Congress

Capitol agenda: It’s down to Trump, Schumer and Thune

Published

11 months ago

August 1, 2025

The Senate’s summer exit is getting complicated as lawmakers brace for some weekend work.

Tensions are running high over government funding negotiations. And Senate leaders have yet to seal a deal to advance dozens of President Donald Trump’s nominees as Majority Leader John Thune shuttles between the White House and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Here’s the latest on where things stand.

Funding meltdown – The prospects for two major appropriations bills are dimming after a flurry of drama.

The odds of including the Commerce-Justice-Science bill in an appropriations “minibus” withered late Thursday night. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, who has used the bill as a platform to fight the Trump administration’s plans for keeping FBI HQ in Washington, objected to including the CJS legislation in the broader funding package. Van Hollen wants the agency’s campus to move to his home state of Maryland, per a prior agreement.

Van Hollen’s hardball tactics rattled Sen. Jerry Moran, the lead appropriator on the bill, who teared up as he spoke about it on the floor.

Moran said he knew “no path forward” that would allow Van Hollen to amend the bill to address his FBI concerns.

“Our appropriations process is fragile,” Moran said.

The Agriculture-FDA funding bill is still a contender for inclusion in the package. But Sen. Amy Klobuchar said she’s seeking answers first from Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins about USDA’s plans for a major reorganization under Trump.

The Senate’s legislative branch funding bill still faces a snag with Sen. John Kennedy. Thune is optimistic the Senate will at least get military and VA funding through before recess.

“We’re trying to work out the rest of the package,” Thune said late Thursday. “And the Dems are now sort of changing their demands with regards to amendments, etc., so we’ll have to see if we can land it early tomorrow morning.”

Noms, noms, noms – Thune met with Trump Thursday to update him on his talks with Schumer to confirm the president’s nominees. It’s the biggest factor threatening to keep the Senate in town longer, given the need to secure unanimous consent to speed up confirmations.

Trump isn’t signaling that a deal is in hand. In a 9:52 p.m. Truth Social post Thursday, he wrote, “The Senate must stay in Session, taking no recess, until the entire Executive Calendar is CLEAR!!!” (Trump separately lashed out at Maine’s senior senator, saying, “Republicans, when in doubt, vote the exact opposite of Senator Susan Collins.”)

Thune staff and Schumer staff are exchanging paper. Senators believe, if it were just up to them, the two leaders could get there. The bigger question is whether any deal they strike can get Trump’s blessing, including Democrats’ demand that the president unfreeze funding for certain agencies.

“It would be easier if Chuck Schumer and Donald Trump would talk, bare-knuckled New Yorker to bare-knuckled New Yorker,” Sen. Kevin Cramer said.

What else we’re watching:

— Republicans eye rules revamp to confirm Trump picks: Senate Republicans are heading toward a potential rules change in the fall to speed up confirming Trump’s nominees. Thune would need support from nearly all Republicans, and it’s not clear he has that yet.

— Mullin plots security boost for senators: Sen. Markwayne Mullin, who leads work on legislative branch appropriations, says he’s still working through potential security protocols for lawmakers back home, after House leaders unveiled increased funding for their members’ residential security. The Oklahoma Republican had previously said a “test program” could be unveiled as soon as August.

“We’re working with Jennifer [Hemingway], the Sergeant-at-Arms, and working through some protocols that may take place and working with state police,” Mullin said. “But yes, we’re very much looking into it.”

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

Congress

GOP leaders cancel Friday votes as House agenda hangs in balance

Published

1 hour ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

House Republican leaders have canceled planned Friday votes as GOP hard-liners continue threatening to block legislative action over an elections bill that is stalled in the Senate, according to a notice sent to members Thursday.

Members are expected to leave town after a 1 p.m. vote Thursday, and it’s possible they might not return Monday as planned: Speaker Mike Johnson is hoping to discuss the legislative agenda with President Donald Trump at an afternoon meeting in hopes of brokering a solution that will allow the House to resume voting next week.

If not, the House could join the Senate on an extended recess, not returning till mid-July, two people granted anonymity to describe internal conversations said.

Congress

Raskin launches discharge effort to formally block ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’

Published

3 hours ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, is launching a campaign to force a floor vote on legislation that would formally block the Trump administration’s $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”

The so-called No Carte Blanche Act — a tongue-in-cheek nod to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche — also would also explicitly bar payouts from the Judgement Fund, a pre-existing account for settlements with the United States, to people who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

While Blanche, who will sit for a confirmation hearing July 15 to run the Justice Department in a more permanent capacity, recently told lawmakers that the administration was abandoning the effort amid bipartisan backlash, he has refused to put that pledge in a written declaration to Congress.

