Congressman Mike Conaway and Congressman Francisco "Quico" Canseco will bring their "American Energy and Jobs Tour" to the Permian Basin Thursday, May 24, starting with a tour of a drilling rig and hydraulic fracturing site in Upton County.

The bulk of El Paso County voters live in the 16th Congressional District, but more than 100,000 are now in the 23rd Congressional District, which stretches from the eastern parts of our county all the way to San Antonio.

DISSIDENT CHEN CAN APPLY TO STUDY ABROAD ? The New York Times' Michael Wines reports this morning from Beijing: CHEN CALLS CONGRESS ? Seung Min Kim reports for the hometown paper: "In a dramatic moment, Chen Guangcheng, the blind Chinese dissident whose circumstances are growing into a diplomatic dilemma for the Obama administration, called into a congressional hearing to talk about his situation. Lawmakers on Thursday had called an emergency hearing into Chen's ordeal. The two-hour hearing was abruptly interrupted as Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) announced that he had made telephone contact with Chen, and Chen ? talking on speakerphone ? spoke in Chinese from his hospital room in Beijing. In his roughly eight-minute phone call, Chen made a public appeal to meet with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, adding that he also wants to 'thank her face-to-face.' 'He wants to come to the U.S. for some time of rest,' activist Bob Fu, who translated Chen's remarks for the hearing room, said. 'He has not had any rest in the past ten years already.' Chen also said he was concerned about the safety of his mother and brother, Fu said. --

Quarterly fundraising reports for Congressional candidates were due to the FEC April 15.

Here's how area members of Congress voted on major issues in the week ending April 27.

HOUSE

FINANCIAL DEREGULATION: Voting 312 for and 111 against, the House on April 25 passed a bill (HR 3336) to exempt derivatives transactions by small banks, credit unions, nonprofit-cooperative lenders and farm-credit institutions from transparency and collateral requirements set by the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial-regulation law.