Congress
‘Hate to lose the earmarks’: This powerful Republican got trounced despite securing billions
More than $1.5 billion in earmarks couldn’t save Sen. Susan Collins from the “blue wave” Tuesday night, proving outsized influence in Congress isn’t always an antidote for deep voter dissatisfaction with an incumbent party.
The Maine Republican centered her reelection campaign on the argument that, in an institution largely governed by seniority, her nearly 30 years in Washington and control of the powerful Appropriations Committee could deliver more for Maine than her Democratic challenger Troy Jackson. She even peppered voters with county-specific text messages in the final days before polls closed, touting the spoils of a half-decade of earmarks guaranteeing funding for specific home-state projects.
But it wasn’t enough, by a long shot. Collins lost to Jackson by almost 8 percentage points Tuesday night, matching similar Democratic blowouts throughout the country as Republicans were ousted from control of both the House and Senate.
Collins campaign manager Steve Abbott attributed the Republican incumbent’s loss to “bigger forces at play” than local politics, noting that the five-term senator “has been able to do extraordinary things for the state at a level that’s unprecedented in our modern history.”
“People are really unhappy about the direction of the country,” Abbott added in an interview at the Collins watch party as disappointed supporters left the ballroom at the Hilton Garden Inn in Bangor.
Collins is not the only Republican incumbent who touted earmarks in the final weeks before Election Day and lost anyway. Reps. Mike Lawler of New York, Rob Bresnahan of Pennsylvania and Monica De La Cruz of Texas were all defeated Tuesday despite reminding voters of the hundreds of millions of dollars they each secured for specific projects in their districts.
Three others who took that tack — Reps. David Valadao of California, Rob Wittman of Virginia and Tom Barrett of Michigan — are trailing their Democratic challengers as election officials continue to tally votes in those districts.
Maine Rep. Chellie Pingree, a Democrat who has represented Portland and surrounding towns for almost 18 years, said in an interview that there is no doubt voters are “grateful for the amount of money a state’s able to receive” when represented by a top appropriator.
“But I think Mainers were balancing the Republican majority and the cuts to our state already,” Pingree added. “So, yes — we hate to lose the earmarks that go to fire departments and sewer projects and other things. But overall, we’re much better off without a Republican majority.”
She noted almost $1 trillion in reductions to health care spending under the GOP megabill enacted last year, President Donald Trump’s tariffs, staffing losses at federal agencies like USDA and the expiration of subsidies for people who buy health care through the federal marketplace.
Jackson, the Democrat who beat Collins, said on Election Day he should be assigned to the Appropriations Committee to ensure Maine still has a seat at the table.
“I know people will chuckle and stuff like that. I know it’s based on seniority,” Jackson told reporters at a canvassing event in Portland Tuesday, hours before the polls called. “But I think if I beat the Appropriations chair, then I should be on Appropriations. That’s going to be my argument anyways.”
However, a person close to the Collins campaign, granted anonymity to speak candidly, warned that Maine voters “are going to wake up and be kind of shocked” at the influence and funding they have lost by ousting the longtime senator — and that “someone brand new” won’t be able to bring home the same level of federal funding.
“You can go to any town here in Maine,” the person said, “and Sen. Collins has delivered.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer is vowing that his party will use control of the chamber next year to try to end the Iran war, launch investigations and act as a legislative stumbling block for President Donald Trump.
Speaking to reporters on the latest stop of his 12-hour victory lap Wednesday, Schumer said that he has not yet spoken to Trump since Democrats won the Senate majority Tuesday night, but warned that “the days of Trump’s supplicant Senate are over.”
“Whenever Trump defies the will of the American people or the law, we will launch investigations, take him to court, and entangle him in legislative razor wire,” said Schumer, who is on track to be majority leader in the next congress.
Asked if he thinks Democrats will be able to work with Trump, Schumer added: “We are going to work hard to drive costs down with the president or without him. Period.”
The New York Democrat sidestepped a question about whether the election results were a mandate to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth — he said that “everyone will make their own interpretation of what it meant in terms of Hegseth” — but vowed that Democrats “are going to end the war.”
Democrats have tried to limit Trump’s military actions against Iran through war powers votes, but they’ve also looked at ways of leveraging government funding bills to place restrictions on the president; an annual defense policy bill has also been held in limbo for months over the issue.
