Congress
Capitol agenda: Health deal hinges on Trump
Congress is back. Welcome to the December of Hellth.
Lawmakers now have a mere 30 days to address expiring Obamacare tax credits and prevent health insurance hikes for millions of Americans. Republicans and Democrats agree success hangs on one question: Will President Donald Trump figure out what he wants?
Interpreting Trump’s intentions has gotten tougher since lawmakers left Washington. Early in the break, Trump appeared to be on the brink of announcing a framework to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies with new eligibility restrictions, only to pull back after GOP criticism. He then said he doesn’t want to extend the subsidies but understands it might be necessary.
Capitol Hill factions are trying to figure out what Trump wants and how to entice him to their side.
“The president has got to sign whatever we do, otherwise it’s a legislative exercise,” says Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, the Pennsylvania Republican who is drafting what he describes as a bipartisan proposal that would largely align with last week’s leaked White House framework.
The timeline as we know it — Though the ACA tax credits expire at month’s end, some lawmakers are looking at Jan. 30, the next shutdown deadline, as the real cutoff for a health care deal.
The Senate will vote as soon as Dec. 9 on an undefined health care proposal, the fulfillment of the bipartisan deal to re-open the government.
What’s in the works — Fitzpatrick and other centrists are looking to build bipartisan support for an extension of the subsidies with new income restrictions and other safeguards. Their efforts have loose backing from the Republican Main Street Caucus, whose chair Rep. Mike Flood (Neb.) endorsed the contours of the leaked White House health plan.
A coalition of House and Senate Republicans that includes key committee chairs are working behind the scenes on a range of possible proposals, but there’s no guarantee the GOP will fall in line or the lawmakers will produce a bill this year.
Senate Finance Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) says he is “working to try to find a pathway to get some bipartisan solution” — not a budget reconciliation bill.
As a fail-safe, centrist House Republicans are prepared to launch a discharge petition to force a floor vote on a subsidy extension. But they’re also trying to give space to the Senate to see if a bipartisan deal can be reached.
Democrats have yet to reach a consensus.
A group of Democrats including Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.) and Rep. Tom Suozzi (N.Y.) has been in close contact with Republicans including Fitzpatrick and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) about what could get bipartisan support. But others, including independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, want Democrats to embrace a sweeping health care plan that could be a rallying cry for the midterms but has no chance of winning GOP votes.
There’s widespread skepticism that Republicans will agree to any plan that isn’t fully endorsed by Trump. A significant swath of GOP lawmakers will simply never vote to extend anything related to Obamacare, according to three GOP aides granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics.
“That’s the trouble today,” says Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). “You can have good-faith negotiations with Republicans, but it just doesn’t matter until Donald Trump weighs in.”
What else we’re watching:
— What’s next for appropriations: House GOP appropriators aren’t yet ready to advance the two biggest outstanding funding bills — Defense and Labor-HHS-Education — and are instead rooting for a cross-chamber compromise on several smaller funding measures, with sights on enactment by month’s end.
Senate Republicans are also looking for a smaller group of bills that could get signed into law as they continue to pursue a separate minibus that would pair defense funding with Labor-HHS-Education and other bills, according to two aides granted anonymity to disclose internal deliberations.
Any appropriations bills finalized in the next three weeks would be ripe for hitching to a year-end agreement on health insurance subsidies, should one materialize.
— NDAA deal incoming: Lawmakers plan to release the final text of a compromise version of the National Defense Authorization Act this week and tee up a House floor vote as soon as next week, though House and Senate leaders still need to sign off on the final product.
Jordain Carney, Jennifer Scholtes, Katherine Tully-McManus and Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.
ALBANY, New York — President Donald Trump’s long-term bromance with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has scrambled Republicans’ collective effort to make the democratic socialist the boogeyman of the midterm elections.
GOP candidates across the country have sought to tie their opponents to the 34-year-old mayor, his anti-Israel views and his brand of socialism — a bet that American voters will reject the Democratic Party’s leftward tilt.
The effort began in earnest last year when the House Republicans’ campaign arm wasted little time launching ads in 49 swing seats nationwide, tying the then-mayor elect to Democratic candidates and warning that a “radical-left earthquake just hit America.” In the race for a hotly contested suburban New York City district held by Rep. Mike Lawler, a House GOP super PAC launched an ad linking his Democratic challenger Cait Conley to the mayor. On Long Island, Republican Mike LiPetri has slammed Mamdani’s “socialist wish list.”
