Politics

I keep picturing Capitol Hill like a town library after closing: fluorescent lights humming, a lone clerk stamping dates nobody reads, and a cart of overdue books nobody wants to check back in. Only these books have committee gavels and campaign accounts. The late fees get paid in civic trust.

Congress reaches the breaking point on its ethics crisis

Axios reported April 13 that the House ethics mess is no longer a background hum. Two members signaled they are heading for the exits, while other cases keep crawling along, feeding the sense that accountability is something Congress schedules for “next session.”

• Rep. Eric Swalwell says he intends to resign, as the House Ethics Committee opened an investigation into whether he engaged in sexual misconduct, including involving an employee under his supervision. He disputes the allegations in part.

• Rep. Tony Gonzales said he would file his retirement from office on April 14 after admitting to an affair with a staff member who later died by suicide, with the Ethics Committee already involved.

• Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick faces a public sanctions hearing on April 21, 2026 after an adjudicatory subcommittee found multiple counts proven.

• Rep. Cory Mills remains under a House Ethics Committee investigation.

The Orwell check: when “due process” becomes “do nothing”

Due process is not a punchline. It is the guardrail that keeps punishment from becoming a partisan hobby. Axios notes leaders in both parties have signaled hesitance to push members out before “full due process.”

But here’s the Orwell check: watch how a noble phrase gets repurposed into institutional bubble wrap. “Due process” can end up meaning: keep your seat, keep your platform, keep the public waiting until outrage cools and the calendar turns the page.

The Paine test, and the tradeoff

The Paine test is plain: does the system expand self-government, or concentrate power and impunity? Expulsion is a sledgehammer, rare by design, and hard to use. Yet the alternative Congress is offering looks like “slow rot,” where the only real off-ramp is voluntary resignation or retirement.

Axios also flagged how accountability can get rerouted: Rep. Henry Cuellar, indicted in 2024 and later pardoned by President Trump, reportedly regained a leadership perch after that pardon.

Guardrails that survive the exit door

One brutal wrinkle Axios highlighted: when members leave, the Ethics Committee can lose jurisdiction and reports can stay locked away, giving the public an outcome without a record.

If Congress wants to stop hemorrhaging trust while still respecting due process, it needs reforms built for sunlight, not suspense. Start with timelines, transparency that survives resignation, and consequences smaller than expulsion but sharper than a stern letter. And above all, stop treating ethics as party warfare dressed up as procedure.

So here’s the question: what would you demand first, deadlines, disclosure, or consequences that actually land?

In Washington, the “process” talk is supposed to smother the mess. Instead, this week it just fed the flames. The House ethics story is no longer background noise. It is propane-level pressure under the marble fireplace, right on the calendar of lawmakers who have been dragging their feet on accountability.

Congress reaches the breaking point on its ethics crisis

Here is the verified headline reality, reported by Axios: Rep. Eric Swalwell resigned after sexual misconduct allegations, and Rep. Tony Gonzales announced he would retire amid bipartisan calls to expel him. At the same time, the House Ethics Committee has already found Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick committed 25 ethics violations, including campaign finance rule breaches tied to roughly $5 million in disaster-relief money. And on the side, Rep. Cory Mills is still under ethics investigation, with no clear timeline on how his case plays out.

The ethics process moves slow, until it doesn’t

Axios described growing frustration with the ethics panel’s glacial pace, and that frustration boiled over into expulsion talk before the system wanted to cooperate. The incentive is simple, like the smell from the grill: power, status, and another day in the building. When discipline takes forever, hypocrisy starts moving faster than consequences.

Associated Press reported that the House Ethics Committee began an investigation into whether Swalwell engaged in sexual misconduct toward an employee under his supervision after allegations surfaced that prompted loud bipartisan calls for him to step down. AP also reported Gonzales would retire after bipartisan calls to expel him, following his admission of an affair with a staff member who later died by suicide.

Cherfilus-McCormick: the grift that got too hot to hide

Now for the mess that makes fans stop shrugging. AP reported the House Ethics Committee panel found Cherfilus-McCormick committed 25 ethics violations, including violations of campaign finance laws. The allegations center on millions of dollars from her family’s health care business after Florida overpayment of roughly $5 million in disaster relief, and the committee’s finding that she used that money to influence her campaign through a web of businesses and family members.

