Congress

Capitol agenda: Johnson moves to thaw House floor

Published

2 months ago

July 14, 2026

House GOP leaders are closer to appeasing the group of hard-liners who have kept the chamber’s floor frozen for weeks.

Several of the rebel Republicans Monday told Blue Light News they will need to see concrete steps on legislation codifying President Donald Trump’s border policies before they’d take a procedural vote to unlock floor business. While it’s unclear what exactly could satisfy them, several said they want more than a promise from leaders to vote on immigration legislation.

“It’s not about promises at this point,” Rep. Chip Roy said Monday. “We need to see movement.”

Negotiations appear to be getting close: Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris said Monday he thought the group would still get an offer from leadership that could lift their blockade on a rule vote Tuesday. Roy predicted a “50/50” chance the rule is adopted Tuesday.

Speaker Mike Johnson and his leadership team are discussing several options for what they will offer hard-liners, according to three people with knowledge of the late night meetings.

“I think there’s going to be action on border security,” Harris told Blue Light News.

Meanwhile GOP leaders made progress with Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, who on Monday said she was lifting her hold on floor business “on the condition that Speaker Johnson attaches the SAVE America Act to all the appropriation bills and all must-pass bills here in the House and ensures it is sent to the Senate in one bill.”

House GOP leaders are also using the promise of another long-shot reconciliation bill to pressure the remaining hard-liners to reopen the floor.

Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought stopped by the House Freedom Caucus’ weekly meeting Monday night and pitched a third reconciliation bill with pieces of the SAVE America Act, three people in the room told Blue Light News.

Johnson said Monday House Budget would vote Wednesday on a budget resolution for the party-line package.

Still, senior Republicans are already starting to walk back that optimistic timeline after intense pushback from several GOP groups who said they needed more details about the plans — including some Budget Committee Republicans.

“I think there’s a long way to go … before we do any markup,” Rep. Erin Houchin, a Budget panel Republican, said in an interview. “We haven’t even seen language yet.”

In the Senate, Sen. Ron Johnson, who is slated to become the next Budget chair after the death of Sen. Lindsey Graham, is already getting ready to follow Graham’s push for a third reconciliation bill. He said Monday he met with Graham’s staff.

But even as House Republicans and a few GOP senators push for reconciliation, it will be an uphill battle for the Senate to pass any bill, Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday

“The path to 51 is going to be a bumpy one over here,” Thune said.

What else we’re watching:

— GRAHAM’S SISTER TO BE SWORN INTO HIS ROLE: Darline Graham Nordone is poised to be sworn in Tuesday afternoon after South Carolina’s governor tapped the late Lindsey Graham’s sister to fill his role for the remainder of this term. Nordone said Monday she promised to “carry forward the efforts of my brother,” but little is known about her stance on policy issues. Kevin Bishop, who served as Graham’s communications director for over 25 years until 2024, said in an interview people will be “pleasantly surprised” at Nordone’s similarities with her brother, adding that she’s closely followed his work so “this is not going to be a babe-in-the-woods kind of thing.”

— SENATE DEMS POISED TO BLOCK NDAA: Senators will vote Tuesday on advancing the annual defense policy bill — and Democrats appear ready to block it in opposition to the ongoing war in Iran. The vote comes after Trump formally notified lawmakers that the nation is once again at war with Iran, giving his administration another 60-day clock to use the military without congressional approval.

Jordain Carney, Connor O’Brien, Leo Shane III and Mark Satter contributed to this report.

Congress

How Talarico is countering Trump’s midterms convention

Published

2 days ago

September 4, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

James Talarico is planning to counterprogram President Donald Trump’s GOP midterms convention in Dallas with a focus on affordability.

The idea from the Texas Democratic Senate candidate and seminarian: host a statewide “Love Thy Neighbor” food drive to offer a contrast with Republicans coming to town and highlight the high cost of groceries, according to plans shared first with Blue Light News.

“Next week, billionaire mega-donors and their puppet politicians will gather at a convention in Dallas to clink champagne glasses and toast their own corruption. They’re paying $20,000 for entry to a Billionaire Ball celebrating corrupt tariffs, billionaire tax breaks, and a new forever war that are all driving grocery costs through the roof,” Talarico said in a statement to Blue Light News. “We’ll be doing something different. We’re bringing Republicans, Democrats, and Independents together to collect groceries for our neighbors who have been screwed over by corrupt politicians.”

The campaign said it will “mobilize volunteers to collect, sort, and donate groceries for middle class Texans struggling with the high price of groceries.” The event will last from Sunday, Sept. 6 through Wednesday, Sept. 9 — the same day the GOP convention kicks off.

Talarico is also expected to field media interviews in a large warehouse near the convention.

“Texans across the political spectrum will come together to build community, show up for their neighbors, and take power back for working people,” the campaign said in a statement.

