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Republicans in the dark on White House plan for Obamacare abortion restrictions

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The White House’s silence on how its health care plan deals with abortion is causing a headache for Republicans on Capitol Hill.

For many GOP members, an expansion of abortion restrictions in Obamacare is a must-have. But the White House’s decision to leave the issue out of its tentative framework caught Republicans off guard, leaving them in the dark about whether the president would ultimately stake out a position publicly, according to two aides granted anonymity to disclose private discussions.

The fight over the Hyde amendment, which bars federal funding for abortion, is just one of many landmines that need to be cleared before any health care deal to extend expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies can be reached. It also comes on top of GOP backlash to other aspects of the White House’s health policy framework that leaked Sunday.

“No Republican has voted for Obamacare or an Obamacare extension or expansion,” said a senior Senate Republican aide, granted anonymity to speak candidly. “Asking members to do that and not including Hyde would be impossible for many.”

The White House did not respond to requests for comment on the president’s stance.

The proposal the administration had planned to roll out this week consisted of a two-year extension of the ACA’s enhanced subsidies with new limitations favored by conservatives, such as a cutoff for people with higher incomes and a requirement that everyone pay a minimum monthly premium. But the White House gave no indication of whether it endorsed GOP lawmakers’ demand to also prohibit any insurance plan that receives a federal subsidy from covering abortion services.

Gavin Oxley, a spokesperson with Americans United for Life, said it would be helpful for the White House to publicly lay out its position on the Hyde question to give lawmakers an idea of how to proceed.

Not weighing in now, or proceeding with a plan without abortion restrictions, “would ultimately fracture the wide-reaching coalition that got President Trump re-elected,” Oxley said.

“We believe the Administration and pro-life leaders in Congress will come to the table in good faith with a plan that includes Hyde,” he continued. “But should it not, we will be prepared to reject such a plan.”

House and Senate Republicans, as well as dozens of anti-abortion groups that havespent months lobbying Congress and the White House, oppose any extension of the subsidies that doesn’t bar all insurance plans in the individual market from covering abortion. One of the people granted anonymity to speak candidly said that including the abortion funding restrictions was a “red line” for a broad swath of Republicans.

“We don’t have any details on this plan, but Senator Young supports Hyde protections and believes they should apply to any taxpayer funded health care spending,” said Leah Selk, spokesperson for Republican Sen. Todd Young of Indiana.

The hard line for Republicans creates a narrow window for bipartisan agreement, if any, before the end of the year, when the subsidies are set to expire and cause premiums to skyrocket. Democrats, whose votes are needed to clear the filibuster in the Senate to advance most legislation, have declared that abortion restrictions would be a non-starter in ongoing negotiations.

“Instead of working with Democrats to fix the health care crisis they created, Republicans now want to hold women’s health care hostage and force their radical agenda on the American people,” said Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Finance Committee that has jurisdiction over much of the sprawling U.S. health system, in a recent floor speech. “I have one thing to say to that: not on my watch.”

Likely cognizant of this political reality, the White House’s decision to sidestep the abortion question was intended to allow the administration to avoid drawing attention to an issue that could have immediately jeopardized the plan’s viability, said a Republican aide with knowledge of the discussions – even if its silence has actually had the opposite effect.

“Look, it’s no secret that this administration is not rushing to put a lot of political capital on the issue of abortion if they can avoid it,” said Patrick Brown, a fellow with the conservative think tank Ethics and Public Policy Center, which has been part of the roiling debate over abortion restrictions in Obamacare. “It’s not something I think they have any interest in highlighting.”

The abortion standoff is just one of many factors complicating a proposed deal to extend insurance subsidies. Deep divisions remain around who should qualify for such subsidies, how generous they should be, and what kind of health services are covered.

Any agreement would need Trump’s blessing, giving Republicans political cover to vote for an extension of the health reform law they have raged against for more than a decade. But given this difficult landscape, conservative lobbyists are skeptical that passage is possible even if Trump endorsed abortion restrictions. Those in close contact with lawmakers say it’s unlikely an extension of the subsidies could win 60 votes in the Senate — or even 50.

“It’d be very difficult, even if they do it through reconciliation,” said Tom McClusky, the director of government affairs for Catholic Vote. “On the subsidies alone, I think you have a large enough contingent on the Republican side that don’t want them renewed at all — regardless of if you can somehow miraculously figure out the protections of Hyde.”

