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Articles by Stephen Dinan

** FILE ** Sen. Ted Cruz, Texas Republican. (Associated Press)

Democrats draft amendment to curb election spending

Senate Democrats on Wednesday backtracked from a wide-ranging proposal to repeal part of the First Amendment, instead passing a slimmer constitutional amendment that singles out corporations for special restrictions and leaves to judges' future rulings the toughest decisions about how far Congress could go in silencing electioneering.

June 18, 2014
From left: Marisa Falcon, Claudia Saucedo, and Yaquelin Lopez, all from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and all part of DREAMers' Moms, demonstrate outside the White House on April 28, 2014, to demand that President Obama stop deportation of immigrants. DREAMers' Moms is a National network of women and mothers who are in support of immigration reform. (Associated Press) **FILE**

White House hosts Dreamers as Obama grapples with flood of new illegal immigrants

The White House on Tuesday played host to illegal immigrants who have been granted tentative legal status under President Obama's non-deportation policies, highlighting the administration's efforts to protect young illegal immigrants in the interior of the U.S. even as it tried to stop a surge of more children crossing the border.

June 17, 2014
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Dave Camp, Michigan Republican, said it should not have taken a year for the IRS to tell Congress that it didn't have all of former employee Lois G. Lerner's emails. "The fact that I am just learning about this, over a year into the investigation, is completely unacceptable and now calls into question the credibility of the IRS's response to to congressional inquiriers," he said. (Associated Press)

GOP: IRS lost emails go beyond Lerner

Two top Republicans said Tuesday that in addition to Lois G. Lerner's emails, the IRS appears to also have lost records from six other agency employees involved in the tea party targeting scandal.

June 17, 2014
Lerner

GOP to investigate IRS computer crash, claim of lost Lerner emails

Republicans ridiculed a claim that the Internal Revenue Service lost two years worth of Lois G. Lerner's emails, with top lawmakers Monday summoning the commissioner to Congress next week to explain the foul-up and one tea party group demanding access to the computers that the tax agency says were responsible for the failure.

June 17, 2014
Lerner

Republicans rebuke IRS explanation for losing Lois Lerner emails

The IRS last week sent a letter explaining how it lost some of former employee Lois G. Lerner's emails from 2009 through 2011, including some from her communications with Democrats in Congress or with other federal agencies, drawing a stern rebuke from Republicans.

June 15, 2014
FILE - In this May 22, 2013, file photo, then-IRS official Lois Lerner is sworn in on Capitol Hill in Washington, before the House Oversight Committee hearing to investigate the extra scrutiny IRS gave to tea party and other conservative groups that applied for tax-exempt status.  The House is preparing to vote May 7, on holding Lerner  in contempt of Congress for refusing to testify at a pair of committee hearings about her role in the agency's tea party controversy. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

IRS says it lost key Lerner emails

The IRS has told Congress that it has lost some of former employee Lois G. Lerner's emails, including some covering communications with Democrats in Congress and with other parts of the government, the House's top tax-law writer said Friday.

June 13, 2014
Johnson

Homeland Security to probe border child abuse allegations

Homeland Security officials announced an investigation Thursday into charges that Customs and Border Protection officers abused some of the young children surging across the U.S. border, as the government continued to struggle to get a handle on the burgeoning problem.

June 12, 2014
Left to Right: Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board Chairman David Medine, moderator and Washington Times Opinion Editor David Keene, Former NSA and CIA Director Gen. Mike Hayden, and American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Washington Legislative Office Director Laura W. Murphy, speak on a panel called "Privacy in America: the NSA, the Constitution and the USA Freedom Act" at the Microsoft Innovation and Policy Center, Washington, D.C., Thursday, June 12, 2014. (Andrew Harnik/The Washington Times)

Former NSA director backs House bill to rein in spy agency

The head of the government's civil liberties protection board said Thursday that its classified review of the NSA's collection of Americans telephone records didn't turn up any evidence of abuses — but both he and the man who lead the National Security Agency's program said it's still time to end bulk collection.

June 12, 2014
House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, leaves a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, June 10, 2014, following a Republican Conference meeting.  Commenting on  problems with the troubled health care system in the Department of Veterans Affairs, Boehner said, "We have a systemic failure of an entire department of our government."  (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Immigration activists blockade Boehner office

More than a dozen immigration activists blocked the hallway in front of Speaker John A. Boehner's office in one of the House buildings on Wednesday, demanding that he bring an immigration bill to the floor for an immediate vote.

June 11, 2014
**FILE** Sen. Charles Schumer, New York Democrat, listens during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on May 22, 2014. (Associated Press)

Democrats say Cantor’s loss should speed up immigration bill

Democrats and immigrant-rights advocates on Wednesday mounted a forceful effort to save immigration, arguing that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's stunning loss in a GOP primary on Tuesday shouldn't be seen as a statement on the congressman's support for legalizing illegal immigrants.

June 11, 2014
Former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and three of his top aides have used personal email accounts for government business, feeding the growing legal storm over secret accounts and how much access the public should have to those records. (Associated Press/File)

Homeland Security chief Jeh Johnson admits to need for border reform

Both in public and in private meetings, new Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson readily acknowledges there is a border "problem" that needs fixing — a major departure from his predecessor, Janet Napolitano, whose consistent refrain was that the border was more secure than it had ever been.

June 10, 2014