Congress
Capitol agenda: John Thune’s pre-recess game plan
Senators are racing the clock to make a dent in both the government funding process and President Donald Trump’s backlog of nominees before heading home for August recess.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune is hoping to get the first appropriations package through the chamber by the end of this week, with lawmakers on the hook for landing a deal to avoid a shutdown come Sept. 30. To that end, GOP leaders are negotiating with members of their conference over a “minibus” of three bills that would, collectively, fund the departments of Commerce, Justice, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs, as well as key military construction projects and the FDA. Sen. John Kennedy’s (R-La.) opposition to including legislation that would fund congressional operations will likely force leadership to postpone debating a fourth bill at this time.
The pending package will require senators to run out two, 30-hour debate clocks; the ability to move faster will require buy-in from all 100 senators. It will also take time for lawmakers of both parties to agree on amendments and then hold votes, and Democrats are still deliberating their strategy, according to a person granted anonymity to share private negotiations. Republican leadership still believes it can pass the mini-bus before leaving town, according to a second person granted anonymity. But one potential fallback option, according to two people granted anonymity, could be for the Senate to schedule a final passage vote before they leave town for the first week back in September.
Senate Republicans are also under pressure from Trump to confirm more of his nominees before heading home for recess. Thune has warned his members to prepare to vote at least through this weekend after the president urged senators to stay in Washington through August to wrap up the work, though many lawmakers aren’t pleased with that idea. They’re eager, instead, to get back to their home states, especially as they look to counter Democratic messaging against the freshly-passed GOP megabill.
Other Senate Republicans say they’re ready to give Trump what he’s after. Over the weekend, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) repeatedly urged his colleagues to either work through August to advance nominations or cancel all pro-forma sessions over the next month to allow Trump to make recess appointments. “The Senate can’t have it both ways,” Lee said in a post on X.
Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley also said he’s on board with the president’s call for the Senate to stick around to vote on nominations through August, writing on X, “Trump needs his administration in place.”
Republicans have typically been unenthused by the idea of recess appointments, though, and it’s unlikely they’d go along with that plan. And while Thune is threatening to keep the Senate in session deeper into August, many lawmakers view it as just that: a threat to get Democrats to cut a deals on nominations to get out of town.
“I think it’s fair to say that we’re going keep the pressure on the Democrats to, you know, stay here until either they cooperate or we’re just going to grind it out and do it the old fashioned way,” Thune told Blue Light News.
What else we’re watching:
— What lawmakers do about Gaza: As the U.S. pulls out of ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza deepens, GOP leaders say Hamas’ inability to cooperate is damaging any hopes of progress in the region. Democratic leaders, meanwhile, are sending dire warnings to Israel — and telling Trump his administration needs to take urgent action.
— Johnson’s Epstein headache persists: Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) are determined to finish collecting the 218 necessary signatures to force a floor vote compelling the release of more Jeffrey Epstein files. Their bill will be eligible for a floor vote upon the House’s return in September.
Hours after Democratic socialist candidates swept to victory in New York primary races, Republicans celebrated those victories as a boon for their own party as it struggles against headwinds from the Iran war and cost of living issues ahead of the November midterms.
Inside a closed-door House GOP meeting Wednesday morning, the head of the Republican campaign arm said the victories of candidates backed by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani offered an opportunity for GOP House candidates to draw a sharp contrast.
Rep. Richard Hudson of North Carolina said “Democrats have a Bolshevik revolution going on in their primaries,” according to three people in the room granted anonymity to discuss the private event.
Speaker Mike Johnson also delivered remarks to Republicans setting the stakes of the election after the “radical” left-wing wins and urging Republicans to dig in and raise money to defeat Democrats this fall. He received a standing ovation, the people in the room said.
Hudson said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries will take the socialists’ wins as a sign he needs to navigate further to the left. There will be no cooperation with Republicans, he added.
Other Republicans publicly seized on the left-wing triumphs Wednesday, including Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio — who said “the lesson is clear: if Republicans don’t act now, we will lose this country as we know it.”
