In the News
Cassie was moving from New York City to Spring Lake, North Carolina, and she was devastated by the idea of giving up her five-year-old cat, Boots, who had been her beloved companion since he was a kitten. She was traveling to her new home by Amtrak, which still doesn’t allow pets, and Cassie couldn’t afford to fly Boots separately on an airplane.
U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn and other members of the Tennessee Congressional delegation introduced legislation on Wednesday that would make it illegal to use computer software called bots to purchase tickets to live events.
Blackburn, R-Brentwood, was joined by Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Nashville; Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Memphis; and U.S. Rep. Scott DesJarlais, R-South Pittsburg, in introducing the Better Online Ticket Sales (BOTS) Act. Bots are used by some ticket scalpers to buy large swaths of tickets to popular concerts or sporting events.
Israel's ambassador to the United States has gotten an earful from a half-dozen House Democrats angered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's acceptance of a Republican invitation to address Congress next month.
WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen said Wednesday he’s considering skipping Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress next month because he fears it will damage Israel’s relationship with the United States.
“I’m afraid it’s going to be a political effort to oppose (President Barack Obama’s) decision on diplomacy, and it will be harmful to the relationship Israel has historically held with our country,” the Memphis Democrat said.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Gov. Bill Haslam's proposal to extend health coverage to 280,000 low-income Tennesseans has failed during a special legislative session.
The Senate Health Committee defeated the Republican governor's Insure Tennessee plan Wednesday on a 7-4 vote.
Haslam spent 21 months negotiating a special deal for Tennessee that included market-based elements like vouchers to buy private insurance, co-pays and assurances that the state could pull out of the deal if it ended up being more expensive than expected.
U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen sponsored legislation in the Tennessee Senate that led to creation of the HOPE Scholarship, which provides four-year college students with $4,000 a year for their studies.
Yet, it isn’t coming close to covering the cost of a university degree, especially with tuition and fees nearly doubling over the last decade as state funding for higher education has stagnated.
U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis calls the Tennessee Promise last dollar scholarship program for community college and state technical centers “a fraud.”
And last week he said a plan by President Barack Obama to model a federal program on Tennessee Promise probably won’t get past the Republican majorities in the U.S. Senate and House.
Cohen has been critical of Tennessee Promise from the moment it was proposed in 2014 by Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam.
At a townhall meeting Downtown last week, Cohen remained sharply critical of the program and Haslam personally.
Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) has reintroduced legislation requiring the Justice Department to maintain data on how many people are killed by police officers each year.
Cohen, a member of the House Judiciary Committee, introduced the legislation in December but filed it again for the new Congress that started this month.
WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen has refiled legislation to require law enforcement agencies to report detailed information on police use of deadly force to a national database.
The bill, filed Tuesday and called the National Statistics on Deadly Force Transparency Act, would close a loophole in federal law that Cohen says prevents the adequate collection of comprehensive national data regarding justified and unjustified fatal interactions with police.
Long a proponent of taking the decennial congressional apportionment process out of the hands of politicians, Rep. Steve Cohen has once again introduced legislation to do just that.
The apportionment process, Cohen says, often leads to partisan gerrymandering. He favors an independent redistricting commission. On Thursday, Cohen reintroduced the John Tanner Fairness and Independence in Redistricting (FAIR) Act, which would create such a commission.