Congress

As affordability concerns mount, Hill Republicans are struggling to act

Published

11 months ago

December 8, 2025

Republicans want to put the economy at the center of their midterm message as they seek to protect their majorities in Congress. But as cost-of-living concerns mount across the political spectrum, the GOP is struggling to act decisively to address them.

Already top Republicans acknowledge they haven’t done enough to sell the “one big, beautiful bill,” the party-line centerpiece of their economic agenda they enacted over the summer. Now internal divisions and the need for bipartisan support in the Senate are threatening any attempt to follow up on it.

The GOP is struggling to coalesce behind a health care plan that would prevent Obamacare premium hikes set to kick in next month and efforts to rein in President Donald Trump’s tariffs have run aground in the House. Meanwhile, the administration’s proposal to distribute $2,000 rebate checks has gotten a lukewarm response on Capitol Hill and the fate of other smaller bills to address things like housing prices and student debt have sparked intraparty sparring.

“The cost of living is a legitimate issue — I think it was one of the main reasons President Trump was elected. I think it’s still an issue,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said in an interview, urging Republicans to pursue another party-line bill before the midterms in response.

While many in the GOP — including Trump — continue to lay blame for their economic problems with former President Joe Biden, there are clear warning signs for Republicans. Forty-six percent of respondents in a recent POLITICO Poll said the cost of living is the worst they can remember it being.

That includes 37 percent of those who voted for Trump in 2024, and about a quarter of Trump voters say he is either fully or mainly responsible for the current state of the economy.

Yet top GOP leaders in Congress are keeping expectations low for major new economic legislation. Instead, they are betting on having an easier time addressing affordability questions next month, when new programs enacted as part of the megabill start impacting voters — like no taxes on some tips and overtime income.

“We haven’t probably messaged as effectively as we should,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in an interview, when asked about the party’s economic case. “I think we’ll have lots of opportunities now that we’re getting into an election year to talk about the things we’ve done and how they are going to lead to things being more affordable for the American people, probably starting with tax relief next year.”

Speaker Mike Johnson also argued voters have not fully felt the impact of the megabill “because it takes a while for it to be implemented.” But he predicted that by mid-2026, “there’s going to be boats rising in the economy, this is going to be a very different situation before we go into the election cycle.”

“Republicans are dialed in like a laser, with laser focus on the cost of living and affordability,” he added, while forecasting more to come: “They are going to see this agenda going forward — our affordability agenda.”

But there are reasons to doubt an impending turnaround. Some of these same leaders argued this summer, as they strained to pass the megabill, that Americans would feel the economic benefits in a big way by late fall. That never materialized, with Republicans instead bogged down in a monthslong fight over releasing files related to Jeffrey Epstein and a lengthy government shutdown. Trump himself has recently taken to calling the emphasis on affordability a “hoax” perpetrated by Democrats.

Democrats are gearing up to hammer the GOP on the issue, and some of them are hearing some familiar echoes in the promises of a rapid turnaround just around the corner. Democrats said much the same thing after their party passed their own major party-line bills as inflation rose under Biden.

“They are in a bubble from Donald Trump on down,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters last week. “Donald Trump says there’s no affordability crisis — what kind of world is he living in?”

Kennedy isn’t the only one talking up the idea of doing a second party-line bill using the budget reconciliation process to overcome a Democratic filibuster in the Senate. The Republican Study Committee, a large bloc of House conservatives, is pushing such a bill aimed at addressing affordability and other issues, and Senate Budget Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is vowing to plow forward in laying the groundwork for another reconciliation measure.

But Johnson and Thune have treaded lightly on the prospects for second such bill, which faces uphill odds with the GOP divided on the policy particulars and the midterms drawing closer by the day. Instead attention is being drawn to smaller-bore efforts.

Tony Fabrizio, a top Trump pollster, also urged members of the RSC last week to tackle high prices for prescription drugs and housing — warning members in a closed-door meeting that affordability concerns were a key reason a House special election in Tennessee was so close.

But even a push to attach a bipartisan housing package to the annual defense policy bill sparked an intraparty turf war, pitting Senate Banking Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the panel’s ranking member, against House Financial Services Chair French Hill (R-Ark.).

Scott said in an interview last week the housing measure is “a great sign that we are looking for ways to address the challenges that we see in real America” and that passing it now would “put lawmakers “on the same page as President Trump and the White House.”

But Hill, who plans to advance a separate housing package through his committee later this month, told senators that parts of the Senate bill are unacceptable to most House Republicans and need to be left out of the Pentagon bill.

Rep. Mike Flood (R-Neb.), who is spearheading the House package, said last week he would be “amenable to something that has provisions the House wants and the Senate wants.” Thune, asked if the Senate housing provision would get in the defense bill, crossed his fingers.

But no agreement could be reached over the weekend, and the House released defense bill text Sunday night that did not include the housing provisions.

Other lawmakers are itching to show that the party is addressing other affordability concerns, even if those efforts face an uncertain path to becoming law.

House GOP leaders, for instance, are trying to move long-delayed permitting reform legislation over the floor in the coming weeks, arguing that reducing red tape for energy and other projects would lower the cost of living. And Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) told reporters Thursday there could soon be a bipartisan effort to force a bill capping student loan interest at 2 percent to the House floor.

“That’s a hint for next week,” she said, when asked if she or a colleague would pursue a discharge petition aimed at sidestepping House GOP leaders who have opposed other forms of student loan relief.

House and Senate Republicans, meanwhile, are having a furious behind-the-scenes debate about how to show they are trying to address health care costs ahead of the end-of-year expiration of Obamacare subsidies used by more than 20 million Americans.

Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) acknowledged “there’s a lot more to do” on affordability beyond this year’s megabill on health care and more: “Obviously, medical inflation is very high.”

But GOP leaders in both chambers are scrambling to figure out what pieces of a health care overhaul to put forward — and getting an earful from competing factions within their own party. It’s possible Senate Republicans this week won’t put a consensus GOP alternative up for a vote alongside the three-year extension Democrats want.

A plethora of rank-and-file options are under development, with Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) backing a two-year extension of the subsidies with new eligibility restrictions, Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) wanting to provide more flexibility for health savings accounts and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) proposing to make it easier to deduct medical expenses on their income taxes.

“It’s a disaster,” Hawley said. “Health care, as it currently is, is too expensive for everybody.”

Katherine Hapgood and Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.

Congress

‘Look what I brought home for you’: GOP embraces earmark revival as Election Day looms

Published

3 hours ago

October 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

With voters sour on Republican governance, GOP candidates in the most competitive House and Senate races are reaching for a time-tested message that has grown out of fashion in their party: bringing home the federal bacon.

A Blue Light News analysis of the dozen closest congressional races for Republican incumbents revealed that most are highlighting earmark success stories in the final days before voters head to the polls.

The ability to secure federal funding for pet projects back home — something many in the GOP have spent years trying to curtail — has given those candidates a positive talking point as President Donald Trump’s flagging approval ratings and widespread voter dissatisfaction over issues like the Iran war, high gas prices and tariffs weigh on other messages.

“When the president’s job approval is in the 30s, it is helpful for Republican candidates to be able to create some distance from the president. It’s challenging to do that without encouraging the president’s wrath,” Republican pollster Whit Ayres said in an interview. “But focusing on bringing home the bacon might be one very good way to do it without antagonizing the president.”

In Michigan, Rep. Tom Barrett is out with an ad about a $750,000 earmark for youth mentoring; in New York, Rep. Mike Lawler is talking about how he secured $120 million for local projects.

Rep. Rob Bresnahan of Pennsylvania is telling voters he has “brought back more than $110 million to our community,” including millions in earmarks, while Rep. David Valadao has run ads showcasing $500 million in earmarks for water projects in California’s Central Valley.

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, a GOP moderate seeking to project independence from Trump in a competitive contest, has repeatedly touted the exact count of the earmarks she has locked in over the last half-decade for her home state of Maine.

The sum: 672 projects totaling $1.5 billion, “from Madawaska to Kittery, from Eastport to Rumford,” as she said in her opening statement earlier this month in her first debate against Democrat Troy Jackson. This past week, Collins has peppered voters with county-specific text messages detailing how much she’s secured for each area.

There are countless other examples of earmark campaigning among vulnerable Republican incumbents, though many conservatives remain reluctant to associate themselves with the practice. It still carries a stigma of corruption after two Republicans were sent to prison on related bribery charges in the mid-2000s, paving the way for the GOP to do away with earmarks in 2011.

That left GOP candidates unable to play up the clearest spoils of incumbency ahead of the “blue wave” of 2018. But Democrats revived them in 2021 with new safeguards, and now Republicans are taking advantage as they navigate another tough midterm cycle.

“That word ‘earmark’ can carry some negative baggage, especially among the old fiscal conservatives,” nonpartisan pollster Mike Noble said in an interview. “But when you describe that same expenditure as funding for a local water system, highway, public safety project — voters evaluate that differently.”

Recognizing the advantages, Republicans opted to keep earmarks around under unified party leadership in 2025, resulting in the enactment of almost $16 billion worth of earmarks this year. For those who still consider earmarks anathema to the GOP’s values of fiscal restraint, it’s causing complications on the trail.

Republican Rep. Bill Huizenga of Michigan is fielding criticism for not requesting any earmarks for his district. While he airs ads calling himself “tight with a buck,” his opponents are telling voters that lawmakers like Huizenga are increasing their net worth “while turning down community project funding.”

Some recent polling shows Huizenga trailing his Democratic challenger, state Sen. Sean McCann, by 1 percentage point.

McCann said in an interview he will “go to bat” for earmarks if he defeats Huizenga: “That’s an expectation that people have when you want to represent them — that you do the things that are important and secure crucial investments for the district.”

Huizenga defended himself in a statement, saying “earmarks have a long history of waste and abuse by politicians looking to enrich themselves in office.”

Huizenga noted that he has “helped secure hundreds of millions in federal investments for Southwest Michigan without requesting a single earmark,” including a $400 million grant last year for a nuclear power plant and $51 million for a housing redevelopment project.

He isn’t the only Republican incumbent in a tight race who has foregone earmarks. Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan, who is facing a competitive challenge from former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola, refused to request cash for district-specific projects as part of the annual government funding process. Instead, he points to his support for efforts made possible through the 2021 infrastructure law signed by then-President Joe Biden, as well as other legislation and grants the Trump administration doles out for local efforts.

Trump officials have traveled to Alaska in recent weeks to stand alongside Sullivan in announcing the delivery of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding for the state, including $38 million in energy grants and $250 million for rail infrastructure.

Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), who appears to be in a dead heat with his Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton, also didn’t ask for any federal funding this year. But he is getting flak for seeking a $4.2 million earmark in 2024 to finance improvements to increase water to a wildlife refuge that borders his ranch.

Spokespeople for the Sullivan and Marshall campaigns did not respond to requests for comment.

Whether voters perceive earmark requests as positive or negative likely depends heavily on how a candidate frames the talking point, Noble said, acknowledging that incumbents rarely use the word in campaign ads or town hall speeches and instead speak broadly about how they “deliver” for their district.

“Voters, at the end of the day — it’s about direct benefit. What are they getting out of this deal? That’s one of the powers of incumbency. They have that ability to say, ‘Hey, look what I brought home for you,’” he said. “But again, what else are they going to talk about?”

Congress

GOP lawmakers start contemplating a diminished Donald Trump

Published

3 hours ago

October 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Donald Trump will have his ironclad grip on congressional Republicans tested like never before if the party loses one or both chambers Tuesday.

Trump already appears to be gearing up to blame others if Democrats retake the House or the Senate. But within the halls of the Capitol, GOP lawmakers are contemplating whether the president’s ability to bend them to his whims will diminish if the party is swept out of power.

“We’ll see,” Rep. Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.) said when asked how much influence the president will have after the midterms, before praising Trump’s record and willingness to hit the campaign trail on behalf of Republican candidates.

Granted anonymity to speak frankly before the election, many of the 15 GOP lawmakers interviewed about the future of Trump’s influence said they believe his days of dictating outcomes with Truth Social posts and late-night phone calls could be coming to an end.

“It’s not like his persuasion is growing,” said a Republican senator. “Political capital is earned and lost the same way.”

One House Republican cast the potential fight for minority leader as an early test of Trump’s sway: “One would say that the president would have quite a bit of influence on who leads in the minority. But one would also say that he has less influence because some people would blame him” for a loss.

The member added: “That will be an interesting dynamic after Election Day. No one expects Trump to take any blame after the election. So if he doesn’t, who does?”

It’s hardly the first time Republicans have predicted that Trump’s days of dominating the GOP were on the wane. A broad swath of the party turned on him after the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021, only to come back to the fold as he regained power.

Despite plenty of kvetching publicly and privately about some of Trump’s policies and personnel picks since being sworn in for a second term, most in the party have fallen in line — and few expect him to change his high-pressure style during his final two years in office.

Many Republicans anticipate he’ll weigh in on 2028 congressional primaries while also playing a loud role in determining the party’s presidential nominee — as well as weighing in on day-to-day machinations on Capitol Hill.