Since its inception more than a decade ago, the Affordable Care Act has barred federal subsidies from paying for abortions, but left it up to states whether health insurance plans in the individual market could cover abortion using other funding.

Half of states have opted to ban all coverage of abortion on their Obamacare markets, including some where abortion itself is legal, like Pennsylvania and Arizona. In the remaining 25 states, abortion coverage through Obamacare is either allowed or required, though any claims paid out involving the termination of a pregnancy come from a separate account that doesn’t use any federal subsidies.

If Congress passes an Obamacare subsidy extension that includes the abortion restrictions conservatives are demanding, it would force roughly a dozen states where abortion coverage is mandatory to make a tough decision: change their laws or risk losing billions of dollars. In the states where abortion coverage is allowed but not required, it would be up to individual insurance plans whether to lose federal funding or drop abortion coverage.

After nearly a year of the Trump administration clawing power away from Capitol Hill and dictating everything from spending to military action, some anti-abortion advocates are baffled by the lack of a firm message on how the Hyde amendment’s ban on abortion funding applies to Obamacare.

“It’s in tension with this administration’s broader approach to dealing with Congress, which has been very heavy handed — sort of, ‘We are calling the shots. Sit back and let us drive,’” said Brown. “But it would be their preference to sit in the back seat on that issue specifically.”

Benjamin Guggenheim contributed to this report.

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Capitol agenda: FISA fight weighs on GOP priorities

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The FISA punt is setting up a chaotic stretch on Capitol Hill, with GOP infighting now threatening to jam up other Republican priorities.

After a dramatic collapse on the House floor, GOP leaders have 10 days to find a path forward on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act before the law expires April 30.

The timing couldn’t be worse. President Donald Trump’s June 1 deadline to pass immigration enforcement funding and reopen DHS is fast approaching, and Republicans are already running out of runway.

Early this week, Senate Budget Chair Lindsey Graham is expected to release text of a budget resolution that would provide up to $75 billion in funding for DHS immigration enforcement, followed by an initial vote as soon as Wednesday.

House Republicans will need to figure out their FISA deal quickly or risk having the fight weigh on the timeline for adopting the budget resolution. House GOP leaders are already planning to push back work this month on the SCORE Act — the college athletics revamp — because of the spy powers fight.

When it comes to FISA, Senate Republicans are done waiting on the House and are preparing to grab the wheel. Senate Majority Leader John Thune on Friday teed up consideration of a three-year 702 extension.

“We’ve just got to have optionality here,” he said. “I don’t know what the House is going to be able to do, and so we’ll be preparing accordingly.”

Speaker Mike Johnson has to figure out how to address conservatives’ concerns over warrantless surveillance potentially sweeping up U.S. citizens, as well as their demand to ban the future launch of a central bank digital currency as part of the FISA bill — which Thune told us would threaten support in the Senate.

Majority Leader Steve Scalise said in an interview that House Republicans are still figuring out a different legislative vehicle where they could attach the CBDC ban.

“We’re gonna find a place for it,” Scalise said.

Some House Republicans are hoping they just need to massage a five-year 702 extension with relatively minor changes aimed at privacy hawks. But others are predicting they’ll face the same internal schism in 10 days. Some, including Rep. Don Bacon, believe it’s time to make a deal with Democrats.

Sen. Ron Wyden is promising to “pull out all the stops” for stronger FISA reforms. Rep. Jim Himes, the top Democrat on House Intel, is finding himself performing rare “shuttle diplomacy” between GOP factions.

“What I learned tonight,” Himes said as it was all crashing down last week, “was that Republicans don’t talk to each other.”

What else we’re watching:

— Burgum on Blue Light News: A House Appropriations subcommittee will hold a hearing at 3:30 p.m. with Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. Appropriators are expected to ask him about plans to downsize the department, including a proposal to cut National Park Service staffing by almost 3,000 positions.

— SCM expulsion push: Republicans including Rep. Anna Paulina Luna will try to force a vote to expel Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick immediately after a House Ethics decision Tuesday on her punishment for ethics violations.

— Iran AUMF incoming? Sen. Lisa Murkowski said she and a group of senators are drafting an authorization for use of military force for the Iran war, as a growing number of Republicans raise public concerns about the conflict. Senate Democrats plan to force a war powers vote this week, and House Democrats may as well.

Meredith Lee Hill, Jordain Carney, Manuel Quiñones and Andres Picon contributed to this report.

