors seeks to take advantage of and construct new terrain.

New CRS Director

Karen Donfried will serve as the next CRS Director, succeeding Robert Newlen, who served as interim director after Mary Mazanec was forced out “amid persistent complaints about leadership” at CRS. According to the LC’s press release, Donfried most recently served as assistant secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs.

According to Wikipedia, Donfried served as president of the German Marshall Fund from 2014 to 2021, having joined that think tank in 2001 and alternating positions between that organization and government, including at the National Security Council. She previously worked as a European specialist at CRS in the 90s. None of her CRS reports are available from CRS’s official website but I did locate a handful in our repository at everycrsreport.com.

The Congressional Research Service is an agency in transition. In July, I wrote about the agency’s struggles – and how to build a modern CRS – in the Washington Monthly. Donfried was an analyst at CRS in the 90s when it began to go off the rails under the leadership of Daniel Mulhollan, and I hope she can draw upon her experiences elsewhere to reimagine how that agency will serve Congress in our modern era. I also hope she will look to CRS’s sister agencies around the world to draw inspiration and to the loving critics here at home from guidance.

Interim Director Newlen did yeoman’s work to address the most immediate concerns at CRS and should be commended for his efforts. Designated by the Librarian as a caretaker, it was not his role to fix the underlying structural and management issues at the agency, so Director Donfried will have her work cut out for her. I hope she has significant expertise with change management and turning around organizations.

We offer her our congratulations and wish her luck on the road ahead.

CRS Strengthening Bills Set for Floor Vote

The House of Representatives has scheduled suspension votes this week on two bills relating to CRS, and the Committee on House Administration issued two committee reports on those bills. Specifically, the committee report concerning legislation to provide CRS with the authority to obtain information directly from the Executive branch (H.R. 7953, H. Rept 118-631), and the committee report to replace the print version of the Constitution Annotated (H.R. 7952, H. Rept 118-632).

Several conservative organizations sent a letter endorsing the Modernizing the Congressional Research Service’s Access to Data Act, writing “strengthening Congress and its support agencies should be a priority for conservatives seeking to restore the appropriate balance in our constitutional government.” In addition, the Foundation for American Innovation’s Dan Lips published this op-ed in support of the measure. He wrote “at this unique moment when the future control of the government is uncertain, all lawmakers should recognize the value of strengthening the Congressional Research Service to help all members of Congress do their jobs better.”

(I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that I’m very happy to see the modernization of the Constitution Annotated, something I’ve wanted for a long time.)

Security

Ade Lilly was sentenced to 13 months in prison after threatening to kill a congressional staffer and making 12,000 phone calls to Capitol Hill, according to Roll Call. According to the DOJ’s press release, Ade Lilly called 54 offices across Congress over an 18 month period, and undertook efforts to mask his phone number.

Between this story and last week’s account of two individuals charged with swatting 61 official victims and 40 private victims, I wonder to what extent harassment and threats of violence against members and staff are attributable to a small number of very motivated individuals.

Congressional clearances

Reps. Houlahan and Lee wrote to leadership to request better training for Members on the proper handling of classified information. “Simply having access to this information is not enough, Members must also be proficient in managing that classified intelligence as well.”

Very true. It’s notable, however, that House members don’t have the same level of access to classified information as do senators – at least, not the same level of staff support. Every member of the Senate is afforded a personal office staffer who is eligible to apply for a Top Secret / Sensitive Compartmented Information (TS/SCI) clearance to support this boss, but that’s not true in the House. Each House personal office is eligible to have two staffers with a top secret clearance, but not the SCI – which provides access to information concerning or derived from sensitive intelligence sources, methods, or analytical processes, but only when there’s a need-to-know.

It had been the case that the Senate did not provide this level of clearance, either, but Senators demanded it in recent years because they needed help evaluating classified information, getting a second set of eyes at briefings, and most importantly: getting advice from a staffer who was solely focused on protecting their interests. It’s not hard to imagine the conflict of interest that can arise when a staffer who is hired by the committee chair is the only staffer with appropriate clearance who can brief an interested committee member.

The issue was fixed in the Senate when leadership sent a letter to the Office of House Security directing them to update their member handbook. It’s just as easy in the House – but it will happen only if members demand equal treatment so they can perform their constitutional duties.

