Max Baucus

WASHINGTON -- A Senate plan to expand the background-check requirement for gun purchases faced a narrowing path to success Tuesday, as advocates for stricter laws sought to scrape together the last few votes they need from among a dwindling number of...

 While Max Baucus and Jon Tester are both Democrats, both U.S. senators and both Montana country boys, last month’s hurried vote to fund nearly $1 trillion of current federal spending shows just how different these Big Sky legislators really are....

WASHINGTON — In a lopsided vote, the Senate launched a debate Thursday over the most significant gun legislation in more than a decade, setting up a contest that could last weeks between reinvigorated advocates for stricter laws and conservatives...

WASHINGTON -- The chairmen of key congressional committees said their bipartisan efforts to overhaul the tax code are on track and still very doable despite the partisan gridlock on Capitol Hill on many issues. "Tax reform can't be about politics,"...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama pressed Congress on Thursday not to forget the heartbreak of the Newtown elementary school massacre and "get squishy" on tightened gun laws, though some lawmakers in his own Democratic Party remain a tough...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate approved legislation Wednesday to lock in $85 billion in widely decried spending cuts aimed at restraining soaring federal deficits — and to avoid a government shutdown just a week away. President Barack Obama's...

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — U.S. Sen. Max Baucus has been here before. Back during the Clinton era, the Democrat faced a choice: support an assault weapons ban urged by a president from his own party and risk angering constituents who cherish their gun...

WASHINGTON — With little time left to strike a deal to head off Friday’s arrival of the sequester, conservative advocacy groups are urging congressional Republicans to stand firm and let the $85 billion in automatic cuts to this year’s...

WASHINGTON -- A Senate committee is expected to vote to confirm Jacob J. Lew's nomination to be Treasury secretary on Tuesday, setting the stage for his confirmation by the full Senate in the coming days. Lew, the former White House chief of staff,...

The new Acting Administrator of USDA's Risk Management Agency (RMA) learned the importance of crop insurance - for both farmers and consumers - at an early age. As a child growing up in rural Utah, Brandon Willis' family raised sheep. But his father...

WASHINGTON -- President Obama won re-election in part by beating up on his opponent for receiving big corporate payouts in exchange for dubious work and for socking away money in tax havens such as the Cayman Islands. So it's a bit, well, rich that...

WASHINGTON -- Treasury Secretary nominee Jacob J. Lew on Wednesday faced tough questions from Republican senators about his tenure as a top executive at Citigroup Inc. in the years leading up to the financial crisis. Lew was criticized for not knowing...