McALLEN, Texas — John Thune is ramping up his sales pitch as he tries to turn the GOP’s attention toward November and keeping the Senate majority.

But as the majority leader campaigned along the U.S.-Mexico border Friday with a coalition of Republicans up for reelection this year, he acknowledged challenges so far in promoting the legislative centerpiece of the party’s message — not to mention what he called the midterm “headwinds” facing any party in power.

Thune is betting that an aggressive campaign blitz between now and the fall, and a hopefully burgeoning economy, will help Republicans keep and potentially grow their 53-seat majority — even as voters seem indifferent about the GOP’s “big, beautiful bill” and President Donald Trump struggles in sticking to a kitchen-table script.

Having Republicans back home touting the party line, Thune said, will help.

“Last year, our members were in many cases, for obvious reasons, in Washington, trying to get the job done,” Thune said in an interview. “But now that we’re in an even-numbered year and people are out running for reelection, I think having us as a body focus very directly on the message that we’re delivering to the American people is going to make a big difference.”

He also acknowledged that Democrats leapt out of the gate last year in hammering the GOP megabill even before it was finished, adding that “they have the advantage of being the opposition party.”

On Friday, Thune & Co. attempted to turn the tide by highlighting the border security resources that were included in the sprawling policy package that also included tax cuts, defense spending and energy initiatives, among other legislative potpourri.

Republicans started out the 2026 cycle as odds-on favorites for keeping control of the Senate. They still have an edge, according to most forecasters. But Democrats have made a dent in the GOP’s advantage by securing big-name recruits in key races as Republicans face some heated and costly intraparty primaries.

Success will depend in large part on the Republicans who joined Thune Friday in Texas. Michael Whatley, who is running to succeed North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, and former Rep. Mike Rogers, who is looking to flip the seat held by retiring Democratic Sen. Gary Peters in Michigan, joined several in-cycle GOP incumbents, including Texas Sen. John Cornyn.

Thune showered particular praise on Cornyn, who is fighting for his political life in a three-way primary. Underscoring the nasty internal fight facing the GOP, rival Ken Paxton — the state attorney general and one of Cornyn’s primary opponents — accused Cornyn of trying to “rewrite history” with the border trip and predicted that his career will end in “national embarrassment.”

Thune’s effort to use his bully pulpit to focus on the party’s legislative accomplishments comes as Republicans continue to fret that they haven’t done enough to sell the megabill. Many wonder in hindsight whether their decision to pack so many priorities together into a single piece of legislation — a decision driven in part by the party-line budget reconciliation process — was ill-conceived.

“We’ve talked about that,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) said in an interview Friday on the sidelines of a news conference at the border wall where it took four placards to display all the highlights from the megabill.

“Secure Border, More Money, New Opportunities,” read a sign on the podium summarizing the legislation.

But an overstuffed domestic policy bill is far from the top concern for Republicans who remain nervous about addressing Americans’ anxieties about the steeply rising cost of living.

While many GOP leaders spent the final months of 2025 vowing to focus on affordability issues — and Thune vowed Friday Republicans would in 2026 — the opening days of the year have been focused abroad after Trump ousted Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro. The military action sparked a fiery debate in Congress about presidential war powers that threaten to blot out other matters.

“It’s certainly going to consume the news cycle for a while,” said Sen. John Hoeven of North Dakota in an interview in the Capitol this week.

It certainly has preoccupied Trump, who lashed out at five Senate Republicans who joined with Democrats Thursday to advance a measure constraining his future military moves in Venezuela. One of them, Susan Collins of Maine, is up for reelection, and Trump announced publicly that she and the other four “should never be elected to office again.”

Thune said he had a “very spirited” conversation with Trump before he delivered the attacks and acknowledged his frustrations. But Thune said he was focused on keeping Republicans “united as much as possible and work[ing] with the president.”

The two are viewed as having a good personal relationship, with Trump publicly praising Thune throughout 2025 — a transformation from just a few years before, when Trump threatened to back a primary challenger against the South Dakotan. Thune, in turn, repeatedly praised Trump and his work on the border Friday.

That doesn’t mean they don’t have their differences. Thune, with the backing of his conference, has rebuffed Trump’s demands to nix the filibuster and other Senate norms that preserve minority power. They have also clashed on policy — most conspicuously on the president’s aggressive use of tariffs which have negatively impacted farmers in Thune’s home state.

Thune acknowledged they sometimes don’t see eye-to-eye but added he views his job as needing to “protect the institution … maintain it as the founders intended as a check and balance.”

