Talk:117th United States Congress

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the 117th United States Congress article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1

This article is written in American English, which has its own spelling conventions (color, defense, traveled) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

U.S. Congress Mid‑importance

	United States portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject U.S. Congress, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the United States Congress on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.U.S. CongressWikipedia:WikiProject U.S. CongressTemplate:WikiProject U.S. CongressU.S. Congress articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is about one (or many) event(s).

United States: Government Mid‑importance

	United States portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions. Template Usage Articles Requested! Become a Member Project Talk Alerts United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by WikiProject U.S. Government (assessed as High-importance).

Politics: American Mid‑importance

	Politics portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by American politics task force (assessed as Top-importance).

Ukraine Democracy Defense Lend-Lease Act of 2022

I recently created the Ukraine Democracy Defense Lend-Lease Act of 2022. Any help would be appreciated. Thriley (talk) 04:27, 18 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Lack of Republican colour, in House seats

Why isn't the Republican background color showing, in the 117th Congress' House history box? GoodDay (talk) 01:59, 28 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean the chart in the "Party Summary" section? Those charts are meant to show which party has the majority and which other parties caucus with them. You'll notice in the Senate's box, the Republicans are colored before January 20, and the Democrats and Independents are both colored blue after January 20, because the majority caucus changed on that day. The House chart is blue all the way through because Democrats have controlled the House throughout the entire 117th Congress, as well as at the end of the 116th Congress. OutlawRun (talk) 02:22, 28 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I see. No prob :) GoodDay (talk) 03:34, 28 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Titles need to be changed across several articles

Per our Manual of Style, section headings need to be unique, so the multitude of "Senate" and "House of Representative" headings must change. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 10:25, 20 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

House Map needs updating

Anybody know how to update the House map? It's now 220-213 for Democrats, since Nov 14, 2022. GoodDay (talk) 00:21, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sinema Should be listed as a independent

I see that this page to be edited to say that Kyrsten Sinema is caucusing with the Democrats, but in her announcement she said that she won't be attending Democrat caucus meetings like the other 2 independent senators who are now in the Senate. Therefore she should be labeled as an independent, not as someone that is caucusing with them. Let'srun (talk) 16:05, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Done, thank you very much. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 17:50, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sinema in membership changes section

Do we add Sinema at 117th United States Congress#Changes in membership section? It was already done by someone, until I hidden it pending a discussion, because technically, party switches aren't changes in membership. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 17:53, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Oh I did that, based on past precedent (see Arlen Specter in the 111th Congress, Paul Mitchell and Justin Amash in the 116th Congress, etc.). 2601:645:8500:17B:692D:D209:3F52:5F7A (talk) 05:55, 14 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Oh ok alright, I'm sorry. I'll add her per past precedence, though I'm personally not convinced that they should be added. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 07:34, 14 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sinema appears to still be caucusing with the Democrats (e.g. she still holds her committee positions, she likely voted in the Dem caucus leadership elections for the 118th Congress), so as far as her membership in Congress goes, it doesn't appear that anything at all has changed. Her personal party registration with Arizona for the 2024 elections has no direct bearing on her service in Congress. In past cases, the legislator actually changed who they caucused with, I believe. I would recommend reverting this. TwigsCogito (talk) 23:26, 14 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I read somewhere that she will cease of attend any Democratic caucus meetings, she already attended few of them. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 12:23, 15 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sinema Party Switch Timing.

So I know that Kyrsten Sinema announced her party switch on December 9, but her party affiliation actually hasn't been updated on senate.gov yet. Does this mean she is still technically a registered Democrat in the Senate? If so, I think we should hold off on showing it on the page until it actually officially changes. On this vote taken today, Sinema is still listed as a Democrat.

As an example of what the page makes it seem like happened, here is a vote on April 29, 2009 that still lists Arlen Specter as a Republican, and here is a vote on April 20, 2009 that lists him as a Democrat.

As a more recent example, here is a vote on December 10, 2020 that lists Paul Mitchell as a Republican, and here is a vote on December 16, 2020 that lists him as an Independent.

Both of these latter votes took place on the day they announced their switch, and they show them having officially switched, but Sinema apparently still has not.

Should we go by when she announced her switch, or should we go by when her registration officially changes? I think for the "major events" section, we could list the day she changed her registration, but for the "party summary" section, we should go by official registration. What do y'all think? OutlawRun (talk) 22:45, 22 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@OutlawRun: Thanks for digging into it. It looks like you are correct. She is still a Democrat in the Senate, as that party identification is separate from your local state party identification. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 08:58, 24 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@CX Zoom So if Sinema, for instance, does not change her party affiliation until the beginning of the 118th Congress, would we change the page to reflect that? This page is about the 117th Congress, not Sinema herself, so I think that the page should reflect party registration in the Senate. The page for the 109th Congress never mentions Joe Lieberman leaving the Democratic Party, even though his page lists his party switch as taking place in "2006," which is during the 109th Congress. Senate.gov also lists Lieberman as a Democrat until the beginning of the 110th Congress, after he won re-election as an Independent. Thoughts? I personally believe that the page should not show Sinema as having switched parties unless she has changed her official registration in the U.S. Senate. OutlawRun (talk) 16:43, 24 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@OutlawRun I made some changes. Would you like to see them? Special:Diff/1129357036. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 00:16, 25 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I've updated the party composition map, but there's still a couple things that need to be tidied up. If she does indeed change her Senate registration at the start of the 118th Congress, we should move that part of the footnote to the "start of the next congress" row, and list her as an independent there. OutlawRun (talk) 04:18, 25 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Observed Bias

Generally speaking, the article for each Congress does not seem to provide subjective commentary on the productivity of that Congress. I note two exceptions: the article for the 115th Congress--the last Republican trifecta, which is noted to have been unproductive--and the article for the 117th Congress--the last Democratic trifecta, which is noted to have been productive. This seems like an obvious political bias at play. LordofChaos55 (talk) 20:02, 7 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like it's an error of omission on the other Congresses to me. Wikipedia is a work in progress. You can WP:BEBOLD and expand the others. – Muboshgu (talk) 20:07, 7 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Why is Nancy Pelosi still showing up as House Speaker?

House Speaker is still showing as Nancy Pelosi instead of Mike Johnson of Republican Party. Please update this change VinayBilla (talk) 16:13, 12 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Because this is an article about the 117th Congress, the congressional term that ran January 3, 2021 – January 3, 2023. AntiDionysius (talk) 16:15, 12 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

United States House of Representatives and 118th United States Congress show Johnson as speaker. AntiDionysius (talk) 16:16, 12 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]