Congress

Capitol agenda: What’s next for Johnson’s budget resolution

Published

2 years ago

February 26, 2025

House Republicans just barely managed to adopt their budget resolution. Now it has to survive the Senate’s woodchipper.

Quick recap: With GOP Reps. Thomas Massie, Tim Burchett, Warren Davidson and Victoria Spartz firmly opposed, House leaders pulled the budget resolution vote at the last minute Tuesday night, only to reverse course after a wild whip effort and some conversations with President Donald Trump. All but Massie flipped their votes when Republican leaders called members back to the floor.

Now that it’s approved, Senate Republicans are largely prepared to switch to the House’s one-bill track, which would link together defense, energy and border security with an overhaul of the tax code. But during a closed-door GOP lunch on Tuesday, senators discussed needing to negotiate changes to the House budget resolution, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss the private meeting.

The potential tweaks include making Trump’s tax cuts permanent, pulling back some of the House’s proposed deep spending cuts and removing the provision to raise the debt ceiling.

Remember: The Senate and the House have to adopt the same budget resolution to move forward, and Speaker Mike Johnson barely squeaked this one through. That all eventually leads to the really difficult part — drafting and passing the bill actually implementing the policy.

Still, Johnson and other House GOP leaders took a victory lap Tuesday night — and some thinly veiled shots at the Senate.

“We’re going to deliver the America First agenda. We’re going to deliver all of it, not just parts of it,” Johnson told reporters. He added that there’s “a lot of work ahead.”

That’s an undersell. The deep concerns that nearly derailed the budget resolution still exist. While hard-liners push for steeper cuts, centrists worry the current levels will mean significant reductions to Medicaid and other safety-net programs. Senators relate to the latter.

“There is going to be a lot of concern about the Medicaid cuts,” GOP Sen. Josh Hawley said in a brief interview.

What else we’re watching:

Republicans meeting on spending deal: House and Senate Republican leaders will meet Wednesday to hash out a unified plan for approaching government funding negotiations with Democrats. “The best-case scenario is that we walk out united about what we need to do,” House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole said in a brief interview. The shutdown deadline is just over two weeks away.
Chavez-DeRemer committee vote: Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan first told Blue Light News she will vote to advance Lori Chavez-DeRemer through Senate HELP on Thursday, significantly boosting Trump’s Labor secretary nominee’s chances at confirmation. Hassan is the first Democrat on the HELP Committee to say she will vote for Chavez-DeRemer, making up for a potential “no” vote from GOP Sen. Rand Paul.
GOP brushing off Musk: The speaker on Tuesday brushed off Elon Musk’s attempt to interfere with his budget, saying he had “no concerns” that the tech mogul would affect his whip count. It’s the latest in a growing number of instances of GOP lawmakers breaking with Musk, but the billionaire doesn’t appear to be done wading into legislative business. Musk also suggested in recent days that a government shutdown “sounds great” — which could further complicate already delicate matters for Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune.

Jennifer Scholtes and Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.

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Congress

Chris Murphy plans midterm travel blitz, fundraising for Nixon in Florida

Published

51 minutes ago

October 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Sen. Chris Murphy wants Democrats to go big for Angie Nixon in Florida’s Senate race — and he’s pushing to raise some “serious money” to help.

“I do believe that we’d make a big mistake if we slept on Florida,” the Connecticut Democrat told Blue Light News on Friday. “I know it feels like a longer shot, but I just think this year is looking exceptional.”

Murphy plans to hit the trail with Nixon as part of a campaign swing for Senate candidates over the next three weeks that will take him through North Carolina and Florida, as well as events with Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota and Chris Pappas in New Hampshire. Murphy will serve as a surrogate for El-Sayed in the spin room at his next debate, and said he’s “just a big believer” in the Michigan Senate nominee.

Murphy’s bullishness about a blue wave comes as Senate Democrats are pushing the boundaries of a midterm battle map that is shifting further into red territory. The Chuck Schumer-aligned Senate Majority PAC has dropped roughly $5 million apiece into Texas and Kansas over recent days, and the minority leader has included Kansas and Mississippi in his pitches to donors.

“If I were in charge, I would definitely put some resources in Florida,” Murphy said. “When you have an exciting candidate like this, it’s a good long-term investment” in growing Democrats’ activist base.

Still, Murphy stressed he’s “not making any formal recommendations” on where Schumer or top Democratic campaign groups should move their money.

“They’ve got so many mouths to feed,” Murphy said. “That’s why I’m going to try to step up and do some work on my own.”

Murphy, who is considered a potential 2028 presidential contender, has spread roughly $2.5 million across candidates, campaign arms and other organizations this cycle. That includes transferring more than $500,000 to Democrats’ three top campaign arms and 25 state parties.