The committee said it would recommend punishment in coming weeks. The Washington Post reported an expectation that the Ethics Committee would meet April 21 to decide whether she should be expelled, censured, or face another form of discipline.

Who benefits when Congress tolerates its own corruption?

This is what the swamp profits from: slowing everything down so the political timeline can outrun accountability. Axios also raised the possibility that lawmakers could force expulsion votes even if the ethics process is not done, given frustration with the panel’s pace. And the political math is messy, especially around Mills, where there is no clear timeline, and where Democrats may not have votes needed to expel without also ousting him.

The last member expelled from Congress was Republican Rep. George Santos in 2023, and AP reporting makes clear how rare and hard expulsion is, since it takes a supermajority in the House. But rarity is not innocence. When scandals pile up and members resign or retire before votes even finish forming, it signals something is finally cracking.

The air in this fight smells like hot paper and old bureaucracy. The American Postal Workers Union rolls out TV spots urging Americans to vote by mail, while President Trump turns up the heat on election rules and eligibility.

Postal Service Union Rolls Out Mail-Voting Ads as Trump Blasts the Method

Per the Associated Press, the 200,000-member American Postal Workers Union is launching a national TV ad campaign encouraging Americans to vote by mail. The 30-second spot features everyday voters and ends with the line: “Vote by mail – keep it, protect it, expand it.” The campaign is set to begin airing in Ohio, with additional states to follow. The story also notes mail ballots were first used in 1864.

History matters, sure. But election rules wrapped in campaign slogans is where the smoke starts rolling. The AP reports the ads land in a politically charged debate as Trump raises skepticism about mail-in ballots and pushes Congress to limit them.

“Trust Us” From the Union, “Check the Gates” From Trump

Who benefits? The union wants voters to keep using mail ballots and wants postal workers out of the role of deciding who is eligible. AP says union president Jonathan Smith said the TV ad was produced before Trump’s executive order was issued.

Meanwhile, Trump’s approach is about enforcement, not vibes. The White House fact sheet on the March 31, 2026 executive order says it directs the creation of state citizenship lists. It also directs the USPS to transmit mail-in and absentee ballots only to individuals enrolled on a state-specific Mail-in and Absentee Participation List. The fact sheet further says the Attorney General will prioritize investigations and prosecution where ballots go to ineligible voters.

Mail Voting’s Risk Question, Answered With Data

Mail voting has existed for over a century, and many Americans use it. The key question is reliability and whether fraud stays rare enough for confidence to hold. Brookings published an analysis finding mail voting fraud is extremely rare, about four cases out of every 10 million mail votes, based on its cross-referenced estimates. That does not mean zero risk, but it undercuts the idea that the system is a constant fraud machine.

The Real Conflict: Channel Control vs. Eligibility Enforcement

This is about who sets the terms and how strict those terms get. Critics see overreach. Supporters see integrity. On the bar stool test, the question becomes simple: will eligibility be verified, and will ballots be handled reliably without turning postal workers into political targets?

So when the union runs “keep it, protect it, expand it,” the argument being made is to keep the channel open. When Trump argues for eligibility lists and enforcement, the argument being made is to secure the gates first. Now the floor is yours: should federal elections rely more on eligibility lists and enforcement, or should mail voting remain insulated as a protected channel for political influence?

The coffee is burnt. The scanner is spitting static. And the White House just dropped one of those statements written in the voice of a copier begging for mercy.

On April 13, 2026, President Donald Trump signed two Senate bills into law: S. 1884, the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2025, and S. 3971, the Small Business Innovation and Economic Security Act. One is about stolen art and stolen time. The other is about innovation money and national security language dressed up as process.

Staple them together and you get Washington in miniature: a narrow lane toward justice that should have existed decades ago, plus a reopened spigot of federal dollars that will be steered by whoever can afford the cleanest compliance and the best-connected help.

What the White House says happened

The White House says S. 1884 permanently extends and expands judicial authority under the original 2016 HEAR Act, and S. 3971 reauthorizes and amends SBIR and STTR and related pilot programs through fiscal year 2031.

That is the official version. Smooth as a lobbyist hallway.

