Two of President Obama's second-term personnel picks that have attracted conservative and business opposition moved a step closer to confirmation Thursday.
President Obama's nominee to head the U.S. Department of Labor hit another snag in the Senate on Wednesday after Republicans who oppose the pick used a parliamentary maneuver to again delay a key vote on his nomination.
Sen. Tom Harkin said he will remove his hold on President Obama's pick to lead the nation's Medicare agency, but the powerful Iowa Democrat said Tuesday he is still not happy with the administration's "penny-wise, pound-foolish" tendency to raid a fund designated for preventative health programs.
The 2014 election battle for control of the Senate will affect just about everything the upper chamber does this year and next, because it could take just a handful of upsets to put the Republicans back in charge.
Montana Sen. Max Baucus said Tuesday he won't seek a seventh term next year, saying he wants to spend the next year and a half on Capitol Hill focused on serving his constituents and chairing the powerful Senate Finance Committee without the distraction of running for re-election.
In political battles to raise the minimum wage, activists love to trot out a handful of business owners who support new mandates. These so-called "high road" employers - part of an umbrella group called Business for a Fair Minimum Wage - act as a foil for other businesses who warn of the consequences of forcing higher labor costs on low-margin employers.
Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa purely hates "big money" in politics, though he's willing to make an exception for donors to the proposed Harkin Institute of Public Policy at Iowa State University.
Senate Democrats on Wednesday defeated the latest Republican effort to repeal President Obama's health-care law, signaling that the 2012 elections did little to change the bitter political divisions over the 3-year-old policy.
President Obama opened the door to making significant changes to entitlement programs during a meeting Tuesday with Senate Democrats, though some among the lawmakers quickly warned that they would not go along with benefit cuts or a higher retirement age.
