Congress

House to return to laundry list of controversies after 7-week hiatus

Published

11 months ago

November 10, 2025

The House is set to return to work Wednesday after a staggering 54 days out of session. Ending the record government shutdown will be the least of Speaker Mike Johnson’s problems.

Tensions have been running high for weeks over Johnson’s decision to shut down the House for the duration of the shutdown, sparking intense criticism from Democrats and private alarm inside pockets of the House GOP.

With members now returning to Washington after spending nearly two months dispersed across the country, he is faced with jump-starting dormant committee work, tackling a looming health care deadline and resolving long-brewing internal conflicts over the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and congressional stock-trading — if he can reopen the government first.

Asked Monday if he had the votes to pass the Senate-negotiated package, Johnson replied, “I think we will,” as he dashed into his office.

Johnson is already leaning heavily on President Donald Trump to get his conference behind the funding package. He made clear on a private call with House Republicans Monday morning that Trump wants the government reopened as soon as possible, and Trump signaled later in the day that he backs the deal.

GOP hard-liners who have traditionally opposed spending bills appear to be falling in line, arguing that the package constitutes a major win because it preempts a year-end omnibus bill that would fund the whole federal government through September and does not extend expiring Affordable Care Act insurance subsidies, as Democrats had demanded.

Even the famously intransigent House Freedom Caucus “is cool” with the package, according to one Republican in the group who was granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics. Their support solves one of Johnson’s biggest headaches and puts the bill on a glide path to passage, with Trump ready to cajole any other holdouts.

The bigger challenge might be getting members to Washington for a final vote. They’re likely to face massive travel disruptions this week with FAA flight limits prompting airlines to trim thousands of domestic flights. Johnson urged GOP members Monday to begin traveling to Washington as soon as possible. Chiefs of staff also received a notice Monday morning for lawmakers to return to Washington by Tuesday evening, and be ready to vote Wednesday.

Once lawmakers arrive and reopen the government, Johnson will then have to confront other long-simmering controversies.

One issue he plans to confront immediately Wednesday, before the first House votes, is swearing in Democratic Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva seven weeks after she won the special election to fill her late father’s Arizona House seat, according to five people granted anonymity to discuss his plans ahead of an official announcement.

But that in turn will jump-start another long-running GOP political hassle: Grijalva says she will be the 218th and decisive signature on a discharge petition to compel the release of the “Epstein files” — records held by the Justice Department that Trump has opposed sharing. That will start a cascade of legislative steps requiring the measure to be brought to the floor by early December.

Republican leadership has taken pains to avoid Epstein-related votes, which have generated fissures inside the GOP, but Johnson has said he won’t seek to block the discharge petition.

Separately, many members of both parties are pushing Johnson to advance a contentious bill that would ban lawmakers from trading individual stocks. Appropriators will also face the daunting task of drafting full-year spending bills for most of the federal government ahead of the new Jan. 30 shutdown deadline. And lawmakers on other committees will be forced to catch up on weeks of missed hearings and markups, with GOP leaders privately warning members that many late nights of work are in store upon their return.

The toughest internal battle Johnson will have to confront centers on health care. A brewing conflict over the expiring Obamacare subsidies — which the speaker was mostly able to keep under wraps with members out of town — is now set to spill out into the open in the coming days.

On one side, scores of Republicans are dead-set against extending the subsidies that have been at the center of the shutdown. On the other side, Johnson is facing a handful of unhappy GOP members, including some who are privately considering backing any discharge petition to sidestep Johnson and force a vote on an extension before the Obamacare tax credits expire Dec. 31.

“We will find a way,” said one House Republican who supports an extension and was granted anonymity to speak frankly about internal dynamics. Johnson told House Republicans on their Monday call that he is not committing to hold any vote on extending the subsidies. Asked later by reporters, he said only that there would be “a deliberative process.”

Across the aisle, he will be facing down over 200 angry Democrats who are already strategizing about how to turn their disappointment over the shutdown’s apparent anticlimactic ending into political advantage.

House Democrats will likely be unable to block the legislation to reopen the government this week, and many are fuming about what happened in the Senate.

Gathering on a private call Monday afternoon for their first party discussion since the Senate deal came together, members vented their anger about the eight Democratic and independent senators who broke ranks to advance the funding bill, according to five people granted anonymity to describe the discussion.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries took steps to cool the internal tensions, offering support to his Senate counterpart, Chuck Schumer, amid a fiery backlash Monday.

“Leader Schumer and Senate Democrats over the last seven weeks have waged a valiant fight on behalf of the American people, and I’m not going to explain what a handful of Senate Democrats have decided to do,” he told reporters Monday.

