Judiciary

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09), the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, today joined Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jerrold Nadler and Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism Homeland Security and Investigations Ranking Member Sheila Jackson-Lee and other members of the House Judiciary Committee in introducing the Special Counsel Independence and Integrity Act.

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09), the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice, welcomed a Maryland federal judge's ruling today allowing a lawsuit alleging violations of the U.S. Constitution's emoluments clauses against President Trump to go forward.

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09) today recalled the important role Linda Brown played in the unanimous landmark 1954 Supreme Court decision, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka that declared state laws creating separate schools for black and white students to be unconstitutional. Brown died Sunday at 75.

Congressman Cohen made the following remarks:

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09) today welcomed rapidly increasing support for his discharge petition to force a vote on his bipartisan Special Counsel Integrity Act (H.R. 4669). Under House rules, if a majority of the House signs onto a discharge petition, the bill is automatically sent to the floor for a vote.

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09) today filed a discharge petition to require House Speaker Paul Ryan to call for a floor vote on the Special Counsel Integrity Act (H.R. 4669), a bill he and Walter Jones (R-N.C.) introduced in December to create procedural protections for independent special prosecutors. The bill would prohibit a special prosecutor from being fired without appropriate cause, and allow a special prosecutor who has been removed to seek judicial review of such removal.

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09) expressed deep concern and condemned the decision by the House Intelligence Committee to drop its incomplete probe of Russian meddling and Trump campaign collusion in the 2016 election.

Congressman Cohen added that the signal sent by Trump's firing of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is that overt criticism of ongoing Russian meddling in other nations' elections will not be tolerated.

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09) has signed on to an effort to require the President to act on a law enacted last August to impose sanctions against high-level Russian officials for their roles in malicious cyber attacks on American democracy.

The Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act passed the House on a 419-3 vote and the Senate on a vote of 98-2 in July 2017 and became law on August 2, 2017. The law was intended to put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin and his inner circle as the United States prepares for midterm elections this year.

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (D-TN) and Steve Chabot (R-Ohio) today introduced the DUI Reporting Act to address the loophole in our nation's drunken-driving laws that enables repeat DUI offenders to be charged and tried as first-time offenders because of inconsistent reporting.