Translation: S. 1884 tells wealthy institutions to stop winning on technicalities

Translation: if you are a museum, collector, dealer, or foreign state sitting behind glass and lawyers, you do not get to keep Nazi-looted art just because your attorneys found a procedural trapdoor.

The bill calls out how courts have used time-based defenses like laches and other non-merits doctrines like forum non conveniens, international comity, and even the act of state doctrine to toss claims without ever reaching the core question: was this art taken because of Nazi persecution, and who should have it now?

Here is the mechanism: institutions with money can turn time into a weapon. They can slow-walk provenance research, litigate for years, and wait out survivors and heirs. Then they show up pretending delay is the problem, not theft.

Follow the money: S. 3971 reopens the innovation pipeline

S. 3971 matters because SBIR and STTR are a long-running federal pipeline that moves public R&D dollars into private hands. When the oxygen comes back on through fiscal year 2031, the celebration is not limited to researchers. An entire ecosystem of contractors, compliance vendors, grant writers, boutique law firms, and defense-adjacent “innovation” shops lives off the act of applying.

Here is the mechanism: reauthorization is not just a yes-or-no switch. “Research security” and “program integrity” reforms mean more screening, more checks, more discretion, and more ways to deny or delay applicants. Translation: you will be told it is about keeping out foreign influence. You will also see it land hardest on small players who cannot afford the overhead.

The quiet part

The quiet part is political convenience. One signing lets the administration look “pro-justice.” The other lets it look “pro-small business.” Meanwhile, the sorting machine stays intact.

So here is my mic-drop: oversight is not a vibe. It is audits, public data, inspectors general with teeth, and courts enforcing merits-based justice. If S. 1884 and S. 3971 are supposed to deliver fairness, are we going to watch outcomes like hawks, or let the same institutions and middlemen cash out again?

The Capitol smells like printer toner, old carpet, and consequences that never quite land. The building has a particular hum when the cameras come on, right before somebody says “accountability” like it’s a houseplant they water once a year.

Now the House is staring at a cluster of misconduct cases and acting surprised, like they just discovered gambling in a casino they personally licensed.

Congress hits the breaking point on its ethics crisis

Axios says Congress is reaching a breaking point as expulsion talk swirls around multiple House members, with leaders urging patience and process while pressure builds inside the ranks.

In that pileup: Axios reports expulsion chatter touching Reps. Eric Swalwell, Tony Gonzales, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, and Cory Mills. The story’s point is not that Congress lacks rules. It’s that Congress has a whole ritual for not using them until the moment is politically unavoidable.

The Washington Post reported lawmakers were preparing expulsion resolutions, and that Swalwell opted to step down rather than face a vote that could have ended his House career. It also reported Gonzales planned to file his retirement when Congress returned.

AP reported the House Ethics Committee began investigating whether Swalwell engaged in sexual misconduct toward an employee working under his supervision, and that Swalwell announced he planned to resign without naming an effective date.

And Cherfilus-McCormick is already deep into the formal machine: the House Ethics Committee held a public hearing on March 26, 2026, and scheduled a public sanctions hearing for April 21, 2026 at 2:00 p.m. in 1310 Longworth to determine what sanction to recommend.

Translation: “Due process” can be a shield for delay

Translation: “Due process” is real. Expulsion is severe. But in the House, “due process” also functions like corporate PR’s “independent review.” It’s not always about truth. It’s often about time.

Time for the story to rot. Time for the caucus to stop sweating. Time for leadership to look solemn while nothing actually happens on the floor.

Here is the mechanism: the accountability bottleneck

Here is the mechanism: when expulsion efforts surge, leadership can deflect by routing the mess to the Ethics Committee. Axios notes that this session, attempts to expel members have often been redirected by motions to refer to Ethics.

Sounds responsible. It’s also a bottleneck. When the institution controls the clock, it can control the outcome often enough to make the machine dependable.

Follow the money: incumbency is the product

Follow the money: this isn’t only a morality play. It’s an incentives play. Incumbency is the asset. Access is the commodity. And the party apparatus does not enjoy sudden instability.

The Washington Post reported lawmakers even floated tying possible ousters together, with Democrats potentially reluctant to provide votes to expel one member without also addressing another. Translation: that is vote math. And vote math is where ethics goes to die.

