Rep. Ruben Kihuen harassed women who worked with him and violated the House’s official code of conduct, according to a House Ethics Committee report released Thursday. 

“Kihuen made persistent and unwanted advances towards women who were required to interact with him as part of their professional responsibilities,” the report says. The advances included kissing, grabbing and comments about underwear.

The release comes after a nine-month inquiry by an investigative subcommittee empaneled in Dec. 2017. 

The Nevada Democrat refused to resign following allegations of harassment by women who worked for and with him, even after top Democrats called on him to step down. But Kihuen decided not to seek re-election, making the announcement a day after the Ethics Committee launched its investigation.

At the time, he disputed the allegations against him, but said they “would be a distraction from a fair and thorough discussion of the issues in a re-election campaign.” 

Three women testified before the investigative subcommittee that Kihuen made unwanted physical and verbal advances toward them between 2013 and 2017. The report details Kihuen’s actions toward a D.C. “firm employee,” a campaign staffer and a Nevada lobbyist.

The committee found that while serving as a member of the House, Kihuen repeatedly kissed the firm employee’s cheek, touched her shoulders and back and commented on her physique. He also inquired about her relationship status and asked if she lived alone. Kihuen insinuated that he would help the D.C. firm employee with her career in exchange for a romantic relationship, according to the Ethics report.

The campaign staffer testified that Kihuen made unwanted advances toward her by touching her thigh while they were driving back from a meeting and by grabbing the back of her thigh as she stood up to check her computer. She told the committee that Kihuen would tell her “you look really good,” and “I would take you out if you didn’t work for me,” by suggesting that the two of them should get a room as they arrived at a hotel for a meeting, and by asking her if she ever cheated on her boyfriend.

The female lobbyist, who worked with Kihuen in Nevada between 2013 and 2015, testified that he slid his hand under her dress and onto her thigh, grabbed her buttocks, asked her to sit on his lap, inquired what color her panties were and suggested that she would look good naked. The report also says the lobbyist testified that he sent messages suggesting — through emojis — that they make a sex tape together.

The subcommittee’s full report includes over 100 pages of text messages, chats and emails between Kihuen and the women, along with the women discussing Kihuen’s behavior with other people.

While the investigative subcommittee chose not to “address whether any of Representative Kihuen’s behavior prior to being sworn in as a Member of the House” fell within the panel’s jurisdiction, the full House Ethics Committee asserted in the report that it has jurisdiction over “misconduct relating to a successful campaign for election to the House.”

The full Ethics panel decided that Kihuen’s behavior toward the campaign staffer, coupled with his actions when he was serving in the House, warrants “reproval.”

Reproval by the Ethics Committee is “intended to be a clear public statement of rebuke of a Member’s conduct issued by a body of that Member’s peers acting … on behalf of the House of Representatives.”

House Rule XXIII, clauses 1 and 2, states that “a Member … of the House shall behave at all times in a manner that shall reflect creditably on the House” and “shall adhere to the spirit and the letter of the Rules of the House.”

Roll Call Reporters Discuss Covering Sexual Harassment on the Hill in the #MeToo Era

The House Ethics Committee found Rep. Mark Meadows failed to take “prompt and decisive action” to handle alleged sexual harassment in his congressional office, according to a Friday report.

The committee also found Meadows violated House rules by failing to take action to ensure his office was not engaging in discrimination.

The House Ethics Committee is requiring Meadows to reimburse the U.S. Treasury for the amount paid to a Meadows staffer who was removed from his role due to allegations of harassment, $40,625.02.

A group of employees in Meadows’ Washington office reported in October 2014 to the deputy chief of staff at the time that Kenny West had acted inappropriately toward them. Meadows continued to pay West his full-time salary after he was moved to a part-time advisory role. The Code of Official Conduct for House members says that members may not “retain an employee who does not perform duties for the employing office commensurate with the compensation the employee receives.”

The Ethics Committee found that when West was demoted to senior adviser, his pay remained the same. The report says that the committee found “little evidence of official work that he completed during that time.”

“To cut off all contact between Mr. West and most of his female employees, caused another potential problem. An environment where only male staff have access to the Chief of Staff risks unequal treatment of employees based solely on sex,” the report said.

The committee found that Meadows did not know about West’s behavior until several of his female staff made complaints to him in Oct. 2014. Meadows arranged for an independent investigation through the Office of House Employment Counsel, or the Office of Compliance.

“After that independent review was complete, he ignored its findings and the recommendation by the independent investigator to terminate Mr. West’s employment,” according to the Ethics Committee report.