“He’s going to continue fully engaged … regardless of the outcome,” Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso said in an interview, praising Trump’s “very creative” and “thoughtful” ideas on domestic and foreign affairs.

Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) said in an interview “it’ll be challenging” for Trump if Republicans lose the House but said his influence would persist: “He still has the bully pulpit, and I say that in a good way.”

White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said Trump “is the unequivocal leader, best messenger, and unmatched motivator for the Republican Party, and he is committed to maintaining Republican majorities in Congress.”

But unlike Trump’s last midterm drubbing, in 2018, a decisive loss this time would officially usher him into lame-duck status. While House members will all be campaigning for reelection with Trump still in office — and face the prospect of a presidential primary threat — only about a third of currently sitting Republican senators are in the same boat.

The rest will stand for reelection in 2030 and 2032, after Trump is out of office.

One GOP senator pointed to the party’s stable of vulnerable candidates and incumbents who have broken with Trump over the Iran conflict as a sign of things to come if Republicans take a battering Tuesday.

“He’s in trouble,” the senator said.

Another House Republican added that if Democrats win only a small majority in that chamber, Trump will “still carry a lot of sway.” But a “shellacking,” the lawmaker said, will have Trump “looking for our help more than we’d be looking for his.”

“If it’s truly a big blue wave, every committee will investigate the hell out of him the next two years and R’s will quickly start looking at [2028] and beyond,” the member added in a text message.

Trump will face a series of quick tests after the midterms. The House is expected to vote on whether to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth soon after members return. Some Republicans said if voters deliver a wipeout for their party amid widespread dissatisfaction with the Iran war, several of their colleagues could end up supporting the measure.

The president could also face headwinds if he tries to muscle a final party-line spending bill through Congress before Democrats take charge in either chamber and kill any chance for partisan legislation like the election bill known as the SAVE America Act. Republicans have already struggled to move these measures, and GOP lawmakers who just lost reelection could have little reason to rally behind them on their way out the door.

House Republicans are in particular keeping their eyes on whether Trump will weigh in on the GOP leadership races that will play out in the week after the election.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan of Ohio are expected to clash if Republicans are electing a minority leader. But many GOP lawmakers think Speaker Mike Johnson could have a shot at hanging on as the chamber’s top Republican if Trump wants it.

Jordan and Scalise are also both close Trump allies, and most Republicans are skeptical he would choose between the two.

“The president of the United States certainly has influence,” Jordan said in an interview. “I think he’ll continue to have influence.”

In the Senate, conservatives are privately questioning whether Trump will blame Senate Majority Leader John Thune if Republicans lose control of the chamber.

Trump sowed doubt about Thune’s leadership over the summer as he stewed about the Senate’s failure to act on the elections bill. But he more recently publicly defended Thune during the party’s midterm convention in September.

Many Republican senators expect Thune to keep his job even if Trump moves against him. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) has aired frustrations about how the Senate is run but has repeatedly said he won’t run for leader and has declined to criticize Thune. Some GOP senators have privately speculated about whether Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has leadership ambitions, but few think he’s actually interested.

Trump turning on Thune “certainly would not” cause Thune to lose his leadership race, said one of the GOP senators, adding that it was “absolutely the case” that Thune would keep his job even if Trump balks.

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who is in line to run the Senate GOP campaign arm in the next Congress, said of Thune, “I don’t think there’s an insurgent movement that’s against him.”

Barrasso, the No. 2 Republican, is backing Thune as well. Asked about the speculation that Trump could turn on Thune, Barrasso said, “He’s going to get reelected as leader.”

Congress

Bill Foster cools on challenging Maxine Waters

Published

13 hours ago

October 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Rep. Bill Foster is leaning against challenging Rep. Maxine Waters for the top Democratic spot on the House Financial Services Committee, according to two people with knowledge of his thinking who were granted anonymity to discuss private deliberations.

The Illinois Democrat has been considering a bid to topple Waters but has not made a final decision, the people said. The timeline for him doing so is unclear.

Democratic Rep. Sean Casten, also from Illinois, told Waters earlier this month that he plans to run against her, likely teeing up a major fight over the Financial Services role, which the California Democrat has held since 2013.

Most Financial Services Democrats on the committee have publicly backed Waters for the role.

Foster, who was first elected in 2008, previously discussed with Waters ways to reform the committee that would give subcommittee chairs more power to shape the panel’s agenda. A physicist with a doctorate, Foster is currently the top Democrat on a House Financial Services Financial Institutions Subcommittee.

A Foster spokesperson declined to comment.