Deadlines Loom for US Congress to Act on Budget, Defense Spending

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U.S. lawmakers have a busy month ahead as they face deadlines for major budget and defense actions, and what Democrats are hoping will be the completion of a $2 trillion collection of health care, climate and family services programs. The most pressing issue for Congress is funding the federal government. A previous stopgap agreement in late September allowed government agencies to continue operating through December 3, but that means by Friday there needs to be a new deal in order to avoid a government shutdown. Shortly after, Congress will need to address the debt limit by either raising the currentmore

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Carrie Meek, Pioneering Black Former Congresswoman, Dies at 95

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Carrie Meek, the grandchild of a slave and a sharecropper’s daughter who became one of the first Black Floridians elected to Congress since Reconstruction, died Sunday. She was 95. Meek died at her home in Miami after a long illness, her family said in a statement. The family did not specify a cause of death. Meek started her congressional career at an age when many people begin retirement. She was 66 when she easily won the 1992 Democratic congressional primary in her Miami-Dade County district. No Republican opposed her in the general election.  Alcee Hastings and Corrine Brown joined Meekmore

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