Page 6 - Florida Sentinel 10-29-19

Political News
Former Representative John Conyers Has Died
Elijah Cummings Is First African American Lawmaker To Lie In State In Congress
Former representative John Conyers, a civil rights icon whose decades-long ca- reer in Congress ended when he was accused of sexual ha- rassment and abuse by multi- ple women, died on Sunday, a family spokesperson told BuzzFeed News.
Conyers, 90, represented a Detroit, Michigan, district from 1965 until his resigna- tion in December 2017. At the time of his resignation he was the longest-serving member of the House of Representa- tives and the ranking mem- ber of the House Judiciary Committee. He died in his sleep, his son told PBS News Hour.
Conyers was a founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus and renowned for his work supporting voter registration drives and pro- viding legal representation for black voting rights ac- tivists during the civil rights movement. He was lauded by Martin Luther King, Jr., was Rosa Parks’s boss for more than 20 years after he hired her as an aide, and was named in former president Richard Nixon’s “Enemies List.” Conyers was the first black member of Congress to serve on the House Judiciary Committee. He would go on to be the first black chair of the committee in 2007.
Conyers, an attorney,
cosponsored the original Vot- ing Rights Act of 1965. And just days after King was as- sassinated in 1968, Conyers introduced a bill that would create a federal holiday in honor of King, years before Ronald Reagan would eventually sign it into law.
Conyers’ legacy would go on to become more compli- cated. In 2017, he was the first sitting member of Con- gress to be scrutinized through the lens of the #MeToo movement after BuzzFeed News reported that he had settled a wrongful dis- missal complaint alleging sexual harassment against a former staffer using taxpayer money in 2015. Several more women came forward after the initial story was pub- lished, accusing him of hav- ing sexually harassed them.
After being hospitalized for a “stress-related illness” in the wake of the allegations and abandoned by Demo- cratic leadership, Conyers resigned in December before the House Ethics Committee could finish its probe into his behavior. He continued to deny the allegations. Mem- bers of the House of Repre- sentatives had struggled over whether to call on him to re- sign, as he was a revered member of the Democratic caucus and the civil rights movement.
Impeachment Timeline In Flux As Evidence Against Trump Piles Up
REP. JOHN CONYERS
coffin by a military honor guard, with his widow Maya Rockeymoore Cummings waiting at the top of the steps, hand on heart.
Inside Statuary Hall, his coffin was placed on the same catafalque used in Abraham Lincoln’s funeral.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called him “truly a master of the House,” and Sen-
ate Minority leader Chuck Schumer said: ‘Our country has lost a giant.’
Republican Congressman Mark Meadows spoke about his “unexpected” friendship with Cummings.
“This place and this country would be better served with a few more unexpected friend- ships. I know I’ve been blessed by one,” Meadows stated.
REP. ELIJAH CUMMINGS
The now-late Elijah Cum- mings who represented Balti- more in Congress earned the right to be referred to as “a giant” when he became the first African-American law- maker to lie in state in the dome of the Capitol.
Congressman Cum- mings, who died a week ago today, was carried up the steps of the Capitol in a flag-draped
Maya Rockeymoore Cummings stood hand on heart as her husband’s coffin was carried to the top of the Capitol steps.
Democrats leading the im- peachment inquiry into Pres- ident Donald Trump have provided no time frame for moving their highly secretive process out from behind closed doors — and that’s because there isn’t one.
Interviews with a dozen Democratic lawmakers and aides reveal little urgency to cut short a string of closed-
House Intelligence Commit- tee Chairman Adam Schiff.
door depositions with senior Trump administration figures that have yielded a mountain of damaging evidence, amid Republican lawmakers’ gripes about the tightly controlled process.
At the same time, House In- telligence Committee Chair- man Adam Schiff is signaling that he plans to expedite the inquiry.
Trump Administration Let Nearly $11 Million In Student Aid Go To Unaccredited For-Profit Colleges
A trove of documents re- leased Tuesday by the House Education and Labor Commit- tee shows the Education De- partment provided $10.7 million in federal loans and grants to students at the Illi- nois Institute of Art and the Art Institute of Colorado even though officials knew the for- profit colleges were not ac- credited and ineligible to receive such aid.
The documents build on prior reports from the commit- tee describing efforts by Edu- cation Department officials to shield Dream Center Educa-
BETSY DEVOS
tion Holdings, owner of the Art Institutes and Argosy Univer- sity, from the consequences of lying to students about the ac- creditation of its since-closed schools. Now it appears the Education Department tried to shield itself from an ill-fated
decision to allow millions of dollars to flow to those schools. Rep. Robert C. “Bobby” Scott (D-Va.), the chairman of the House Education Commit- tee, is threatening to subpoena Education Secretary Betsy DeVos for more documents related to the department’s role in Dream Center’s actions. Scott says the agency has ob- structed the committee’s in- vestigation and refused to answer questions, as emails and letters paint a picture of a federal agency complicit in an effort to place profits before
students.
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