No Big Deal (Except Everything Hangs In The Balance Right Now)

A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things.

Buckle Up For A Big Week Ahead On The Hill

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is finessing the two-step Biden legislative agenda, navigating between suspicious progressives and a small cadre of moderates in her own chamber, while the real action remains in the Senate.

• Pelosi announced in a “Dear Colleague” letter Sunday evening that the House will begin debate Monday on the bipartisan infrastructure bill, with a planned vote on Thursday. That massages her previous agreement with moderate Democrats to “consider” the bipartisan bill no later than today.

• The House would also work to “conclude negotiations” over the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill that moderates have been trying to divorce from the passage of the bipartisan legislation. But the center of gravity for the reconciliation package remains with Senate Democrats.
  • Pelosi signaled earlier on Sunday that the reconciliation package’s price tag will be shrunk down, telling ABC’s “This Week” that the decrease “seems self-evident.” 
• Pelosi’s announcement came after Congressional Progressive Caucus chair Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), who has repeatedly warned that more than half of the caucus will torpedo the bipartisan bill if it gets put to a vote on Monday, predicted that there wouldn’t be a vote today.
• Two of the House centrists who tried to force Pelosi to hold a vote on the bipartisan bill before the reconciliation bill announced on Sunday that they now support the “swift passage” of the $3.5 trillion plan.
• The House Budget Committee passed the reconciliation bill out of committee on Saturday. One Democrat joined the committee’s Republicans to vote against it: Rep. Scott Peters (D-CA)

TPM’s Josh Marshall Goes On CNN To Discuss Media Coverage Of The Budget Fights

Pro-Trump County Elections Official Who Allegedly Leaked Vote Data Tried To Indoctrinate Her Staffers

Colorado Republican Tina Peters, the Mesa County clerk and recorder who is currently under investigation by the FBI, required her office’s employees to attend a presentation in April in which physics teacher Frank Douglas, an election truther working for MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, peddled a bunch of fake conspiracy theories about the 2020 election being riddle with fraud.

• Peters also brought her staff to a separate private meeting with Douglas for him to push the conspiracy theories to them directly, Douglas told the Washington Post. “I sat down with her and showed her how her election was hacked, and she brought in all of her employees, one after the other,” he said.
• Peters urged her staffers not to talk to law enforcement last month, per an email obtained by the Post, amid the FBI’s investigation and the Colorado secretary of state’s lawsuit against her and her deputy, Belinda Knisley, for allegedly allowing an unauthorized person access to data from the county’s Dominion Voting Systems machines that later leaked online.
• Peters admitted last week during a podcast that she had “commissioned somebody to come in” to copy the data. Peters and Knisley’s lawyers deny that the officials had leaked the data online, and argue that they had at worst committed merely “several technical violations of election regulations.”

Hit-And-Run Attorney General Still Faces Trouble Even After Avoiding Jail Time

South Dakota lawmakers have called for a special session to consider impeaching state Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg after the official was given a slap on the wrist for fatally striking a pedestrian with his car last September.

• The move doesn’t guarantee that there’ll actually be impeachment proceedings, Speaker of the House Spencer Gosch (R) told the Argus Leader.
• Ravnsborg avoided jail time for the accident and instead was ordered to pay a fine of $500 for each of the two traffic misdemeanors he had pleaded no contest to, plus court fees of $3,742. Prosecutors had initially charged the official with three traffic misdemeanors before dropping one of the charges in a plea deal with Ravnsborg.
• The state attorney general refuses to resign even as multiple lawmakers plus South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R) demand that he do so.
• Ravnsborg is staring down other problems over the collision as well: The victim’s widow has vowed to sue the attorney general.

The Kids Aren’t Alright

Kids today are on track to face three times as many climate disasters as their grandparents, according to a new study published in the journal Science.

In Case You Missed It

Rudy Giuliani has been banned from appearing on Fox News for almost three months, according to Politico.

• Giuliani’s real sad about it and feels betrayed by Rupert Murdoch, a source told Politico.
• Andrew Giuliani, the ex-New York City mayor’s son, has reportedly been banished too.

Hey Check Out This Adorable Kitty

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