Congress

How Rand Paul got sidelined by fellow Republicans

Published

1 year ago

June 20, 2025

As chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Sen. Rand Paul technically has jurisdiction over a central plank of President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” But the Kentucky Republican’s desire to aggressively cut the administration’s request for border security spending has sidelined him in negotiations.

In an interview this week, Senate Budget Chair Lindsey Graham said that he has taken over as the lead negotiator in talks with bicameral leadership and the White House over how to deploy tens of billions of dollars to strengthen border security and reduce the flow of migrant encounters at the southern border into the United States.

Graham, a South Carolina Republican who released his own border security funding plan shortly after Paul introduced his, said he offered himself up to the Trump administration as the point person on the border security provisions of the megabill.

“Senator Paul usually votes ‘no’ and blames everybody else for not being pure enough,” said Graham, who has a long history of clashing with Paul over federal spending and foreign policy. “As chairman, you … don’t have that luxury sometimes. You have to do things as chairman you wouldn’t have to do as a rank-and-file member.”

“Senator Paul’s reducing the amount [for border security] didn’t withstand scrutiny,” Graham added. “The analysis was shallow.”

At the same time, the office of Senate GOP Conference Vice-Chair James Lankford of Oklahoma — also the chair of the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Border Management, Federal Workforce and Regulatory Affairs — is planning to work directly with Senate leadership staff on the government affairs provisions, said a Senate Republican aide granted anonymity to describe internal party dynamics.

Paul has made clear repeatedly he isn’t planning to vote for the party-line tax and spending bill anyway, giving leadership few reasons to try and play nice. Yet the decision by senior Senate Republicans to undermine a committee chair in such a way marks a dramatic departure from standard Senate procedure. It also reflects the extent to which Paul has become an ideological island, despite him holding a committee gavel thanks to the chamber’s rules around seniority.

And in another break with precedent, few of Paul’s own members on the Homeland Security panel, if any, appeared supportive of the chair’s approach or willing to back him up against leadership’s attempts to undermine him. Sen. Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, said it was concerning that Paul would draft his own proposal “without any consultation of the committee.”

Hawley added he had “never seen that happen before.”

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who sits on both the Homeland and Budget panels who described Paul as “well-meaning” and “principled,” said if Paul’s goal was to change people’s minds, the Kentuckian would have been better off working with fellow members of his conference.

“If your objective is just to have a point of view, that’s one thing you can do; but if your objective is to rally support, then you have a different path,” Moreno said.

Paul has even lost an ally in Sen. Ron Johnson, another steadfast fiscal hawk who leadership hopes will ultimately support the megabill. Johnson said last week he will support the administration’s border security funding request after hearing directly from Stephen Miller, a top White House adviser and architect of the president’s immigration platform.

Graham said he and Senate Majority Leader John Thune requested that Miller brief Senate Republicans on the administration’s border security needs to “contest the analysis of Senator Paul.” Paul did not attend the briefing, nor has he spoken to Graham about their differences, according to Graham.

In a statement, Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, had no direct comment on Paul’s exclusion from the process.

“The administration is profoundly grateful for Senator Graham and the Budget Committee’s excellent work on the Homeland Security Text,” said Jackson, adding that it would aid Trump’s actions to crack down on illegal border crossings by “funding at least one million removals, adding new ICE and border personnel, expanding detention capacity, and giving bonuses to hardworking Border Patrol and ICE agents.”

The framework put forward by Graham, which Senate GOP leadership is expected to draw from in the final package they hope to vote on next week, would mirror the House-passed funding levels by allocating about $46.5 billion for the border wall and surrounding infrastructure and $5 billion for Customs and Border Protection facilities and checkpoints.

In contrast, Paul’s proposal would allocate just $6.5 billion in border wall and related infrastructure funding, with only $2.5 billion for CBP facilities and checkpoints.

When asked about concerns he was operating without consulting his fellow Republicans on the panel, Paul emphasized that no committee is holding a markup on their contributions for the megabill.

“There were no committee votes on what the product would be,” Paul said. “All of the drafts were done by the chairman of each committee.”

Paul also said he thought some of the provisions of his proposal unrelated to border security would end up in the final bill, and that he was involved in talks with the parliamentarian about what provisions would be germane under the strict rules governing the filibuster-skirting budget reconciliation process Republicans want to use to pass the megabill.

A Paul spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment about whether he still expected to have a say in negotiations with the parliamentarian.

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

Congress

Paxton reports $18M quarterly fundraising haul

Published

45 minutes ago

October 5, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton raised $18 million in the third quarter of 2026 across his campaign and his joint fundraising committees, his campaign tells Blue Light News, a significant haul for the homestretch of the election.

Paxton’s number is double his $9 million second-quarter total, and signals Republican donors are rallying behind their Texas nominee. The campaign did not provide a current cash-on-hand total.

Democrat James Talarico’s campaign has yet to release his fundraising totals for the quarter. He raised $30 million last quarter.

“We now have the resources to make sure every Texan sees Talarico’s radical record between now and Election Day,” said Nick Maddux, senior adviser to the Paxton campaign.

The past quarter — the first full reporting period after Paxton’s primary runoff victory in May — saw Republicans flock to Texas for their midterm convention, which featured pro-Paxton fundraisers on the sidelines. Last week, the Paxton campaign announced a massive $20 million ad buy across the state, one of the largest-ever single media investments in a Texas Senate race.

