Congress

Capitol agenda: Nobody’s making Mike Johnson’s week easy

Published

4 months ago

April 29, 2026

We’ll find out Wednesday if Speaker Mike Johnson can cross off something—anything—from his long to-do list this week.

The House meets Wednesday morning to vote on a procedural step to advance three legislative priorities: government spy powers that expire Thursday, the farm bill, and a budget resolution for immigration enforcement funding.

But after a weeks-long standoff over how to proceed on reauthorizing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the sweeping agricultural policy bill and the budget framework, House Republican leadership doesn’t appear to have the votes to advance anything.

And some House and Senate Republicans want President Donald Trump to get involved to break the stalemates.

Here are the battles Johnson is facing within his own caucus and the Senate:

— FISA: A growing number of House Republicans are livid Congress is barreling toward a three-year FISA extension with a House plan Senate Majority Leader John Thune has warned is “dead on arrival.”

“Our team has spent too much time with approximately 10 of our members who want compromises the other 210 don’t want,” Rep. Don Bacon said. “Meanwhile there’s about 40 Dems who are willing to support. This is dysfunction.”

As the House activity flounders, the Senate is negotiating its own FISA extension, multiple senators told Blue Light News. Members are currently looking at a three-year extension paired with some changes, according to three senators. But Sen. John Kennedy warned that there was “heartburn” over that length for an extension, adding: “I don’t think we have the votes in the Senate.”

Even if the House is able to move the procedural rule Wednesday, the Senate won’t swallow a ban on central banking digital currency attached to the measure upon passage.

“That’s not happening,” Thune said in an interview about linking the two matters.

— FARM BILL: Rep. Chip Roy sent the first warning Tuesday night that the rule’s fate was at risk. GOP leaders’ plan to tack on language green-lighting year-round sales of E15 gasoline blend was “E15 crap,” he said, adding it is still a problem with conservative hardliners.

Rep. Lauren Boebert later announced she would vote against the rule after many of her amendments for rural constituents introduced in the Rules hearing were voted down.

House GOP leaders’ plan to simply add E15 legislation to the farm bill is also looking dead on arrival in the Senate. Privately, GOP senators and aides told Blue Light News they’re going to write their own farm bill and haven’t agreed to add the E15 language to it, as they feel that provision won’t clear the chamber.

— IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT: Johnson tried to press his members in a closed-door meeting Monday night to approve the narrow, Senate-approved budget resolution as-is that would set up a path to fund immigration enforcement. The Department of Homeland Security funding lapsed more than two months ago.

Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith, who wants a more expansive bill to fund the department — as do other key House GOP chairs — declined to say if he would support the measure if Johnson put it on the floor in its narrow form.

“I’m just listening to all the conversations,” Smith said in a brief interview.

Johnson can only lose a couple of votes on the rule Wednesday with full attendance.

What else we’re watching:

— WARSH VOTE IN SENATE BANKING — Few if any Democrats are expected to support Kevin Warsh when the Senate Banking panel takes up his nomination to serve as Fed chair Wednesday. The panel is still expected to advance Trump’s pick to replace outgoing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, putting him on a glide path to confirmation. But Warsh’s potential lack of Democratic support stands in stark contrast to Powell’s years as a bipartisan force on Blue Light News.

— WHAT MEMBERS WILL ASK HEGSETH — Republicans and Democrats see Pete Hegseth’s hearing before the House Armed Services panel Wednesday as a rare chance to get direct, public answers from the Defense secretary. The hearing is Hegseth’s first congressional testimony outside of classified sessions since the start of the Iran conflict.

Jordain Carney, Jasper Goodman, Victoria Guida and Leo Shane III contributed to this report.

Congress

How Talarico is countering Trump’s midterms convention

Published

3 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

3 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

3 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.”