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Former aide skewers California House Dem in primary launch

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Another House Democrat is getting an age-driven primary challenge.

Jake Rakov, a former staffer to Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.), is launching a bid Wednesday to oust his one-time boss. Rakov, 37, is part of a string of Democrats waging intra-party battles against a long-time House incumbents by calling for a generational change in leadership.

Standing in front of a Los Angeles structure decimated by wildfire, Rakov used a 2.5-minute long launch video to blast Sherman, 70, as out of touch with his constituents and unwilling to mount a meaningful resistance against President Donald Trump’s “MAGA hellscape.”

“He and people like him, who have stayed on for so long, who don’t even check into the district anymore,” Rakov said in an interview with Blue Light News, “are why we have Trump twice, and why our party is so bad at fighting back against him now.”

First elected in 1996, Sherman is serving his 15th term in the House. His last truly competitive election was in 2012 when redistricting pitted him against then-Rep. Howard Berman in a race that turned so acrimonious that the two nearly came to blows during a debate. Sherman ended 2024 with $3.9 million in the bank.

Rakov served as Sherman’s deputy communications director in 2017. He is active in the LGBTQ+ community in the district and sat on the steering committee for Los Angeles’ Stonewall Democratic Club.

The district spans the western San Fernando Valley and includes Pacific Palisades, a part of Los Angeles devastated by the wildfires in January. Sherman was a regular presence at press briefings in the area as a series of major fires fueled by high winds and dry brush raced through the county. He also sparred with Trump during the president’s January visit to the disaster area, challenging the assertion that FEMA was doing a poor job.

But Rakov said Sherman’s response to the tragedy was lacking and that he did little besides “maybe tweeting out a 1-800 number.”

“If I were in office and our district had gone through what it’s gone through, I would be here every recess with my staff out at the Westside Pavilion rebuilding center,” Rakov said. “How can the federal government help? Who do you need us to talk to? He hasn’t done any of that.”

Rakov pledged to eschew corporate PAC money — he is married to Abe Rakov, who is the executive director of campaign-finance reform group End Citizens United — to serve no more than five terms in the House and to hold monthly in-person town halls, a practice he says Sherman avoids.

He said his challenge is motivated more by Sherman’s leadership style rather than ideological differences.

“We’re both progressive Democrats, and I’m sure we’ll find daylight on a few things here and there,” he said, “but I think this is much more about being a better member of Congress and actually doing what needs to be done in this moment in time.”

Sherman’s speeches on the House floor and lengthy social media videos don’t win the party new voters or “get any of our message out there,” Rakov said. Younger Democrats can better relate to Gen Z and millennial voters, he argued, and know how to reach them on new mediums.

California’s primary advances the top-two vote-getters regardless of party to a general election, so Rakov and Sherman could face off twice. Such a campaign would require significant resources. But Sherman, a senior member of the House Financial Services committee, has remained skeptical of cryptocurrencies, which he has called a “Ponzi scheme.” Pro-crypto super PACs spent heavily in the 2024 election and could see an opportunity to dethrone an opponent by spending against him.

Besides Rakov, two other younger progressives have launched prominent campaigns against older Democrats. YouTuber Kat Abughazaleh, 26, is challenging Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), and Saikat Chakrabarti, the 39-year-old former aide to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), is primarying Nancy Pelosi. Both described their campaigns as an attempt to usher in a new cohort.

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Congress

Floor arm-twisting continues

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The House floor has been frozen for more than an hour now as GOP hard-liners dig in against a procedural vote to move ahead with consideration of extending a government surveillance law, a farm bill and a budget blueprint for a party-line immigration bill.

GOP leaders have been seen huddling with holdouts on the House floor and have so far been able to flip Reps. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, and Andy Biggs and Eli Crane of Arizona. Speaker Mike Johnson will need to flip several holdouts to be able to proceed.

Five Republicans, however, are still standing firm. That includes Reps. Troy Nehls and Keith Self of Texas, as well as Reps. Harriet Hageman of Wyoming, Tim Burchett of Tennessee and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania. GOP leaders have been seen in huddles with the hard-liners, several of which have still not voted. Though a few have since voted for the rule after talking to GOP leaders.

Many Colorado Republicans also haven’t voted yet, with several of them concerned about small refinery language added to a E15 sales bill that will merge with the farm bill upon passage.

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House Oversight sets date for Pam Bondi deposition

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Former Attorney General Pam Bondi will appear May 29 for a deposition before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, a panel spokesperson said Wednesday.

The announcement came after committee Democrats said they would pursue contempt charges against Bondi after she failed to appear for an earlier deposition as part of Oversight’s investigation into Jeffrey Epstein and the Department of Justice’s handling of the federal inquiry into the late convicted sex offender.

In a sign of Republican efforts to quickly preempt Democrats’ action, ranking member Robert Garcia of California was taken by surprise by the development during a news conference Wednesday morning to roll out the contempt resolution.

Since the bipartisan vote to compel Bondi’s testimony earlier this year, she has been ousted, and her former deputy, Todd Blanche, has assumed the role of acting attorney general.

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

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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.

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