Congress
Democrats’ fight-or-flight dilemma comes to a head in the Senate
Senate Democrats have been grappling for months over how to show their voters they are standing up to President Donald Trump.
Now they have their chance. They are facing key decisions this week over how readily they should cooperate with Republicans to advance Trump nominees and bipartisan spending bills. And an even bigger test looms on the horizon: a Sept. 30 shutdown deadline.
It’s all workaday congressional business, but dealing with it has become more politically fraught under the second Trump administration. The internal debate between members who want to resist and those who want to cut deals has been simmering, and it played out both behind closed doors and out in public view this week.
The tensions spilled out on the Senate floor Tuesday evening when Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey accused fellow Democrats of being “complicit” in Trump’s actions and urging them to “have a backbone,” fueling anger among some of his colleagues.
On Wednesday, Democratic senators used a closed-door lunch to hash out what their strategy should be heading into the fall funding fights, where they are hoping to avoid a repeat of the shutdown drama that played out this spring — ending in internal divisions and recriminations.
“The Republicans can roll us once, but we sure as hell shouldn’t let them roll us a second time,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said in a brief interview. Warren added she was “deeply skeptical” of spending negotiations after Republicans approved a $9 billion clawback of funding at Trump’s request this month.
But it was Booker’s fiery protest — targeting a package of bipartisan police-focused bills that had been shepherded by his Democratic colleagues on the Senate Judiciary Committee — that underscored the tension over his party’s approach to Trump.
“Democrats need to learn to fight, and fight him, and stop him from hurting people,” he told reporters shortly after blocking several bipartisan bills. “There’s a lot of us in this caucus that want to fucking fight, and what’s bothering me right now is we don’t see enough fight in this caucus.”
The burn-it-down crowd might be a minority inside the caucus, but those words echo what many progressive activists, and some congressional Democrats, have been urging since at least March, when Minority Leader Chuck Schumer joined with nine Senate Democrats to help advance a GOP-written funding bill to avoid a shutdown they worried would only empower Trump.
The immediate stakes for Democrats’ fight-or-flight dilemma are relatively limited — the fate of their summer recess, to be precise.
Republicans want Democrats to agree to accelerate the confirmations of dozens of the roughly 150 pending Trump nominees before they allow senators to leave Washington. Democrats are seeking a “quid pro quo,” in the words of Minority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois. The main idea under discussion is getting the White House to release frozen agency funding while still holding up some of Trump’s most controversial picks.
But some Democrats like Warren are questioning why they should agree to help the Trump administration fill its ranks at all. Booker’s outburst is hanging over the decision (though even he showed pragmatism this week, allowing two of the police bills in the larger package to advance).
The bigger fight, senators agree, will come in September, and some Democrats are already warning that they need to stiffen their spines — and get their strategy settled — ahead of a potentially messy shutdown brawl.
They aren’t there yet. But Schumer convened another special caucus lunch on Wednesday to talk through potential September strategies.
One idea Democrats are discussing would be to secure a commitment from Republicans that they would not pursue additional funding clawbacks following this month’s successful “rescissions” votes, according to a person granted anonymity to disclose the private deliberations. There’s plenty of skepticism that they can trust the GOP to stick any deal, however, and they are also discussing possible policy demands, such as preserving Affordable Care Act tax credits that are set to expire at the end of the year
“We’re having, I think, very productive discussions about what our priorities are,” Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said after leaving the caucus lunch Wednesday. He added that, based on the discussion, Democrats “are going to have a pretty good consensus position.”
As they hash out demands for the nominations and shutdown battles, Senate Democrats are trying to show some fight in smaller ways. They continue to try and put the GOP on the back foot regarding the so-called “Epstein files” — the yet-to-be released investigative records pertaining to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Schumer and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Democrats invoked a little-known law this week to try to force the administration to hand over the files — a move almost certain to be spurned by the Trump administration.
Schumer insisted during a news conference Wednesday that the letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi was “not a stunt” and suggested Democrats could sue if the Justice Department does not comply.
“That’s what accountability looks like. This is what oversight looks like,” Schumer told reporters, before sidestepping a question about whether Democrats would use their leverage on nominations and spending to pursue the Epstein matter.
Democrats are also working through whether they want to use the Senate’s government funding process this week to show Republicans they are willing to work with them. Senate Majority Leader John Thune is hoping to advance a small subset of the fiscal 2026 spending bills ahead of the summer recess, and many Democratic appropriators are ready to play ball. Other Democrats want to be more combative, with some floating an amendment related to Epstein.
Asked if she believed Democrats are appropriately fighting back by participating in the funding process, the top Democratic appropriator, Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, said, “Absolutely. We are working really hard to make sure that our priorities are in these bills.”
Booker, for his part, said Wednesday he had “very strong feelings” about how the caucus should handle the overall funding fight.
But he said “the last thing I would do is discuss it.”
Calen Razor and Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.
Congress
Trump apparently shares Tom Cotton’s phone number in push to make Daylight Saving Time permanent
President Donald Trump appeared to share Sen. Tom Cotton’s phone number in a Saturday morning social media post imploring the Arkansas Republican to get behind a bill to make Daylight Saving Time permanent.