Leg Branch Operations: Leg Counsel, the ACRC, and GPO

Rep. Steil, who chairs the House Administration Committee, introduced several bills on Friday that were referred to his committee that concern House operations and elections. The bills themselves are interesting, and it’s notable that the House Admin Committee is holding a full committee hearing on the elections on September 11th. It is sometimes the practice of the committee to tag on a markup to a full committee meeting, so I wouldn’t be surprised if some of these measures came up. They include:

Authorizing the House’s Legislative Counsel to designate more than one attorney in that office as Deputy Legislative Counsel – H.R. 9487 (bill text not yet available). Leg Counsel are the folks who draft the vast majority of the House’s legislation and they have a crushing workload. Legislative Counsel Wade Ballou pointed out in his testimony from 2025 that the number of legislative drafting requests have increased from 24,524 in the 115th Congress to 33,321 in the 118th Congress, a 36 percent increase. When reviewing the growth of amendments, Ballou testified “The legislative process as it currently exists is not able to sustain this level of effort and it is not able to handle continued growth at these rates.”

While the number of staff have increased from 49 to 61 from the 115th to 118th Congresses, the average years of experience for each attorney has dropped from 16.4 to 12.7, a decrease of 23 percent. Writing legislation is hard, there’s a 2-year apprenticeship to learn the fundamentals, and it can take years before an attorney becomes an expert.

Sunsetting the Advisory Committee on the Records of Congress – H.R. 9487 (bill text not yet available). The ACRC is a federal advisory committee created in 1990 to advise Congress and the National Archives on managing and preserving Congress’s records. It includes institutional as well as public stakeholders “who represent historians, political scientists, congressional archivists, and other users and caretakers of legislative records.” As we reported in July, the reasoning for a potential sunset is summarized in the QFRs from this hearing. What would replace it?

“Without the ACRC, coordination would simply be a continuation of the formalization of current long-standing practice of informal collaboration among the Center [for Legislative Archives] and House and Senate staff regarding shared projects and collective issues related to congressional records. Ideally, it should include a regular meeting calendar with the following: monthly meetings between the Center and House archival staff, quarterly or bi-annual meetings of the Center and House and Senate staff, as well as meetings on an as-needed or project specific basis. Additionally, coordination should include an internal briefing of the Clerk of the House, House Historian, Chief of the Office of Art and Archives, and House Archivist upon the Center’s delivery of the annual report to Congress.”

I’ve long thought that the ACRC shared a partially overlapping mission with the Congressional Data Task Force: preserving information about the work of Congress and sharing it with the public, including as electronic data. In practice, at least compared to the CDTF, the ACRC felt to me as somewhat academic and divorced from some of the day-to-day issues of access. When preserving information, it’s important to consider who is using it and how it will be used.

Also, in all the stakeholders that will be involved with “managing and preserving” Congress’s records, I did not see the inclusion of the Congressional Data Task Force as a stakeholder, nor the public. Perhaps that can be assumed, but perhaps not. While the form of a federal advisory committee might be unwieldy, we should seek out input from historians, political scientists, congressional archivists… and journalists, technologists, civil society, businesses, and citizens.

There might be value in transferring some aspects of the ACRC’s mission to the Congressional Data Task Force. The ACRC has high level participation from the Clerk of the House, Secretary of the Senate, and the National Archives, as well as each chamber’s historians. There is excellent participation and support for the CDTF from various stakeholders, and the merging of some functions would allow them to even more deeply participate in the work and lend additional logistical support. Access to Congressional data is predicated upon preservation of Congressional information – and moving that data in a logical way into digital formats.

Revising the authorities of the Government Publishing Office – H.R. 9490 (bill text not yet available). Since Abraham Lincoln was president, GPO has been key to informing the public about the work of Congress and the Executive branch. An agency that old (but young at heart) has a lot of cruft in its authorizing language. In addition, the way Congress oversees GPO has changed significantly over the last few decades, with the desuetude of the Joint Committee on Printing. The JCP was the body inside the government responsible for thinking about and implementing public access to information, and its defunding during the Gingrich revolution was a mortal blow to government openness and transparency.

Over the last decade there have been various efforts to update Title 44, the provision of US Code that governs GPO, but only minor provisions have become law (such as term limits and an agency renaming). The last extended exploration of these issues that I remember is a series of hearings in 2017 on “Transforming GPO for the 21st Century and Beyond” – see parts 1 (transcript, testimony), 2, 3, and 4. There’s likely draft legislation kicking around from prior Congresses and it will be interesting to see what ideas will emerge in this bill.

Two election bills, one concerning electronic donations and the other on voter identities, were also introduced. They’re beyond the scope of this newsletter.

