July 9, 2015

Watch House Republicans Block an Effort to Remove the Confederate Flag From the US Capitol

And watch the Democrats go crazy.

The floor of the US House of Representatives was as noisy and contentious as the British Parliament on Thursday afternoon, when House Republicans tried to stall a vote on a spending bill that surprisingly included a Republican amendment to keep the Confederate flag on display in federal cemeteries.

Earlier in the week, the House had approved amendments introduced by Rep. Jared Huffman, (D-California) that would block the display of Confederate flags on graves in federal cemeteries and prohibit the use of federal funds to display the flag on federal lands. The amendments passed as part of a Department of Interior spending bill, which was set for a vote on Thursday. But Wednesday night, Rep. Ken Calvert (R-California) inserted an amendment that would make it possible for Confederate flags to stay in use in federal cemeteries. House Democrats immediately objected, and House Republicans—with their leaders apparently nervous about being portrayed as pro-Confederacy—pulled the entire bill from the floor. (Here’s a good breakdown on the sequence of events from The Atlantic).

On Thursday, the same day the state of South Carolina voted to remove the flag from its capitol grounds, as Congress was wrestling with the Interior spending bill and the Confederate flag provisions, House Democrats upped the ante. Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi proposed a measure that would remove any flag with Confederate symbols from the US Capitol. House Republicans objected and essentially kicked the resolution off the floor, sending to a committee. Chaos ensued. As the House clerk read the motion to exile the measure to a GOP-controlled committee, Democrats started shouting in protest. When a voice vote was called, Republicans yelled “aye,” while Democrats loudly shouted “no.” Republicans won, and the Democrats responded by yelling, “vote! vote! vote!”—challenging the Rs to vote on the flag-removing measure and not duck the issue.

The video above captures the moment that the GOP ran away from the issue when Democrats tried to remove the Confederate flag from Capitol Hill. (For a more complete video, see here.)

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

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