In 1948, Harry S Truman successfully won the White House by labeling Congress the “Do Nothing Congress.” He charged Congress with only passing 900 bills, earning them the electoral condemnation of a majority of American voters in that presidential election year.

Now comes the 118th Congress, which has only passed 27 pieces of substantive legislation since January 2023—the lowest number of bills passed in a century. Their talk has been voluminous, but their actions are minuscule. Certain quarters refer to this Congress as the “New Do Nothing Congress,” a label among the more polite versions we have heard.

The laundry list of do nothing is arduously long, but here are a few highlights of legislative and executive branch dysfunction in Washington:

• Insurrections disrupted the peaceful transition of power for the first time in American history following a presidential election in which the incumbent president claimed the election was “rigged” when, in fact, more than 60 courts of law determined there was no such evidence. One hundred forty-seven members of the Senate and House voted to deny certification of the election on the same evening that a pro-losing candidate mob attacked the United States Capitol, killing several and injuring scores of Capitol police officers.

• Congress never failed to pass a budget from 1975 to 1998. In the last 15 years, Congress has not passed a budget for seven of those fiscal years. The President of the United States has not submitted a budget proposal that was not considered “dead on arrival” at that same time.

• The full faith and credit of the federal government has been seriously threatened ten times since 1981 by federal government shutdowns due to the failure of Democrats and Republicans alike to fund our agencies. Federal government shutdowns occurred in 1981, 1982, 1984, 1986, 1990, 1995, 1996, 2013, 2018, and 2019.

• Federal deficit spending in Fiscal Year 2017, when Republican Donald Trump became President, was $665.7 billion. At the end of Fiscal Year 2024, under Democrat Joe Biden’s watch, it is projected to be $1.5 trillion.

• President Trump added $7.8 trillion to the federal debt during his time in office, rising from $19.95 trillion in Fiscal Year 2017 to $27.75 trillion at the end of Fiscal Year 2020, primarily by legislative action and executive fiat. President Biden has added another $6.25 trillion over three years of his administration.

• Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives inartfully vacated Kevin McCarthy's speakership because the Speaker had the audacity to work with Democrats to head off another looming federal shutdown.

• Ukrainian security aid in that country’s war against Vladimir Putin’s Russia has been held hostage by House and Senate Republicans trying to tie the critically needed defense funds to increased border security with Mexico as part of the budget supplemental.

• Bi-partisan immigration reform to help secure the Mexico-USA border from a massive influx of illegal immigration was derailed at the urging of 2024 Republican presidential nominee, former President Donald Trump, who prefers to use the issue as a continuing political cudgel against his rival, incumbent President Joe Biden.

• President Bill Clinton was impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives in 1998, charged with perjury and obstruction of justice. The United States Senate voted not to convict the 42nd president. Donald Trump was impeached by the U.S. House in 2019 for abuse of power and obstruction of justice. The United States Senate voted not to convict the 45th president. In 2021, President Trump was impeached for the second time for incitement of insurrection. Again, the United States Senate voted not to convict President Trump.

• House Republicans are hearing Potential Articles of Impeachment against President Biden without evidence of “crimes and misdemeanors.” The FBI has arrested the Republicans’ star witness against the President for lying about circumstances related to the current House impeachment process.

• House Republicans impeached Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Myorkas because they disagreed with how the secretary is executing the Biden Administration’s border security policy. No “crimes or misdemeanors” have been cited by the GOP members, which is the constitutional standard for impeachment.

• Roe v. Wade, which has stood for 50 years protecting women’s reproductive rights, was overturned by the Supreme Court of the United States, which had three conservative members seated by Republican President Donald Trump. Congress has failed to take action to correct flaws in the law cited by the Supreme Court for its reasons in overturning the landmark decision.

• Congressional legislative districts were gerrymandered by deep-red state governments across the nation, only to be overturned by courts of law, which found the new district lines resulting from the 2022 Census governing reapportionment lacking fairness.

• In recent months, reports have implicated a Supreme Court Associate Justice of questionably ethical behavior in accepting paid vacations and other unreported gifts from non-family members who may or may not have interests before the Court. A “voluntary” code of ethics was adopted in response to news revelations of the gifts. A legally binding code of ethics was not legislated by Congress nor adopted by the Court, significantly reducing the public’s trust in our judicial system.

While these are only a representative sample of our Congress’s do-nothingness, with a sometimes complicit executive and judicial brand of government, it is easy to see that Washington is a cesspool operated chaotically and with little priority on the needs of our citizenry.

It is time for more than just two-party rule in America.