Congress has found an unusual way to get Trump to condemn white supremacists
On Tuesday night, the House easily passed a bipartisan joint resolution urging President Trump to "speak out against hate groups that espouse racism, extremism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and white supremacy," and "use all resources available to the president and the president's Cabinet to address the growing prevalence of those hate groups in the United States." The Senate passed the measure by unanimous consent on Monday night, and Congress deliberately structured the measure as a joint resolution so that Trump has to sign it, rather than a simple or concurrent resolution, which expresses the sense of Congress without the president's signature.
The White House declined to say that Trump will sign the resolution, according to Politico's Kyle Cheney, though Congress expects him to.
The resolution was negotiated and introduced by Virginia's congressional delegation after Trump equivocated on condemning the white nationalist protesters at a rally in Charlottesville. The measure says that anti-racism protester Heather Heyer's murder was a "domestic terrorist attack," and called on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to "investigate thoroughly all acts of violence, intimidation, and domestic terrorism by white supremacists, white nationalists, neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan, and associated groups" and also "improve the reporting of hate crimes" to the FBI.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Film reviews: ‘Send Help’ and ‘Private Life’Feature An office doormat is stranded alone with her awful boss and a frazzled therapist turns amateur murder investigator
-
Movies to watch in Februarythe week recommends Time travelers, multiverse hoppers and an Iraqi parable highlight this month’s offerings during the depths of winter
-
ICE’s facial scanning is the tip of the surveillance icebergIN THE SPOTLIGHT Federal troops are increasingly turning to high-tech tracking tools that push the boundaries of personal privacy
-
Trump sues IRS for $10B over tax record leaksSpeed Read The president is claiming ‘reputational and financial harm’ from leaks of his tax information between 2018 and 2020
-
Trump, Senate Democrats reach DHS funding dealSpeed Read The deal will fund most of the government through September and the Department of Homeland Security for two weeks
-
Fed holds rates steady, bucking Trump pressureSpeed Read The Federal Reserve voted to keep its benchmark interest rate unchanged
-
Judge slams ICE violations amid growing backlashSpeed Read ‘ICE is not a law unto itself,’ said a federal judge after the agency violated at least 96 court orders
-
Rep. Ilhan Omar attacked with unknown liquidSpeed Read This ‘small agitator isn’t going to intimidate me from doing my work’
-
Democrats pledge Noem impeachment if not firedSpeed Read Trump is publicly defending the Homeland Security secretary
-
The billionaires’ wealth tax: a catastrophe for California?Talking Point Peter Thiel and Larry Page preparing to change state residency
-
Hegseth moves to demote Sen. Kelly over videospeed read Retired Navy fighter pilot Mark Kelly appeared in a video reminding military service members that they can ‘refuse illegal orders’
