Chris Haulmark introduced us to the basic structure and composition of the US federal government.

Transcription:

[Video Description: Chris Haulmark is standing in the kitchen wearing blue short-sleeved and button-up shirt.]

Hello everyone!

I am Chris Haulmark, running for U.S. House of Representatives for Kansas’s Third Congressional District.

Someone asked: “What is Congress?”

Whew!

Today's vlog answers that question for us all!

Here's the concept of USA's governing body...

Basically, our US Government, as established at the federal level, is composed of three separate and co-equal branches.

One branch is called the Executive (Presidential) Branch.

Another branch is the Legislative (Congressional) Branch.

The third branch is the Judicial (Supreme Court) Branch.

Congress is the Legislative Branch, composed of two chambers.

What are those two chambers?

One chamber is the House of Representatives.

The other chamber is the Senate.

The elected people who work in the Senate are titled "Senator."

The elected people who work in House of Representatives are titled as either "Representative" or "Congressman."

Actually, the "Congressman" title can refer to both chambers, either a Representative or a Senator.

Got it?

I am running for election to the House of Representatives.

The legislative purpose of Congress is to pass bills into laws at the federal level and coin money for federal funds.

There are currently 435 Representatives in Congress' House of Representatives.

There are 100 Senators in the Congressional Senate.

Got it?

How is the number of 435 Representatives determined?

That number is based on the Census population counted across America.

For example, Kansas has four equal-population Congressional districts, represented by four members of the US House of Representatives.

For Senate, there are ALWAYS two Senators from each state.

Our Third Congressional District is one of Kansas's four Congressional districts.

These Congressional districts are called: First, Second, Third, and Fourth.

It's specifically representing the Third Congressional District for which I am running for office as the elected Representative.

Got it?

Basically, the House of Representative chamber members are elected biannually.

All Representatives are elected biannually.

Senators are elected every 6 years.

Yet not all Senators are elected in the same year.

Senate elections are rotated across America.

For Kansas, our two Senate terms expire in 2020 and 2022.

This means that those who wish to run for the next Senate seat in Congress can challenge the incumbent in 2020.

For 2000...uhh..10, wait... no, 20- that year is Senate election.

Let me pause here to gather my thoughts.... *recomposing*

Basically, House of Representatives was established to “REPRESENT the common people.”

Senate was supposed to be composed of members with intellectual capabilities in politics from experience as either lawyers or skilled in political study.

That was the expectation back when our nation was founded.

Got it?

So back then, the members of the House of Representatives would depart from their district and head to office in Washington DC.

There was not much daily communication back then- even written letters took a great amount of time to reach a Congressperson.

The people of the district relied on the press- newspapers to monitor what was happening in Congress.

In a way, people would close their eyes, and vote for their representatives, hoping for the best that the elected representative would faithfully represent their interests.

Now, in today's day and age, we have Internet, radio, television, newspapers that rapidly distribute information to us.

Everyone now can keep up with our representatives and keep monitoring them on what they do in the people's interests.

So..that is the basic summary of what Congress was designed to accomplish.

I am running for Kansas's Third Congressional District to represent the people in next year's election!

Vote for me!

We the People ARE the Government!

[Video fades into a black background with a logo of a cartoonish Chris Haulmark signing “Believe” with white text of “Yes, We Can Believe” below the logo. There is the text of www.HaulmarkForCongress.com at the bottom]

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