He and other Democrats are trying to refocus attention on extending the health care subsidies, with Jeffries telling fellow Democrats on the private call he would pursue all options to force action, including a new discharge petition, the people said. Democrats believe enough House Republicans are willing to cross Johnson and circumvent his leadership, though the House might not be able to act quickly enough to prevent a massive hike in Americans’ health insurance bills in the coming months.

Democratic leaders are expecting their members to vote en masse against the Senate deal and are expected to formally recommend a “no” vote. But one centrist House Democrat granted anonymity to comment on internal discussions said at least a handful of colleagues are expected to vote for the funding package this week.

A spokesperson for the only Democrat to vote for a GOP-led stopgap spending bill ahead of the shutdown — retiring Maine Rep. Jared Golden — said his “position on using a government shutdown as a legislative strategy has been clear and has not changed.”

Golden also said he has “spent months having bipartisan conversations about how to build the support necessary to extend the ACA credits” and “looks forward to continuing those conversations with his colleagues in the days to come.”

Congress

Senate passes bipartisan bill to overhaul college sports

Published

6 hours ago

September 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Senate passed a sweeping bipartisan bill Monday that would overhaul the multibillion-dollar college sports industry — a major legislative victory shared by members of both parties and President Donald Trump, who wants to sign the package as soon as possible.

A high priority for Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz of Texas and the panel’s top Democrat, Maria Cantwell of Washington, the Protect College Sports Act would replace a patchwork of state laws governing student athlete compensation, transfers and eligibility with one overarching federal rulebook.

“Today the Senate has the opportunity to protect the half million college athletes and the millions more who follow in their footsteps,” said Cruz in a floor speech Monday. “Students are transferring three or four times. Pros are trying to play ball against college kids. Conflicting court decisions have created a fragmented system — one that no one intended. And young men and women are losing opportunities to compete and receive an education.”

But while the 77-22 vote would ordinarily present itself as a welcome glimpse of cross-party unity, it is now being overshadowed by a murky outlook in the House, where Republicans oppose multiple provisions of the Senate package.

Democrats, meanwhile, are smarting from a highly-charged debate over whether the legislation would exploit college athletes of color — and some are questioning why their colleagues would split from the AFL-CIO and the NAACP, two organizations core to the party’s base that oppose the legislation.

That the vote was one of the last actions senators will take before leaving Washington to campaign for the midterms also has also presented unsavory optics for many Republicans, who are desperate to show they are serious about alleviating concerns around rising gas prices and interest rates.

“Is this really what we should be spending our time on?” Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), one of the most vocal opponents of the legislation, asked Monday night on the Senate floor. “Our country faces real challenges. Gas is at $5. Diesel costs are a record high. We’re at war abroad. Health care expenses are skyrocketing.”

“And,” Booker continued, “the United States Senate is spending precious time rewriting the rules of college sports while athletes’ groups, survivors of sexual assault, labor, civil rights leaders are all begging Congress to slow down and listen to their voices. What does this say about our priorities?”

In one apparent acknowledgement of the dynamics at play, Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) offered an amendment that would have put limits on how much schools and conferences can increase the price of tickets for games — arguing it would help keep costs stable for fans amid a nationwide affordability crisis. Cruz objected to the proposal, arguing it would “harm schools from being able to respond when market factors change.”

Kennedy’s amendment was ultimately rejected, while senators adopted a change to the bill sought by Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) to require the disclosure of foreign financing of intercollegiate athletics.

Cruz in a Senate floor speech Monday presented the Protect College Sports Act as a binary choice for his colleagues: Stand by, or turn their backs, on student athletes who are currently being undercut by bidding wars that force schools to scrap programs because they don’t make headlines or big time television contracts.

Cantwell, meanwhile, has insisted the “historic bill” is a victory for the half-million college athletes across the country — particularly women and participants in Olympic sports programs — who are losing out on money and resources as big-ticket departments like football spend big money to attract top talent.

“We need to stop stealing money out of college [and] university institutions for education, for tuition, for professors, and putting it into an arms race on sports,” she said.

These arguments are lost on members of the Congressional Black Caucus, of which Booker is a part — with its chair, Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.), saying in an interview last week the bill fails to “center the lives of the athletes.”

“There’s so much that this bill neglects,” she said, pointing specifically to health care provisions.

The all-Democratic CBC has been unanimously opposed to moving forward on any college sports bill since May, following the late April Supreme Court decision that allowed Republican-led states to eliminate majority-minority districts across the South.

In a statement at the time, the CBC said it would not support legislation “benefiting major athletic institutions that continue to remain silent while Black voting rights and Black political power are being systematically dismantled.”