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Republicans stare down a growing, neverending FISA crisis

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Hill Republican leaders are finding themselves in a never-ending crisis over the fate of a government spy law that has unleashed a bitter, intraparty battle within the House while also threatening to derail a host of other GOP priorities.

Republicans now have scant legislative days to build new plans to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA. But President Donald Trump, GOP leaders and White House officials have failed to come up with a workable framework for months — and there is no agreement yet on the path forward.

Some House Republicans hope they’re in the final stages of massaging a multi-year extension that would incorporate some minor changes intended to pacify privacy hawks. Others are already predicting they’ll face the same internal schisms come April 30, when the current short-term extension runs out.

For many Republicans, the high-drama meltdown in the House was entirely predictable and has been months in the making, after Trump demanded a clean extension of the surveillance law despite well-documented skepticism within his own party.

“A trainwreck,” was how Tennessee Republican Rep. Andy Ogles described it, as he walked off the House floor in the pre-dawn hours of Friday morning. Speaker Mike Johnson had just tried and failed to secure a long-term reauthorization after days of ultimately fruitless negotiations across his conference.

“I don’t know how we solve it,” said one House Republican of the current impasse, granted anonymity to speak candidly.

It’s gotten to the point where Senate Republicans, who have until now largely taken a back seat on FISA, are warning they are prepared to grab the wheel if the House can’t figure it out.

“We’ve just got to have optionality here,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Friday of the path forward, shortly after clearing the House-passed, 10-day emergency Section 702 extension to avert a looming expiration. “I don’t know what the House is going to be able to do, and so we’ll be preparing accordingly.”

The task ahead of Republicans is only being compounded by the fact that this week was supposed to be about taking the first step in the Senate to advance a budget blueprint, necessary to begin the party-line reconciliation process that will deliver funding for the Department of Homeland Security’s immigration enforcement activities.

Trump has given Congress a June 1 deadline to get that reconciliation bill to his desk and reopen the long-shuttered DHS. Two people granted anonymity to discuss private scheduling said Senate Republicans will still be able to move the budget resolution this week as planned. But House Republicans will need to either quickly resolve their differences over the future of Section 702 or risk this policy fight colliding next week with expected disagreements over the scope of the reconciliation package.

Johnson, leaving the floor past 2 a.m. Friday after 20 Republicans voted down the procedural rule needed to advance his latest attempt to pass a long-term Section 702 reauthorization, said, “we were very close tonight.”

He chalked up the GOP rebellion to “some nuances with the language, and some questions need to be answered.” The emergency 10-day extension, he argued, gives Republicans more time to hammer out those pieces.

But Johnson will have his work cut out for him as he attempts to figure out how to satisfy conservative hard-liners who want more guardrails to prevent the warrantless surveillance of Americans. Trump has insisted on a clean reauthorization and has been resistant to more sweeping policy changes.

After Johnson unveiled legislative text of a five-year extension of the surveillance program late Thursday night, House GOP hard-liners quickly revolted over what one described as the “inexplicable five-year extension, the fake warrant requirement, and the walk back of the promise from this afternoon to include CBDC.”

The member was referring to central bank digital currency. Leaders previously promised ultraconservatives to secure a ban on it, and Section 702 holdouts now say a prohibition must be included as part of any spy power reauthorization deal. This particular policy battle has already stalled passage of bipartisan housing legislation.

Majority Leader Steve Scalise said in an interview near midnight Friday that House Republicans were “still working through” another legislative vehicle where they could potentially attach the CBDC ban. “We’re gonna find a place for it.”

That’s a tough sell, as some hard-liners have acknowledged that the White House isn’t on board with this plan, and Thune in an interview late last week warned its inclusion would erode support from Democrats whose votes will be needed to pass any Section 702 reauthorization in the Senate.

It doesn’t help that morale among House Republicans is under new strain.

When the speaker approached Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), a leading opponent of government surveillance programs, on the House floor overnight Friday to secure an agreement for an emergency patch, Biggs let the speaker know a previous deal they had was “off,” according to three Republicans who heard it, who were granted anonymity to recount a private exchange.

More moderate House Republicans are losing patience with the standoff. One GOP centrist, granted anonymity to speak candidly, called the Friday floor meltdown “ridiculous” and that the speaker didn’t have “much of a plan to begin with.”

Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) cautioned: “You’ve got to make a deal with the Democrats.”