“While Representative Meadows took some important immediate steps – restricting Mr. West from the congressional offices and prohibiting him from contacting most of the female employees – those steps were essentially all he did to prevent and correct the alleged sexual harassment for nearly six months,” says the report.

Meadows was approached by GOP Rep. Trey Gowdy, who told him that the measures he took to separate West from the female staff were not working. The speaker’s office got involved in the spring of 2015, which prompted Meadows to remove West from his supervisory role.

“There is no place in any congressional office for looking up skirts, or down shirts; staring at a woman’s chest; unwanted touching; or making sexual comments, even if subtle or in jest. The fact that Mr. West supervised the women he did these things to makes his behavior even more unacceptable,” says the report.

“Making sure my team feels safe and secure in our office is the highest priority for me and I’m truly sorry for any stress this situation caused them. I thank the Ethics Committee for their work in resolving this, and my office will remain committed to serving western North Carolinians every day to the best of our ability,” said Meadows in a statement Friday afternoon.

Meadows intends to pay back the severance as the committee requested, according to an aide.

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The midterms have come and gone and it’s back to the Hill for members new and old. The lame duck sessions in the House and Senate gaveled in Tuesday while new member orientation kicked off its first week.

The chambers, along with orientation, recess next week for the Thanksgiving holiday and will start up sessions again the week of Nov. 26.

Here's the entire week in photos:

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A group of Senate Democrats want the private prison industry to explain whether it is complying with federal standards for housing at ICE immigration detention centers.

Led by Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the senators have written to CoreCivic and GEO group about their housing practices following reports from the inspector general at the Homeland Security Department.

“These reports and the results of the OIG investigations indicate that the perverse profit incentive at the core of the private prison business model has resulted in GEO Group and CoreCivic boosting profits by cutting costs on expenditures including food, health care, and sufficient pay and training for guards and prison staff,” the senators wrote.

The senators want answers by the end of the month.

The signatories on Warren’s letters included a bunch of other potential 2020 presidential hopefuls such as Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Kamala Harris of California, Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

Among the requests are for the prison operators to turn over any waivers that may have been granted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement for noncompliance with relevant standards.

“In their review, OIG found that detainees in immigration detention facilities do not have access to basic necessities or prompt and adequate medical care,” the senators wrote.

Specifically, they cite a report about disturbing findings on the frequency of suicide attempts at a GEO Group-operated ICE facility in Adelanto, California.

“The report found that in 15 out of approximately 20 cells examined inspectors saw nooses fashioned from twisted bedsheets hanging from vents,” they said. “A detainee quoted in the report explained that detainees use braided bedsheets to attempt to commit suicide.”

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Democrats’ draft proposals for overhauling the House rules would return at least some so-called regular order processes to the lower chamber by ensuring major bills go through committee before hitting the floor. 

The requirement that all bills being brought to the floor under a rule must have gone through a committee hearing and markup is just one of several notable changes Democrats are floating to House rules now that they’ll be in the majority. 

Incoming Rules Committee Chairman Jim McGovern presented the draft proposals, a list of which was obtained by Roll Call, to the Democratic Caucus Thursday afternoon.

Some of the notable proposals include:

One proposal not included on the list is a restoration of earmarks.

Since the 2010 earmark ban Republicans implemented was included only in their intraparty rules, Democrats technically do not need to use the rules package to restore them. They can just start using them again. 

However, House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, who’s expected to be majority leader next Congress, has suggested that language be added to the rules package outlining the parameters under which earmarks could be used and providing guidelines for ensuring they are transparent. 

Watch: Pelosi Talks Midterm ‘Wave,’ Says She Has Votes for Speakership

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The special select panel charged with overhauling the congressional budget process on Thursday punted a final vote on recommendations until after Thanksgiving amid disagreement by its two leaders over when the panel should act.

The committee is scheduled to reconvene at 2 p.m. Nov. 27, three days ahead of the Nov. 30 deadline for the committee to report a bill.

House Budget Chairman Steve Womack and House Appropriations ranking member Nita M. Lowey, the select committee’s leaders, agreed to recess the meeting until after Thanksgiving when it became clear there would be a problem getting a quorum as senators on the committee began to leave town.

Lowey also wanted to postpone the vote to give Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Democratic Leader Charles E. Schumer of New York time to reach agreement on Senate floor consideration of the budget process bill, which among other things would make the annual budget resolution a biennial exercise. A Democratic aide said that without an agreement, there is worry the Senate could approve a “poison pill” amendment that would sink the measure.