The quiet part: an ethics crisis is useful if it never resolves

The quiet part: a permanent ethics fog is convenient. If everything is “under review,” leadership can always ask everyone to calm down, wait, and stop demanding a vote.

Axios called this a breaking point. Fine. But breaking points only matter if they break toward consequences, not toward another resignation timed to dodge the most embarrassing roll call.

Mic drop: if Congress can move fast when the stakes are power, donors, and must-pass deals, it can move fast to police itself. It just chooses not to. Who benefits from that choice?

Congress is supposed to be the room where problems get argued into shape. Lately it feels like a courthouse hallway: hushed voices, hard stares, and somebody clutching the folder marked “procedure” while the building smolders.

Congress reaches a breaking point on its ethics crisis

Axios reports the House’s ethics mess hit a new peak when two members said they would leave rather than risk being pushed out: Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas).

• Swalwell: He says he plans to resign as he faces sexual misconduct allegations and a newly opened House Ethics Committee investigation. The committee says it is investigating whether he violated standards of conduct regarding allegations of sexual misconduct, including toward an employee under his supervision. That phrase matters. When power sits on one side of the table, “consent” is not a Hallmark card. It is a question Congress should treat like it owns a dictionary.
• Gonzales: He says he will retire after bipartisan calls for expulsion. The Associated Press reports the Ethics Committee initiated an investigation after he admitted to an affair with a staff member who later died by suicide. He posted that he would file his retirement when Congress returns, without detailing the timing.

Axios also points to two more members under heavy scrutiny: Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-Fla.) and Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.).

• Cherfilus-McCormick: In a statement dated April 10, 2026, the Ethics Committee says an adjudicatory subcommittee found multiple counts in a Statement of Alleged Violations proven. The committee will hold a public hearing on April 21, 2026 to determine what sanction, if any, to recommend to the House.
• Mills: AP reports the Ethics Committee announced a wide-ranging investigation, including whether he violated campaign finance laws, misused congressional resources, and engaged in sexual misconduct or dating violence. The same report notes a Florida judge ordered him to have no contact with his ex-girlfriend and to stay away from her home and workplace. The committee also emphasized that opening an investigation does not mean a violation occurred.

The tradeoff: swift catharsis versus due process

When scandals pile up, expulsion starts sounding like air freshener for a dumpster fire. But expulsion is the House’s most severe internal weapon, and using it before a full process risks setting a precedent where majorities can vote out members when the news cycle peaks.

Axios reports Speaker Mike Johnson and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries have expressed hesitation about pushing members out before full due process. That is not softness. It is a guardrail. The problem is the current system also tempts shortcuts because it can move slowly and unclearly, leaving a vacuum that gets filled with weaponized outrage.

Congress does not need a new moral code. It needs functional machinery: clear, public steps, real hearings like the one scheduled for April 21, and consequences calibrated to evidence instead of trending topics. If Congress cannot police itself without turning into either a kangaroo court or a country club, what exactly is the job?

I have been in enough town halls to recognize the sound of civic trust leaving the room. It is not a bang. It is a scrape of folding chairs and a sudden, practiced silence. Washington can manufacture outrage fast. Fairness takes longer, and Congress hates waiting.

What happened

Rep. Eric Swalwell, a California Democrat, says he plans to resign from Congress after sexual misconduct allegations. The Associated Press reported that the allegations were first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle and then by CNN. They include a claim by one woman that Swalwell sexually assaulted her twice, including during a time she worked for him. CNN also reported allegations from other women involving explicit messages or unsolicited nude photos.

Swalwell has denied what he describes as a serious false allegation, while also expressing regret for what he called past mistakes in judgment. He did not give a specific resignation date.

What Congress did next

The same day Swalwell announced his plan to resign, the House Ethics Committee said it opened an investigation under its rules to gather more information about whether he violated the House Code of Official Conduct or other standards, including alleged misconduct toward an employee under his supervision. The committee also emphasized that an investigation is not itself an indication that a violation occurred.

Meanwhile, calls for a quick expulsion vote began circulating. Swalwell argued that expelling a member without due process in the days after an allegation is wrong. He also said it is wrong for his constituents to have their representative distracted.

The Paine test: liberty or power?