Such attacks are significantly harder to make after Trump, who retains tremendous sway over the Republican base, stood beside Mamdani at Gracie Mansion on Monday and said the mayor has “great potential” and that he’s rooting for his success. The plaudits from the president could not have come at a worse time for a GOP struggling to maintain control of Congress.
“Mamdani is one of the most popular politicians on planet earth right now,” said Chapin Fay, a GOP operative working for a super PAC allied with New York Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman. “Everything that comes out of his mouth I stand against, but he’s good looking, he knows how to operate the media, he’s an incredibly dangerous threat. But you need a good villain to run against in politics, and he’s just not a good villain.”
Still, Republicans aren’t making adjustments. GOP campaigns don’t necessarily expect voters to be turned off by Mamdani specifically, but by a broader concern over the perception that the far left is surging after a string of primary victories by candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America. Running against a rising socialist tide is viewed as much easier than competing against the New York City mayor himself.
“That dynamic hasn’t changed,” said one New York Republican operative who was granted anonymity to discuss strategy. “It’s still a very salient issue in the New York City suburbs.”
In a statement, a White House spokesperson touted Trump’s economic record, including tax cuts and addressing prescription drug costs.
“The President’s top priority is always improving the lives of Americans everywhere,” White House spokesperson Allison Schuster said.
The jarring union between two deeply polarizing politicians is an unwelcome splitscreen for Republicans in tough races trying to yoke their moderate opponents to Mamdani’s hard-left image. And their bond has effectively neutralized what could have been a potent weapon for Republicans in a midterm election that increasingly appears dire for the GOP. Polls are showing tightening races in deep red states, while swing seat Republicans need every bit of political ammunition they can muster to counter Democratic attacks over affordability.
The conundrum is particularly complicated for Republicans in deep blue New York, home to several swing districts where the upcoming electoral outcomes stand to determine which party controls the House and the direction of the president’s final two years in office.
It’s an especially thorny challenge for Blakeman, who’s running an uphill campaign against Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul and has tried to paint the incumbent as a Mamdani fellow traveler. Blakeman’s campaign has released artificial intelligence-generated videos of Blakeman and Mamdani walking side by side, accusing them both of enabling New York City’s destruction. He’s admonished the governor for helping bolster the city’s finances — enabling the mayor’s agenda as a result.
Losing Mamdani as an effective foil, GOP strategists warn, undermines Blakeman’s ability to make that argument against the Democratic governor, who’s leading in the polls.
“It’s very bad for him,” said a Republican operative granted anonymity to speak frankly about the dynamic. “He’s supposed to be the Trump guy and here’s Trump praising Mamdani as a guy with a lot of potential. It seems to have really shocked people all over the state. It really deflates his entire campaign basis.”
Blakeman shrugged off the Gracie Mansion lovefest, insisting to reporters a day later that it had no impact on the race — or his effort to paint Hochul as a far-left radical aligned with the mayor.
“The president is a government official. He’s the highest government official in the United States,” Blakeman said. “And the mayor’s a government official, so I expect that the two of them would talk.”
It’s not the first time a Trump-Mamdani sitdown sapped a Republican’s effort to inject the New York City mayor into their campaign. Rep. Elise Stefanik’s short-lived gubernatorial campaign was short-circuited in part by the lovefest, when the president declined to repeat her claim that Mamdani is “a jihadist.”
For many of those who’ve been in Trump’s orbit, the relationship is a broad reminder that the president continues to harbor a fixation with his hometown where for decades he was a larger-than-life real estate developer.
“One thing you can always count on is that Donald Trump, in spite of everything, loves New York City,” said Michael Caputo, a former Trump administration official and Republican strategist. “I don’t think he’d ever give up on [New York City]. If that makes it a little difficult for some people in their races, I’m sorry, but that was baked into this presidency 50 years ago.”
Trump, who had toyed with running for mayor and governor during his days as a Manhattan developer, has tried to influence New York City’s fate throughout much of his life. He endorsed Mamdani’s main foe in last year’s mayoral election, Andrew Cuomo, warning voters in the financial capital of the world to not elect a socialist. His administration tried unsuccessfully to halt a Manhattan toll plan meant to reduce traffic. And the federal government’s push to redevelop the catacomb-like Penn Station may end up with the president’s name on it.
His meetings with Mamdani have reflected back that intense interest in the five boroughs.
