Author: Heather Cox Richardson

Midterm results gave Republicans control of the House of Representatives after a campaign in which they emphasized inflation. On November 17, Representative Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), who has received his party’s nomination to become speaker of the House, along with other Republican leadership, outlined for reporters their plans for the session. “We must be relentless in our oversight of this administration,” the number 2 Republican in the House, Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, told his colleagues. They plan to begin a raft of investigations: into President Joe Biden’s son Hunter, the origins of Covid-19, the FBI, the withdrawal from Afghanistan,...

November 8 was a good day for democracy. Americans turned out to defend our principles from those who denied our right to choose our own leaders. There was little violence, the election appears to have gone smoothly, and there are few claims of “fraud.” As of November 10 control of the House and Senate is still not clear, but some outlines are now visible. Usually, the party in power loses a significant number of congressional seats and state seats in the first midterm after it takes the presidency. President Joe Biden spoke to reporters on November 9 and noted...

“Anecdotal data point,” conservative commentator Tom Nichols tweeted on November 2, “Had lunch with an old friend, a fellow former [Republican] (but not in politics or media or anything) and he said that things feel different after the Pelosi attack. Not sure why. I feel the same thing; not sure that it’ll matter, but have that same sense.” Perhaps it is the echoes of lawyer Joseph Nye Welch, who in 1954 on television confronted Joseph McCarthy as the Wisconsin senator shredded people’s lives by accusing them of being communists: “Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged...