Congress
‘It’s going to be a circus’: Inside Mike Johnson’s grueling week’
Welcome to another grueling week in the House.
A growing list of deadlines is bearing down on Speaker Mike Johnson as House Republicans try to push through an extension of an expiring government spy power Tuesday, a budget plan to end the Department of Homeland Security shutdown Wednesday and a farm bill many members say is key to midterm victories Thursday.
Each legislative undertaking is deeply complicated and rife with intraparty warfare — from a MAHA revolt over the farm bill to a rebellion from ultraconservatives who blocked Johnson’s last bid to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and could do so again.
Johnson is also facing a rebellion from his rank-and-file all the way up to some of his senior members over his plan to move ahead with the budget resolution the Senate advanced last week that would only address immigration enforcement funding. Hard-liners insist they need a comprehensive follow-up to last summer’s tax and spending megabill to help them stave off massive losses in the November elections.
Hanging over it all are the events of this past weekend’s White House Correspondents Dinner, where a gunman fired shots near a ballroom where the president, vice president, the Speaker of the House and Cabinet officials in the line of presidential succession were all dining.
It’s not clear yet how it will affect negotiations around extending Section 702 or passing an immigration funding bill by April 30 and June 1, respectively, but lawmakers late Saturday night and the weekend said it underscored the need to quickly reopen DHS, which houses the Secret Service.
The speaker will need nearly every Republican to advance all three of these critical items that hold enormous political and policy consequences; none are guaranteed to survive the week.
“It’s going to be a circus,” one Republican said.
“The week from hell,” another added.
GOP leaders are already losing precious floor time Tuesday when King Charles III, who is in town for a state visit at the White House, will address a joint session, forcing leaders to cut off House votes by noon, according to two people with knowledge of the plans. Republican leaders are now in further talks surrounding security protocols for the royal visit, which could result in additional delays for the House GOP early in the week.
This week will also mark 60 days since the start of the conflict with Iran, and some Republicans are growing anxious over the economic uncertainty it has wrought, especially concerning energy prices. This is the time, some GOP lawmakers have warned, they could break rank and vote with Democrats on legislation to rein in Trump’s military authority overseas, though, many Republicans are pointing to the ceasefire — though tenuous — as a reason to continue opposing war powers resolutions for the time being.
And in another blow, Johnson is down one GOP vote as Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-N.J.) has been away from Capitol Hill since March 5, with little more explanation than his team saying he’s dealing with a personal health matter.
AfterPOLITICO reported that New Jersey House Republicans have called and texted Kean, only to get “radio silence,” Johnson released a statement late last week saying he spoke “by phone” with Kean last Thursday. He added: “He is attending to a personal health matter and expects to be back to 100% very soon.”
Perhaps the biggest political landmine for Johnson will be the budget resolution needed to allow Republicans to write and pass a filibuster-skirting reconciliation bill funding immigration enforcement activities under DHS. Trump is demanding such a bill on his desk in a little over a month, at which point the House is expected to finally pass a bipartisan measure funding all other DHS operations and end the record-setting shutdown.
But Rep. Warren Davidson of Ohio and other Republicans have warned the budget resolution will fail on the floor if Johnson pushes ahead with the narrow Senate plan rather than a more expansive policy package. Republican leadership needs to convince these members to go along with the Senate budget plan for immigration funding now — by promising to move another partisan package of other GOP priorities later.
“We will not get a third reconciliation bill,” Davidson said in a statement. “We need to use reconciliation 2.0 to deliver the full agenda the American people sent us to accomplish. The train is leaving the station, and we need to load it up.”
Leaders plan to discuss the matter in closed-door meetings throughout the week, conference-wide and in smaller groups. The speaker will also try to put some more meat on the bones of general ideas Republicans could pursue in a later party-line package during the weekly House GOP conference meeting Tuesday, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter.
Changes to the blueprint, Johnson and his allies caution, would punt the measure back to the Senate and almost certainly cause Republicans to miss Trump’s deadline. The White House and Homeland Secretary Secretary Markwayne Mullin are warning the administration is running out of money to pay a swath of DHS employees, increasing the urgency to move quickly.
Some senior House Republicans believe the shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner could spur some GOP lawmakers to put aside their various gripes and support the budget resolution now, recognizing national security risks without a fully operational DHS, according to three people granted anonymity to speak candidly.
“I think Congress should pass DHS funding — it needs to be everything,” said Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) in an interview Sunday. “I think it’s going to be a much higher priority.”
Many Republicans said the events of Saturday night should prompt Democrats to end the impasse over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement agenda and just vote to reopen all agency operations without conditions. Democratic leaders were signaling Sunday their calculus hadn’t changed, however, underscoring the need for Republicans to pursue a party-line approach to immigration funding if other department functions stand a chance of coming back online in the coming weeks.