Prominent Democrats have been ramping up their attention on Florida. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has funneled $250,000 toward Nixon’s campaign, along with other resources. Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) also told Blue Light News he hopes to campaign with Nixon.

But Democrats across suddenly competitive red states are clamoring for more cash and Florida is an expensive state, complicating the chances of a significant investment from national groups.

Nixon also faces an uphill battle against GOP Sen. Ashley Moody in the Sunshine State. A progressive state lawmaker, Nixon aligned herself with the Democratic Socialists of America over the summer in a state where many voters, especially those with ties to Cuba, reject such an ideology. Also, Republicans in Florida have a 1.5 million voter registration advantage over Democrats.

Congress

Democrats drop $5M into Kansas Senate race

Published

4 hours ago

October 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Senate Democrats’ top super PAC is pushing into Kansas.

The Chuck Schumer-aligned Senate Majority PAC is launching a $5 million statewide television ad blitz starting Saturday through Election Day — the latest sign that Democrats believe the Senate map is shifting onto red turf.

SMP had signaled in recent days it could get involved in the race, telling Blue Light News late last month it was “actively thinking” about whether to wade into the state where Democrats haven’t won a Senate seat in nearly a century but where Adam Hamilton narrowly leads GOP Sen. Roger Marshall in recent polls. Internal SMP polling that found an increasingly competitive race factored into the group’s decision to spend. It will also run digital ads.

“The gap is closing in Kansas,” SMP spokesperson Lauren French said in a statement. “We are committed to ensuring families understand Marshall’s real record of making health care and basic goods more expensive for working Kansans.”

Republicans are scrambling to shore up Marshall. Senate Leadership Fund, a top GOP super PAC aligned with Republican leadership, has booked over $10 million in ads through Election Day in the state, per ad tracking firm AdImpact.

SMP’s first ad attacks Marshall for joining Senate Republicans in voting to table a Democratic-led amendment last year to release the Jeffrey Epstein files. The Senate later approved legislation to release the files by unanimous consent. It’s the latest in a slate of ads from Democrats hitting their Republican rivals over the late, disgraced financier and convicted sex offender. Marshall’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Senate Democrats’ plunge into the state comes as the midterm battle map is undergoing a major realignment. Georgia and North Carolina — primed to be two of the cycle’s premiere battlegrounds — are tilting left to the point where national Republicans are retracting spending in both states and Democrats are starting to follow suit, freeing funds on both sides to shift elsewhere.

Republicans are racing to reinforce incumbents across what was once safer red turf. SLF has also pledged $5 million to bolster Sen. Darline Graham in South Carolina.

Democrats, meanwhile, are starting to spend more in red states. SMP has dropped over $2 million on digital ads in Texas. Schumer, the Senate minority leader, has included Kansas and Mississippi in his pitches to donors.

Congress

House Democratic campaign arm says it needs $17 million, and fast

Published

5 hours ago

October 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is begging for resources, and setting a hard deadline for donors to give $17 million in order to compete in a handful of districts that Republicans carried easily in 2024.

DCCC Executive Director Julie Merz said the committee needs the cash influx by Oct. 22 in order to “to take advantage of the opportunities we have” outside of the core battlefield, according to a memo shared with donors on Friday and obtained by POLITICO.

If they don’t pony up, Merz warns, the party “could be leaving winnable races on the table.”

Democrats have been clear that they have a fundraising disadvantage this cycle, but they have so far been reluctant to place a specific dollar amount on their needs, making the DCCC’s memo Friday a particularly surprising outlier.

“Here’s the tough reality though: the Republican ecosystem has amassed a massive war chest that is significantly greater than ours and is spending it,” Merz says in the memo after arguing that the members of the committee “remain confident that we will win back the majority in 25 days.”

Specifically, Merz dedicates significant portions of the memo to four districts where the committee is desperate for more money in order to compete — all of which President Donald Trump won by double-digit margins in 2024:

— Florida’s 27th District (Trump +14.6)

— Nevada’s 2nd District (Trump +13.9)

— South Carolina’s 1st District (Trump +13)

— New York’s 21st District (Trump +20.7)

The fundraising disadvantage has created headaches for both House and Senate Democrats over where, exactly, to deploy the resources they do have.

The committee tells donors that their internal polling shows all of those races within reach, but that Republicans’ big cash advantages — especially in the Trump-aligned super PAC MAGA Inc. — will make it harder to win those and other reach seats.

Merz also name drops a handful of other deep-red districts that are “worthy of additional investment in this environment,” including seats held by GOP Reps. French Hill (R-Ark.) and Richard Hudson (R-N.C.), the chair of the Republican National Congressional Committee.

The NRCC was quick to mock the DCCC’s memo.

“No amount of money fixes candidates voters don’t want. These seats are staying red, and Republicans are on offense across the map,” NRCC spokesperson Mike Marinella said in a statement.