Congressman Gerry Connolly will hold his annual Open Season Workshop on Saturday, November 18, 2017 at the Fairfax County Government Center to assist federal employees and retirees in navigating through the many changes in the 2018 Federal Employees Health Benefits Plans (FEHBP), dental and vision insurance programs. The federal government’s Open Season for federal employees and retirees to change their health plans runs from November 13, 2017 through December 11, 2017. Connolly’s Open Season Wo...
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Brianna Sacks, Tom Namako, and Adolfo Flores President Donald Trump delivered an address Tuesday that made him sound like President of the Confederacy. Trump went on an angry defense of the racists who sparked riots that led to a suspected terror attack and three deaths in Charlottesville this weekend, inaccurately blaming much of the violence on the "alt-left." Trump also defended the monuments of Confederate-era leaders — the people who went to war in an effort to maintain slavery in the Unit...
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Jordan Fabian One person was killed and 19 others were injured when a car plowed into a group of people protesting a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., turning a day of violent demonstrations into a tragedy that rocked the nation. The University of Virginia Health System said 20 people were brought to the hospital Saturday afternoon after the incident near a popular pedestrian mall in the college town. One died and the rest were being assessed and treated for injuries. The inciden...
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Rep. Gerald E. Connolly (VA-11) White House Advisor Stephen Miller took pains last week to point out that Emma Lazarus’ sonnet, “The New Colossus,” was not affixed to the Statue of Liberty when she was unveiled in 1886. He, of course, was right in fact but wrong in spirit. The famed “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses” lines were added 20 years later, but have come to represent the American ideal that we are a nation of immigrants, enthusiastically welcoming those from any backg...
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Representatives Gerry Connolly (D-VA), Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), Frank A. LoBiondo (R-NJ), Mark Sanford (R-SC) and David Price (D-NC) led a bipartisan group of 66 members of the House of Representatives in sending a letter to Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke, opposing any effort to allow oil and gas leasing in the Atlantic Ocean and Eastern Gulf of Mexico. This letter was sent in response to a July 3rd Request for Information on the preparation of a new five-year National Outer Continental ...
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Today, all Democratic Members of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform sent letters to all Cabinet Secretaries and other federal agency heads requesting documents about how their Departments are spending federal taxpayer funds on products or services provided by businesses owned by or affiliated with the Trump Organization. “The American people deserve to know how their tax dollars are spent, including the amount of federal funds that are being provided to private businesses own...
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Today, Reps. Elijah E. Cummings, Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, John Conyers, Jr., Ranking Member of the House Committee on the Judiciary, Gerry Connolly, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Government Operations, and David Cicilline, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform, Commercial and Antitrust Law, sent a letter to Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney and Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Administrato...
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Betsy Woodruff As chaos unfolded at the nation’s airports, Trump administration officials issued clear directives: treat lawyers’ calls like “protests” and keep duly elected representatives out. On the chaotic day the Trump administration’s travel ban went into effect, high-level Homeland Security officials directed their staff at airports around the country to stiff-arm members of Congress and treat lawyers with deep suspicion. Members of Congress say they’re shocked by the orders, uncovered i...
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Eric Katz House Republicans made their first use of a revived rule allowing them to target the salaries of individual employees, using the appropriations process to go after employees conducting work the lawmakers believe is obsolete. Conservative lawmakers initially targeted 89 employees at the Congressional Budget Office through an amendment to an appropriations bill that would fund a handful of federal agencies. That amendment failed Wednesday night by a 116-309 vote. Rep. Ron DeSantis, R-Fl...
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Today, Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-VA) sent a letter the Boy Scouts of America condemning President Trump’s remarks at this week’s quadrennial Boy Scout Jamboree. Connolly called on Randall Stephenson, National President for the Boy Scouts of America, to respond to the President’s remarks in a way that teaches Scouts the valuable lesson that all of us are created equal…and that even the President of the United States, when he does something wrong – something that contradicts not only the princ...
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