Some Democrats in the Senate also lamented that the bill would set student athletes back after many have benefited from various federal court rulings entitling them to compensation for their name, image and likeness.

“This bill…only caps the money going to the players — does nothing to cap the money going to the coaches,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said on the floor Monday.

On the Republican side of the aisle, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise — who was heavily involved in working on a House version of a college sports overhaul bill that has repeatedly fallen short of support — has consistently raised concerns that the Senate measure would leave the door open to possible unionization efforts by players.

House conservatives are also expected to oppose provisions in the Senate bill that would provide $1 billion for competitive grants to Historically Black Colleges and Universities without offsets; could increase litigation related to student unionization efforts; provide no cap on granting international student scholarships; and generally insert Congress into the business of college sports.

GOP Rep. Michael Baumgartner of Washington, who introduced an earlier House version of the bill, posted on social media Monday that the bill will “have a better than 50% chance in the House.” He also said that even with the president’s blessing, the legislation will need Democratic votes, pointing out the “Dem CBC will be a factor.”

But Republicans may ultimately face pressure to fall in line: Trump promoted the Senate bill as recently as this weekend in an interview with Clay Travis, founder of the digital sports column Sport & State.

Trump also suggested Speaker Mike Johnson might bring the House back before the midterms to clear the measure for his signature.

“We have to get it voted on,” he told Travis, “and we’re counting on the House — and I think the House will come through, too.”

Riley Rogerson contributed to this report.

Congress

Republicans scheme to block Trump’s funding cancellations

Published

6 hours ago

September 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Lawmakers are fuming over President Donald Trump’s latest challenge to Congress’ funding power and already plotting to stop him in the future — a move that would require Republicans to buck their own party’s standard-bearer.

Trump declared Friday that he unilaterally nixed a total of $810 million across several pots of cash Congress enacted for specific programs. It’s the second time in two years he has deployed the “pocket rescission” tactic to automatically claw back federal funds.

It’s now too late for lawmakers to stop that money from expiring when the fiscal year ends late Wednesday: The House has adjourned until after the midterms, and Congress relinquished a key piece of leverage by clearing a short-term funding patch weeks ago to keep government operations afloat through mid-December.

But lawmakers in both parties are talking about ways to prevent Trump from circumventing the congressional funding process during the final two years of his presidency.

“We’re already looking at whether there’s language we can put in the next set of appropriations bills that would prohibit this from happening,” Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) told reporters Monday evening. “But it’s going to take some legal work.”

Since lawmakers need to enact another funding bill by Dec. 11 to avert a government shutdown, they could add provisions to it barring Trump from sidestepping congressional spending mandates. Or lawmakers could add similar stipulations to whatever spending measures Congress might enact next year.

That will require bipartisan cooperation. After Trump used the same pocket rescissions tactic last year to cancel $4.9 billion in foreign aid, the Supreme Court allowed the administration to withhold the funding until it expired. In the months that followed, Democrats repeatedly attempted to use funding bills to thwart that kind of late-stage clawback but fell short without alliances across the aisle.

“I have been trying to get that language in there. … The Republicans objected,” Washington Sen. Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate appropriations panel, told reporters Monday evening.

Republicans who now say they are interested in blocking Trump from employing the maneuver are also thinking about the support they would need in both chambers to override a presidential veto.

“How many votes does it take to bar him?” said South Dakota Sen. Mike Rounds, a senior Republican appropriator. “Depending upon the strategy that you’re talking about, it’s going to be a vetoable item. If that’s the case, then you’ve got to have two-thirds in the House and the Senate. So we have to talk about things we can actually get done.”

Some lawmakers have floated the idea of seeking to bar the president from sending a rescission package to Congress in the last quarter of the fiscal year. That could stop Trump from unilaterally canceling federal cash because such a move only works in the final weeks of the fiscal year.

Under decades-old impoundment law, the president is allowed to send Congress a request to rescind funding and must then withhold the money for 45 days while lawmakers consider whether to approve, reject or ignore the ask. In a legal interpretation many lawmakers challenge, Trump administration officials argue that sending a rescission request less than 45 days before the end of the fiscal year ensures its expiration on Sept. 30.

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, another top Republican appropriator, described the strategy as a “sneaky” ploy “designed to go around Congress … where you basically just run the clock out.”

“I think Congress needs to save ourselves,” Murkowski told reporters Monday. “I don’t think that our strategy should be just hoping for a good decision out of the courts. I think we have a role here, and it’s up to us to exercise it.”

“Easier said than done,” she added.

