Congressman Cline is one of several Congressional Republicans who are spreading falsehoods about the the Dream and Promise Act passed by the House of Representatives earlier this month.

Also known as H.R. 6, the Democratic legislation would open up a path to a green card for nearly 2.7 million undocumented immigrants, according to the Migration Policy Institute. The bill covers “dreamers” — a term for undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children — and smaller groups of noncitizens who were eligible for temporary protected status or “deferred enforced departure” before the Trump administration announced it would curb those programs.
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As MPI noted in this analysis, the bill covers “unauthorized immigrants, regardless of age, who entered the United States before age 18 and at least four years before enactment of the legislation, and who have a high school diploma or GED, or are enrolled in a high school, GED program, or an apprenticeship program.”
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“This bill will certainly give green cards to gang members,” Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) said during the floor debate. Rep. Ben Cline (R-Va.) said “H.R. 6 also provides green cards to gang members.”

But according to The Washington Post Fact Checker:

The Dream and Promise Act says it doesn’t cover immigrants who “knowingly, willfully, and voluntarily participated in offenses committed by a criminal street gang” at any point in the five years before their application for a green card. This provision does not seem to require a conviction of any kind, only proof of participation in a crime gang.

However, the bill also says “allegations of gang membership obtained from a State or Federal in-house or local database, or a network of databases used for the purpose of recording and sharing activities of alleged gang members across law enforcement agencies, shall not establish the participation.”

Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren of California made a key point:

“If we had wanted to prevent the Department of Homeland Security from using or referring to gang databases, we would have said so,” Lofgren said on the House floor. “The bill would clearly state that DHS could not use, rely on, or refer to gang databases. That is not what the bill says. The bill says ‘it shall not establish disqualifying gang participation.’ It can be evidence, but it can’t be the establishment of that fact.”

She continued: “Now, why would that be the case? We value our law enforcement community. They keep us safe. They are hard-working. But these databases are populated by people way beyond law enforcement, people in school police, school security. They can result in people being mistakenly tagged as gang members when they are not. I will give an example. There was an audit done of California’s gang database, CalGang. When the auditors went through, they found out there were 42 individuals who were under the age of 1 year old who had allegedly self-reported that they were part of a gang. Obviously, that was incorrect. So we would not want to make that the determining factor.”

The Fact Checker concludes:

Republicans are making sweeping and factually flawed claims that H.R. 6 would give legal status to gang members and smugglers. We give them Three Pinocchios.

Under The Post’s rating system, Three Pinocchios signifies

Significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions. This gets into the realm of “mostly false.”

Cline, like President Trump and many other Republicans, is all too willing to engage in phony scaremongering on immigration-related issues. It’s easier and perhaps less politically risky than doing the hard work of fixing a broken immigration system.

Congressman Cline has announced plans to hold a town hall meeting (register here) on Monday June 17 from 5:30-7 p.m. at Linville-Edom Ruritan Club, 3752 Linville Edom Road, Linville, VA.

According to the announcement:

Citizens of Rockingham County will be given priority regarding comments during the town hall. Signs and noisemakers are prohibited.

Perhaps some of our Rockingham County readers can take the opportunity to ask Cline about some of the things he has said and done, as chronicled here and elsewhere, since he was sworn in as our representative in Washington.

“In one of my first speeches after being sworn in, I reintroduced four words to Congress that Washington needs to hear again and again: we can’t afford it.”
–Congressman Ben Cline, The Roanoke Times

“I will continue to vote against wasteful spending and demand fiscal responsibility in Washington in all areas. If we can find ways to balance our state budgets and our family budgets, I believe it is time for the federal government to follow suit.”
–Congressman Ben Cline, Sixth District Perspectives

Meanwhile, and so far unmentioned by Congressman Cline:

Happy to bring this to your attention, Congressman.

Nearly 48 hours after the horrific slaughter in Virginia Beach, Congressman Cline has finally acknowledged it on his Facebook page.

Sorry, Congressman. That’s too late and much too little.

On Saturday– one day after the atrocity– Cline addressed a meeting of the Sixth District Republican Committee in Harrisonburg. He did not mention Virginia Beach at all. But he did restate his commitment to opposing any and all forms of firearms regulation. He said that when he entered Congress this year, he urged Republican leaders to appoint him to the Judiciary Committee and “task me with defeating gun control bills.”

As a member of the Virginia House of Delegates, Cline helped kill virtually every legislative effort to impose regulations of any kind on ownership of firearms or the kinds of weapons and accessories that can be sold or owned in the commonwealth.

In 2018, after he was named chair of the Militia, Police, and Public Safety Committee in the House of Delegates, he bragged about his endorsements by the National Rifle Association (one of the largest donors to his campaigns) and the Virginia Citizens Defense League— which prides itself on being more extreme than the NRA.

