Heard on the Hill – 7/8/24
What we’re hearing from people we trust on and around the Hill – please send us more tips!
Oversight of Arnold Ventures: We have heard that Republicans on the Hill are interested in oversight of Arnold Ventures, the left-wing organization funded by Enron billionaire John Arnold. Our Hill sources said that — especially if Trump wins — expect investigations into Arnold Ventures’s advocacy on online education, healthcare, and criminal justice.
Exclusive Arizona ad: Republican Senate candidate Kari Lake debuted her latest digital ad with the Washington Reporter, hammering the Democrats’ likely Senate nominee, Rep. Ruben Gallego, for his progressive record in Congress. While the ad focuses heavily on “Joe Biden and Radical Ruben,” it also takes aim at Vice President Kamala Harris. Watch the ad here.
Smoke ‘em: The House’s Energy and Commerce Committee will be holding a food and tobacco hearing in September, we’re told. Expect an intense focus on the Biden Administration’s failure to approve legal vaping devices while allowing illegal Chinese vapes to flood the market.
Natural gas playing in Pennsylvania Senate: Dave McCormick, we’re told, is planning to blast his opponent Sen. Bob Casey’s (D., Pa.) years of voting against expediting oil and gas leases and for supporting a “moratoria on offshore drilling.” Casey is also backed by anti-fracking groups like the Natural Resources Defense Council, McCormick’s campaign noted to the Reporter.
Bipartisan congratulations: The Senate Press Secretaries Association elected their new leadership for the next year, including Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s (R., Ala.) press secretary Hannah Eddins, the Senate Finance Committee Republicans’ Eric Fejer, the Senate Appropriations Committee Republicans’ Phoebe Ferraiolo, Sen. Katie Britt’s (R., Ala.) communications director Amy Hasenberg-Elliott, Sen. James Lankford’s (R.,Okla.) Natalie Ihrman, Sen. Bill Hagerty’s (R., Tenn.) Brandon Jackson, Sen. Mark Warner’s (D., Va.) Valeria Rivadeneira, the Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats’ Josh Sorbe, and Sen. Peter Welch’s (D., Vt.) Elisabeth St. Onge. The group, which facilitates events between Hill communications staff, reporters, and trade organizations, was led by Sen. Cynthia Lummis’s (R., Wyo.) Stacey Daniels for the past year. Sorbe will take over next year, per the association’s standard that leaders must alternate between parties.
Thanks for reading! The Bucks County Herald shouted out Dave McCormick’s Fourth of July op-ed we published last week. “McCormick, who also appeared at a rally in Doylestown in June, penned a July 4 op-ed for the right-leaning Washington Reporter news and commentary website. In it, he lauded veterans, the continuing importance of military service, and the critical role of veteran leaders in the public sector at a time in which “the public is questioning the value of military service.’” Read our full Fourth of July edition, in which we published McCormick, along with twenty other GOP veterans, here.
Fourth of July fire: George Logan, who is running against Rep. Jahana Hayes (D., Ct.), released a video for the Fourth of July, in which Logan, a frontman in a Jimi Hendrix tribute band, performs a rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner that you have to see to believe.