Ultimately, Democrats will still need help from Republicans to pass most legislation, and Trump can always veto a bill that gets to his desk that would attempt to hem him in. Schumer, however, was bullish Wednesday about Democrats’ impending power.
“We have some Republicans already who have joined us in ending the war,” he said, “and the founding fathers had the power of the purse as one of the ways of deterring a president who does war without the consent of the American people.”
He also said that while Democrats will launch investigations into the Trump administration because “there was such rampant corruption,” that it wouldn’t be their top focus.
“We’re not going to take our eye off the ball. Number one, reducing costs, ending corruption,” Schumer said.
Democrats’ overwhelming takeover of both the House and Senate will trigger a shot clock on the Republican governing trifecta, setting up a tense post-election session on Capitol Hill.
Lawmakers will return to Washington next week for what’s known as the lame-duck session, where they’ll begin sorting through a pile of must-pass legislative business, including funding the government to avoid a pre-holiday shutdown and passing the annual defense authorization bill.
Republicans will have to prioritize what they want to accomplish in their waning days of congressional control, while Democrats have little incentive to help move GOP-led legislation after voters delivered a brutal rebuke of Republicans and the president on Tuesday night
“We are in a stronger negotiating position” when Democrats takeover in January, Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar of Texas said in an interview Wednesday morning, adding, “we should not give the Republican majority a huge a chance to influence much more of what happens in this country, because their own Republican voters just told them that they have failed.”
Meanwhile, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles was telling a group of aides on election night that “anyone who thinks President Trump or this team is going to take our foot off the gas over the next two years is sorely mistaken.”
“We know exactly what’s at stake, we know what we’re fighting for, and we have no intention of backing down,” she continued, according to a person granted anonymity to share portions of her speech.
But the posturing from both parties could strain lawmakers in the final weeks of the 119th Congress. Lawmakers are currently scheduled to be in session for fewer than 25 days before the end of the year, with the House calendar set at 20 days and the Senate at 22. Even before the midterms, lawmakers were hinting that those numbers could easily tick up given the lengthy to-do list.
The question of attendance, however, remains a serious concern for congressional leadership, with a broad swath of Republicans potentially disinclined to come to work now that they’ll soon be out of a job.
It’s going to be “a real problem for us,” one House Republican, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said in an interview Wednesday morning, adding that “no-shows” was a topic of conversation even as election results were rolling in.
Republicans share at least two legislative priorities with Democrats: Passing a government funding bill and the National Defense Authorization Act. According to retiring Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) in a Wednesday morning text message, the Trump administration also wants a war spending supplemental, funding for the president’s ballroom and triumphal arch projects and a third party-line package jammed through the budget reconciliation process.
Bacon, however, was less optimistic: “I doubt it will happen,” he said of Congress’ likelihood of approving the supplemental funding request in particular.
Government funding negotiations will take precedence, as lawmakers have until Dec. 11, when the current short-term funding bill expires, to reach a deal. While key appropriators insist they’ll try to enact full-year spending bills, that’s looking like a longshot — especially now that Democrats will have more leverage in the new Congress to force enactment of their top priorities.
The most likely scenario at this point — according to senior congressional aides, granted anonymity to share details of private conversations — is for leaders of the House and Senate Appropriations committees to advocate for another stopgap to buy themselves more time to come up with a larger agreement on spending levels and negotiate a longer-term funding deal.
Even with the extra time, negotiations are likely to be difficult. With Republicans about to lose their majority in both chambers, there is a standoff over funding levels and policy riders brewing. Republicans will want to lock in an agreement that reflects their priorities, while Democrats could seek to hold off until January when they control all of Congress and can exert more leverage in negotiations.
“[Hakeem] Jeffries will be under immense pressure to force a [continuing resolution] until the New Year, where they think they can negotiate a better deal,” said the House Republican.
Lawmakers are also girding for two divisive policy fights they punted in the September funding stopgap: whether to delay a ban on intoxicating hemp products from going into effect, and whether to allow Trump to finalize a plan that would put political appointees in charge of approving federal grants.
Another wild card could be how hard Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins fights for her own priorities in her final months in office, after the Maine Republican’s stunning loss Tuesday after a 30-year career in Congress.