“We need to be clear about what we stand for,” he wrote on X. “Closed borders, secure elections, economic prosperity for all Americans, and, most of all, proudly protecting the American way of life against socialism.”
President Donald Trump abruptly canceled a bill signing for major bipartisan legislation on housing affordability on Wednesday, saying he wouldn’t back the law until Congress passes his elections bill.
“Today’s Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social.
Trump was scheduled to sign the 21st Century ROAD to Housing bill on Wednesday afternoon, which passed both chambers with wide bipartisan support.
Trump announced the cancellation as Speaker Mike Johnson and top House leaders held a news conference touting the bill.
President Donald Trump Wednesday will come face-to-face with Senate Republicans for the first time in months as the party struggles to set its priorities heading into the midterms.
After weeks of shadowboxing with each other, Trump is scheduled to visit Capitol Hill and press the conference to pass his signature election security bill that has languished for months. Senate Republicans — several of whom have openly agonized that Trump isn’t focused enough on helping their party keep its tenuous control of Congress — have their own agenda for talks.
Let’s be clear: Wednesday’s lunch isn’t going to change the fate of the GOP election bill. Majority Leader John Thune told reporters Tuesday that “people at some point have to come to grips” with the fact that there aren’t the votes to nix the filibuster or pass Trump’s No. 1 priority.
But Trump is showing no sign of being ready to accept that — and indicated he intends to make the case for doing whatever it takes during the lunch with Senate Republicans.
“We’re just going to talk about SAVE America. … We have to pass it so we’re going to have to talk about that and many other things,” Trump told reporters.
Asked about Thune saying the party lacks the votes for passage, he added: “That’s what being a leader is about. … John is a leader and hopefully he can get the votes.”
While Trump wants to focus on the SAVE America Act, GOP senators expect a wider-ranging conversation, including how both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue can turn their collective attention off of a string of recent intraparty fights and toward Democrats.
“My question is how do we get all on the same page and get unified rather than squabbling amongst ourselves,” Sen. John Cornyn said he’ll ask Trump. Cornyn told reporters it’ll be his first time speaking with the president since losing his primary against Trump-backed Ken Paxton.
That may mean Trump and senators Wednesday confront festering questions about the highly unpopular Iran war in the lead up to elections.
Senate Republicans openly criticized Trump’s agreement last week to end the Iran conflict, including a $300 billion reconstruction fund. And congressional Republicans are chafing at the idea Trump is asking for tens of billions of dollars in fresh military funding without briefing most of Congress on the plan.
As lawmakers prepare for a roughly $80 billion emergency Pentagon funding request to land as soon as this week, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is also set to meet with the Republican Study Committee Wednesday. While the briefing is meant to focus on the funding requests, Speaker Mike Johnson suggested it could be lawmakers’ only chance for the time being to get questions answered about the administration’s Iran endgame.
“I’m sure he’ll provide a lot of information,” Johnson said when asked about further briefings beyond Hegseth’s. “I mean, we’ll see what the secretary does, and then evaluate after that.”
Also on our radar Wednesday: Democratic lawmakers are teeing up a host of amendments on the war against Iran at a House Appropriations markup of the fiscal 2027 Defense bill, where more funding talks are guaranteed to take place.
Read also: Republicans push to add billions in farm aid to Iran war package
What else we’re watching:
— DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY SPLIT SCREEN: A Zohran Mamdani-backed trio of progressives pulled off a string of upsets during New York’s primary elections Tuesday, dealing a blow to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and his leadership allies.
—- HOUSE GOP HUDDLES ON RECON 3.0: Johnson and key House Republicans will meet Wednesday to discuss the next steps for a possible third reconciliation bill as the clock ticks to get a budget resolution moving before the July 4 recess. The speaker said he will know more about the timing for any budget resolution to kick off another party-line bill afterwards. Still, several Budget Committee Republicans are still skeptical the effort will actually gain momentum.
Madison Fernandez and Nick Reisman contributed to this report.
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