Tom Paine did not write pamphlets so Congress could do morality theater and skip the hard parts. The Paine test is simple: does this moment expand liberty or concentrate power?

• Staff safety: If allegations involve a member and an employee under their supervision, the power imbalance is not a footnote. It is the whole book.
• Due process: The accused is still owed a rule-bound process. Not as a shield from consequences, but as a minimum standard that keeps precedent from becoming a partisan weapon.

If Congress takes staff safety seriously, it should want clean, documented accountability that survivors can trust and that accused members cannot dismiss as political vengeance.

The Orwell check: “accountability” and “distraction”

Orwell warned about language that turns sharp questions into soft fog. “Accountability” can mean investigation, evidence, and consequences. Or it can mean a fast vote designed to let everyone claim purity while avoiding oversight. “Distraction” can be real, but it can also be a euphemism that dodges the harder question: whether the office itself became a workplace liability.

The liberty ledger and the tradeoff

Rush expulsion without meaningful process, and Congress buys a quick headline while spending legitimacy. Slow-walk the Ethics process, and people see impunity. Either way, cynicism cashes the check.

Swalwell says he will resign. Fine. But resignation is not oversight. The House still owes the country guardrails that protect staff and uphold due process in the same building. If it cannot do both, what exactly are we legislating for?

Smoke was in the air this morning, but not from a backyard grill. It was Capitol Hill, slow-braised in ethics and scandal, and now the House floor is starting to talk expulsion votes like politics is a smoker that never truly cools down.

Swalwell and Gonzales face expulsion votes, as Luna aims at Swalwell

Here’s the headline reality, straight from the trail. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna plans to force a vote to expel Rep. Eric Swalwell next week over sexual assault and misconduct allegations. Swalwell denies those allegations, because denial is the first defense in any campaign menu.

But the ethics smoke is not imaginary. Axios reported that Democrats are prepared to respond by moving to expel Tony Gonzales, a Republican lawmaker who is being investigated by the House Ethics Committee over sexual misconduct allegations.

The AM-radio moment: why expulsion is hard, not casual

Expulsion is not like firing off a hot take and calling it accountability. Under House rules, members need a two-thirds vote to boot a colleague from Congress. So yes, the bar is high. This place was built to survive heat without becoming a mob.

What the Ethics Committee is looking at

For Swalwell, the House Ethics Committee has begun an investigation into whether he engaged in sexual misconduct toward an employee working under his supervision, AP reported. The committee made clear that an investigation does not automatically mean a violation has already been found, but it also does not smell like nothing. Meanwhile, the allegations that triggered the attention reportedly led to Democratic support for Swalwell collapsing quickly after reports surfaced.

For Gonzales, the smoke has been accumulating too. AP reported that Gonzales withdrew from reelection after admitting to an affair with a former staff member who later died by suicide. The point is not just the personnel drama. It is the kind of conduct the House ethics rules are designed to prevent, including a prohibition on sexual relationships with employees under a lawmaker’s supervision.

Who benefits, besides the voters?

Let’s not pretend this is only about morality. These expulsion efforts also become political opportunity. Leadership aides, activists, and caucus managers can paint it as morality, restoring trust, or a strike against a problem that might infect the broader brand.

But the principle matters for regular Americans. Congress should not treat serious misconduct like it comes with a free pass. If the House proceeds with hearings and investigations and applies the rules, and if it takes a two-thirds vote, then Congress is forcing itself to reach consensus, not just posture.

Brick’s bottom line: accountability beats performative outrage

I do not need Congress to play nice. I need it to play by the rules. Whether expulsion happens or not, the message on the grill stays loud: misconduct allegations do not vanish just because the scandal comes with a party logo.

The courthouse air in Boston always feels like marble, toner, and somebody lying into a microphone. This week, the lie wore a suit and carried a subpoena-shaped attitude: the U.S. Department of Justice tried to force Massachusetts to hand over its statewide voter registration list. A federal judge told them to take a seat.

On April 9, 2026, U.S. District Judge Leo T. Sorokin dismissed DOJ’s lawsuit seeking Massachusetts voter rolls. The ruling is the latest setback in a broader push by the Trump administration’s DOJ to collect detailed voter data from states. According to the Associated Press, it is at least the fifth time a judge has rejected similar attempts.

