Conor Kenny's blog

While the presidential race is getting all the attention, voters in Indiana and North Carolina also selected their parties' nominees for their 22 House of Representatives seats and one Senate slot on Tuesday. Each seat's incumbent is running for reelection, but this is a turbulent election year, and the three high-school teachers, three attorneys, several small business owners and elected officials, and one TV weatherman challenging them could give them a run for their money. The Democrats are defending twelve House seats to the Republicans ten, plus Elizabeth Dole's seat in the Senate.

Each candidate and incumbent has a profile within Congresspedia's Wiki the Vote project, which you can find at the Indiana and North Carolina portals, or through the full listing of the primary victors below. We need your help to find out more about these candidates, so remember that these profiles are editable by anyone and jump right in. You can always contact one of the staff editors for help.

In addition to the presidential primaries taking place today, there are also a number of congressional contests occurring in Indiana and North Carolina. The highest-profile primary race may be in Indiana’s 7th district, where recently-elected Rep. Andre Carson will battle for a slot on the November general election ballot. In March, Carson won a special election to serve the remaining term of his grandmother, Julia Carson, who passed away last year.

Once again, housing legislation aimed at reforming the Federal Housing Administration and at helping homeowners threatened with foreclosure is at the top of the list for senators and representatives this week, as debate intensifies over differing proposals. In addition, Democrats are mulling how much domestic spending to include in a $108 billion Iraq/Afghanistan supplemental, while 10 days remain before a second extension of the 2002 Farm bill expires. Negotiations, which began last year, continue as the House and Senate work to reconcile subsidy-levels and income-brackets for farmers.

Rep. Barney Frank, chair of the House Financial Services Committee, has proposed legislation that would force the FHA to insure some $300 billion in home loans that are close to being foreclosed. Lenders would be asked to renegotiate the loan principle, while the FHA would insure a 30-year fixed rate the borrower could afford. According to Frank, the legislation could cost taxpayers between $3 and $6 billion, depending on how many of the new loans default.

To sweeten the deal for President George W. Bush, Frank proposed tougher oversight of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae (the two government-sponsored enterprises that sell mortgage-backed securities) and new regulations on the FHA. In addition, Congress might grant local housing finance agencies the authority to issue tax-exempt bonds to help some homeowners refinance their mortgages.

For more on this week's legislation and upcoming committee schedules, click through.

The big action in Congress this week was on bills with big price tags: the $290 billion Farm Bill and a new $300 billion housing crisis bill. It also passed a law banning employers and insurers from using your genes to discriminate against you. And, of course, the race for Democratic superdelegates continues between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, with both picking up several endorsements.

The 2007 Farm Bill looks like it might be ready for a final vote as the House and Senate negotiate between themselves and with President Bush to find a bill that hits all the right political constituencies and has the right price tag. The latest version of the bill, which at $290 billion over ten years is $10 billion over the congressional budget rules and $4.5 billion more than President Bush wants, contains most of the usual subsidies and conversation programs of years past but adds several key provisions. Bush is pressing Congress to lower the income limits on farmers who can receive subsidies from the current $1.95 million to $200,000, well short of Congress' currently proposed $500,000. But Bush also supports keeping $5.2 billion in direct subsidy payments to farmers despite record crop prices, so he's not exactly uniformly thrifty. Also included in the current version of the bill is a $5 billion trust fund for farmers hit by disasters including floods, droughts and fires, a key demand of farm state Democrats and Republicans alike.

However, Bush has taken a hard line on the total price tag for the bill, and has raised a veto threat that Democrats say may be designed to bolster Sen. John McCain's anti-spending credentials. While it remains to see who will blink first, the extension that funds the farm programs is running out and some type of vote is imminent in the next week or two.

For more on this week's legislation and an update on Superdelegate endorsements, click through

By Avelino Maestas

As more and more states hold their primary elections and caucuses in the Democratic presidential nominating contest, we’ve seen the importance of superdelegates grow. These individuals will undoubtedly help decide the nomination, and they’re now the focus of intense scrutiny: for who will the vote, and why?

Since we joined with our partners to begin the Superdelegate Transparency Project, we’ve seen a number of proposals on how superdelegates can follow the “will of the people.” DemConWatch characterizes one group of supers who will vote for the “pledged delegate leader” the Pelosi Club, after Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). Representatives of Sen. Hillary Clinton’s campaign have said she would lead in the popular vote by the time the August convention roles around, implying she would have the most legitimate support.