Lowey said McConnell and Schumer have not reached such an agreement for consideration of whatever bill emerges from the committee, which will require 60 votes to advance in the Senate. “That concerns me greatly, since it imperils all the work we have done to date,” Lowey said after she and Womack returned to the hearing after a break.

Until an agreement is reached, Lowey said, “it is my strong belief that we should not report out our final product since doing so could doom it to failure.”

Womack said while he appreciated Lowey’s concerns, “nothing has changed.”

Womack noted that the law that established the joint committee lays out the procedures for Senate consideration. He said while the joint committee package does not completely satisfy every member of the panel, “that is no reason for us not to move forward and finish this, across the finish line, without regard to what the prospects would be for what leadership may intend to do one way or the other.”

Earlier, the 16-member group unanimously adopted an amendment to its biennial budgeting proposal to make sure there is an opportunity to use the budget reconciliation process every year, as long as Congress adopts a budget resolution every other year.

The panel voted 16-0 for the proposal from Republican Sen. Roy Blunt to maintain the ability to use reconciliation every year a budget resolution is in effect, as long as Congress adopts a budget in non-election years that contains instructions to the relevant committees.

Reconciliation directives are a powerful tool allowing authorizing committees to draft legislation changing mandatory spending programs or tax laws that are not subject to filibuster in the Senate.

House and Senate Republicans, for example, were able to use the fiscal 2017 budget instructions to write what became the ultimately unsuccessful health care law “repeal and replace” bill. They were then able to turn around within months and draft what became the largest tax code overhaul in three decades under the authorities in the fiscal 2018 budget resolution.

“This just gives the Budget Committee more flexibility,” Blunt said.

It had been unclear whether the biennial budget proposal, under which Congress would only adopt a budget every two years, would allow annual reconciliation. Blunt said he was told that the House parliamentarian believed that the language of the biennial budget proposal agreed to by the committee allowed annual reconciliation. But he said he also was told that the Senate parliamentarian was “not as sure.”

Lowey initially objected to the amendment, saying there was no need to have more than one reconciliation opportunity per budget resolution, and she urged a “no” vote. When it came time to vote she said she had been “persuaded” and voted “yes.”

The mechanics of how to provide for annual reconciliation in a biennial budget are still unclear.

Georgia GOP Sen. David Perdue said he believes that the two-year budget resolution would have to contain a set of reconciliation instructions for the first year and the second year in order to do reconciliation in the second year.

But Sen. James Lankford said it also would be possible for the Budget Committees to write and adopt reconciliation instructions in the second year. “That would be my assumption,” the Oklahoma Republican said. “It’s not worked out.”

Under a unanimous consent agreement reached by the committee, an amendment needs the support of the majority of the eight Democrats and eight Republicans on the panel.

The committee adopted three amendments, rejecting eight others, while two were withdrawn by their sponsors.

An amendment offered by Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse on behalf of himself, Perdue and Blunt provides for the option of a “bipartisan” budget resolution in the Senate that would need the support of at least half the Democrats and half the Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee to be reported to the floor. The panel adopted the amendment 14-0 with the support of seven Republicans and seven Democrats, with two absent for the vote.

The proposed bipartisan budget would include a target ratio for public debt as a share of gross domestic product, as well as annual targets for health care spending, tax breaks or “expenditures” as they are called in the amendment, discretionary spending and revenue, with the aim of developing a “glide slope” to reduce the debt.

“While this amendment creates no guarantee that the senate will rise to the occasion, it does create a pathway and opportunity for the Senate to do that,” Whitehouse said. He said Schumer supports it.

Any reconciliation bill emerging from the bipartisan budget resolution would still only need a simple majority to pass in the Senate, but it would also need support from 15 members of the minority party in the Senate if the amendment became law.

Watch: Pelosi Talks Midterm ‘Wave,’ Says She Has Votes for Speakership

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House Republicans are already thinking about what to do if more members of their caucus face indictment. A new rules proposal for the conference would force its indicted members of Congress to relinquish leadership assignments and committee roles.

The rules change would require any GOP member facing indictment “for a felony for which a sentence of two or more years imprisonment may be imposed,” to “submit his or her resignation from any such committees to the House promptly.”

The proposed rules would also apply to any House Republican leadership, requiring them to “step aside” if indicted for a felony. Republican lawmakers will vote on the rules package this week.

Two House Republicans, New York’s Chris Collins and California’s Duncan Hunter, were both indicted in August. Hunter won his race, and Collins is ahead in his, although the Associated Press has not declared a winner. Without committee roles, their responsibilities would be pared back significantly.