A recent poll conducted by Texas Public Opinion Research poll released last week showed Talarico leading ,his opponent Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, 48 percent to 42 percent.

Trump this week said he would campaign for Paxton soon.

Congress

‘I don’t think anyone is really comfortable’: Democrat leading on AI raises alarms at Trump, Zuckerberg call

Published

2 days ago

September 4, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

A House Democrat trying to lead her party on artificial intelligence policy sent a warning shot Friday to tech CEOs trying to undermine efforts to regulate the fast-growing technology.

In an interview, Rep. Lori Trahan raised alarm bells over a POLITICO report detailing attempts by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to personally discourage President Donald Trump from moving ahead with plans to establish an independent AI regulator modeled after the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or FINRA.

“I don’t think anyone is really comfortable when they see tech executives who are sitting on the stage at the president’s inauguration, and have had to pay millions of dollars to this fund and that fund, calling the shots,” said the Massachusetts Democrat.

Allowing Zuckerberg to call the shots on the proposed AI commission would be tantamount to “a complete abdication of Congress,” Trahan continued. She also suggested would use her perch on the House Energy and Commerce Committee to work with other Democrats to haul in industry executives like Zuckerberg to testify, should Democrats win back the House majority in the midterms.

“Congress’ job is to do oversight and to have those hearings,” she said. “And I think we would learn a lot from those hearings so that we can put pen to paper on thoughtful proposals. So yes, there have been a number of people, myself included, who have called for those hearings, and I think we’re going to continue to do that.”

Trahan is poised to be a major player in the coming weeks and months when it comes to AI, especially if Democrats prevail in the November elections and are forced to solidify a position on the subject; the party is currently all over the map.

Unlike other Democrats who have retreated to their corners to work on partisan proposals, Trahan has gone out on a limb by crossing the aisle to broker a deal on a bipartisan AI safety bill with Rep. Jay Obernolte (R-Calif.) — a package that was originally met with disdain by members of both parties.

She announced this week she would opt out of a run for a place in House Democratic leadership after being widely expected to make a play in the next Congress — in part, she said, to continue working on AI issues.

But Trahan’s comments Friday illustrate the deep distrust among Democrats, herself included, over the GOP approach to AI regulation — from Republicans waffling on whether they support the proliferation of data centers to Trump’s recent call with Zuckerberg.

Her calls are consistent with left-leaning members like Rep. Greg Casar, a Texas Democrat and chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, who has been at the forefront of the most aggressive proposals to crack down on top tech companies.

“The CEOs of Anthropic and OpenAI say that cutting edge AI could be as dangerous as nuclear weapons,” Casar said Thursday on X in response to the Blue Light News report. “But Trump is conspiring with billionaires for this technology to be regulated like … Hollywood movies.”

Trahan said Friday that “reasonable people can disagree on what regulatory construct we come up with” governing development and use of AI.

But, she added, “what I don’t think the American people agree with is that Mark Zuckerberg and President Trump are going to figure that out on a phone call.”

Congress

House Dem election leader’s message to states: Count faster

Published

2 days ago

September 4, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

House Democrats’ top election leader has a message for states ahead of the midterms: count faster.

“We are, I think, nicely trying to encourage people to do their balloting as quickly as possible, and that means hiring additional staff so that it doesn’t call into question results,” Rep. Joe Morelle of New York, the top Democrat on the House Administration Committee, said in a Thursday interview with Blue Light News.

The advice is just one part of Morelle’s efforts to secure the midterm elections. He said Democrats have wargamed over 150 scenarios of how the Trump administration could attempt to interfere or complicate the November elections and its certification. He is encouraging states to have a “degree of urgency” when counting ballots to stave off Republican-led conspiracy theories about the reasons for delays.

Morelle said he is leaning on states to staff up on election officials to facilitate speedy ballot counting while emphasizing the process should still be “done properly,” “fairly” and that “we don’t want people with cast ballots not to have their ballots counted.” He is going to Los Angeles next week to deliver that message and meet with election security experts and election administrators — though he did not specify whom he is meeting with or where.

“We are trying to gently encourage people to staff up,” he said. Morelle added that if Democrats take the House majority, they’d “push for more resources for local and state administrators so they can hire additional capacity.”

Morelle has other big plans in the majority, including cracking down on dark money in politics, protecting voting rights and most notably, working on a bipartisan voter identification bill.

Asked whether he could accept some form of voter identification as part of a larger bipartisan elections package, Morelle said, “I’m personally not opposed to some form of voter ID,” adding that he has opposed multiple Republican-led proposals to tighten up identification requirements.

“I don’t know where my colleagues on the Democrat side will be, but I think voters think, ‘Okay, you show your ID for just tons of things. Is it really that much of a burden?’” he said. “And if it is, we’ll get state issued IDs or federally issued IDs to people who can’t afford it. So I do think that there’s hope for a bipartisan way forward, and I’ll be anxious to work with colleagues to do it.”