Paxton needs the money: In a recording of a private donor event last month shared with POLITICO, he said he has “never been in a race where I felt less control over the campaign,” pointing to influence “from D.C.”

Texas has emerged as a huge money suck for Senate Republicans, who have poured tens of millions into the state to aid Paxton. Senate Leadership Fund, their top super PAC, has spent or reserved well over $100 million in the state to date, and the Trump-aligned MAGA Inc. and its affiliates plan to spend near $45 million in the state through Oct. 12.

Paxton has acknowledged that money has changed the race’s narrative: In a recording of a private donor event last monthshared with POLITICO, he said he has “never been in a race where I felt less control over the campaign,” pointing to influence “from D.C.”

Most recent public polling shows Talarico with a small lead in the race in spite of the recent onslaught in GOP spending, though Paxton’s campaign released an internal poll last week showing Paxton leading by three points.

Congress

Where Warnock is visiting in the final midterms sprint

Published

8 hours ago

October 5, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Sen. Raphael Warnock is hitting the road for the last month before Election Day.

The Georgia Democrat’s final midterm campaign surrogate sprint will only increase chatter around the possibility that he might run for president in 2028, according to a nine-stop itinerary shared first with Blue Light News.

First, he’ll touch down in New Hampshire on Tuesday before hitting Nevada on Wednesday. Next, he’ll travel to South Carolina (Oct. 13), Mississippi (Oct. 14), North Carolina (Oct. 15), South Carolina (Oct. 16-17), Michigan (Oct. 20-21), Wisconsin (Oct. 23) and Ohio (Oct. 24-26).

“Senator Reverend Warnock will be hitting the trail to energize voters who are sick of the President enriching himself while ordinary people continue to pay more for everything,” a spokesperson told Playbook. “Tapping into the righteous anger that voters are feeling across the country, the pastor in the Senate will again make the campaign trail his pulpit: calling out Trump’s corruption, while leaving voters hopeful for the next generation of Democratic leadership.”

Asked recently at the Texas Tribune Festival about whether he would run for president, Warnock said: “We’ll see what happens.”

Congress

Capitol agenda: Dems split on probing Trump corporate allies

Published

9 hours ago

October 5, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Democrats are eager to win back subpoena power if they retake Congress, but they’re split on how hard they’ll go after corporate America.

The party is united by the idea of aggressive oversight of President Donald Trump’s administration, which will help shape their messaging in the run-up to the 2028 election. But Democrats are at odds over how fiercely to use their probing power to go after the corporations, law firms and universities that courted the White House over the past two years.

“We don’t want to turn into a banana republic where you lose an election and it’s all about retribution,” Rep. Bill Foster, a senior member of the Financial Services Committee, said.

“We’re going to have to be a little bit wise about when companies simply did something they had to do to survive this unprecedented level of corruption, compared to companies that actually got on board and profited more by being a partner in his corruption,” he added.

Some progressives counter that a restrained approach would sit uneasily with the party’s base.

“It would be political suicide for Democrats to campaign on fighting corruption and then turn around and go easy on the very companies that are facilitating it,” said Ella Fanger, corporate power policy adviser at the liberal nonprofit group Demand Progress.

Prime targets for some Democrats are the tech companies that have taken steps to be on the president’s good side, like Apple, Amazon and Meta, which have all donated to Trump’s ballroom effort. Major cryptocurrency players, including Coinbase, Ripple and Tether also chipped in for the ballroom, and will be subject to questioning from Democrats.

The late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s networks and associates are also poised for probes — a push that has ensnared big banks like JPMorgan Chase, Deutsche Bank and Bank of America in the past.

Sen. Chris Murphy said the party should focus on the nexus between Trump and corporate corruption.

“We should get to the bottom of the corrupt relationship that exists between corporations in this country and the Trump administration,” Murphy said, pointing to questions he’s posed about a tobacco company’s donation to Trump’s super PAC before new e-cigarette rules were unveiled.

Still, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, who serves on Senate Banking, warned against the weaponization of power.

“Our focus should be solving problems that we’re seeing happening,” she said, pointing to cost-of-living issues around health care, housing and energy.

What else we’re watching:

— FIRST IN IC: BUILD AMERICA CAUCUS AGENDA — Energized by progress on permitting and housing legislation this term, a bipartisan development-focused caucus is rolling out a detailed agenda for next term. The 40-member Build America Caucus is releasing a 95-page package of proposals, first shared with Blue Light News, that outlines plans touching on health care, transportation, child care and research. The group launched last year with the goal of cutting red tape and regulatory bottlenecks to spur development.

— AI COLLAB STILL ILLUSIVE FOR CRUZ, CANTWELL — Commerce Chair Ted Cruz and ranking member Maria Cantwell might still be celebrating Senate passage of their landmark college sports bill last week, but it’s unclear the momentum will carry forward to agreement on another committee priority: artificial intelligence. Among the dozen lawmakers, aides and industry experts who spoke to Blue Light News, few expect the two senators to shed their well-established ideologies and styles after the mutual win. That could doom their ability to replicate their latest achievement in something as complex and divisive as an AI regulatory framework.

Jasper Goodman, Katherine Hapgood, Riley Rogerson and Kelsey Brugger contributed to this report.