What the judge said, in plain language

DOJ leaned on a 1960 civil rights law that allows the U.S. attorney general to inspect state voter records, but only if the demand includes a statement explaining why the records are being requested and how they will be used.

Translation: Congress built a gate. DOJ tried to climb around it.

Sorokin said the statute requires a statement of why the attorney general demands production of the records, and that statement must be factual, not just a conceivable or possible basis. In this case, the judge found DOJ did not take the necessary steps required under the law. DOJ’s position, in court documents, was that it wanted the data to check Massachusetts’ possible lack of compliance with federal voter registration list requirements, and that it should not have to prove a violation before seeking evidence. Sorokin was not impressed.

Massachusetts calls it a privacy win

Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell called the decision a decisive win for voters and the rule of law, framing it as a defense of voter privacy and election integrity. DOJ, for its part, said it does not comment on ongoing litigation.

Here is the mechanism: “investigation” as a data pipeline

Here is the mechanism: you label a mass request “inspection,” you skip the safeguards, and you try to turn a civil-rights tool into an all-you-can-eat voter database.

The quiet part: once a government agency gets a reusable dataset, the next fight is never about whether it should exist. It is about who controls it, who gets access, and what new “purposes” magically appear after the fact.

And Massachusetts is not alone. Judges in Michigan, California, Oregon, and Georgia have also dismissed similar DOJ lawsuits, and DOJ has appealed some of those losses.

The fluorescent lights in Congress do not flatter anybody. They make the marble look tired. They make the microphones look like they have heard too many lies. I am on stale coffee and scanner static, watching the House Ethics Committee tee up another civics-class ritual where accountability shows up in a suit, gets patted down by procedure, and exits through a side door labeled “discretion.”

House Ethics sets April 21 hearing on sanctions for Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick

The House Committee on Ethics says it will hold a public hearing on April 21, 2026 to decide what sanctions, if any, it should recommend against Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick of Florida. There is a date, a room, and a clock. The committee is excellent at clocks.

It is worse at consequences.

This hearing comes after the committee’s adjudicatory subcommittee found that multiple counts in a Statement of Alleged Violations had been proven. Reporting around the case says the panel found 25 ethics violations. The allegations center on money tied to a roughly $5 million overpayment connected to her family’s health care business and on funding her 2022 campaign through intermediaries. Cherfilus-McCormick has denied wrongdoing, and she has also faced separate federal criminal charges, to which she has pleaded not guilty.

Translation: they are deciding how hard to slap, not whether the behavior is rot

Translation: When you hear “what, if any, sanction,” do not hear moral clarity. Hear bargaining space. Hear risk management. Hear members of Congress treating an ethics case the way a boardroom treats a lawsuit: not “right vs. wrong,” but “exposure vs. inconvenience.”

The ethics process is built to look like justice without functioning like justice. It is incumbents judging an incumbent. Even when it goes public, it is public in the way a product recall is public: carefully worded, tightly scheduled, and designed to keep the brand alive.

Here is the mechanism: enforcement calibrated for institutional survival

Here is the mechanism: Congress wrote itself a disciplinary system that has to protect two products at once. Product one is the image of integrity. Product two is operational continuity in a House where every seat is leverage and every vote is a bargaining chip.

That is why ethics cases move like they are walking through wet cement. The committee performs solemnity. But the deeper function is damage control: weighing behavior against headlines, caucus math, and the risk that punishing one member too hard becomes a precedent that threatens others later.

Follow the money: a cash pipeline, and the punishment is usually paperwork

Follow the money: The reporting points to a familiar pipeline. Money tied to government programs sloshes into private hands. Then it allegedly reappears in the political bloodstream through intermediaries. The public sees a campaign. The ledger sees a route designed to make the money harder to trace.

The committee says April 21. The public hears closure. I hear a negotiation with gravity.

The quiet part: “clean government” that protects itself first

The quiet part: When the House polices itself, it is always policing the boundary between scandal that threatens the institution and scandal the institution can survive.

So yes: watch the hearing. Read the findings. But do not let the institution sell you a procedural sunset as a moral sunrise. If Congress can decide the punishment for Congress, then the only reliable accountability is external pressure: watchdogs, aggressive reporting, and elections and organizing that treat corruption like the material issue it is.