Hunter and his wife, Margaret, were indicted by a federal grand jury in late August for allegedly using $250,000 in campaign funds for personal expenses and covering their tracks in campaign finance filings to the Federal Election Commission. The couple is facing 60 federal charges.

Collins faces insider trading charges stemming from his investment in an Australian biotech company where he served on the board of directors. He gained personal benefit and provided nonpublic information to his son Cameron Collins, who sold nearly $1.4 million of Innate Immunotherapeutics shares, according to a complaint filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The other proposed changes include a clarification that committee leaders get to participate in Republican Steering Committee deliberations when the panel is considering removing a member of their committee and language specifying the distribution of Steering Committee votes for when the party is in the minority. In the majority, the speaker has had four votes and the majority leader two, while all other Steering members get one. In the minority the minority leader will get four votes and the minority whip will get two.

Currently, there are no no federal statutes or rules of the House that directly affect the status of a member of Congress who has been indicted for a crime that constitutes a felony.

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Officials have yet to determine the winners in one Senate contest and six House races — a week and a half after the midterm elections.

As the Florida Senate race between Sen. Bill Nelson and his GOP challenger, Gov. Rick Scott, heads to a manual recount, a federal judge called the state’s election processes “the laughing stock of the world.”

Nelson trailed Scott in the original tally and machine recount by a shade over 12,000 votes.

House Democrats have already passed the threshold for a majority that they haven’t held since 2010. They currently have 231 seats called in their favor with the potential to win some of those six not-yet-called races. They’re likely to finish around 234 with a 33-seat majority.

In the Senate, the GOP flipped seats in Indiana, North Dakota and Missouri — states that President Donald Trump won by double digits in 2016. But Democrats picked up seats in Nevada and Arizona.

Here are the races yet to be called as of Friday that will determine the size of the Republicans’ majority in the Senate and the Democrats’ in the House:

The race for the Senate seat in Florida is as nasty as ever as state and local officials kick off a manual recount.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott won the machine recount completed Thursday by a little over 12,000 votes over incumbent Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson.

Scott declared victory over the three-term senator late on Election Night, but nearly a week and a half later the race remains uncalled by The Associated Press. Scott’s margin narrowed since election night as votes from Broward continued to trickle in and absentee and provisional ballots remained uncounted.

A judge tossed out the lawsuit this week from Scott and the National Republican Senatorial Committee against Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes for failing to turn over information about ballots that have been counted. There has been no evidence of voter fraud in Broward, the judge ruled. Scott has also called for a Florida Department of Law Enforcement Investigation into Broward’s handling of ballots.

President Donald Trump and Rubio, without citing any evidence, have also accused Broward County officials of voter fraud.

The Mississippi special election for the final two years of former GOP Sen. Thad Cochran’s term is heading to a Nov. 27 runoff after no candidate cleared 50 percent last Tuesday night.

Just 1 point separated appointed GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith and former Democratic Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy, with Hyde-Smith ahead 41 percent to 40 percent. Republican state Sen. Chris McDaniel took 16 percent of the vote.

Eight of the last nine House races that have been called by The Associated Press have flipped to the Democrats after Bruce Poliquin lost his Maine 2nd District seat and Democrat Katie Porter ousted Rep. Mimi Walters in California’s 45th District on Thursday. Democrats now control every seat in Orange County, California.

In Georgia’s 7th District, Rep. Rob Woodall leads by less than 500 votes over Democrat Carolyn Bourdeaux in the Atlanta suburbs. Bourdeaux has called for a recount.

Utah Rep. Mia Love, who spoke at the 2016 Republican National Convention and is the only African-American Republican woman in the House, pulled within 873 votes of Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams with 94 percent of precincts reporting in the 4th District. McAdams’ lead has narrowed since Election Day, and Republican-leaning Utah County still has more votes to report.

Democratic challenger Anthony Brindisi leads Rep. Claudia Tenney by about half a percentage point in New York’s 22nd District. Tenney ran one of the most pro-Trump campaigns of any vulnerable Republican this cycle.

Republican incumbents in New York’s 27th (Chris Collins) and Texas’ 23rd (Will Hurd) hold narrow edges in their respective races, but those contests remained uncalled Friday.

One open seat held by the GOP remains uncalled.

Republicans, including new House GOP standard-bearer Kevin McCarthy, have claimed victory for Young Kim over Democrat Gil Cisneros for the seat vacated by retiring Rep. Ed Royce in California’s 39th District.