The Secret Service is still getting paid through emergency funding, lowering that pressure point for now.
The Saturday shooting also has had the adverse effect of ginning up enthusiasm among hard-liners to expand the pending budget resolution to allow construction of the White House ballroom to proceed despite legal challenges, with members arguing increased political violence necessitates a secure place for elected officials to gather safely.
“Any consideration of DHS reconciliation instructions this week & beyond should provide for construction of a secure ballroom on White House grounds,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) posted on social media.
Budget Chair Jodey Arrington, Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan and Rep. August Pfluger — who helms the Republican Study Committee of 189 Republicans — spent last week agitating for broadening out the upcoming party-line package beyond just stalled immigration funding. They all stood up during a closed-door conference meeting last week to make their case, according to four people granted anonymity to share details of the discussion.
Then there’s legislation to renew section 702 in time to both meet the expiration deadline and give the Senate time to clear it for Trump’s signature.
Johnson unveiled a reworked, three-year extension late last week but he has to sell it to a group of House Freedom Caucus members who want guardrails on the government’s warrantless surveillance practices. Many hard-liners are still not backing down from demands that leadership agree to advance a ban on a central bank digital currency as part of a reauthorization.
And finally there’s the farm bill. Activists with the Make America Healthy Again movement — a coalition that helped President Donald Trump win the presidency in 2024 — say they’ve been betrayed by the GOP over a provision in the legislation that would shield pesticide makers from lawsuits.
Some Republican lawmakers are so angry about the leadership-sanctioned plan that they’re now working with a group of House Democrats to strip out the provision or kill the whole bill, according to four people involved in the conversations.
Farm state Republicans, who are aligned with the powerful pesticide industry, don’t think the pushback will be successful; they argue the farm bill simply clarifies labeling rules and national standards for popular pesticides and herbicides used by the agriculture sector. But threats from the opposition could present a major headache and draw attention to larger party dysfunction.
Several conservatives are privately warning they could take down the farm bill and Johnson’s DHS funding plans if he tries to steamroll them on a Section 702 extension that relies on some bipartisan support.
“They are all connected,” one House Republican warned of the trio of bills.
DALLAS — Top Republicans are scrambling to shore up their Senate map in Alaska, Texas and other red states — and are privately acknowledging they could very well lose in Georgia and North Carolina.
As GOP lawmakers, candidates and party officials gather for their midterm convention in Dallas, their conversations reveal how the party is thinking about their chances in the battle for the upper chamber, less than two months from Election Day.
THE TOP TARGETS
Senate Majority Leader John Thune ticked through a handful of battleground states he’s confident about in a closed-door lunch on Thursday — he’s particularly focused on Alaska, Maine and Michigan.
The meeting was hosted by the Senate Leadership Fund, the Senate’s top GOP super PAC, and was used to rally Republican donors, according to two people in the room who were granted anonymity to share details of the private discussions.
Republicans are bullish about their chances of holding their seat in Maine after the Democratic side devolved into chaos over the summer, when Graham Plater suspended his campaign following an allegation of sexual assault, which he denies. Now, a largely untested, progressive Troy Jackson is looking to unseat five-term GOP Sen. Susan Collins.
In Alaska, Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan is locked in a tight race with Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola, but they are optimistic about his prospects in the state that President Donald Trump won by double digits in 2024.
Michigan is another opportunity: Republicans have been leaning into attacks warning of the takeover of socialism this cycle. They are spending heavily to boost Republican Mike Rogers, who is running against progressive Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic nominee who’s backed by the Democratic Socialists of America and who has become a boogeyman for Republicans.
TEXAS IS FOR TRUMP
Senior Republicans also indicated they would continue to leave shoring up imperiled Ken Paxton in Texas largely to Trump, given that he helped unseat Sen. John Cornyn by backing Paxton in the primary.
Trump said in his convention speech Wednesday night that he would help boost Paxton. His affiliated super PAC, MAGA Inc. has already started spending in Texas to shore up the Republican. Senate Leadership Fund, which publicly backed Cornyn during the GOP primary, has not announced any spending in Texas.
THE PROBLEM CHILDREN
Georgia, where Republican Rep. Mike Collins is facing rising Democratic star Sen. Jon Ossoff, didn’t come up in the SLF meeting with Thune, according to the people. One of the people who was in the room later told Blue Light News that North Carolina would be “tough.”
Republicans have been increasingly worried about Collins falling behind in Georgia and Michael Whatley, a former RNC chair, in North Carolina. Public polling shows both candidates trailing their Democratic opponents. They are also both being outraised on the candidate level, but Republicans have a substantial overall fundraising advantage — buoyed in large part by Trump’s MAGA Inc. super PAC.
Sen. Rick Scott, a former NRSC chair, said in an interview at the convention this week that if the Georgia GOP gubernatorial nominee Rick Jackson “runs an unbelievable race in Georgia, he gives Mike Collins an opportunity possibly to beat Ossoff.” He also painted North Carolina as “probably one of the hardest ones,” given that Whatley is facing popular former Gov. Roy Cooper for an open seat.
