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Capitol agenda: Dems’ big wins could prolong the shutdown

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It’s officially the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, and about a dozen Democrats are itching to find a way out.

But after Democrats’ sweeping victories Tuesday night, their colleagues are waking up this morning and wondering: Are we really going to cave now?

The big wins in Virginia, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and elsewhere stand to complicate efforts to reopen the government. It’s hard to see most Democrats wanting to temper their momentum immediately after witnessing a massive voter backlash to President Donald Trump and Republicans.

“Tonight’s results are a repudiation of the Trump agenda,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement that called it “a good night for Democrats and our fight to lower costs, improve healthcare, and reach a better future for American families.”

The Democrats searching for an exit to the shutdown had their say during a two-hour-plus caucus lunch Tuesday that ended with grim faces and tight lips. Expect voices like Sen. Chris Murphy’s to carry weight Wednesday.

“Maybe the take is that (a) people think Trump is out of control; and (b) people like Dems when we’re taking a stand and fighting for what we believe in — as we have been for the last month,” Murphy (D-Conn.) posted on X Tuesday night.

Now it’s Republicans’ turn to have a long awkward meal. GOP senators are headed to the White House Wednesday morning for a breakfast meeting with Trump, who is unlikely to be in a jovial mood given the GOP’s electoral drubbing.

Senators can expect the president to rekindle his push to kill the filibuster as two senior Republicans granted anonymity to speak candidly say he is getting increasingly unhappy as the shutdown drags on.

He hinted as much in a late-night Truth Social post: ‘“TRUMP WASN’T ON THE BALLOT, AND SHUTDOWN, WERE THE TWO REASONS THAT REPUBLICANS LOST ELECTIONS TONIGHT,’ according to Pollsters.”

But GOP senators made clear Tuesday he won’t have a very receptive audience if he makes a hard sell on going “nuclear,” with many favoring the 60-vote status quo.

“Simply going to make the Senate a mini version of the House is not what any of us really want to do,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) said.

What else we’re watching:   

— Congress gets more info on strikes: The White House is starting to provide Congress more information about U.S. maritime strikes as GOP senators threaten to side with Democrats to restrict Trump’s war powers. Senate Armed Services ranking member Jack Reed (D-R.I.) said Tuesday that last week’s bipartisan public admonishment of the administration for not providing the legal rationale for the strikes on alleged drug traffickers prompted DOD officials to provide lawmakers “some new material to read.” He doesn’t think it covered most unanswered questions.

— Boozman, Booker meet with crypto czar: Senate Agriculture Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) plan to speak Wednesday afternoon with White House crypto and AI czar David Sacks as lawmakers look to finalize the committee’s portion of a sweeping crypto market structure bill.

Connor O’Brien, Jordain Carney, Katherine Tully-McManus, Jasper Goodman, Meredith Lee Hill, Nicholas Wu and Kelly Garrity contributed to this report.

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Congress

Congress ends shutdown, approves $1.2T in funding — and sets up DHS cliff

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Congress approved a spending package Tuesday afternoon that secures funding for the vast majority of federal agencies through September, ending the second government shutdown in the span of four months.

But what’s left unfinished — funding for the Department of Homeland Security — will be a doozy, with partisan tensions over President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda threatening another lapse for the embattled department that also includes TSA, FEMA and other crucial agencies.

The package the House passed in a bipartisan 217-214 vote Tuesday afternoon only funds DHS through next week. Democrats are refusing to support months of additional cash until Republicans agree to rein in the actions of ICE and Border Patrol agents following the fatal shootings last month of two U.S. citizens in Minnesota.

If Republicans don’t concede to enacting significant new mandates for DHS by the new Feb. 13 deadline, the department many Democrats have called “rogue” will face another funding lapse or short-term patch.

“We have a list that we want done, and we aren’t settling for half-measures,” Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), the No. 3 party leader, told reporters Tuesday. He warned that if Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Speaker Mike Johnson “don’t want to come to the table and negotiate real reform, then they’re going to have to explain to the American public why they’re shutting down agencies.”