But Cisneros took a 941-vote lead over Kim Thursday as California officials continue to tally mail-in votes. Kim's lead shriveled from 4,000 votes on Election Night.

Watch: Bill Nelson Makes a Statement on Florida’s Senate Race Recount

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The new House GOP leadership team gave no indication Wednesday it would reconsider its cozy relationship with President Donald Trump, despite losses in dozens of suburban districts in the midterms last week.

Newly elected House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California acknowledged at a press conference Wednesday that winning back the American suburbs will be a “challenge” in 2020 but said multiple times at the press conference that “history was against” the GOP keeping control of both chambers of Congress in a midterm election with a first-term Republican president in the Oval Office.

McCarthy declined to assign blame for any midterm losses to the president and his bombastic immigration-centric rhetoric. Instead, he attributed Democratic gains to millions of dollars in outside spending from billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and others.

The new House GOP standard-bearer, who will serve out the lame duck session as majority leader, indicated Republicans would actively protect Trump by countering Democratic efforts to execute oversight over the Trump administration.

Democrats want to “disrupt” and “impeach,” McCarthy said. Democratic leaders and prospective House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler have not suggested at any point before or since the midterms that they plan to pursue articles of impeachment.

Nadler and Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff and Elijah Cummings have, however, already made clear that their top priority will be to protect special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election — including possible collusion between Trump campaign officials and Russia.

Democrats have a laundry list of other matters they want to investigate — the president’s tax returns, possible violations of the Emoluments Clause, internal administration communications that led to the immigrant family separation policy at the U.S. border — but have said they know they will need to be methodical and prioritize.

The new Republican leaders panned the notion of Democratic House oversight over the administration.

Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise, who will remain the House Republican whip after a unanimous voice vote in his favor Wednesday, said “people in this country don’t want an obstructive Congress.”

McCarthy agreed.

“If their agenda is simply investigations and impeachment ... we’ll be there to defend the American public,” he said.

McCarthy and Scalise were flanked at the press conference by new Republican conference chairwoman Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who will fill the position her father held three decades ago; conference vice chairman Mark Walker of North Carolina; conference secretary Jason Smith of Missouri; and policy committee chairman Gary Palmer of Alabama, the first conservative House Freedom Caucus member to hold a leadership position.

The new National Republican Congressional Committee chairman, Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, did not attend the press conference.

Walker branded the House GOP as the party of the future, noting the average age of the likely top three leaders on the Democratic side are a combined average of 78 years old. The average age of the new GOP leaders is 52.

“We’re all about new ideas,” Walker said.

The new leaders have not had a chance to discuss how they will extend an olive branch to the Freedom Caucus and other supporters of its founder, Jim Jordan, who lost the race for minority leader to McCarthy, 159 votes to 43.

McCarthy thanked Jordan for running, suggesting it was good for members to have options to weigh for new leadership.

Trump has told confidants that he wants Jordan, a fierce and skillful defender of the president on the cable news circuit, to be appointed ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee to repel possible impeachment proceedings against him, Politico reported Wednesday. That appointment does not, for now, appear likely, as Republican Reps. Steve Chabot of Ohio and Doug Collins of Georgia prepare to court steering committee votes for the post.

A spot has opened up for Jordan, though, to lead Republicans in the Oversight Committee. The current GOP chairman, South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy, is retiring in January.

“I think Jim is an incredibly talented guy,” Palmer said. “I think he will [be the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee] one day. He’s that talented,” Palmer said.

He declined to say whether “one day” meant in the new Congress in January or further in the future.

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House Republicans on Thursday will consider changes to their internal conference rules, with several amendments targeting the process for selecting committee leaders. 

The biggest proposed change comes from Wisconsin Rep. Mike Gallagher, who wants committee members to be able to choose their own chairmen or ranking members. 

His amendment would exclude the Rules, Budget and House Administration committees — the heads of which are appointed by the Republican leader — from the member-selection process. 

Under the conference’s current rules, the Republican Steering Committee, a panel composed primarily of leadership and regional representatives, nominates committee leaders and the full conference ratifies those recommendations. 

If Gallagher’s amendment were adopted, the Steering Committee would still be in charge of assigning members to committees. 

Also Watch: Senate Republicans Talk Leadership Team and Special Counsel Protections

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows, who’s a proponent of allowing committee members to select their leaders, has an alternative amendment should Gallagher’s fail. Meadows’ proposal would at least reduce leadership’s influence in selecting committee leaders. 

The North Carolina Republican wants to get rid of an existing rule that would allow the Republican leader’s vote to count as four votes and his deputy’s to count as two votes, so that their combined votes are equal to all other Steering members’ votes.

