Congress
Schumer, Mamdani talk in wake of electoral victory
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Wednesday he had spoken with New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, following the 34-year-old’s electoral win in the Senate leader’s hometown.
Schumer repeatedly passed up opportunities to endorse Mamdani after several conversations between the two New Yorkers. On Tuesday, Schumer declined to say whom he voted for in the mayoral election, sharing only that he looked forward to “working with the next mayor to help New York City.”
The Senate Democratic leader said at a Wednesday press conference that he and Mamdani “had a very, very good conversation” in which they discussed their shared commitment to New York City.
“I congratulated him on running a very, very good campaign, and the issue that he has stressed is being stressed by Democrats across the country, from one end of America to the other, the high costs that the Trump administration is imposing on us and their failure to do anything about it,” he said.
Schumer and some other New York Democrats were reluctant to stand behind Mamdani throughout the race even as he emerged as the clear front-runner, with some in party leadership worrying that the democratic socialist could provide easy fodder for Republicans who seek to paint the party as a bastion of socialism.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, originally from Buffalo, endorsed Mamdani shortly after his primary win and campaigned with him. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries — another New York City native — ultimately expressed support for the candidate before the start of early voting.
Congress
Shutdown end in sight after spending package clears key House hurdle
A spending package that would fund the vast majority of the federal government cleared a key procedural vote Tuesday, setting up votes later in the day to send the measure to the White House for President Donald Trump’s signature.
Final passage of the measure, which also includes a funding patch for the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 13, would end the partial government shutdown that began Saturday.
Republicans stayed mostly united on the 217-215 test vote to advance the package that would fund the Pentagon and departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, and Education through Sept. 30 and less than two weeks of funding for Homeland Security Department.
The short-term DHS funding is intended to give lawmakers time to negotiate reforms to how ICE and CBP officers execute the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement crackdown, with the hope of tamping down instances where federal officers have killed U.S. citizens. Republicans have their own demands, such as blocking federal funding on “sanctuary cities” that don’t cooperate with federal enforcement agencies.
The largely unified GOP vote came on the heels of a White House whip operation that headed off a handful of defections from within Speaker Mike Johnson’s party. Trump’s call for there to be no changes to the package in the House helped quell an effort from hard-line conservatives to attach a partisan elections bill, known as the SAVE Act, to the rule.
Speaker Mike Johnson, Majority Whip Tom Emmer and Majority Leader Steve Scalise also did some personal whipping on the House floor during the vote series, circulating between some of the most hard-line members of the Republican Conference in the leadup to and during the rule vote. It was a nail-biter for the leaders, with the vote held open for nearly an hour as they tried to bring their GOP colleagues in line.
Final passage of the Senate-passed $1.2 trillion funding package is expected Tuesday afternoon on a bipartisan vote.
Congress
No filibuster deal with House conservatives, Thune says
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in an interview Tuesday he has made no decisions about bypassing Senate filibuster rules to skirt the normal 60-vote margin required to advance legislation in the chamber.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) said Monday she had White House-brokered “assurances” that the Senate would allow for a “standing” or “talking” filibuster that could allow the SAVE Act, a House-passed elections bill pushed by conservative hard-liners, to be enacted into law.
Thune was not party to Luna’s conversation with President Donald Trump, which prompted Luna to indicate she would support a massive spending bill moving through the House on Tuesday. Many GOP senators have long opposed weakening the 60-vote margin, believing it would open the door to far-reaching Democratic policies.
“Some of our colleagues in the Senate are interested in it,” Thune said. “We will have a conversation about it. Nothing decided.”
Congress
House GOP leaders set noon deadline for Clintons to reach deal on testifying
Speaker Mike Johnson said in an interview Tuesday morning that Republicans have given Bill and Hillary Clinton a noon deadline Tuesday to provide details of how they plan to comply with a pair of subpoenas issued by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which have until this point gone unheeded.
Otherwise, Johnson said, Republicans will move forward with votes later this week to hold the former president and secretary of state in criminal contempt of Congress.
“We’re holding off until noon,” Johnson said. “They have a deadline until noon to work out the details, and if it’s not done satisfactorily, then we’ll proceed with the contempt.”
Majority Leader Steve Scalise also said in an interview that, if the details aren’t provided, then Republicans will proceed with a vote Wednesday as leadership had initially intended before the Clintons surprised Capitol Hill by reversing course. They had for months been resisting subpoenas to testify in the House Oversight investigation into the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, saying the process was invalid and designed to embarrass and put them in prison.
According to a person granted anonymity to share internal discussions between the Oversight Committee and the Clintons’ legal team, the GOP-led panel is seeking clarification that the Clintons will accept the standard deposition terms for which they were originally subpoenaed. That includes transcribed, filmed depositions to take place in February, with no time limits.
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