Congressional lawmakers from both parties are signaling that despite President Donald Trump’s assertion that he will control the money gained from selling Venezuelan oil turned over to the United States, they’ll want to check the books.

Democrats said they were appalled by the Trump administration’s plans to sell Venezuelan oil “indefinitely” and control the revenue, suggesting it would amount to a takeover of the country’s fledgling oil industry.

“It’s an insane plan,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) told Blue Light News coming out of a briefing Wednesday with Trump administration officials on Venezuela. “They are proposing to steal Venezuela’s oil at gunpoint forever and use that leverage to run the country.”

Republicans expressed tepid support for the plan, and though they projected confidence in Energy Secretary Chris Wright’s ability to manage the funds, they demanded some oversight over how the money would be spent.

“Chris Wright is brilliant when it comes to energy,” said Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) after the briefing. “Nobody’s going to do a better job than him in terms of making sure that that oil is properly marketed. Congress will have an oversight role. He’ll [Wright] be up here testifying in front of us exactly how they’re doing it.”

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) said the U.S. controlling oil revenues would provide important “leverage” over Venezuela’s government, given the fragile state of its economy.

“As long as we can control how they spend it, that could be a really important part of rebuilding the country and democracy in the region,” Cramer said after the briefing.

But he expressed some hesitation around selling the oil in the United States that would compete with crude produced in the United States. Both Cramer and Hoeven represent a state that is one of the largest oil producers in the United States but has recently seen its output plateau amid weak prices. The type of oil it produces wouldn’t compete directly with the lower-quality grades coming from Venezuela, but could be pushed out at the margins.

“As long as it’s not sold at a discount I probably don’t have a big problem with it. As long as they aren’t going to use that dirty, cheap oil to flood the market,” Cramer said.

Speaker Mike Johnson in an interview earlier Wednesday said he didn’t have the full details of the administration’s plans to secure oil fields and output in Venezuela, but he said he thought the plan “makes sense.”

And he said he did not expect the Trump administration would spend taxpayer dollars for the effort.

“I do not expect that they would,” he said.

Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.

A conservative rebellion against earmarks is threatening to tank a key procedural vote Wednesday afternoon on a three-bill spending package as House GOP leaders scramble to avoid another intraparty meltdown on the chamber floor.

House leaders plan to strip out an earmark from Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, which could have major repercussions in a legislative body already plagued by partisan tensions and mistrust.

The community project funding at the center of hard-liners’ ire is $1 million for an organization in Minneapolis focused on “wraparound services” that include job training, addiction recovery and housing support. The organization describes itself as “youth-led East African recovery organization.”

The scrutiny over the earmark, which was also backed by Minnesota’s Senate delegation, comes as federal funding for childcare centers in Minnesota’s large Somali community is under fire by the Trump administration due to allegations of fraud. Some Republicans are claiming that this organization is also fraudulent.

“Earmarks are the currency of corruption, and they’re coming back in full force in these products,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) told reporters Wednesday morning about the spending package heading to the House floor later in the day. “And I just don’t support it.”

Following a GOP revolt inside the House Rules Committee late Tuesday night, House Republican leaders landed on a compromise to kill the earmark, according to four people granted anonymity to speak candidly about a private plan.

Leadership also agreed to split up the three-bill package that would fund Energy-Water, Interior-Environment and Commerce-Justice-Science when it comes to the floor for a vote.

That would give some Republicans the ability to vote against the CJS measure while backing the other two. The procedural gambit would then allow all three bills to be repackaged for the Senate to consider as one bundle.

House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.), however, warned Wednesday the intense focus on one single earmark is a liability for carefully negotiated full-year funding bills, ahead of the Jan. 30 deadline to avoid a shutdown.

“I can’t afford to have a million dollar project jeopardize a $184 billion package of bills,” Cole told reporters. “If we have an individual project that can pose a political problem, I’ve had these in the past from our side before, where we had to tell a member, ‘look, there might be a way to do this, but our advice to you is to withdraw this.’”

Cole said the onus was on Democrats to convince Omar to abandon the request, or risk tanking the whole bipartisan spending package.

“It is under discussion and it will be resolved. That’s the way things go with these community projects. If there’s a difficulty, if there’s a problem, we try to work it out. Or it comes out,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democratic appropriator in the House, said in an interview Wednesday afternoon.

The underlying language of the bill will not change, but the earmark is expected to be functionally neutered by making a change to report language that accompanies the bill text.

“It’s too late in the process,” for changes to funding levels or the bill text itself, Cole said.

Omar’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Earmarks were banned under Republican leadership for more than a decade before being revived and rebranded by Democrats as “community project funding” in 2021. The new process has tighter restrictions for eligibility than the old one, which has calmed angst among most Republicans about frivolous hyperlocal projects.

Lawmakers from both parties request money for initiatives in their districts, but the vast number of earmark requests each appropriations season comes from House Republicans.

Roy and Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris (R-Md.) each stood up in Wednesday morning’s closed door House GOP Conference meeting to voice their frustration about the earmarks in the CJS funding bill and the lack of opportunity for rank-and-file members to offer amendments to the bill, according to four people in the room granted anonymity to speak candidly.

With these changes, and if Republicans have perfect attendance Wednesday, House GOP leaders – for now – believe they will have enough votes to narrowly clear the at-risk procedural hurdle on the floor late this afternoon.

This also would keep Republicans on track for final passage Thursday given strong support from Democrats, according to five people granted anonymity to share internal party dynamics.

A bipartisan Senate group is nearing an agreement to revive lapsed Obamacare subsidies, with a key negotiator saying the group could release draft legislation early next week.

The deal being discussed by the senators would reestablish the enhanced tax credits that expired Jan. 1 for two years, with new restrictions including minimum premium payments and income caps. The developing agreement would pair that with new cost-sharing reduction measures and expanding access to health savings accounts.

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), a key negotiator, said Wednesday that legislative text could be finalized “realistically, probably Monday.”

Two other people granted anonymity to disclose private negotiations characterized the Senate group as close to an agreement. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) added she was “encouraged” by the group’s progress and agreed an agreement is close.

Even if the fluctuating group of roughly a dozen lawmakers is able to come to a consensus, there’s no guarantee it will get the votes to pass. Senators have been keeping their leadership in the loop on the talks and will meet this week with House lawmakers to update them on their progress.

The group is eyeing an income restriction for the subsidies that would exclude those earning more than about 700 percent of the federal poverty level, as well as a $5 a month minimum premium. They would also slap steep new fines on any insurance companies that add so-called phantom enrollees, meaning people who are signed up for subsidized coverage without realizing it.

Under the discussions, according to Moreno, Americans who receive the Obamacare subsidies could choose to have the money go instead into a pre-funded health savings account during the second year of the extension.

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who has been involved in some of the group’s discussions, cautioned that there were “still some major stumbling blocks.”

Moreno, for instance, did not say how the group was going to resolve concerns that the tax credits could be used to subsidize coverage of abortions. But he said the framework of the agreement, as he had described it, does not change current abortion policy and that the abortion discussion remained a “peripheral” issue.

“We’re trying to resolve how we ensure compliance with the spirit” of the Hyde Amendment, Moreno said, referring to the longstanding appropriations restriction preventing taxpayer funding of abortions.