Congress
House Republicans find it difficult to focus on rising costs as they plot 2026 agenda
DORAL, Fla. — House Republicans arrived at their yearly policy retreat aiming to craft a 2026 agenda that will help them keep their majority in the upcoming midterms. But they left with few specifics on what more they can do before the election to quell voter angst about higher prices.
Speaker Mike Johnson told GOP members in a private session Wednesday closing out the retreat that he remains intent on pursuing a new party-line domestic policy bill to follow on last year’s tax-cuts-focused megabill.
While that legislation could theoretically tackle some cost-of-living issues, Johnson didn’t offer any specific policies that would be included or a timeline for passing it, according to four people in the room granted anonymity to describe the private meeting. Some senior Republicans present at the meetings privately warned they don’t have much time left for such a big legislative lift.
Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), chair of the hard-line House Freedom Caucus, said he awaited party leaders’ ideas for a second megabill, which would be passed through the party line reconciliation process. But he was candid about the GOP’s limited legislative options before November.
“The bottom line is that inflation is stable, gas prices are going to come down once the Iran conflict is over, we’ll deal with housing in some way,” he said. “I mean, the American people will see the stability in inflation. They’ll see the stability in energy and gas prices. And, you know, that’s probably all we’re going to be able to do before the midterms.”
The GOP’s inability to coalesce behind an election year economic agenda is being driven in no small part by President Donald Trump, who opened the retreat by telling House Republicans their “No. 1 priority” should be passing an GOP overhaul of federal elections, with new restrictions on transgender rights tacked on.
Trump all but dismissed the affordability issue, noting at one point that Americans “don’t talk about housing, they don’t talk about anything” except for the SAVE America Act — the elections bill he’s pushing the House to pass a third time.
Asked about the divide between voters’ top priority and the president’s, Rep. Lisa McClain of Michigan said, “I don’t think it’s an ‘or.’ I think it’s an ‘and.’”
“When you look at economic issues, that is really what is important to a lot of Americans,” said McClain, the No. 4 Republican leader. “It’s pocketbook issues, right? So it’s an ‘and’ not an ‘or.’”
Trump’s obsession with the elections bill — and Johnson’s determination to pursue a reconciliation bill despite long odds — leaving Republicans with a tough task in addressing rising prices on everyday goods, which remain an issue of top concern to voters.
Even the new pressure on energy prices from Trump’s decision to join Israel in launching a war on Iran has yet to spur GOP lawmakers into action. Most, like Harris, simply asserted oil prices would come down soon enough.
Pressed on affordability issues, Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) raised the ongoing shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, noting it’s “disrupting travel” and “people’s lives,” as he also made the case for the Trump-backed elections bill.
“Especially coming into the election, the SAVE America Act is a top priority, as well,” he said. “But … pocketbook issues are what drives people to the polls. So we need to do both at once, focus on affordability, but focus on the integrity of the election.”
The chair of the House GOP campaign committee, Rep. Richard Hudson of North Carolina, tried to square the two demands as he left the retreat Wednesday. Like other leaders, he raised last year’s tax cuts and other bills the Republican-controlled Congress passed last year, arguing candidates have “lots of wins to talk about.”
“Our entire focus as House Republicans is on average, everyday American working families,” Hudson said in an interview. “We’ve delivered tax relief, a lot of other things they care about — school choice, upgraded the air traffic control system.”
Asked if there’s more Republicans could do to lower prices, Hudson said, “Sure.”
“Lots of other things we’d like to do,” he added. “We just have to figure out if we’ve got the votes.”
House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) was among several lawmakers who pointed to pending housing legislation as a major opportunity to address rising prices in a key sector.
“I think there’s a program there that we can certainly advance,” Cole said in an interview, mentioning the possibility of energy and transportation bills as well.
But the housing bill is facing a rocky path out of Congress, despite broad bipartisan support. While a version is expected to pass the Senate as soon as this week, it now faces hurdles in the House after Harris and other members of the Freedom Caucus raised objections to provisions dealing with the ownership of single-family homes by large companies and a possible Federal Reserve digital currency.
Rep. Keith Self (R-Texas), for instance, said in an interview that “socialist policies” would have to be stripped out of the bill. Several invoked the involvement of progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, who helped negotiate a Senate compromise.
“It’s not as conservative a product as the House bill was,” Harris said.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and pardon attorney Ed Martin traded personal insults Thursday on social media, a remarkably public feud between a sitting Republican senator and member of the administration.
Tuesday’s sparring comes after Tillis, who helped sink Martin’s nomination to be U.S. attorney in Washington and is leaving the Senate at the end of his term next January, incorrectly asserted in a POLITICO interview Thursday that Martin was no longer employed by the Justice Department.