Trump is expected to swiftly sign the legislation, ending the partial government shutdown that began early Saturday morning after the Senate passed the altered package, punting the measure back to the House.

By advancing the trillion-dollar package, Congress has approved more than 95 percent of the government funding it approves each year to run federal agencies, after clearing full funding for some agencies in November and another slate in January.

Under the legislation that now awaits the president’s signature, the Pentagon and all remaining domestic agencies besides DHS will get new funding levels through the end of the fiscal year, which started with the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.

“We finalized true, bipartisan, bicameral bills to fully fund our government in a member driven, district focused way,” House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said on the House floor. “Funding the government is not an optional exercise. It’s the most basic duty we have in Congress.”

Only 21 Democrats voted yes on passage, highlighting the challenge leaders face over the next 10 days in negotiating new immigration enforcement rules that can attract enough Democratic support for funding DHS into the fall.

“I refuse to send another cent to Stephen Miller or Kristi Noem,” Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) said this week. “They are undermining our Constitution, and the department they run is murdering American citizens in the streets.”

To ensure Democratic leaders on both sides of the Capitol are aligned heading into negotiations with Republicans over changes to DHS immigration operations, Jeffries is set to meet Tuesday afternoon with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

House Democrats are demanding that Jeffries have a seat at the bargaining table after many groused this week about the altered funding package Senate Democrats brokered with the White House.

“They need to talk to Hakeem — the House and Senate are equal partners,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) said in an interview.

House Democrats contend that they have a better understanding of Trump’s immigration enforcement actions in communities throughout the country, as well as the sentiment of Americans.

“We are the ones that are closest to the anger and the frustration of our constituents,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) said in an interview. “We need [Senate Democrats] to start negotiating with us and carrying out our demands instead of constantly caving to Republicans.”

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Congress

Shutdown end in sight after spending package clears key House hurdle

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A spending package that would fund the vast majority of the federal government cleared a key procedural vote Tuesday, setting up votes later in the day to send the measure to the White House for President Donald Trump’s signature.

Final passage of the measure, which also includes a funding patch for the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 13, would end the partial government shutdown that began Saturday.

Republicans stayed mostly united on the 217-215 test vote to advance the package that would fund the Pentagon and departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, and Education through Sept. 30 and less than two weeks of funding for Homeland Security Department.

The short-term DHS funding is intended to give lawmakers time to negotiate reforms to how ICE and CBP officers execute the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement crackdown, with the hope of tamping down instances where federal officers have killed U.S. citizens. Republicans have their own demands, such as blocking federal funding on “sanctuary cities” that don’t cooperate with federal enforcement agencies.

The largely unified GOP vote came on the heels of a White House whip operation that headed off a handful of defections from within Speaker Mike Johnson’s party. Trump’s call for there to be no changes to the package in the House helped quell an effort from hard-line conservatives to attach a partisan elections bill, known as the SAVE Act, to the rule.

Speaker Mike Johnson, Majority Whip Tom Emmer and Majority Leader Steve Scalise also did some personal whipping on the House floor during the vote series, circulating between some of the most hard-line members of the Republican Conference in the leadup to and during the rule vote. It was a nail-biter for the leaders, with the vote held open for nearly an hour as they tried to bring their GOP colleagues in line.

Final passage of the Senate-passed $1.2 trillion funding package is expected Tuesday afternoon on a bipartisan vote.

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Congress

No filibuster deal with House conservatives, Thune says

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in an interview Tuesday he has made no decisions about bypassing Senate filibuster rules to skirt the normal 60-vote margin required to advance legislation in the chamber.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) said Monday she had White House-brokered “assurances” that the Senate would allow for a “standing” or “talking” filibuster that could allow the SAVE Act, a House-passed elections bill pushed by conservative hard-liners, to be enacted into law.

Thune was not party to Luna’s conversation with President Donald Trump, which prompted Luna to indicate she would support a massive spending bill moving through the House on Tuesday. Many GOP senators have long opposed weakening the 60-vote margin, believing it would open the door to far-reaching Democratic policies.

“Some of our colleagues in the Senate are interested in it,” Thune said. “We will have a conversation about it. Nothing decided.”

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