Democrats need to hold onto all of their seats — including defending the open seat in Michigan — while also flipping four GOP-held ones to gain control of the upper chamber. Republicans are also eager to boost John Sununu in New Hampshire after his primary win this week, as they work to beat back serious challenges in Ohio and Iowa.
Collins and Whatley both welcomed additional financial support coming into the final stretch of their races in interviews during the convention.
“Listen, we’ll always make a case for more money,” Collins told Blue Light News he left a closed-door meeting with the NRSC, SLF head Alex Latcham and top Senate Republicans on Wednesday.
House GOP leaders will put legislation on the floor next week designed to compel tech companies to pay for the infrastructure associated with energy-sucking data centers, according to the offices of Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise.
It comes as vulnerable House Republicans have been pleading with leadership to take some sort of action before the midterms to address the rising power prices linked to the data center boom, necessary to meet the growing artificial intelligence demand.
Many of these Republicans, who were hammered on the issue during the summer recess by fed-up constituents, have been calling for consideration specifically of the so-called Ratepayer Protection Act, which passed unanimously out of the House Energy and Commerce Committee in July.
Leaders, however, have been weighing whether or not to move forward with the measure on the floor, with Scalise’s office claiming late last month that some of his members had problems with the proposal that still needed to be worked out.
That Scalise and others have now caved is a sign of the political pressure the party is feeling on the matter as Election Day draws near. This is one the last bills lawmakers will vote on before leaving town for a six week recess before the midterms.
According to four people with knowledge of next week’s agenda, the bill will come to the floor under an expedited floor procedure that only requires a two-thirds majority of those present and voting to secure passage. That means Republican leaders won’t have to worry about the legislation overcoming a procedural, party-line rule that GOP lawmakers could tank for any number of reasons, including outstanding concerns over the Ratepayer Protection Act.
One person granted anonymity to describe internal deliberations said the bill that passed out of Energy and Commerce has not been revised, meaning there could still be lingering opposition.
Many Republicans, in recent weeks, have continued to argue that data center construction is a local matter that ought not be regulated at the national level.
“I’m a true believer in local control,” House Majority Whip Tom Emmer said in an interview Thursday along the sidelines of the GOP midterm convention in Dallas this week.
The news of the planned vote was first reported by Axios.
Lawmakers next week will also vote on the so-called AM Radio in Every Vehicle Act, legislation that would force automakers to include AM radio capabilities in all new vehicles, according to two people granted anonymity to describe private scheduling.
The measure has wide bipartisan appeal but has been criticized as too onerous by some electric vehicle manufacturers who say their car designs cannot currently accommodate AM radio functionality.
DALLAS — House Majority Whip Tom Emmer has a message for the multiple House committee chairs seeking an exception from Republicans’ term limit rule: He’s “not a fan” of waivers, and you should have a good reason for seeking one.
“I’ve never liked waivers,” Emmer said in an interview at the GOP midterm convention. “I think it’s one of the things that helped the Republican majority stay more connected to Main Street.”
As the No. 3 Republican leader, Emmer does not control the waivers, which are in the hands of the 35-member GOP Steering Committee and the larger House Republican Conference.
But he has an influential voice as a top leader and Steering Committee member, and he said there are only “limited circumstances where it might make sense” to allow Republicans to lead a committee for more than three terms.
Several chairs, including Agriculture’s G.T. Thompson (R-Pa.) and Armed Services’ Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), have applied for waivers to continue in their posts next Congress. The three-term limit includes time served leading panels in both the majority and minority.
Emmer said members should be free to make their case to continue on but, he said, the bar should be high.
“I love our members who have been around for years and have institutional knowledge,” Emmer said. “But unlike Democrats, we have turnover on the Republican side.”
He added, “Every two election cycles or so, you have close to 50 percent turnover in the Republican House. You don’t get that in the Senate. You get people who are serving as octogenarians, and they’re showing no signs of leaving.”
One GOP chair who is planning on handing off his gavel is Judiciary’s Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a MAGA favorite who could start the new Congress without a perch of power — leading to rampant speculation about what he has planned.
“I heard the president saylast week in the Rose Garden that we need to keep Jim right where he is, which was interesting because it’s like — OK, but I think he’s termed out,” Emmer said.
Many believe that Jordan — as well as Emmer and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise — could seek to run for the top leadership post now held by Speaker Mike Johnson if Republicans lose their majority in November. Emmer reiterated that he believes that won’t happen and that the GOP leadership will stay the same.
“It’s going to be Mike Johnson, Steve Scalise. I hope I’m rehired, and I expect Lisa McClain will be rehired,” he said, referring to the No. 4 GOP leader from Michigan.
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