Martin responded in a now-deleted post on X: “Hey @SenThomTillis: are you ok? Having memory issues for retirement? You called me on my cellphone recently to block a pardon for one of your constituents. Remember?”
He fumed in another post: “Deranged. Instead back to North Carolina, just go to Hell. Good riddance. #DrainTheSwamp Btw, the TILLIS Standard: MAGA doesn’t forget losers!”
“Being hated by idiots is the price you pay for not being one of them,” Tillis fired back on X.
The pair have a history.
The North Carolina Republican dealt a crushing blow to Martin’s nomination to be the U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., last March because of Martin’s advocacy on behalf of multiple Jan. 6 defendants.
Tillis told POLITICO he’d employ that same standard for whomever Trump nominates to replace Pam Bondi as attorney general.
“Hopefully, they’ll take me at my word when I say anybody who equivocated on the Jan. 6 rioters, I just can’t support,” he said.
Later Thursday morning, Tillis said he had called Martin to stave off the pardon of a billionaire North Carolina financier who owes more than $500 million in restitution payments to insurers.
“Ed Martin is correct about one thing,” Tillis wrote. “The ‘constituent’ I opposed pardoning was Greg Lindberg, who was convicted of defrauding North Carolinians to the tune of billions of dollars and attempting to bribe public officials. Keep up the great work, Ed.”
GOP unity over the Iran war started to crack Thursday when Sen. Susan Collins of Maine voted with Democrats to halt the conflict, marking the first time a Republican has changed their vote on the military campaign in the Middle East.
While the vote failed, the shift signaled President Donald Trump could soon face far more resistance over the conflict. That’s especially true as he blows past a legal deadline this week for the U.S. to exit the war without congressional authorization.
Just two Republicans — Collins and Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky — joined Democrats to support curtailing Trump in a 47-50 vote. Unlike Collins, Paul has supported all attempts to rein in the war. Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania continued to be the lone Democrat to oppose the effort.
The measure is the sixth resolution the Senate has rejected since the conflict began in February.
The military campaign against Tehran will hit a 60-day deadline Friday that requires the administration to halt U.S. involvement unless Congress authorizes continued military action. Trump does not seem eager to end the military campaign unilaterally, and no legislation exists yet to green-light its continuation, meaning the war is certain to break the threshold.
Democrats have been counting on that deadline to sway Republicans, several of whom have said they’ll be hard pressed to continue their support beyond the deadline.
“Time’s up,” Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the Senate floor. “Republicans, stop sitting out, start speaking up.”
The War Powers Resolution of 1973 limits U.S. involvement in hostilities to 60 days after the president has notified Congress, which the Trump administration provided March 2. The White House can extend military operations for another 30 days in order to wind down U.S. involvement.
Collins flipped her vote a day ahead of the administration’s legal deadline, which she signaled would be a turning point for her. The move by Collins, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, also reflects her tough reelection bid as Democrats count on unseating her to win the majority. The war is largely unpopular, and her challenger, Graham Platner, is running on an anti-war platform.
“I have said from the very beginning that the law is definitive that at 60 days, Congress has to either authorize or block the military hostilities,” Collins said ahead of the vote. “I’ve been pretty clear what I was going to do at that point.”
Collins gave a preview of her vote Tuesday, when she joined with Democrats on a separate measure to block potential military action against Cuba. That measure was also defeated by Republicans.
Other GOP senators who indicated the 60-day mark would be problematic for them held off joining with Democrats on Thursday. One such Republican, Sen. John Curtis of Utah, said in a statement that he was “engaged in thoughtful discussion” on the path forward. But he also warned: “I will not support continued funding for the use of force without Congress weighing in.”
A White House official, granted anonymity to describe the dynamics of the 60-day deadline ahead of the vote, said the administration “is in active conversations with Blue Light News on this topic.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, though, suggested to senators on Thursday that the ceasefire would effectively negate the 60-day clock. War powers advocates contend that’s not how the statute works and note the U.S. military is still blockading Iranian ports.
Senators approved a 45-day extension of a key surveillance program by voice vote Thursday, just hours before it is set to lapse.
The extension will give Congress until mid-June to work out a deal on a long-term reauthorization of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which targets foreigners abroad but can sweep in communications involving Americans.
The House is set to hold a vote Thursday afternoon to pass the extension and send it to President Donald Trump ahead of the deadline.
The Senate’s decision to do a short-term extension came after the House passed a three-year bill Wednesday but packaged it with a controversial digital currency provision that made it “dead on arrival,” according to Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
The Senate has been working on its own three-year extension, and supporters of the surveillance program say more time is needed to finalize a longer deal. “This will allow additional time to do that,” Thune said Thursday on the Senate floor.
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