Four moderate Democrats did help Republicans on a party-line vote paving the way for passage of a clean, 18-month reauthorization: Reps. Jared Golden of Maine, Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington and Tom Suozzi of New York. But it was not nearly enough to offset the 20 Republican defectors.

Democrats face division within their own ranks, too. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a longtime privacy hawk, argued the House’s setback gave new momentum to a bipartisan coalition that wants more sweeping changes, including stronger warrant provisions.

“We’re going to pull out all the stops,” Wyden told reporters Friday after letting the stopgap pass on the Senate floor without objection. “We’re ready to go to the mat and fight for a full package of reforms.”

Yet back in the House, Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, has been pushing for a clean extension. He was seen hustling around the floor Friday night talking to different Republican members, including GOP leaders and hard-liners.

At one point, Himes was overheard saying on a phone call in the speaker’s lobby he was in a rare position to be doing “shuttle diplomacy” between the speaker and House Freedom Caucus members.

“What I learned tonight was that Republicans don’t talk to each other,” Himes said later in an interview. “They sure as hell don’t talk to us — but they don’t even talk to each other.”

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GOP senators urge Trump to find Iran exit plan as energy prices rise: ‘The clock is ticking’

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President Donald Trump promised a quick end to the war in Iran, but the ongoing conflict has kept energy costs high — and some Senate Republicans are starting to go public with their concerns.

GOP lawmakers who already feared November would be an increasingly tough battle are trying to nudge the president toward clearly defining his endgame after a surge in oil, gas and fertilizer prices. Trump warned the sticker shock might not completely recede by the time the November elections roll around, though news Friday that the Strait of Hormuz would reopen could begin to bring some relief if the agreement sticks.

Several GOP senators are warning the president could face growing pushback, including them not supporting military action against Iran after the conflict hits the 60-day mark at the end of the month, if he doesn’t articulate his plan. The White House could try to invoke a 30-day extension for national security reasons.

“I hope that we are arriving at an exit strategy here to bring this to a close to preserve our security interests and bring down the cost of gasoline,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told reporters this week, adding that the “clock is ticking” on the war.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said in an interview that she and a group of other senators are in the process of drafting an authorization for the use of military force against Iran, which would lay out when and how Trump could use force. She pointed to the 60-day threshold as a possible deadline for hammering out text, saying it would be “helpful” for it to be done by then.

Even senior Republicans are warning that if the administration wants Congress to greenlight tens of billions in additional war funding, Republicans are going to need to know more about the president’s ultimate Iran strategy beforehand.

“I think our members are going to be very interested in what next steps are,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, predicting that the administration’s forthcoming Iran war spending ask “will be an important inflection point if and when the administration submits their request.”

Thune, like most congressional Republicans, has been supportive of the administration’s Iran campaign but said the impact on gas and fertilizer prices is “a big deal” back in his home state of South Dakota.

“We’re in planting season so if you didn’t buy fertilizer ahead of time, you’re really feeling it, and obviously fuel is a critically important part of production, agriculture,” Thune said this week, prior to the Strait’s reopening.

Retiring Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) predicted his party would ultimately keep the Senate majority, but said the Iran war and the related spike in pricing could be a drag when they are already facing “headwinds.”

“The president has to help us get the vote out,” Tillis said. “But the base alone is not going to be able to do it. The way we’re going to get the other ones is addressing the energy challenges, particularly the price at the pump and some of the other affordability issues.”

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), in an interview before Friday’s announcement, predicted that prices would come down after the strait’s reopening and that it would matter the most in September, when swing voters start tuning in for the midterms.

“If we’re going into September and, even more, October … with super high — you know gas prices over $4 — I mean it’s going to be a problem,” Cramer said.

There were early signs of celebration from Senate Republicans Friday over the announcement that the strait had reopened, even if it’s potentially only temporarily.

“Very glad to hear the Strait of Hormuz is open, at least for the remainder of the ceasefire,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) wrote on X.

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), also took a victory lap: “Will Dems be making comments about the massive drop in oil prices?” he asked.

Trump has suggested that he is eager to negotiate a deal to end the conflict. And GOP lawmakers have largely deferred to Trump so far — including defeating attempts in both chambers this week to limit the president’s ability to carry out additional military action without Congress.

But even with oil shipments through the strait set to resume now, some Republicans say generally, they want to see the president focusing more on affordability issues.

“I would like to see the president spend 70 percent of his time talking about all the things that we and he have done to reduce the cost of living and 30 percent of his time on other important stuff,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said in an interview.

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