Meadows also has two other amendments. One would strike an existing rule that allows members who are appointed to the Rules Committee to reserve their seniority on one standing committee they had to leave to join Rules. The other would ensure that if the GOP leader convenes a panel to consider conference rules changes, the members he appoints would be “broadly representative of the diverse perspectives within the Republican Conference.”

Texas Rep. Pete Olson is offering an amendment to prevent committee leaders who reach their three-term limit (an existing conference rule that no one is proposing to change) from leading any of that panel’s subcommittees during the following three Congresses.

Many Republican committee leaders often retire from Congress after reaching their term limits, as five of them did for that reason this cycle. (Three chairmen who were not term-limited retired too). But Olson’s amendment would likely force even more into that decision and thus seems unlikely to be adopted.

Olson does provide a grandfather clause in his amendment that would allow any former committee leader who held subcommittee chairmanships this Congress to continue on in those roles for up to two more terms. 

In amendment that is blatantly self-serving, Alaska Rep. Don Young is offering an amendment to allow the dean of the House to serve on the Republican Steering Committee when the dean is a GOP member. Young is the dean, the title ascribed to the longest-serving House member. 

The final amendment comes from New York Rep. Elise Stefanik and would require members of elected leadership who decide to run for higher office like governor or senator to vacate their leadership positions after announcing. 

It's unclear whether Stefanik’s amendment is meant to target a member of the leadership team the conference elected Wednesday. But it could seen as an insurance policy against Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney — who was elected conference chairwoman for the next Congress — using the leadership post as a platform to run against Sen. Michael B. Enzi for his Senate seat again. 

Enzi is up for re-election in 2020. Cheney challenged him when he last ran in 2014 — she was not in Congress at the time — but ultimately dropped out of the race, citing family health issues.

Noticeably absent from the amendment offerings were controversial ones that arose two years ago over restoring earmarks.

At the time House Republicans, who banned earmarks after they won the House majority in 2010, appeared poised to provide a limited restoration of what proponents like to call congressional directed spending. But Speaker Paul D. Ryan urged the members to drop the proposal for further debate, promising a vote in the following months that never happened. 

The reason GOP earmark proponents aren’t offering new amendments this year is likely because they’re not in the majority so wouldn’t have much power on their own to use them anyway. Plus, Democrats seem likely to lift the earmark ban as part of the House rules package for the 116th Congress. 

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Florida’s Senate race is proceeding from a machine recount to a hand recount, the Secretary of State announced Thursday.

It’s the latest development in the drawn-out race between Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson and his Republican opponent, Gov. Rick Scott, whose margin remains under the 0.25 of a percentage point that automatically triggers a hand recount. 

Canvassing boards in each county will have three days to examine “overvotes” and “undervotes” to try to determine how voters intended to vote. Overvotes are when the machine detects too many votes for the same office, and undervotes are when the machines don’t pick up any vote for a particular office. A Miami Herald/Tampa Bay Times estimate found there could be anywhere between 35,000 and 118,000 of these ballots.

Democrats are seeking a hand recount of all ballots in Palm Beach County because of problems with the county's vote-counting machines. 

Scott’s campaign claims that his lead grew by 865 votes during the machine recount. That would make his margin about 13,400 votes, according to his campaign. Nelson’s campaign believes the margin remains around 12,600.

Scott’s campaign, which has made multiple unfounded allegations of voter fraud in the week since Election Day, is calling on Florida to “move forward.”

But Nelson’s campaign remains optimistic about its chances to win the race and believes more votes need to be counted. 

“It has never been our position that there was going to be one silver bullet that would change the margin in this race,” Nelson recount attorney Marc Elias said on a call with reporters Thursday evening. 

Besides the hand recount, Elias believes Nelson can pick up votes from voters “curing” what’s known as signature mismatches. That refers to mail-in or provisional ballots that were rejected because the signatures on them did not match the signatures state officials had on record. A district court on Thursday extended the deadline for voters who were belatedly notified of a signature irregularity to correct their signatures on those ballots.

Elias also sees opportunity for Nelson to pick up votes from a pending lawsuit that would allow the counting of mail-in ballots that were cast by Election Day but not delivered in time. 

Watch: Bill Nelson Makes a Statement on Florida’s Senate Race Recount

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In the dog days of summer, before many Americans were tuning into the midterm elections, the leading Democratic super PAC dedicated to winning the House convened a giant meeting with dozens of outside groups.

