Katherine Tully-McManus at Politico:
POLITICO got a peek at a robust set of proposed changes for the 119th Congress from Zach Graves at the Foundation for American Innovation and Daniel Schuman at the American Governance Institute — two key advocacy groups that are part of what some call the Fix Congress Coalition. Here are a few of the proposals that caught our eye:
- Motion to vacate: We saw it in action last year, and the proposal’s authors view the motion that can be used to oust the speaker as “an essential tool” to keep the House’s leader “responsive to a majority of the chamber’s members.” They’d keep the 118th Congress MTV that allows any member to make the motion, along with all the options to dispose of the motion.
- Stock trading: The authors would require the House Ethics Committee to review and update guidance on securities trading, and force members to fully divest from publicly traded individual stocks (or move those investments to a blind trust.) They’re also urging Ways and Means to recommend policy that would let members sell securities in compliance with ethics without negative tax consequences.
- Member pay: The proposal would bar language used since 2009 to block cost of living increases — already in statute — for House members. Member pay is an issue that has contributed to tanked spending bills in recent years.
- Subpoena power and contempt: Graves and Schuman would like to see an independent special counsel who would decide whether or not to prosecute contempt findings by Congress, plus “provide an expedited review and enforcement process in the courts.”
- It takes just seven members of the Oversight Committee to demand information from the executive branch, but under current House rules one of those seven must be the committee chair. The proposal would restore the “rule of seven,” striking the requirement that the chair be on board — a way to claw that authority away from party leaders.
- Committee makeup: Graves and Schuman would like to see the speaker-appointed committees (Intelligence, Administration and Rules) get a shakeup. They recommend appointments by the steering committee or election of the full House. And they suggested that all committee chairs be elected by members of the panel they would lead.
- Intelligence staffing: Following recent Senate action, the proposal would allow every House member one personal office staffer who is eligible to apply for a TS/SCI clearance.
- Post-Chevron: Congress will need to be much more prescriptive when legislating regulations in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling that ended the Chevron doctrine. That could require more subject experts on committees, so Graves and Schuman recommend providing resources and authority to hire professional staff, along with a legislative branch counterpart to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs to analyze proposed regulations and advise on legislation.
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