Thune reiterated Friday that he’s labored to hash out most of those differences behind the scenes, seeking to avoid any public blowups that would suck up political oxygen and potentially force his members to choose sides.

That said, he added, “there are times, yes, where you have to push back” — pointing back to the conversation on the war powers resolution, which Thune opposed.

Pushing back could be trickier in an election year, when Republicans need to be in lockstep as they make their case for another two years in power on Capitol Hill while Trump seeks to lock in a presidential legacy and otherwise enforce his will over the party.

Beyond dealing with Trump’s angry outburst, Thune is trying to keep the party — and the president — singing from the same hymnal heading into November.

“Obviously, yesterday he was frustrated, but I think there’s going to be a lot to point to in terms of a record of accomplishment for him and for him working with us,” Thune said of Trump. “As we get out there and talk about it, I think it’ll start to change the perceptions and the views in the public.”

Alex Gangitano contributed to this report. 

The Republican-led House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is threatening to hold former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in contempt of Congress if they fail to appear for closed-door depositions next week as part of the panel’s investigation into convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The panel previously issued a subpoena for Bill Clinton, who has been tied to Epstein, to appear before congressional investigators Jan. 13; Hillary Clinton has been provided a subpoena to testify Jan. 14. But a committee spokesperson said Friday that, so far, neither had confirmed they would participate.

“They are obligated under the law to appear and we expect them to do so,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “If the Clintons do not appear for their depositions, the House Oversight Committee will initiate contempt of Congress proceedings.”

This seldom-used congressional power can range in implications from a symbolic action to a precursor to forcing jail time.

In examples of the potential serious consequences to contempt of Congress charges, two Trump associates, Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, were sentenced to prison time for failing to cooperate with subpoenas from the Democratic-led select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attacks on the Capitol.

The GOP-controlled House voted to hold former Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt in 2024 over the Justice Department’s decision not to provide the audio of then-President Joe Biden’s interview with former special counsel Robert Hur.

The Biden-era DOJ did not prosecute the case, and that audio was ultimately released by the Trump-era department.

A lawyer for the Clintons did not immediately return a request for comment.

A spokesperson for Bill Clinton has insisted the former president did not know about Epstein’s crimes and that, as of 2019, had not spoken to Epstein in over a decade. In wake of the initial release of materials in the Justice Department’s possession in the Epstein case in which Bill Clinton appeared in multiple photos, the same spokesperson has called for the Trump administration to release all materials in its possession related to the former president.

“We need no such protection,” the statement read.

House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan said in an interview Friday he will invite former special counsel Jack Smith to testify in an open hearing as soon as this month in what would be a politically high-stakes event for members of both parties and the White House.

“He’s coming in,” the Ohio Republican said of Smith, who led the federal criminal cases against President Donald Trump.

Smith sat for over eight hours, with breaks, before Judiciary Committee members and staff investigators last month behind closed doors while his legal team has repeatedly requested a public forum for their client to argue his case.

Jordan released a transcript and video record on New Year’s Eve and said Friday he now wants Smith to stand before the public and defend his claims of misconduct against the president.

Smith found Trump guilty of working to circumvent the results of the 2020 election, mishandling classified documents and obstruction of justice, but was forced to drop the charges when Trump won reelection in 2024.

“One of the key takeaways in the transcript is, we said, ‘did you [have] any evidence that President Trump was responsible for the violence that took place at the Capitol?’ He had no evidence of that whatsoever,” Jordan said of the committee’s December interview with Smith.

Jordan said he is eager for Smith to answer that question, and others, before live cameras.

Lanny Breuer, one of Smith’s lawyers and a partner at the firm Covington & Burling, said in a statement that “Jack has been clear for months he is ready and willing to answer questions in a public hearing about his investigations into President Trump’s alleged unlawful efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his mishandling of classified documents.”

Republicans have been going after Smith for years with allegations that he was presiding over a partisan witch hunt with the support of the Biden administration, but they have redoubled their efforts after revelations that Smith’s office secretly obtained phone records for GOP lawmakers in the days around the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

Smith has maintained he never spoke to Biden or White House staff during his investigation.

Smith defended his work last month to House Judiciary members and staff, but his testimony was hamstrung, in part, by a federal court order that has kept the second volume of his report surrounding the classified documents case under seal. He has maintained he is interested in sharing the results of this investigation, but the Justice Department has interpreted that the order precludes him from discussing details with Congress.

These potential restrictions on his testimony back in December will likely be the same for a public hearing in the near future.

Democrats will likely celebrate the opportunity for Smith to discuss his work publicly, believing he has information that will damage the president.