That laid the foundation for an unprecedented coordination effort among Democratic independent expenditure groups that spent over $200 million in more than 70 House races, overwhelming Republicans and helping deliver a Democratic majority.

At the August meeting, House Majority PAC staffers passed out binders with race information, public TV reservations and examples of direct mail already circulating in specific districts. And most importantly, they pointed out the gaps — the places they needed other independent expenditure groups to jump in.

“It’s almost like an auction,” said Charlie Kelly, executive director of HMP, with different groups laying claim to spending responsibilities for different weeks on radio, TV, digital and mail. Kelly likened HMP’s role to playing “air traffic control.”

It’s the reason why HMP was created: to coordinate the vast army of Democratic outside groups to ensure there’s no duplicative spending in any one place. Veteran Democratic operative Ali Lapp founded the super PAC in 2011 just after Democrats lost control of the House.

Flashback: Democrats Are Breaking Fundraising Records 3 Weeks From Election Day

But HMP knew that this year was going to be different. For starters, it had to build the capacity to accommodate a surge in participation. With the fight for the House the Democrats’ only real way to register their opposition to President Donald Trump, interest in House elections among activists and donors was high. HMP and its affiliated nonprofit Patriot Majority USA raised $113 million compared to the $58 million they raised and spent in 2016.

There was also an explosion of grassroots organizing on the ground. The result was an unprecedented number of progressive groups coordinating on the Democratic side, most of which rallied around a central message across both working-class and suburban districts — health care.

Even outside groups that have their own niche found ways to make the Democrats’ health care message part of their paid communications. An ad from the League of Conservation voters in Iowa, for example, attacked GOP Rep. David Young for trying to cut environmental regulations, pointing out the health risks of increased pollution. It then tied that threat to Young’s vote for the Republican health care bill, which would have weakened protections for people with pre-existing conditions.  

As a super PAC, HMP can legally coordinate with other independent expenditure groups, but not with the campaigns or the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. It involved the IE sides of these other groups — such as EMILY’s List, LCV, the Environmental Defense Fund, Priorities USA, VoteVets and various labor organizations — early on in its weekly calls about specific races and in broader conversations about its research and polling to figure out where Democrats should be investing. 

Right after Labor Day (“Week 9” in campaign lingo that counts back from Election Day), HMP and these groups started their big wave of spending. “It was our shock and awe moment,” Kelly said. 

Through communication between the different groups — from their political shops to compliance teams — spending was structured to avoid redundancies in the same district. 

Democratic polling in June showed a good opportunity in Michigan’s 8th District, which Trump had carried by 7 points. So the various groups set about divvying up the responsibility of touting Democrat Elissa Slotkin while attacking Republican incumbent Mike Bishop. HMP’s polling suggested that contrasting her public service career with Bishop’s time in politics could be effective.

The super PAC went up in the ninth week in the Lansing market with a spot laying out that contrast. VoteVets went up in Week 6, followed by Women Vote!, the independent expenditure arm of EMILY’s List, in Week 5 in the Detroit market. HMP ran separate ads in Lansing and Detroit in the final weeks, with Independence USA closing in Week 2. The DCCC was also spending here, which was public information HMP could see. By the end of the race, which Slotkin won by nearly 4 points, Democrats had run 32,000 gross ratings points in the district compared to about 17,000 for Republicans, according to data from HMP. (A gross ratings point is a metric used to determine the size of an ad’s target audience.)

The super PAC undertook similar coordination efforts in districts across the country.

Illinois’ 14th District didn’t start as one of the most competitive races. But HMP’s early polling suggested there might be a chance to make it one. The super PAC continued to do benchmark polls through the fall, and by mid-September, it found that GOP Rep. Randy Hultgren was only ahead of Democrat Lauren Underwood by 2 points.

Women Vote! was doing mail, while HMP started a cable TV buy beginning in Week 5. By mid-October, HMP’s polling showed a tied race, with both Hultgren and Underwood at 46 percent. Combined with Women Vote! and Priorities, HMP started an expanded digital program. It then went up on Chicago broadcast, partnering with the American Federation of Teachers and the Black Economic Alliance to target African-American voters. Independence USA came in at the end on Chicago broadcast, allowing HMP to focus on cable. Independence USA ran what’s known as a dual track — one positive spot for Underwood and one negative spot against Hultgren — for the final 10 days. Underwood ended up winning by nearly 4 points. 

Howard Wolfson, who runs Independence USA, admits he was a bit nervous about how so many outside groups would coordinate on so many House races. 

