It's a simple holiday wish: having your family together. For many immigrant children, having mom or dad at home is all they want. In the first six months of 2011, 46,000 parents of children were torn away from their families and deported. Now, children are writing to Congress to ask for action to stop these deportations. 

The current state of the U.S. Congress—marked by gridlock and bad legislation—is attributable, in large part, to understaffing and a lack of bipartisan expertise, according to a new report from the New America Foundation.  Representatives and senators are barraged with an overwhelming amount of information and the methods they use to handle that flood of data is antiquated the report says.

We're asking our blog readers to tell us how Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid impact their lives. We've been hearing from working families all over the country that Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security are essential lifelines that we just can’t cut. 

The upcoming lame-duck fight is urgent—we need stories from every single one of you to make sure Congress knows that these aren't just programs, they're your lives.

Share your Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid story. 

The way President Obama and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) have set aside partisan politics to “work in singular and cooperative fashion to relieve the pain and suffering of those whose lives have been turned upside down” by Hurricane Sandy should be an example to elected officials everywhere, including members of Congress, says Sean McGarvey, president of the AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department (BCTD).

President Obama and Governor Christie do not see the victims of this tragedy as 'Democrats' or 'Republicans,' they simply see them as 'Americans' who are in dire need of the assistance and generosity of our government and its people.

Nearly nine out of 10 Americans say they disapprove of the U.S. Congress, and for good reason, too, says House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). The current Congress is the least productive in history. But, says Pelosi in a column in USA Today:

The source of congressional inaction today is a Republican congressional leadership that cannot, or will not, govern; that will not put aside partisanship to work together.

There are doubts about the institutions responsible for the rule of law in Honduras and the government’s protection of human rights, acknowledged the U.S. State Department in an Aug. 8 report. Unfortunately, the State Department says virtually nothing about the widespread impunity regarding violations of freedom of association or the threats and violence aimed at labor activists.

When wages rise, workers and communities benefit. So imagine how improved our national economy would be if the wages of nearly 30 million workers got a boost?

If Congress acted to raise the federal minimum wage to $9.80 by July 1, 2014, some 28 million workers would see a pay increase, according to the Economic Policy Institute’s (EPI) latest report on the minimum wage. Further, those workers would receive nearly $40 billion in additional wages over the phase-in period.

During an across the phase-in period of the minimum-wage increase, the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) would increase by roughly $25 billion, resulting in the creation of approximately 100,000 net new jobs, according to EPI.

What is it with Republicans in Congress and outsourcing jobs?

We know Mitt Romney loves to outsource jobs (not to mention raise taxes on the middle class).

Now, House Republicans are using bait-and-switch tactics to lure the public into believing that by outsourcing Amtrak jobs, they will reduce government waste. In reality, notes the AFL-CIO Transportation Trades Department (TTD):

these lawmakers will hurt transportation safety while taking your tax dollars and subsidizing corporations.

New data showing U.S. median net worth plunged by nearly 40 percent following the not-so-Great Recession is getting big media play today. Pundits are shocked—which gated communities do they live in again?—but the Federal Reserve figures showing individuals’ net worth dropped from $126,400 in 2008 to $77,300 in 2010 doesn’t come as a surprise to most Americans. They’ve been struggling to find jobs in an economy where there still are more than three job seekers for ever one available.

Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are holding hostage the America Dream.

The Census was good enough for Thomas Jefferson. But apparently not so for today’s House Republicans. Yesterday, they passed, by 232 to 190, a measure to cut the American Community Survey, conducted annually as part of the U.S. Census.