Congress

Ways and Means chair warns he ‘won’t support’ next reconciliation bill without tax provisions

Published

3 months ago

June 9, 2026

House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith says he won’t get behind the GOP’s next budget reconciliation bill if tax provisions aren’t included.

“I won’t support it unless tax is in it,” the Missouri Republican said in an interview Tuesday morning — a potential warning to GOP leaders who can’t afford defections given their razor-thin majority.

As House Republicans prepare to follow last summer’s tax and spending megabill with passage of a party-line immigration enforcement package as soon as Tuesday night, conversations have turned to what the GOP would put in a third filibuster-skirting reconciliation measure.

House GOP leaders have been meeting with different factions of their conference in recent days and weeks, from moderates to hard-line conservatives, on what they might support. There are talks about cracking down on fraud in health care and other social programs and adding some federal energy permitting provisions.

Leaders may try to revive a number of provisions that were ultimately not included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, such as one that would adjust a property’s purchase point for inflation. Smith said he has a list of priorities that he would “be happy to release” once Speaker Mike Johnson confirms that taxes will be part of the next reconciliation package.

But Smith said Johnson has not yet communicated to him whether his committee would have buy-in.

“I have not been notified whether tax is part of reconciliation yet,” Smith said. “I’d love for the speaker to say tax is going to be a part of it.”

A number of House Republicans — including those in leadership — are voicing concerns that including tax provisions would allow Democrats in the Senate to force floor votes on politically fraught health care amendments, putting vulnerable Republican senators in a difficult spot just before the midterms.

Senate Finance Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), who will need to thread this needle on his side of the Capitol on behalf of his members, said in an interview Monday that he didn’t know what discussions were happening in the House.

He said there is “a lot of tax law that would be helpful to do” in a third reconciliation bill, and that “there are a number of reforms of the health care entitlement system — particularly the health care entitlement system — that I think would be very helpful and would not reduce health care access or reduce access to any of our safety net programs.”

Yet Crapo waved off a question about whether some looking for cost savings in Medicare could create difficult votes for senators in tough races.

“These are always battles,” he said. “I think the American people are completely ready to see us deal with waste, fraud and abuse in all government spending.”

Congress

Softball game is a go

Published

44 minutes ago

September 3, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Speaker Mike Johnson’s decision to cut the House schedule short won’t affect one late-September congressional spectacle: Multiple members said Thursday that the Congressional Women’s Softball Game will proceed as planned on Sept. 23.

The event, which pits a team of women members against an all-media team, is a fundraiser for the benefit Young Survival Coalition, a group supporting young women diagnosed with breast cancer.

“It’s the only day we can play,” said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), a captain of the member team. “We’re playing in Audi Field, and yeah, members are coming back.”

Congress

Leon Black defies House Oversight Committee, sues Congress amid Epstein investigation

Published

59 minutes ago

September 3, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Leon Black, a billionaire investor with ties to the late convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, declined to show up for his scheduled transcribed interview Thursday with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee — choosing instead to file a lawsuit calling the panel’s subpoenas for his participation “invalid.”

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, argues that the subpoenas served to Black compelling his testimony and demanding he turn over certain non-disclosure agreements go beyond the committee’s “delegated authority in seeking private information that bears no legitimate connection to [the committee’s] legislative purpose.”

Black’s escalation is likely to trigger a corresponding dramatic response from the Oversight Committee, where Republicans are still endeavoring to show they are taking their Epstein investigation seriously more than a year since its launch.

House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) said that Black’s deposition will move forward with an empty chair this morning and that he will talk to his members about next steps.

“It’s a shame Leon Black is hiding behind litigation rather than provide answers to the American people,” Comer said in a statement. “Our investigation is examining how the federal government for decades failed survivors of Jeffery Epstein and [co-conspirator] Ghislaine Maxwell’s crimes and how Mr. Epstein sought to curry favor with influential individuals to avoid scrutiny. Mr. Black’s testimony is crucial to our investigation as he was one of Mr. Epstein’s fee paying clients and has several nondisclosure agreements.”

Democrats are also eager to send a strong message that those who defy the panel now won’t be spared if the party retakes control of the House in 2027.

“By refusing to testify today, Leon Black is now defying two Congressional subpoenas. Black gave Jeffrey Epstein over $180 million over six years. He funded Epstein’s abuse and trafficking of women. Multiple women have also accused Black of sexual assault,” said Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the Oversight Committee’s top Democrat who is poised to take the gavel if Republicans lose their majority in the midterms.

“His connections to Epstein and his unwillingness to cooperate are unacceptable,” Garcia continued. “We must hold him in contempt immediately.”

Black, who founded Apollo Global Management, appeared in a closed door session with the Oversight Committee earlier this summer to discuss his association with Epstein. As a result of that meeting, Black was slapped with a subpoena to produce certain non-disclosure agreements he signed with women tied to Epstein and told to come back for a second grilling.

The panel has been counting on the NDAs to shed further light on how Epstein and his network were able to sexually exploit women and girls and evade liability for decades.

Black has since produced one NDA between himself and a woman with whom he had an affair and to whom he paid $9.5 million. Comer called that insufficient, demanding Black turn over the others and threatening to pursue contempt proceedings if Black did not cooperate.

Black’s attorneys contend the subpoenas “would … expose women who value their privacy, who have no known or public connection to Epstein, who bargained for confidentiality and have refused to release it, and who have no ability to protect themselves and their privacy before the Committee.”

Susan Estrich, one of Black’s lawyers, in a statement accused the Oversight Committee of going on “a fishing expedition that oversteps its authority and completely ignores its responsibility. This is no longer about finding the truth about Epstein. It is about trying to destroy Mr. Black. We were left with no choice but to file this lawsuit in response to an abuse of Congressional power.”

Estrich added that Black continues to deny his knowledge of Epstein’s misconduct and “feels terrible for Epstein’s victims.”

Congress

House Republicans set to cut pre-election session short

Published

1 hour ago

September 3, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Republican leaders are set to announce Thursday that the final two weeks of the pre-election House session are canceled, according to two people granted anonymity to describe the decision ahead of a public announcement.

That means members are set to depart Washington no later than Sept. 17 and not return until mid-November. The House will recovene for one additional week of business after next week’s Labor Day break.

Leaders would recall the House for those canceled weeks if the Senate moves forward with a party-line budget reconciliation package in the meantime, the people said.

The decision comes as candidates agitate to get back on the campaign trail and as GOP leaders continue to struggle to maintain control of the House floor. Earlier this week, a procedural measure setting up votes on several Republican bills was poised to fail until two Democrats voted in favor, rescuing Speaker Mike Johnson’s agenda for the week.