Payroll Tax Cut

GOP Goes To War With Itself Over Payroll Cut

Brian Beutler | December 19, 2011, 5:30PM

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) conducts a news conference along with fellow GOP members on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. on November 30, 2011.

A civil war between House Republicans and their Senate counterparts had gone public over the possibility that the GOP will be held to blame if the current payroll tax cut expires on January 1. The Senators feel abandoned after having voted overwhelmingly on Saturday to pass a two month extension of the holiday -- only to have conservatives in the House GOP conference reject it publicly, and insult the legislation itself.

GOP Leaders on both sides of the Capitol are trying to contain the fallout, but with vulnerable Senate Republicans exposed, and the payroll tax cut set to lapse in less than two weeks, that's a tall order.

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Richard Cordray

GOP Filibusters Top Consumer Protection Nominee

Brian Beutler | December 8, 2011, 11:37AM

This post was updated at 11:55 a.m.

As they promised they would, the overwhelming majority of Republicans on Wednesday filibustered Richard Cordray, the uncontroversial former Ohio Attorney General whom President Obama tapped to be the director of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau -- an agency tasked with mitigating fraudulent and dangerous financial products.

The final vote was 53-45, with one Senator, Olympia Snowe (R-ME) voting present and one, John Kerry (D-MA) not on hand to vote. GOP Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) -- running for re-election against the CFPB's godmother Elizabeth Warren -- joined the Democrats in supporting Cordray.

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