Congress
Biden ‘praying’ Trump will continue to aid California wildfire response
President Joe Biden said Friday he’s “praying” the incoming Trump administration will continue to aid California’s wildfire response, warning that the state faces a lengthy recovery even after it gets the devastating fires under control.
“We’ve done really well on it, and I’m praying they continue to focus,” Biden told reporters during a briefing on the federal government’s emergency efforts. “We’re briefing the opposition — not the opposition, the incoming administration — on what they’re going to have to do.”
While Biden’s team has briefed the Trump transition team on the wildfire response, the president declined to speculate on how much the recovery could ultimately cost, saying officials are assessing the damage and drawing up estimates.
“We want to make sure we get a cost estimate that is real, that is thought through,” he said.
Trump has blamed California Gov. Gavin Newsom for the disaster in a series of social media posts, suggesting he’d failed to properly prepare the state for such a catastrophe. Newsom has dismissed the criticism, accusing Trump of playing politics even as firefighters are in the midst of a dayslong struggle to contain the blaze.
Biden’s Oval Office meeting was the second briefing in as many days on the wildfires, which have generated historic levels of damage across swathes of southern California.
On Thursday, Biden pledged that the federal government would shoulder all of the cost of the disaster response for the next 180 days, including paying for debris removal, temporary shelters and first responder salaries.
“This is not going to be over even when the fires are out,” he said. “We’re going to be around.”
Congress
Jeffries warns against arresting New Jersey Democrats involved in immigration protest
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries warned Republicans and federal law enforcement against sanctioning or arresting three Democratic New Jersey lawmakers who were involved in a tense immigration protest.
“They’ll find out. They’ll find out. They’ll find out,” Jeffries said Tuesday when asked how he’d respond if officials arrested or sanctioned Democratic Reps. Rob Menendez, LaMonica McIver and Bonnie Watson Coleman. “That’s a red line. It’s a red line, it’s very clear.”
The three Democrats were inspecting the new ICE facility, which is set to play a major role in White House Northeast immigration operations, and were involved in a scrum when federal agents arrested Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who authorities said was trespassing.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson on Saturday said arrests for the three lawmakers were “on the table.” Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) has proposed stripping them of committee assignments.
“First of all, I think that the so-called homeland security spokesperson is a joke,” Jeffries said. “It’s a joke. They know better than to go down that road. And it’s been made loudly and abundantly clear to the Trump administration. We’re not going to be intimidated by their tactics to try to force principled opposition from not standing up to their extremism.”
Congress
Senate Republicans move toward vote on California emissions waiver
Senate Republicans could vote as soon as next week on a controversial proposal to nix federal waivers allowing California to set its own emissions standards — potentially bringing a simmering debate over the chamber’s rules to a head.
“We’re going to pass it next week,” Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) told reporters after a closed-door conference lunch where they discussed the proposal at length.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune hasn’t yet committed to bringing the measure to the floor next week, and a key sponsor, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, cautioned that the schedule isn’t “100 percent decided” yet. The Senate has until the first week of June to act under the Congressional Review Act.
But Republicans are feeling increasingly confident that they will have the votes to undo California’s longstanding waivers after leaving a House-passed disapproval resolution in a weeks-long limbo. Republicans can lose three of their own and still let Vice President JD Vance break a tie.
“We’re going to do it,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said after Tuesday’s lunch, adding that he was confident because “I can tell the way people feel.” Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), a leadership adviser, also said that he was “very confident” that Republicans will have the votes to nix the California waiver.
The controversy is less about the policy merits and more about a Government Accountability Office ruling that said the waiver isn’t actually subject to CRA review. Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough backed up that finding, and the prospect of overruling her has spooked a handful of GOP senators wary of weakening Senate rules in a way that would come back to bite them when Democrats are back in control of Congress.
Republicans are hopeful they’ll have support from at least one member Democrats have targeted — former GOP Leader Mitch McConnell — but they haven’t locked in the votes yet and are actively working to sway the undecideds.
One of them, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, said she continued to have “some procedural issues” and would meet Tuesday with Capito to work through them. Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said in a brief interview she is discussing the issue with colleagues and not yet ready to make a decision.
“There is obviously apprehension if we go sideways on our own rules and so I’m having a lot of good conversations,” Murkowski said.
Democrats have sounded the alarm over a possible vote, warning GOP leaders in a letter earlier this month that it would be akin to deploying the “nuclear option” against the Senate’s rules. But Republicans are trying to minimize any blowback by focusing on the GAO ruling, not the parliamentarian.
“It’s about whether GAO is able to … veto a process that has never been questioned before,” Capito said. “I see it as us asserting our prerogative.”
Congress
GOP proposal would boot three N.J. Democrats from House committees
Rep. Buddy Carter is proposing to strip three New Jersey lawmakers of their House committee assignments after they participated last week in a protest at a Newark migrant detention facility.
The Georgia Republican introduced a one-page resolution that would remove Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman from the Appropriations Committee, Rep. Rob Menendez from the Energy and Commerce Committee and Rep. LaMonica McIver from committees on Homeland Security and Small Business.
“This behavior constitutes an assault on our brave ICE agents and undermines the rule of law. The three members involved in this stunt do not deserve to sit on committees alongside serious lawmakers,” Carter said in a statement.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson already suggested the lawmakers could be arrested — something House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called a “red line” on Tuesday. Spokespeople for the three New Jersey Democrats did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Removing the lawmakers from their committees would be a less drastic step but still mark a major escalation in cross-party tensions. Republicans removed three Democrats from committees last Congress for various infractions; that followed Democrats booting Reps. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) from their panels when they held the majority in the Congress before that.
While Republicans say the lawmakers wrongfully forced their way into the detention facility, resulting in a chaotic scrum that was caught on video, Democrats argue they were legally entitled to inspect the facility as members of Congress. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka was arrested at the protest and later released.
Carter last week launched a Senate campaign against Democratic incumbent Jon Ossoff. It’s not clear if the resolution will hit the House floor; a spokesperson for Speaker Mike Johnson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Carter could seek to bring the measure up under a fast-track process that would bypass House leadership and committees.
Fox News first reported the bill’s introduction.
Hailey Fuchs contributed to this report.
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