“The last thing you’d want is people not talking to each other and duplicating efforts and not going in somewhere else,” he said. 

But Wolfson said that never ended up being a problem, in large part because of constant communication. He estimates he was talking to Kelly from HMP three times a day.

“There was a time at which he was my first call of the day and last call at night,” he said.

Eventually, it became more efficient for Wolfson to move into HMP’s offices, where he remained for the final days of the election.

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Officials have yet to determine the winners in one Senate contest and eight House races — a week and a day after the midterm elections.

If the 2000 presidential race is an indication, the outcome of the Florida Senate race could be weeks away as state election personnel recount votes for Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson. Nelson trailed in the initial tally by less than 15,000 votes to his challenger, GOP Gov. Rick Scott.

House Democrats have already passed the threshold for a majority that they haven’t held since 2010. They currently have 227 seats called in their favor with the potential for those 10 not yet called races. But they’ll likely land more around 231 seats — still good for a 27-seat majority.

In the Senate, the GOP flipped seats in Indiana, North Dakota and Missouri — states that President Donald Trump won by double digits in 2016. But Democrats picked up seats in Nevada and Arizona.

Here are the races yet to be called as of 3 p.m. Wednesday afternoon that will determine the size of the Republicans’ majority in the Senate and the Democrats’ in the House:

The race for the Senate seat in Florida has turned into a nasty battle of accusations as officials begun a machine recount over the weekend.

Republican Gov. Rick Scott declared victory over three-term Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson late last Tuesday, but more than a week later the race remains uncalled by The Associated Press. Scott’s margin narrowed since election night as votes from Democratic-leaning Broward County continued to trickle in and absentee and provisional ballots remained uncounted.

A judge tossed out a lawsuit from Scott and the National Republican Senatorial Committee against Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes for failing to turn over information about ballots that have been counted. There has been no evidence of voter fraud in Broward, the judge ruled. Scott has also called for a Florida Department of Law Enforcement Investigation into Broward’s handling of ballots.

President Donald Trump and Sen. Marco Rubio, without citing any evidence, has also accused Broward County officials of voter fraud.

Democratic groups have sued Scott to try to prevent him from being involved as governor in the recount process, which will go to a manual recount if the machine recount yields a margin between the candidates of less than 0.25 percent.

The Mississippi special election for the final two years of former GOP Sen. Thad Cochran’s term is heading to a Nov. 27 runoff after no candidate cleared 50 percent Tuesday night.

Just 1 point separated appointed GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith and former Democratic Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy, with Hyde-Smith ahead 41 percent to 40 percent. Republican state Sen. Chris McDaniel took 16 percent of the vote.

Democrat Josh Harder defeated four-term GOP incumbent Rep. Jeff Denham in California's 10th District, the AP projected Tuesday.

Last weekend, Democratic challengers from the Golden State picked up two other seats, in the 25th and 48th Districts.

Local officials in California are still counting ballots in two other GOP seats, whose results are trending Democratic after Republicans held cushions on Election Day.

In the 45th District, Democrat Katie Porter has overtaken Rep. Mimi Walters by just hundreds of votes, according to results released last night. Walters had a 6,000-vote cushion on Election Night.

In Georgia’s 7th District, Rep. Rob Woodall leads by less than 500 votes over Democrat Carolyn Bourdeaux in the Atlanta suburbs.

Utah Rep. Mia Love, who spoke at the 2016 Republican National Convention and is the only African-American Republican woman in the House, pulled within half a percent of Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams with 85 percent of precincts reporting in the 4th District.

With just absentee and provisional ballots left to count, Democratic challenger Anthony Brindisi leads Rep. Claudia Tenney by about half a percentage point in New York’s 22nd District. Tenney ran one of the most pro-Trump campaigns of any vulnerable Republican this cycle.

Republican incumbents in Maine’s 2nd District (Bruce Poliquin), New York’s 27th (Chris Collins) and Texas’ 23rd (Will Hurd) hold narrow edges in their respective races, but those contests remained uncalled Wednesday. With none of the candidates taking more than 50 percent in Maine, the race will be decided by the state’s new ranked-choice voting system for the first time.

One open seat held by the GOP remains uncalled. Republican Young Kim holds a narrow lead over Democrat Gil Cisneros for the seat vacated by retiring Rep. Ed Royce in California’s 39th District. Her lead has shrunk from 4,000 votes on Election Night to roughly 700 by Wednesday with more mail-in ballots left to count. Experts have predicted Cisneros will overtake Kim.

Watch: Bill Nelson Makes a Statement on Florida’s Senate Race Recount

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