The Trump-Mamdani rapport was forged months ago during their first Oval Office meeting in November. There, the president and the incoming Gotham mayor posed in front of Franklin Roosevelt’s portrait. At their second meeting in February, Mamdani gifted Trump a fake tabloid front page with the headline “Trump to City: Let’s Build” and discussed how to change New York City’s byzantine zoning laws to enable development.
During their most recent meeting the two men discussed building thousands of housing units on top of a Queens rail yard.
“He may not be one of the city’s most popular residents, but he’s never going to quit on New York City,” Caputo said. “It’s never going to matter who the mayor is.”
For similar reasons Mamdani has faced little political downside from the solicitous meetings with a president who most Democrats view with toxicity. The mayor entered office with scant executive experience and has been under pressure to prove he can govern. Trump’s federal government can provide money to help deliver wins for him in City Hall. Much like the president, Mamdani maintains support from an enthusiastic base.
“There’s no danger — his base gives him a complete pass for this,” Democratic strategist Trip Yang said. “There’s no progressive organization that would criticize Mamdani for this. He’s been able to demonstrate some early progress and some potential with Trump.”
Interest has already started to wane in leveraging Mamdani as a villain in Republican campaigns. For suburban New York City voters concerned about public safety and antisemitism, the mayor remains a divisive figure. While a recent Siena Research Institute poll found he has a 60% favorable rating in New York City, only 43% of voters in the suburbs feel the same way.
And some Republicans believe the meetings with Mamdani may have the effect of sanding down some of Trump’s rougher edges — weakening Democratic efforts to demonize the president in the process.
“It works both ways,” former GOP Rep. John Sweeney said. “If one guy is a boogeyman, the other guy is a boogeyman on the other side.”
Rep. Max Miller issued a subpoena to his former father-in-law and fellow Ohio Republican, Sen. Bernie Moreno, in the latest escalation of a long-running family legal drama.
Pamela MacAdams, an attorney for Miller, reported to the Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Court Monday that three subpoenas were served in Miller’s divorce case, according to court records. A person with knowledge of the subpoenas granted anonymity to comment on them said that two were sent to Moreno and his wife, Bridget.
Their daughter, Emily Moreno, was married to Miller, and the two remain embroiled in a nasty legal battle.
Spokespeople for Miller, Emily Moreno and Bernie Moreno did not immediately return requests for comment. TMZ first reported on the subpoenas.
Miller is seeking reelection in a competitive district, and his campaign has been marred by accusations of domestic abuse against Emily Moreno and their daughter. Miller has repeatedly denied the allegations and chose to remain in the race despite other Republican lawmakers pressuring him to withdraw his campaign.
The House Ethics Committee, which began an inquiry into Miller after Miller asked to be investigated, is currently in a preelection blackout period. During that period, which will continue through the midterms, the Ethics Committee doesn’t take any action against sitting members who could return next Congress.
Congress
Trump declares $1B canceled in ‘pocket rescission’ in another affront to Congress’ funding power
President Donald Trump informed congressional leaders Friday that he has unilaterally canceled almost $1 billion without Congress’ consent — employing a budget maneuver many lawmakers consider illegal.
In a move that will almost certainly set up an ugly government funding battle after the midterms, Trump has again claimed the power to execute a so-called “pocket rescission” to nix money Congress has already enacted. The money his administration will claw back is for for immigration services, support to foreign countries, education programs, health research efforts and assistance for businesses owned by minorities.
By law, the president is allowed to send Congress a request to rescind federal funding, then withhold that money for 45 days while lawmakers consider whether to approve, reject or ignore it. Trump administration officials also argue they have the power to cancel funding without any congressional action by sending Congress a rescission request with less than 45 days left in the fiscal year. The argument is that the money automatically gets canceled on Sept. 30, when funding lapses at the end of the fiscal year.
Last year, Trump canceled $4.9 billion in foreign aid.
The Senate’s top Republican appropriator, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, immediately blasted the move as illegal, saying in a statement Friday night that “any effort to rescind appropriated funds without congressional approval is a clear violation of the law.”
“This move shows that OMB intentionally withheld these funds for months to execute this unlawful cancellation of appropriations that were approved on a bipartisan basis and signed into law,” Collins added, pledging to work with other lawmakers “to address these illegal actions.”
Collins and other appropriators have already been on high alert in recent days, pressing multiple agencies about funding officials have yet to spend ahead of the expiration date.
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