“Almost everybody wants “The Sunshine Protection Act” to pass, except for Tom Cotton,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “To the Great People of Arkansas, please let your Senator know it would be a GREAT Bipartisan WIN for the United States Senate, and for America, itself.”
The president has spent months personally pushing Senate Republicans to end the practice that sees Americans change their clocks twice a year, cementing more sunlight hours in the evening for all twelve months of the calendar. Cotton, whom Trump called “a friend of mine” in the Saturday post, has long argued that making daylight saving time permanent would leave children, farmers and other early risers in the dark for hours on winter mornings.
One of Trump’s key selling points on Saturday: the PGA tour.
“The PGA TOUR, as an example, needs more Daylight in the afternoon in order to finish their Tournaments,” he said, attaching a letter from PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp endorsing the bill. ”Likewise, regular Golfers, Tennis Players, Hunters and, perhaps most importantly, Farmers who want more Daylight to play or work.
A Blue Light News call to the cellphone number went to voicemail. A spokesperson for Cotton did not respond to a request for comment. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The current version of the bill was introduced in the House in January 2025 by Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.), with Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) leading the Senate version. The legislation would make daylight saving time permanent across most of the country, ending the twice-yearly clock changes. The legislation has been stalled in the Senate since July.
The president encouraged supporters of the bill, dubbed the “The Sunshine Protection Act,” to call Cotton to “let your Senator know it would be a GREAT Bipartisan WIN for the United States Senate, and for America, itself.”
During the 2016 Republican presidential primary, he publicly gave out the personal cellphone number of then-rival Sen. Lindsey Graham after the South Carolina Republican criticized him. Trump, who came to count on Graham as a reliable Senate ally after he won the presidency, revisited the moment during Graham’s funeral in July, acknowledging that sharing the number was something he “shouldn’t have done.”
Kelsey Brugger contributed to this report.
Sen. Bernie Sanders will hit the road for Troy Jackson in Maine starting Oct. 10, the first time the progressive leader will stump for the candidate this cycle.
The Vermont independent plans to hold three rallies with Jackson, according to an itinerary shared first with Blue Light News: first in Bangor on Oct. 10th followed by Lewiston and Biddeford on Oct. 11.
The Maine swing will kick off Sanders’ travel for the final stretch of the midterms, covering ground throughout October for House and Senate candidates, POLITICO reported.
“Bernie and Troy know that working people built this country and deserve a government that fights for them,” Jackson spokesperson Dan Gottlieb told Blue Light News. “Susan Collins has had nearly 30 years to deliver, and working Mainers are still getting squeezed while she serves the billionaires and corporate interests who bankroll her campaigns. Mainers don’t need another six years of excuses.”
Sanders campaigned ahead of major wins for progressives in the primary season, speaking at more than 60 rallies since last year’s Fight the Oligarchy tour and endorsing more than 90 candidates up and down the ballot.
He’s also opening his substantial $23 million campaign war chest, POLITICO reported, and contributing hundreds of thousands of dollars toMinnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan’s Senate campaign and others including Angie Nixon in Florida and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison,
Sanders will return to Maine after initially backing Graham Platner’s campaign for Senate. Allegations reported by POLITICO ultimately led him to call on the Democratic nominee to drop out of the race.
Sanders had not formally endorsed Jackson since he clinched the nomination from Platner, though he previously backed Jackson’s initial run for governor.
House Financial Services Chair French Hill said he has “no concerns” about winning back his Arkansas seat in the upcoming midterm elections, but the six-term House member acknowledged the political headwinds for his party.
“I consider the atmosphere a very tough political environment right now because of President [Donald] Trump’s lack of favorability at the top, and you know people are concerned about, as I say, what it’s like to live under an inflated economy the last four years,” Hill said in an interview.
Hill is in a solidly red district, according to the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, and said he is up against a “weaker candidate this time than I’ve had in past races.” Polling in the district, however, has shown a tighter race. The two polls done this year placed Democratic challenger Chris Jones ahead of Hill by a few percentage points. Any perceived polling victory for Jones is still well within the margin of error, and one of the polls had a Democratic sponsor.
Stephannie Lane Baker, a spokesperson for Jones, said that “of all the Republicans in Congress, the chairman of the Financial Services Committee doesn’t get to dodge responsibility for this economy. He’s in trouble, and he knows it.”
Additionally, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker’s PAC, Ready for the Fight, committed more than $1 million in television ads through the next five weeks for Jones’ race in Arkansas’s 2nd District, Jordan Abudayyeh, a spokesperson for the PAC confirmed. Overall Democratic spending on advertising for the race was just over $1 million, primarily made up by contributions from the Ready for the Fight PAC, with Republicans spending almost $2.7 million on ad buys, according to AdImpact, an advertising tracking service.
Hill said he has addressed affordability concerns “head on” this Congress.
“My work on housing, my work on the Price Stability Act, my work to try to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse, and drop the federal budget deficit as a percentage of GDP,” Hill said. “All these things can contribute to a more affordable environment for people. So I’ve tried to make that a forefront of my campaign this year.”
Hill was a key architect of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, a bipartisan housing affordability bill that became law in July. The Price Stability Act, which is unlikely to become law this year, would narrow the Federal Reserve’s current dual mandate of pursuing maximum employment and price stability to focus exclusively on containing inflation.
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