“This is why Congress must act to comprehensively shut down this shameful shakedown once and for all,” Raskin, of Maryland, said in a statement. “The people’s representatives must decide whether to uphold the rule of law and protect taxpayer dollars—or stand aside as this unprecedented corruption spins out of control.”

Raskin is attempting to compel a floor vote on his bill through a discharge petition, where 218 signatures in support will require Speaker Mike Johnson to bring the measure up for a vote. It’s a maneuver members of both parties have deployed with success in recent months due to the GOP’s slim majority — and it’s possible it could work this time, too, with a small number of House Republicans on record opposing the fund.

It would likely face an uphill battle getting the necessary 60 votes in the Senate to become law, however: An earlier attempt from Democrats to block the “Anti-Weaponization Fund” from going into effect failed in a 50-49 vote.

The fund was created out of a settlement from President Donald Trump’s lawsuit against the federal government over the leak of his tax returns. While it was purportedly intended to provide financial compensation to individuals deemed victims of “lawfare,” critics worried it was designed to reward Trump’s allies.

Also as part of the settlement agreement, Trump, his family and businesses would be freed from any current audits of their taxes. Raskin’s legislation would also block that provision.

Congress

Capitol agenda: Johnson tries to clean up Trump’s Hill mess

Published

5 hours ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

President Donald Trump’s obsession with the SAVE America Act has hurled Congress into indefinite gridlock.

Senators are gone until July 13 after starting their Independence Day recess a few days early.

Now House Republican lawmakers are looking toward Speaker Mike Johnson, who will Thursday head to the White House to try to convince the president to salvage the GOP’s legislative agenda.

The president’s insistence Congress pass the controversial election security legislation has ground both chambers to a halt.

The deadlock threatens to derail a host of other legislative efforts Republicans and the White House hoped to complete in the coming weeks, including a sweeping reconciliation bill filled with potentially hundreds of billions of dollars in Iran war military funding, billions of dollars in relief for farmers, fiscal 2027 funding bills and the annual defense policy bill.

“I’d like to celebrate victories, not come up with reasons why we failed,” Sen. Kevin Cramer said in an interview, joining other Republicans in venting frustration after Trump scrapped a planned signing of a major housing affordability bill Wednesday.

“We’ve demonstrated a lot of dysfunction lately,” he said.

Wednesday’s explosive lunch with Trump and GOP senators probably didn’t help.

“The president came to the Capitol to do what he thinks Senate Republican leadership can’t do: flip votes on SAVE and nuking the filibuster,” a senior Senate GOP aide told Jordain.

“He left with the same number of votes that existed when he arrived — possibly fewer.”

Now eyes are on Johnson, who has lost control of the floor as hard-liners demand the Senate pass the elections overhaul.

He’s keeping the House in session ahead of his 2 p.m. Trump meeting in hopes of salvaging plans to put several bills on the floor this week — including a pair of fiscal 2027 spending measures.

But if Johnson and Trump can’t reach a compromise, GOP leadership may cancel all votes for the remainder of the week and next week, too.

That would further imperil their plans for another party-line reconciliation bill and the $88 billion supplement funding request the White House transmitted Wednesday.

What else we’re watching:

— JOHNSON’S PITCH FOR RECON 3.0 FALLS SHORT: House GOP leaders are trying to make good on their promise to advance a long-shot, party-line package of conservative priorities by arguing it’s the only chance to pass pieces of Trump’s doomed elections bill. So far, their pitch is falling short. Members who attended a meeting with House Budget Republicans Wednesday argued the REAL ID grant program Johnson proposed was no substitute for enacting the full SAVE America Act. And fiscal hawks on the panel warned they would oppose any budget resolution unless it’s paid for on a yearly basis, and without budgeting gimmicks.

— TRUMP’S $88B ASK FOR IRAN WAR, FARM AID: The White House sent Congress Wednesday a much-awaited request for emergency funding to cover military operations in Iran, farm assistance and disaster assistance. But the proposal could complicate House Republicans’ pursuit of a third party-line spending package, which was supposed to be centered around $350 billion in defense funding that Democrats wouldn’t support. The request for tens of billions of dollars in extra war spending comes as the House Appropriations panel Wednesday advanced a $1.1 trillion base budget plan for the Pentagon. Taken together, the three efforts represent a record-breaking roughly $1.5 trillion military budget, about a 50 percent hike from this year’s level.

Jordain Carney, Mia McCarthy, Meredith Lee Hill, Connor O’Brien and Grace Yarrow contributed to this report.