WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on Congress (all times EST):
2 p.m.
Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats are asking Sen. Jeff Sessions to recuse himself from any investigation of Russian hacking in the U.S. election. Sessions is Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general.
Reports of unsubstantiated claims that Russia had amassed compromising personal and financial allegations about Trump surfaced just as Sessions finished being questioned by the Judiciary panel Jan. 10. Democrats asked him about the reports, but Sessions said then he had no information.
In a letter Tuesday, the Democrats asked Sessions to commit “not to impede or shut down” an FBI or Justice Department investigation and also recuse himself.
They wrote that “All Americans should agree that Russian interference in our nation’s democratic processes is a matter of grave national importance.”
Sessions is expected to win confirmation in the GOP-led Senate.
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1:35 p.m.
President-elect Donald Trump will dine on Maine lobster, Virginia beef and shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico just after taking office on Friday.
Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence will attend the traditional inaugural luncheon in the Capitol shortly after their swearing-in. They will be joined by their families, congressional leadership, members of the Supreme Court and their future Cabinet secretaries.
According to a menu released by the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies on Tuesday, they will lunch on a three-course meal of lobster and shrimp with a saffron sauce and peanut crumble, a second course of beef with dark chocolate, juniper jus and potato gratin, and a chocolate soufflé and cherry vanilla ice cream.
The courses will be served with California wines.
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12:35 p.m.
The top Democrat on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee is expressing significant concerns over the nomination of Republican donor and school choice advocate Betsy DeVos as education secretary.
In remarks released ahead of DeVos’ confirmation hearing Tuesday afternoon, Sen. Patty Murray said she wants to know about DeVos’ “extensive financial entanglements and potential conflicts of interest.” DeVos and her family have donated millions of dollars to Republican candidates and organizations, including contributions to at least four committee members.
Murray also said that DeVos has spent her career and money “fighting to privatize public education and gut investments in public schools.”
Murray added that she wants to ask DeVos about her stance on higher education, student debt and her approach to fighting sexual assault on campus.
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11:45 a.m.
A key Republican lawmaker is defending the House GOP tax plan despite criticism from President-elect Donald Trump.
Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, who chairs the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, says that current law favors foreign beef, steel and autos — and Republicans’ approach will help American exports.
His statement Tuesday came in response to comments from Trump in an interview in The Wall Street Journal. Trump called the House GOP approach “too complicated.”
At issue is a proposal called “border adjustment” that would tax imports to the U.S. while exempting exports. It’s part of a sweeping planned rewrite of the U.S. tax code aimed at lowering overall rates on corporations from 35 percent to 20 percent.
“Anytime I hear border adjustment, I don’t love it,” Trump said.
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11 a.m.
Ryan Zinke, Donald Trump’s choice to be interior secretary, says he is an “unapologetic admirer of Teddy Roosevelt” and believes Roosevelt was right to place millions of acres of land in the West under federal protection.
The Republican Montana congressman says in prepared remarks for his confirmation hearing Tuesday that national parks and forests offer Americans the opportunity to hike, hunt, fish, camp and enjoy the great outdoors. Zinke says his father and the Boys Scouts taught him the principles of environmental stewardship and the importance of public access to public lands.
He says those lands should also be used to harvest timber and mine for coal and other energy sources.
The Associated Press obtained a copy of Zinke’s remarks in advance of a Senate energy committee hearing.
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10:45 a.m.
Congress’ nonpartisan budget analyst says premiums would jump sharply and millions more people would be without health coverage under a bill Republicans passed last year eliminating President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul.
The Congressional Budget office says under that measure, premiums for people buying policies on the law’s online marketplaces would jump up to 25 percent in the first year after enactment. They’d about double by 2026.
It also says there’d be 18 million new uninsured people in the first year after enactment. That number would grow to 32 million by 2026.
Republicans have said they’re using last year’s bill as a starting point as they try to dismantle Obama’s law this year and replace it.
Last year’s measure did not include any replacement provisions.
Obama vetoed last year’s bill.
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10:25 a.m.
Republican donor Betsy DeVos says she will push for school choice and advocate for “great” public schools if confirmed as education secretary.
DeVos’ confirmation hearing is set for later Tuesday before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
DeVos is a prominent charter school supporter and conservative activist. In remarks released by the committee, she says “parents should be empowered to choose the learning environment that’s best for their individual children.” She says she will advance magnet, virtual, charter, home and religious schools.
Teachers’ unions have charged that DeVos intends to dismantle public education. Critics also have raised concerns of a possible conflict of interest, since DeVos has donated heavily to Republicans, including several of the Senate committee members.
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10:23 a.m.
A student’s painting that divided lawmakers on Capitol Hill for its depiction of Ferguson, Missouri, has been removed.
Some GOP lawmakers had complained that the painting violated rules for a national student arts competition, noting that works depicting subjects of contemporary political controversy or of a sensationalistic or gruesome nature are not allowed.
The Architect of the Capitol informed lawmakers late Friday that the painting would be taken down on Tuesday.
The painting shows a pig in a police uniform aiming a gun at a protester. The painting was among hundreds completed by high school students that are featured in a tunnel leading to the Capitol and had been hanging for months.
Republican lawmakers repeatedly removed the painting, and Democratic Rep. William Lacy Clay of Missouri kept putting it back, saying its removal violated his constituent’s First Amendment rights.
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