In 2017, the VCDL PAC even went so far as to say, “Ben just might have the ONLY absolutely unblemished record in the [General Assembly]! He is as faithful as they come!”

This, after all, is a man who opposed issuing a new Virginia license plate with the message: “Stop Gun Violence.”

So we don’t have to guess what Cline’s position would have been on this if he had been in Richmond this year.

A Virginia bill designed to ban sales of large-capacity magazines similar to those used by the Virginia Beach gunman died in committee in January on a party-line vote.

The fate of the legislation, SB1748, was so widely expected that the outcome drew virtually no public attention. For more than 20 years, Republicans and a few rural Democrats in the General Assembly have killed almost every measure aimed at restricting gun ownership.

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Virginia Beach police said their officers shot and killed the gunman after a lengthy gun battle in which he used two .45-caliber semiautomatic handguns that were purchased legally.

Along with the weapons at the scene, investigators found a sound suppressor and extended magazines, which contain more than the standard number of rounds. Police have not identified a motive for the shooting.

[State Sen. Adam P.] Ebbin’s bill would have prohibited any person from importing, selling, bartering or transferring a firearms magazine designed to hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition. Eight Republicans voted it down, with six Democrats in favor, in the Senate Courts of Justice Committee on Jan. 28.
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Another bill that died in the Virginia House in January would have allowed localities such as Virginia Beach to ban firearms from government buildings such as the one where the attack on Friday occurred. Virginia Beach Council member Guy King Tower said after the shooting that it was regrettable that the city needed state approval to take such actions.

It’s regrettable too that we are represented in Congress by a man whose devotion to the radical “gun rights” lobby is so slavish that he dutifully opposes the most common-sense measures to restrict gun violence– even those supported by many or most gun owners.

Congressman Cline has announced plans to hold a town hall meeting (register here) on Monday June 3 from 8-9:30 a.m. (another inconvenient time for most people) at American Legion Post 119, 411 South Muhlenberg Street, Woodstock, VA.

According to the announcement:

Citizens of Shenandoah County will be given priority regarding comments during the town hall. Signs and noisemakers are prohibited.

Perhaps some of our Shenandoah County readers can take the opportunity to ask Cline about some of the things he has said and done, as chronicled here and elsewhere, since he was sworn in as our representative in Washington.

It’s been more than a month since Congressman Cline wrote to Attorney General Barr calling out the Department of Justice for failing to enforce more than $208 million in fines against lawbreaking robocallers.

I think even those of us who disagree with Cline on most other issues can appreciate his stand on this one.

Cline concluded his letter to Barr:

In the interest of the American people, the Justice Department must reevaluate its practices when it comes to enforcing FCC fines against robocallers. I look forward to hearing your plan to remedy the situation and working with you should the matter require a legislative solution.

I emailed Cline more than a week ago asking if he had received a response to his letter. So far he has not replied. He has not mentioned anything more about it on his website, his Facebook page or his Twitter account.

I hope Cline will follow up and hold the Attorney General (and ultimately the President himself) accountable if there is no serious response– not just words but action– to his letter.

We’ll be watching.

In an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN, Congressman Cline tried to make the case that Congress has more important things to do than investigate evidence of President Trump’s possibly criminal behavior.

But Blitzer noted that “members of Congress can do more than one thing at a time. You guys can investigate, you can do oversight, but you can also pass legislation on critically important issues.”

Cline said he would be willing to have former White House counsel Don McGahn– who provided much of the incriminating evidence against Trump in the Mueller Report– testify before the House Judiciary Committee “if Mr. McGahn can work it out with the White House.”

Work it out with the White House? The White House instructed McGahn not to testify, in defiance of a subpoena. Is that good enough for Cline? Does he or doesn’t he believe that Congress is a coequal branch of government?

 

 

Congressman Cline has announced plans to hold a town hall meeting (register here) on Wednesday May 29 from 6-7:30 p.m. at Amherst-Monroe Ruritan Club, 115 Bruner Road, Monroe, VA.

According to the announcement:

Citizens of Amherst County will be given priority regarding comments during the town hall. Signs and noisemakers are prohibited.

Perhaps some of our Amherst County readers can take the opportunity to ask Cline about some of the things he has said and done, as chronicled here and elsewhere, since he was sworn in as our representative in Washington.

Last week I emailed Congressman Cline as follows:

Dear Congressman Cline:

Before the redacted Mueller Report was released, you expressed an eagerness to read it and judge the contents for yourself.

Have you in fact read the Report in its entirety? If so, does it raise any issues of concern for you about President’s Trump’s behavior, regardless of whether any actual crimes were committed? If it does raise concerns, I think you owe it to your constituents to identify those concerns publicly.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Unlike my previous queries to Cline, this one produced an actual reply. And since it appears to be a form letter sent to everyone who contacts the congressman about the Mueller Report, I don’t think he’ll mind my sharing it:

Dear Mr. Zitver,

     Thank you for contacting my office regarding the conclusion of the Mueller Investigation. I appreciate hearing from you on this matter.  

