ABOUT:
Defense policy analysis, commentary and discussion.John Gramlich covers legal affairs for CQ Roll Call. He previously covered justice policy as a staff writer with Stateline, the daily news service of the Pew Center on the States, and worked as a news producer with The Baltimore Sun. His work has been published in The Washington Post, Chicago Sun-Times, Houston Chronicle and other outlets.
A dual citizen of Germany and the United States, John is from Easton, Pennsylvania, and attended Penn State University and American University.
Gun control supporters made progress in both chambers this week, as a Senate committee advanced a nominee to become the first permanent director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in seven years and a House panel approved a significant funding increase to improve background checks on gun sales.
President Barack Obama Tuesday nominated a slate of judges to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, an aggressive move that is likely to spark swift resistance from Senate Republicans who say the court is underworked and does not need additional judges.
Bipartisan momentum is building for legislation that would give reporters new legal protections from government authorities who want them to reveal their confidential sources. But it’s far from clear whether the effort can overcome the objections that derailed similar bills in the Senate in 2007 and 2009.
Did the Justice Department break the law when it secretly reviewed the phone records of more than 20 Associated Press reporters and editors? Many legal experts aren’t ready to go that far.
An independent government watchdog is probing allegations that President Barack Obama’s nominee to lead the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, B. Todd Jones, improperly retaliated against a whistle-blower while working in his current job as a federal prosecutor in Minnesota.
Advocates are frantically lobbying a small and rapidly shrinking list of undecided senators from both parties who control the fate of the most ambitious gun control legislation to reach the floor in nearly 20 years.
With the Senate voting comfortably Thursday to take up its most ambitious gun control legislation in nearly two decades, all eyes turn to the “open amendment process” that Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has promised.
A bipartisan group of Senate negotiators signaled Tuesday night that it has reached a deal in principle on expanding background checks to include more gun sales, in what was widely seen as the major sticking point on the biggest gun control legislation to reach the floor since 1994.
Majority Leader Harry Reid issued an emotional plea as he launched debate Monday on the most sweeping gun control legislation to reach the Senate floor in nearly two decades. But fundamental questions remain, including what the bill’s final language will be and whether Republicans can block the debate from proceeding.
Sen. Lindsey Graham said Sunday that President Barack Obama is “showing a little bit of leg” by proposing a budget that includes cuts to entitlement programs, a concession that Republicans have long demanded.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer said Sunday that a bipartisan group of eight senators is “on track” to introduce comprehensive immigration legislation by the end of this week, despite recent “kerfuffles” in its negotiations and competing items on the congressional agenda.
White House adviser Dan Pfeiffer on Sunday said a group of Senate Republicans would go back on their word to the families of Newtown, Conn., if they choose to filibuster gun control legislation that is set to come to the floor this week.
A majority of the Supreme Court may be willing to strike down the controversial 1996 federal law that defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman, but perhaps not on the grounds being sought by the Obama administration and supporters of gay marriage.
A little-noticed Senate vote just before 4 in the morning on March 23 — amid the chamber’s 13-hour vote-a-rama on a fiscal 2014 budget resolution — suggests trouble for President Barack Obama’s gun control agenda.
Supreme Court justices jousted with lawyers over California’s Proposition 8 banning gay marriage, weighing whether marriage should be a national fundamental right, left up to the states or somewhere in between. Of the 80 minutes of legal questioning, here are the 12 best moments.
Tuesday’s historic arguments before the Supreme Court left the strong impression that a majority of the nine justices is not yet willing to establish a nationwide, constitutional right to marry for all same-sex couples, even if the court allows such marriages to occur in California or a subset of states.
Advocates on the left expressed frustration Monday that President Barack Obama has not pushed harder to seat judges on the powerful federal appeals court in Washington.
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, will offer an amendment to the Democrats’ fiscal 2014 budget resolution that seeks to require a two-thirds majority for the passage of any gun control legislation in the Senate.
The Justice Department responded Friday to Sen. David Vitter’s request for more information about its enforcement of a federal voter registration law — a response the Louisiana Republican demanded before deciding whether to drop his threat to block the nomination of Thomas Perez as the next Labor secretary.
Sens. Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vt., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced legislation Wednesday that would give federal judges leeway to hand down lesser criminal penalties than those called for under mandatory minimum sentencing laws.
Senior Senate Democrats bluntly acknowledged Tuesday that a proposed federal ban on assault weapons will not become law, bowing to the political calculus that only lesser gun control measures stand a chance of passing Congress, despite three months of emotional national debate since the Connecticut school massacre.
Sen. David Vitter, R-La., announced Monday that he will block President Barack Obama’s nominee for Labor secretary, Thomas E. Perez, until he receives more information about Perez’s enforcement of a federal voting law as the head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.
President Barack Obama on Monday nominated Thomas E. Perez, an assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, as his next Labor secretary, saying he has “spent a career as a consensus builder.”
All eyes now shift to Harry Reid. With the Senate Judiciary Committee completing its work on a series of gun measures Thursday, the majority leader must determine his strategy for how the full chamber will move forward in response to last year’s Connecticut school shooting.
Gun control advocates and some congressional Democrats expressed frustration Thursday that the continuing resolution being debated on the Senate floor this week seeks to make several permanent policy changes related to firearms.
Want Roll Call on your doorstep?
SIGN UPAlready a subscriber?
Sign up to have the print PDF emailed to you.
Roll Call has launched a new feature, Hill Navigator, to advise congressional staffers and would-be staffers on how to manage workplace issues on Capitol Hill. Please send us your questions — anything from office etiquette, to handling awkward moments, to what happens when the work life gets too personal. Submissions will be treated anonymously.