Some Republicans argue that it’s futile to enact another law to reinforce the limits they believe are already clearly laid out in the original impoundment law Congress enacted in the 1970s, which was designed to prevent presidents from withholding money lawmakers approve.

“So if we pass another law that basically says the same thing, then that’s going to change it?” Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), a member of the Appropriations Committee, said in an interview.

“The Impoundment Control Act was set up to make sure that Congress had the power of the purse and the funds were expended. The executive is interpreting it differently,” he continued. “That’s why I don’t know how you resolve it without the court stepping in.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday that he is also assuming “that it’s going to continue to get litigated.”

He wouldn’t say whether he agrees with top appropriators like Collins who argue that Trump’s move is against the law.

“There’s that argument, for sure,” Thune said. “And I think as an appropriator she feels strongly that these are decisions made by appropriators and that the administration doesn’t have this authority. But again, that is probably something the courts probably decide.”

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

Congress

Taxpayer-funded ads are the latest Trump headache for beleaguered GOP senators

Published

7 hours ago

September 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Senate Republicans want to spend this week insulating themselves from a deteriorating political environment before getting back on the campaign trail. Instead, they’re fending off some final curveballs from President Donald Trump.

White House decisions to use air campaign-style ads with taxpayer funds while separately rescinding about a billion dollars in congressionally approved spending are the latest pre-midterm frustrations for GOP senators — who spent much of Monday fielding off-message questions about the president’s latest actions.

The distractions come as Republicans grow increasingly anxious that the economic fallout from the Iran war could doom their majority in November. They decided to spend a few extra days in Washington to take affordability-related votes they hope their vulnerable members can use back home.

Instead, they’re being quizzed on the propriety of federally funded ads promoting Trump, which ran during weekend football games and other programming.

“I will just tell you that right now in Utah, they’re worried about affordability, and they don’t want to be worried about how their taxpayer dollars are being spent,” Sen. John Curtis (R-Utah) said of how his constituents could regard the ads.

The ads and the spending cuts created twin — though not necessarily overlapping — circles of pushback inside the Senate GOP.

Appropriators, in particular, fumed over White House budget director Russ Vought’s Friday night announcement of fresh “pocket rescissions” that Congress cannot vote to overrule. A budget office spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Monday night.

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins — who is now campaigning for reelection in part on her hefty influence over federal spending — called Trump’s action “illegal” and told reporters Monday that she and allies would work to ban similar steps in the future. Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) warned the latest rescission would “make it very hard” to get government funding deals in the future.

The bigger reaction among Senate Republicans Monday was to the taxpayer-funded ad campaign. One spot is virtually identical to a 2024 Trump campaign spot; another includes images of the president and a caption including that “America will never be a communist country.”

The Trump administration has not disclosed the amount being spent on the ads or where the funding is being drawn from but is defending them as “public service announcements.”

A White House official granted anonymity to speak candidly noted that Trump is not on the ballot in November. A White House spokesperson said the ads are about “reminding Americans to love their country and understand what makes it worth defending” — not midterm politics.

Still, Republicans from Senate Majority Leader John Thune on down distanced themselves from the ads.

“It’s a great message. I like the message. But it shouldn’t be paid for with taxpayer dollars,” Thune told reporters.

Other Republican senators tried to toe a similar line — disagreeing with the decision without directly criticizing Trump. Rounds, who is up for reelection, said that “it’s not something that I would have done.”

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) gave a similar response over the weekend, saying that no public official “should spend public money on private ads for themselves.”

Asked if using public funds for the ads was appropriate, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said, “No, it’s not even a close question.”

The bristling inside the GOP comes after some of them previously questioned Department of Homeland Security-funded ads that heavily featured then-Secretary Kristi Noem. GOP senators privately viewed the ads as an effort by Noem to promote herself, and they believe they factored into Trump’s decision to move her into another job.

The latest ads put Republicans in an even tighter spot given the president’s direct involvement and the political winds blowing against them — especially as they prepare for votes later this week aimed at convincing voters they are in touch with their concerns.

“I hate them,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who announced last year that he would retire after policy splits with Trump. “Again, these are taxpayer dollars. People say it wasn’t that much money. Well, you go talk to people that are struggling and figure out whether or not they think it was that much money.”

Yet other GOP senators — including members of leadership such as Sens. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and James Lankford of Oklahoma, as well as Sen. Steve Daines of Montana — gave a tried-and-true response to the Trump controversy du jour.

“Here’s the honest truth … I didn’t see it,” Daines told reporters, laughing as explained he was watching his grandkids over the weekend. “I really didn’t.”

Chris Marquette and Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.