Hearings and Floor Action

One legacy of imperial America are the Freely Associated States, three modern nations once ruled by the United States as “districts of the former U.S.-administered United Nations Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, established after World War II,” according to CRS. The three former districts – now the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), and Republic of Palau – chose the status of “free association” with the U.S., rejecting offers of territorial or commonwealth status.

Their approximately 200,000 citizens have the right to live and work in the U.S. as “habitual residents” and are eligible to join the U.S. military. The Pacific Islands play an important role in supporting the U.S. security presence in the region. In 2024, Congress enacted a law to address “long-standing challenges for citizens of each of these FAS who choose to reside lawfully in the United States,” such as “eligibility for key federal public benefit programs” while they reside in the U.S., according to a Department of Interior press release.

The Natural Resources Committee has scheduled a subcommittee oversight hearing on Tuesday, September 10th, to examine the implementation of the Compact of Free Association Amendments Act of 2024. The U.S. historically held far more extensive territory than most people realize, including me, and I strongly recommend the excellent book How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Immerwahr.

The Congressional Budget Office keeps an eye on federal spending and the House Budget Committee has scheduled a hearing on the CBO for September 11th. Congress created the CBO in the 1970s because it had learned it could not rely on the White House’s Office of Management and Budget or Executive branch forebearance. The non-partisan agency provides analysis and data for Congress and scores the cost of legislative proposals.

In recent years it has become clear that CBO at times has difficulty getting information from the Executive branch. In response, there are two sets of bills to remedy this issue.

The Congressional Budget Office Data Sharing Act, H.R. 7032, specifies that CBO can obtain data from the Executive Branch without a written agreement so long as CBO maintains the same level of confidentiality as the agency. The bipartisan bill, co-sponsored by Reps. Boyle and Arrington, the ranking member and chair of the Budget Committee, passed the House in April and has not yet been referred to committee in the Senate.

The Congressional Budget Office Data Access Act, H.R. 7184 & S. 1549, exempts CBO from the Privacy Act of 1974 – joining GAO and the National Archives in that respect – “to expedite the sharing of data and information between CBO and federal agencies.” The Senate companion measure, co-sponsored by HSGAC Chair Peters with Sens. Collins and Lankford, passed the Senate in June and is being held at the desk in the House. The House companion measure, co-sponsored by Reps. Grothman and Mfume, who lead various House Oversight subcommittees, was marked-up and ordered to be reported from the House Oversight Committee in February.

These CBO bills are part of a broader effort to empower Legislative branch support agencies to get information they need. Similar legislation is on the floor this week pertaining to CRS. I am not aware of a comparable bill for GAO, but as National Security Counselors Executive Director Kel McClanahan has testified, the Intelligence agencies have spent decades fighting against GAO’s ability to conduct oversight of them.

On suspension. The House of Representatives scheduled 32 bills on suspension and three pursuant to a rule. The vast majority of the bills appear to relate to international relations, concerning great powers’ competition with China and Russia and concerns about foreign interference or undue influence inside the U.S. Two bills, however, concern CRS, and are discussed elsewhere in the newsletter.

There’s also a CR, but right now Republican leadership is engaged in ideological signaling and the bill is not expected to become law in its current form. See the Weekly Schedule here.

Technology and Democracy

The Library of Congress will hold a public forum on September 18th from 1-3pm to provide “an opportunity for the public to learn about recent enhancements to Congress.gov and to provide feedback about the site.” I’ll be there, you should be too. It’s your chance to say what you’d like from Congress.gov. Click on the link to RSVP.

The Congressional Hackathon will take place on September 19th from 1-6pm. The hackathon “will bring together a bipartisan group of Members of Congress, Congressional staff, Legislative Branch agency staff, open government and transparency advocates, civic hackers, and developers from digital companies to explore the role of digital platforms in the legislative process.” Follow the link to RSVP.

What’s your genius idea? Should there be a tool that allows staff to automatically schedule meetings with outside groups at free times on their calendar? An app that automatically condenses written witness testimony and the committee memo into a two-page doc that includes draft member questions? A tracker that shows how busy each cafeteria is? Or that collates all QFRs that relate to an agency? Submit your tech ideas here. I’ll publish the best, but also will keep submitters anonymous unless you give the go-ahead.

A fun idea from this week’s mailbag: “Create an email alert for new CRS reports from https://crsreports.congress.gov/. Right now, there is no way to get automatic alerts for new reports.” Hear hear! (And how about access to those older reports?)