And while DNC rules give superdelegates unlimited freedom to vote their conscience, at least two supers are appealing directly to their constituency: college students. Lauren Wolfe and Awais Khaleel, president and vice-president (respectively) of the College Democrats of America, have recorded a YouTube video seeking direction in how they should vote:

By Avelino Maestas

With voters heading to the polls in Pennsylvania today, some people might be wondering how the delegates in Pennsylvania are alloted. Well, Congresspedia has you covered! Pennsylvania will send 187 delegates to the Democratic National Convention in August, including 29 superdelegates that will certainly help decide the nomination. Pennsylvania voters, on the other hand, will play a role in choosing the other 158 delegates today: 103 will be allocated by congressional district, while 55 are based on the statewide vote totals.

As this CQ Politics article points out, regions in Pennsylvania that leaned toward Democrats in the most recent presidential and gubernatorial elections received more delegates from the state party. In addition, the state's 19 congressional districts use a proportional system to determine how many delegates a candidate receives at the convention. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama will easily clear the 15% threshold mandated by the DNC, but the number of delegates they receive will depend on how well they perform in the districts.

By Avelino Maestas, Congresspedia Assistant Managing Editor

Negotiations between the House and Senate regarding the 2007 Farm Bill reauthorization broke down on Thursday evening. That forced lawmakers in both houses to approve a one-week extension of the 2002 version, which had already been extended one month.

The debate remains the same: how to offset $10 billion in increases, and whether to enact a $2.5 billion tax package. House members have balked at tax breaks, while questions remain over the support for farm subsidies.

Attention shifted to earmarks again last week with new revelations about the Coconut Road earmark, which was inserted into legislation—already approved by both chambers of Congress—on its way to President George W. Bush. Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), whose office admitted to changing the bill’s language, faced a storm of questioning, while the Senate sought to involve the Department of Justice in an investigation of the earmark.

By Avelino Maestas

This week in Congress, Democrats are looking at cutting a deal with President Bush over the Columbia Free Trade Agreement and the Senate will hold new hearings on global warming legislation hearings on Earth Day. Meanwhile, a new battle for extending Iraq War funding looms on the horizon.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is considering what to do about a trade agreement with Colombia. She pressed the House to adopt a rule change earlier this month that prevents President Bush from requiring a vote on the agreement. Now, Democrats are investigating potential deals involving the trade agreement, while the White House has asked that Pelosi change her mind.

Some Democrats have proposed exchanging reworked trade adjustment assistance for a vote on the FTA. Others have suggested a deal for the reform of the Foreign Service Intelligence Act (FISA) or an expanded State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Read the rest of the blog for more news and complete Senate and House hearing schedules for the week.

The big stories on Congress last week were the Senate's passage of a housing crisis bill, House Democrats delaying the U.S.-Columbia Free Trade Agreement and testimony by General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker.

President Bush had thrown down the gauntlet on Monday by submitting the Colombia Free Trade Agreement to Congress for approval. Under the Trade Promotion Authority (or "fast track" authority) rules in place, the House had 60 days to give the agreement an up-or-down vote and the Senate had 30 following that. House Democrats, however, were able to parry his move by invoking a part of the Trade Promotion Authority law that affirms "the constitutional right of either House to change the rules (so far as relating to the procedures of that House) at any time, in the same manner, and to the same extent as any other rule of that House," and passed a resolution removing the deadline in this case.

By Congresspedia assistant editor Avelino Maestas

As Americans rush to finish their tax returns on Tuesday, Congress is also hustling to finish the Farm Bill and a housing crisis package while gearing up for fights over Iraq War funding.

The 2002 Farm bill is set to expire on April 18th, and members of both chambers are scrambling to work out an extension. Substantial debate remains, however, over the bill's overall price tag: the $10 billion increase initially floated has been countered by House Agriculture Chairman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), who, with the support of House Republicans, wants to limit the increase to $5.5 billion.

Peterson’s proposal would also strip out a disaster relief program championed by Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Senate Budget Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.). Peterson cited "pay as you go" rules as his reason for opposing the program. On the flip side, Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) was upset that his proposed food stamps increase, coupled with tax breaks for farmers, was left out of the Senate version.

(More on this weeks' legislation and a complete list of this week's committee hearings after the jump.)