Congress
House GOP tees up hearing on Trump’s foreign aid overhaul
The House Foreign Affairs Committee is holding a hearing next week on the U.S. Agency for International Development amid the Trump administration’s contentious efforts to shrink the institution, according to a notice obtained by Blue Light News.
The hearing, announced Thursday night to panel members by chair Brian Mast (R-Fla.), is titled “The USAID Betrayal” and is set to examine concerns over U.S. foreign aid policies. The hearing is set for Thursday at 8:30 a.m., and former Florida Republican Rep. Ted Yoho and Bill Steiger, who served as the agency’s chief of staff during the first Trump administration, are set to testify.
The move is unlikely to satisfy Democrats, who have been furious about the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle a federally codified agency, calling it unconstitutional and warning of dire humanitarian and geopolitical consequences. The have demanded an urgent hearing with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Peter Marocco, State’s director of foreign assistance.
President Donald Trump, urged by Elon Musk, has shut down USAID headquarters, fired contractors and placed employees on leave.
Mast and other Republicans have largely backed Trump on the moves, which include folding USAID into the State Department, accusing the agency of wasteful spending.
Congress
Senate Republicans release budget blueprint ahead of Wednesday markup
Senate Republicans will hold a committee vote next week on a budget blueprint that will unlock their two-bill strategy for enacting the heart of President Donald Trump’s domestic policy agenda.
Senate Budget Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) announced Friday that his panel will meet Wednesday and Thursday to debate and vote on the budget resolution, which paves the way for a border, defense and energy bill. Graham also released the text of his budget resolution Friday.
“This budget resolution jumpstarts a process that will give President Trump’s team the money they need to secure the border and deport criminals, and make America strong and more energy independent,” Graham said in a statement Friday about the budget resolution.
The formal announcement comes after Graham told Senate Republicans during a closed-door lunch Wednesday that his committee would vote next week on their budget blueprint. Senate Republicans will be at Mar-a-Lago on Friday night for a celebratory dinner with Trump where they intend to ask him about whether their chamber should move first on the budget reconciliation legislation.
The Senate is effectively in a race with the House, which wants to pursue one sweeping bill that would also fold in an overhaul of the tax code. House Republicans have been struggling to get on the same page regarding their strategy, which delayed their plans to consider their own budget resolution this week inside the House Budget Committee.
But after around-the-clock meetings this week, Republicans are intending to work through the weekend and want to have a vote in committee next week on their own budget blueprint, which would tie together tax, energy, border and defense spending.
Congress
House Dems physically denied entry to Education Department building
House Dems physically denied entry to Education Department building
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Congress
Mike Johnson says Democrats ‘unresponsive’ ahead of shutdown deadline
Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters Friday morning that Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries “seemed to be trying to set up some sort of a government shutdown.”
“We have been negotiating in good faith, trying to get a top-line number. But so far as I know, they’ve been unresponsive the past two days or so,” Johnson said.
The speaker weighed in as anxieties are spiking about the coming March 14 deadline for extending government funding. Democrats have grown wary about cutting a deal with Republicans as President Donald Trump and his ally Elon Musk move swiftly to unilaterally cut agency funding
Top appropriators have been negotiating in recent weeks about a top-line spending number — a necessary first step toward passing funding for the remainder of fiscal 2025. The chair of the House Appropriations Committee, in fact, said Thursday night — contra Johnson — that those talks are ongoing.
“We are actively exchanging proposals,” Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said. “You know, we are exchanging things back and forth.”
The top Democrat on the panel, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (R-Conn.), said much the same Friday after Johnson spoke: “The speaker is mistaken. No one has walked away from the table. We sent them an offer yesterday. He should give Chairman Cole a call for a status update.”
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