The OSC Steps Up To Protect Whistleblowers

The Office of Special Counsel – an independent federal investigative and prosecutorial agency that protects federal employees from prohibited personnel practices – announced two new proposals to shed light on when an agency engages in misconduct towards an employee. The purpose of these new policies, as explained by the agency head in an op-ed in GovExec, is to “to deter agency misconduct and protect federal workers.” In particular, it is to meet Congress’s direction that OSC should “focus on getting any inflicted harm undone as quickly as possible.”

First, “OSC would post summaries of whistleblower allegations where my colleagues and I have made a ‘substantial likelihood’ of agency wrongdoing determination. These summaries would be for open matters where I await final agency reports detailing their findings and fixes.”

Second, “When OSC sees evidence indicating that whistleblower retaliation or some other prohibited personnel practice has occurred, and the agency is not timely and reasonably responding to the injured employee, we would say something quickly and publicly whenever the wronged worker agrees.”

The full text of the proposal spells out in more detail how this would work. The policy is expected to be finalized on October 1st.

Reforming the mother of parliaments

The British parliament will establish a new Modernisation Committee this week, focused on “recommending reforms to the standards, practices and procedures of the House of Commons,” according to the Hansard Society’s excellent newsletter. According to Labour’s Election Manifesto, Parliament will create a new independent Ethics and Integrity Commission to deal with matters of corruption, establish post-employment restrictions, fix voter ID rules that prevent people from voting, and give 16 and 17 year olds the right to vote.

The Modernisation Committee is tasked with “reforming House of Commons procedures, driving up standards, and improving working practices.” Parliament will immediately ban MPs from taking up paid advisory or consulting roles.

It promises a mandatory retirement age of 80 in the House of Lords, and they’ll work to replace that chamber with “an alternative second chamber that is more representative of the regions and nations.” (They have 154 peers over the age of 80.)

I bet some folks would like to see some similar reforms in the U.S.

Odds and ends

Rep. Stephanie Bice speaks with Kevin Kosar about new member orientation. There’s a useful primer on NMO from the POPVOX Foundation as well.

The Office of the Whistleblower Ombuds has new guidance on closing whistleblower cases and supporting whistleblowers with FOIA.

GAO Restricted Report: GAO indicated it completed a report entitled “Special Operations Forces: DOD Should Reassess Its Need to Acquire Armed Overwatch Aircraft.” The “restricted” report can be requested by a Member of Congress, the federal government, and the public/press.

Do staff cuts increase lobbyist influence? New political science research from Alex Garlick and Mary Kroeger says yes-ish. “There is a link between the policy capacity of a legislature and the efficacy of groups looking to lobby its members…. When legislators were strapped for staff, they did not appear to just rubber stamp bills introduced by outside groups, but they become more likely to ignore bills that were not being supported by lobbyists. Therefore reformers (like the “Fix Congress” committee) that are looking to offset the influence of outside lobbying groups are moving in the correct direction by increasing policy resources for legislators.”

The AOC IG issued a new report on the AOC’s Human Capital Management that contained twelve recommendations. While noting the AOC met five out of seven KPIs, the IG “found deficiencies within the Human Capital Management activities, operations[,] and internal controls (control environment, control activities, information, communication and monitoring).”

The PACER working group, intended to provide a “forum for PACER users to share and recommend ideas for expanding and improving EPA services,” is not serving its intended purpose. Michael Lissner, who runs the Free Law Project and knows more about making federal court records available to the public than just about anyone, resigned from the committee on Thursday because, in his view, its focus is on a tiny item and is not addressing the major concerns with PACER, specifically, that the system is “obsolete, insecure, and ineffective.”

Burgess Everett published his inaugural piece in Semafor, articulating the conventional wisdom that there will be a continuing resolution keeping the government open through December, and reminding readers that the debt ceiling lapse is right around the corner. How about we use the expected December omnimultibus to get rid of the debt ceiling entirely, which is anachronistic, misleading, dangerous, and unnecessary.

ICYMI

From the 8/26 newsletter: Congress’s once and future legal advisory body and McConnell’s surprising views on proxy voting (link)

From the 8/19 newsletter: Building technology in congress (link)

From the 8/12 newsletter: Recommendations to update the rules of the House of Representatives, Ross Vought’s views on the imperial congress, Can you govern with multiple parties (link)

From the 8/4 newsletter: Senate hearing on updating the nomination confirmation process, CRS building out its data analytics capabilities (link)

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