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Capitol agenda: Troop pay fight tests the GOP

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Tensions over troop pay are taking center stage as the shutdown heads into Week 4.

A number of Republican lawmakers are uneasy with President Donald Trump once again sidestepping the legislative branch’s power of the purse, this time to keep paying members of the military.

“While it’s a desired outcome, there’s a process that’s required — by Constitution and by law — for Congress to be not only consulted but engaged,” says Sen. Jerry Moran, a GOP appropriator from Kansas.

“There’s a way we take care of this. It’s called appropriations. It’s called reprogramming. And I don’t think that process is being respected,” says Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), another member of the Appropriations Committee.

Per two White House officials granted anonymity, Trump will continue to tap alternative funding for military paychecks if Congress doesn’t pass a bill before the next pay date at the end of the month. It’s unclear to top congressional appropriators how much cash the White House believes is available for use, and the administration has not submitted requests to Capitol Hill to reprogram any money.

Senators are poised to get a vote on paying the military and some other federal workers this week, via a bill from Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.). Democrats are expected to block it from moving ahead. Senate GOP leaders are also considering holding another vote this week on a defense appropriations bill, after it failed to get enough Democratic support to pass on Thursday.

The White House is hunting for money to address other shortfalls to support politically popular programs, including key loans for farmers (a priority for Senate Majority Leader John Thune), according to two Trump officials and two senior Hill Republicans.

What else we’re watching:   

— Republicans rally shutdown support: Johnson will host a call with House Republicans Tuesday at 11:30 a.m. as he tries to keep his conference united against Democrats and supportive of staying out of Washington until the Senate reopens the government. Also on Tuesday, Trump will host Republican lawmakers for lunch to thank them for sticking together during the shutdown and confirming nominees, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss the plans.

— North Carolina enters the redistricting fight: North Carolina Republicans are expected to approve a new congressional map for the state this week, endangering Democratic Rep. Don Davis. It will mark the state’s fourth map change in just five years, and comes as Trump and national Republicans seek to shore up the GOP majority ahead of the 2026 midterms.

Jennifer Scholtes, Meredith Lee Hill, Jordain Carney and Calen Razor contributed to this report.

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Congress

Johnson touts ‘bipartisan’ path for FISA reauthorization, but obstacles remain

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Speaker Mike Johnson is raising the possibility of a “bipartisan” path forward on extending a key spy authority after negotiations among House Republicans blew up late last week.

“We’re confident that we’ll be able to find strong bipartisan consensus that builds off of the really meaningful reforms that we included in the legislation the last time we reauthorized it,” Johnson said during a news conference Tuesday morning.

The emergency short-term reauthorization Congress cleared last week expires April 30, putting pressure on lawmakers to reach a deal quickly.

Among the options GOP leaders are discussing: If the Senate can advance a three-year extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, with policy changes, the House could then pass it with a majority of Republicans and some Democrats, according to three people granted anonymity to share direct knowledge of ongoing conversations.

It’s also possible Johnson could put that measure on the House floor under an expedited procedure that does not require prior adoption of a party-line rule, but would need a two-thirds majority voting in the affirmative to secure passage. House GOP leaders still need to appease hard-liners who have very specific demands for new guardrails on warrentless surveillance practices as part of any reauthorization measure.

House Democratic leaders, meanwhile, aren’t promising cooperation — and they’re skeptical Johnson is as close to a deal as he might suggest.

“His confidence meter was always pretty high, and then he put a bill on the floor that had zero consensus among his caucus, and looked like the disaster that it was after midnight,” House Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar of California told reporters Tuesday.

He added that he has not had “any discussions” yet with Republican counterparts on next steps for Section 702, and “absent those conversations, it’s going to be hard to find bipartisan consensus.” Aguilar also said that Democrats would follow the leads of House Intelligence Chair Jim Himes of Connecticut and Jamie Raskin of Maryland.

Johnson is planning to meet Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Darin LaHood of Illinois later Tuesday as the pair of Republicans works with Democrats on a bipartisan FISA extension plan, according to two people granted anonymity to share private scheduling.

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Graham releases blueprint for GOP immigration enforcement funding plan

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Senate Budget Chair Lindsey Graham unveiled a fiscal blueprint Tuesday paving the way for the GOP’s party-line immigration enforcement plan.

The budget resolution is the first step in Republicans’ two-step plan to deliver a bill funding Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Border Patrol and other agencies to President Donald Trump’s desk by his self-imposed June 1 deadline.

Senate Republicans are aiming to adopt the budget resolution this week. Senate Majority Leader John Thune can lose as many as three GOP members so long as Vice President JD Vance is available to break ties.

“Republicans are doing something that must be done quickly, and that our Democrat colleagues are trying to prevent us from doing. That something is simple: fully fund Border Patrol and ICE at a time of great threat to the United States,” Graham (R-S.C.) said in a statement.

The budget resolution tasks the Senate Judiciary Committee and Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee with drafting the subsequent immigration enforcement bill.

The resolution gives the committees until May 15 to hand over text. It sets a ceiling of $70 billion for the Judiciary Committee’s portion and $70 billion for the Homeland Security panel’s portion. While the language would allow for a larger bill, a Graham aide said Tuesday that Republicans are aiming to keep the measure to about $70 billion.

Senate Republicans are expected to take an initial vote on the budget resolution as soon as Tuesday afternoon. After that they’ll need to complete a marathon session known as a vote-a-rama before they can approve the fiscal blueprint and send it to the House.

Democrats are expected to force several amendments related to cost-of-living concerns. Senate conservatives could also try to expand the scope of the bill, though GOP leaders hope to avoid making any changes to Graham’s text.

House Republicans could take their own vote next week. They are also waiting to grant approval of a Senate-passed deal to fund the rest of the Department of Homeland Security. Speaker Mike Johnson has delayed action on the measure amid hard-right demands that the Senate move on the immigration enforcement funding bill first.

Some House conservatives want the Senate to complete the entire reconciliation process, which allows ICE funding to bypass a Democratic filibuster, before they take up the larger DHS deal. That could drag the agency’s shutdown deep into May.

Senate Republicans are aiming to put the final immigration enforcement bill on the floor the week of May 11.

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‘Many families are struggling’

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Rep. Lisa McClain of Michigan offered a rare acknowledgment from a GOP leader Tuesday that the U.S. economy might not be in tip-top condition. McClain, the Republican Conference chair, said at a news conference that “even with bigger [tax] refunds, many families are struggling right now, and I get it.”

That’s a departure from the message President Donald Trump sent at a event in Las Vegas last week, where he said “everything’s doing really well” and played down the impact of higher energy prices since he ordered military strikes on Iran.

“But we also owe it to the American people to be honest about how we got here, to make sure we don’t ever go back again,” McClain, the No. 4 party leader added, saying Americans are “digging out of a hole” from former President Joe Biden’s administration.

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