For those of you who don’t know a lot about Cummings, here’s a brief bio.
Congressman Elijah E. Cummings was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland, where he still resides today. He obtained his Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science from Howard University, serving as Student Government President and graduating Phi Beta Kappa, and then graduated from the University of Maryland School of Law. Congressman Cummings has also received 13 honorary doctoral degrees from Universities throughout the nation.
Congressman Cummings has dedicated his life of service to uplifting and empowering the people he is sworn to represent. He began his career of public service in the Maryland House of Delegates, where he served for 14 years and became the first African American in Maryland history to be named Speaker Pro Tem. Since 1996, Congressman Cummings has proudly represented Maryland’s 7th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Congressman Cummings currently serves as the Ranking Member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. As the main investigative committee in the House of Representatives, Oversight and Government Reform has jurisdiction to investigate any federal program and any matter with federal policy implications.
He is a member of both the Black Caucus and the Progressive Caucus.
He will be a point person in efforts to address our failures in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Here he is in opening salvos against FEMA head Brock Long.
Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) tore into Trump FEMA Administrator Brock Long for a litany of failures involved in the federal preparation for and response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.The encounter came at hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, on which Cummings is the ranking Democrat.This hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee was the FIRST on hurricane preparedness since Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico in the fall of 2017. Democrats on the committee had requested such a hearing on Sept. 29, 2017. It finally happened on Nov. 29, 2018, after Republicans delayed until, not only after the midterms, but also on the same day as Dem. caucus leadership elections. They wouldn't even move the hearing up by 30 minutes to allow Democratic members to question Brock Long for a few minutes. So, the Democrats had to submit their questions in writing, and, with it, ranking member Elijah Cummings offered this statement before he and most Democrats had to leave. He implied that it will be a different ballgame next session. Brock Long, the administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), testified on disaster response and answered several questions about the lessons he and his agency learned from their response to Hurricane Maria. Members also questioned FEMA’s response, or lack thereof, to requests for information and documentation related to response and recovery efforts over the 16-month period leading up to this hearing.
Most people who are not politics junkies don’t read government reports. The reports often don’t get much press coverage either. One report I paid close attention to, given my focus on Puerto Rico, was issued back in September:
Elijah Cummings Releases Report Saying GOP Failed to Hold Trump Accountable for Hurricane Maria
Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD),the Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, issued a new Democratic staff report accusing Republicans on the committee of shutting down efforts to investigate the Trump administration’s response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The report entitled, A FAILURE OF OVERSIGHT, says that the committee has received some documents requested from the administration, but that the GOP members have refused to subpoena documents and emails that the Trump administration is still withholding, and that they’ve refused to ask for a single record from the White House. The Committee has scheduled only one full hearing to analyze the administration’s response to Maria, which happened nearly a year ago. The response is in stark contrast to Congress’ reaction to Hurricane Katrina, when Republican leaders held nine hearings about the federal response, obtained more than 500,000 documents from the Bush administration, and, within five months, had prepared a 569-page report outlining the government’s failures in responding to the disaster.
You can read the full report here:
We now have a major task on our hands: fumigating the Republican Augean stables of slime, stink, and corruption.
That task has multiple tentacles, and will reach into almost too many areas to list here.