Charles Mahtesian

Among the hurdles in the House to authorizing U.S. strikes on Syria: Many lawmakers say that back home there's very little support for military action.

Recent polling confirms those accounts. According to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Tuesday, just 19 percent of those surveyed supported intervention in Syria, compared ...

It's hard to imagine a rookie senator who's better equipped to confront a complicated issue like Syria than Massachusetts Democrat Ed Markey.

Before winning a Senate special election in June, Markey served for nearly four decades in the House, and he's a recognized policy heavyweight in the halls of Congress. ...

Another day, another political dynasty.

This latest one is taking shape in Wyoming, where Liz Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, announced Tuesday that she's challenging incumbent Sen. Mike Enzi in the 2014 Republican primary.

Her announcement is a fitting prelude to the next four years, when ...

San Diego voters knew that Bob Filner could act like a jerk on occasion. But in 2012, they elected him mayor anyway.

Now, though, Filner's behavior may have crossed a threshold that few politicians can recover from.

The Democrat is facing numerous accusations of sexual harassment, and growing ...

The U.S. Census Bureau released its list of the nation's 100 fastest-growing counties Thursday, and here's what we learned: They're mainly clustered in the South and West, and their rapid population gains are fueled by a wide variety of economic and cultural factors including the energy boom, military realignment, ...

Viewed out of context, recent Washington revelations paint a disturbing portrait of the vast amount of electronic data the nation's spy agencies are collecting. But the blockbuster news stories belie a simple truth: Personal privacy rights have been under sustained assault since well before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. And ...

New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg wasn't a regular on the Sunday talk shows. He never ran for president or cut much of a national profile.

Still, the liberal Democrat, New Jersey's longest-serving senator, left his mark as a legislator on a wide range of issues, from transportation to public health ...

President Obama's second trip to New Jersey to meet with Republican Gov. Chris Christie post-Superstorm Sandy was accompanied Tuesday with a familiar flurry of speculation.

The first time, last fall, Christie's gracious welcome of the president raised questions about whether it might affect Obama's re-election just weeks later.

This time, ...

In the end, it wasn't even that close.

Republican Mark Sanford, the former South Carolina governor whose political career seemed to end in ignominy in 2010, capped a remarkable political comeback Tuesday by defeating Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch, 54 percent to 45 percent.

His victory in a Charleston-area ...

Sen. Judd Gregg, a New Hampshire Republican who was asked to join President Obama's Cabinet as Commerce secretary, has declined the invitation. He announced his decision at a press co...