Work also will continue in pursuit of passing the annual defense policy bill before the year’s end. But lawmakers were at an impasse before the midterms, with Senate Democrats dug in against the Iran war and Trump’s record-breaking $1.5 trillion Pentagon defense proposal. The administration could be prepared to cut that ask by $400 billion to make it more palatable and open up a lane for passage, but the midterm results show an electorate sour on the Iran war, which could complicate any additional funding request related to that effort.
Then there’s the GOP’s possible mad dash to pass a third party-line bill through the filibuster-skirting budget reconciliation process. House Republicans sought to lay the groundwork over the summer for a package that would unleash military spending and crack down on alleged fraud in social safety net programs. The Senate never touched the proposal.
“As we look at just the weeks ahead of us, we’re going to be ready to build on our record of accomplishment,” Speaker Mike Johnson told event attendees in his hometown of Shreveport, Louisiana Tuesday night as it was becoming clear that GOP control was slipping away. “Our job is nowhere close to being finished yet, and the outcome of an election on one night doesn’t change that a bit.”
Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) recently told reporters that Republicans need to pack “everything that we could possibly get into a reconciliation bill” during the lame duck, calling it the party’s “Last Supper” before the end of the party’s governing trifecta in Washington.
Republicans could try to work with the House’s budget blueprint to pass even a narrow partisan bill that notches some GOP wins in the final weeks of the 119th Congress, but many doubt there will be enough time to write a party-line bill from scratch.
There’s interest in advancing a bill to overhaul the federal permitting process for energy projects, which has bipartisan support in the Senate and the backing of the White House. Senate GOP leadership have paved the way for procedural votes on that measure as soon as lawmakers return to Washington next week.
While many negotiators feel Congress has never come this close to victory on the thorny energy issue they’ve been working on for years — and should not now let the perfect be the enemy of the good — Democrats’ success in the midterms has some progressives feeling emboldened to reject it out of hand.
“Voters spoke loud and clear, and they don’t want this dirty, fossil-fuel-expanding bill,” Rep. Jared Huffman of California, the top Democrat on the Natural Resources Committee, said in an interview Tuesday evening. “We need to go back and change some very problematic parts of this bill.”
Republicans may also press a long-shot bid for a major bill to regulate the cryptocurrency industry before the end of the year, fixes to a bipartisan law from 2020 shielding patients from exorbitant medical bills and an overhaul of the multibillion-dollar college sports industry.
Even before the midterms, however, some lawmakers were tempering expectations of a productive lame duck session.
“I’m hearing that we might be in session many, many days between the middle of November and the end of the year,” Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) told reporters last week. “What will get accomplished? I’m not yet sure.”
Megan Messerly, Mia McCarthy, Riley Rogerson, Connor O’Brien, Ari Hawkins, Nico Portuondo, Katherine Hapgood, Jasper Goodman, Simon J. Levien, Kelsey Brugger and Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said he will run for the top GOP leadership post in the aftermath of his party’s devastating midterm losses.
In a letter sent to fellow House Republicans, Scalise highlighted the need for unity and a “clear vision and agenda.”
“I am ready to lead on day one and chart our path back to the majority,” he wrote.
The Louisianan, who has served as the GOP’s No. 2 or No. 3 leader for more than a decade, was long expected to jump into the race, given his longtime ambitions and robust campaigning and fundraising for fellow GOP lawmakers and candidates.
He made his announcement after Speaker Mike Johnson, whom Scalise helped propel from back-bench obscurity, said Wendesday morning he would not seek a leadership position in the upcoming Congress.
Scalise will face Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, the Judiciary Committee chair who announced his bid for the position earlier Wednesday, arguing he was a “battle-tested” leader ready to take on the new Democratic majority.
Scalise has been House majority leader since 2023. In 2017, during his time as House majority whip, he was seriously wounded by a would-be assassin who attacked Republican lawmakers who were practicing for the annual congressional baseball game.
After then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy was ousted in 2023, Scalise made a bid for the gavel but faced skepticism from the hard right and was ultimately unable to secure enough votes.
He won a majority in an internal GOP conference vote, but a group of holdouts refused to support him during the public floor vote in a bid to elevate Jordan. This time, Scalise would only need a majority vote in the GOP conference to be elected minority leader.
Scalise pointed to his past leadership and played up his credibility — after some members criticized Johnson for seeming to make contradictory promises to different blocs of the conference.
“I am always honest about our challenges but work to solve them in the most conservative and consensus-driven way possible,” he said. “That’s what you’ve come to expect from me and that will be more important than ever in the next two years.”
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