     The Mueller Report, which was the result of a two-year, $35 million investigation, was publicly released on Thursday, April 18. I supported and voted on March 14 for H. Con. Res. 24, which provided that Congress shall publicly release any report relating to the Special Counsel’s investigation, in compliance with all federal laws. The report was provided to the Congress and the public in a redacted form to protect grand jury material, information that would harm ongoing investigations, information that would disclose sensitive sources, and information that involves third parties.

     As a member of the Judiciary Committee, I believe the Justice Department should provide the entire Committee with a version of the report free from most redactions. Of course, the redaction of grand jury testimony is necessary to comply with federal law. The Chairman can obtain access to the grand jury testimony with a court order, but he has not yet made such a request of the court. For that reason, I did not support the issuance of a subpoena on April 19 for the full unredacted report. Additionally, I opposed the effort to hold Attorney General Barr in contempt for his failure to comply with the subpoena, since providing the full unredacted report would have put him in violation of federal law. Nevertheless, I continue to hope that a compromise can be reached so that most of the redacted portions of the Mueller Report can be made available to all of the Judiciary Committee members.

     As you know, the Special Counsel did not find evidence that either Presidential campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in their effort to interfere with the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. The Special Counsel also did not recommend that any additional charges be filed as a result of the investigation.

     The nearly 400-page report detailed the work of 19 attorneys, 40 FBI agents, and countless others who issued more than 2,800 subpoenas, executed nearly 500 search warrants, obtained 230 orders for communications records, and interviewed almost 500 witnesses.  

     It is an honor to represent you and all of Virginia’s Sixth Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives. Please do not hesitate to contact me if I can be of further assistance in the future. To receive the latest updates from my office I encourage you to sign up for my e-newsletter at cline.house.gov or like my Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Sincerely,

Ben Cline
Member of Congress

In other words, he didn’t answer my questions.

Cline seems downright eager to shift the focus from the contents of the Mueller Report itself to what he considers its suspicious origins– a diversion that even conservative commentator Mona Charen isn’t buying.

Now we have heard from Cline’s colleague Justin Amash, the first House Republican to say President Trump engaged in impeachable conduct.

The Michigan lawmaker, often the lone Trump dissenter on his side of the aisle, shared his conclusions in a lengthy Twitter thread after reviewing the full special counsel report.

Amash wrote that after reading the 448-page report, he’d concluded that not only did Robert S. Mueller’s team show Trump attempting to obstruct justice, but that Attorney General William Barr had “deliberately misrepresented” the findings and that few members of Congress had even read it.

So I repeat my questions to Congressman Cline and hope others will do the same: Have you in fact read the Mueller Report in its entirety? If so, does it raise any issues of concern for you about President’s Trump’s behavior, regardless of whether any actual crimes were committed?

Update: In an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN, Cline said he has read the entire redacted Mueller Report. That answers the first question. It would be good to get an answer to the second question.

The House of Representatives voted Thursday to enable lower costs for generic prescription drugs and to protect the Affordable Care Act’s prohibition against denying health insurance to people with pre-existing conditions.

Only five Republicans joined the Democratic majority in voting for the MORE Health Education Act. Along with the other Republicans, Congressman Cline voted no.

To address prescription drug costs, the bill would restrict the ability of generic drug manufacturers from blocking competitors, thus cracking down on anticompetitive behavior by pharmaceutical companies.

The bill also contains several provisions to roll back attempts of the Trump administration to push junk health insurance plans to the general public. These plans, which Trump and Republicans champion, do not contain the protections for people with preexisting conditions enshrined in the ACA, such as ensuring costs are not higher and that people with preexisting conditions cannot be denied health insurance.

Further, the bill would add $100 million in funding for the program that helps people sign up for health insurance through the ACA, as well as restore funding for marketing and outreach so more people are aware of the health care options under the ACA.

Before the vote, Cline spoke against the measure on the House floor:

“As lawmakers we owe it to Americans to protect their rights to make their own decisions, particularly as it relates to health care… Reject this idea that government knows best.”

Considering Cline’s approval of government interference at every stage of a woman’s pregnancy from conception to birth, he appears to have a selective understanding of Americans’ rights to make their own decisions.

And the Affordable Care Act, for all its correctable faults, has not limited Americans’ access to health insurance. It has greatly expanded it— especially in states like Virginia, which (despite the opposition of then-Delegate Cline and other Republicans) approved expansion of Medicaid under the ACA.

Thanks in large part to the Medicaid expansion that Cline so passionately opposed, since January 1 more than 277,000 previously-uninsured Virginians have obtained health insurance– including more than 28,000 of Cline’s constituents in the Sixth Congressional District.