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Schumer withholds Senate orientation invite from McCormick

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Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer will not allow Sen.-elect Dave McCormick (R-Pa.) to participate in Senate orientation this week because he doesn’t consider the race to be resolved yet.

Though the Associated Press projected Thursday that McCormick defeated Democrat incumbent Bob Casey in Pennsylvania’s Senate race, Casey has yet to concede, claiming that there are still thousands of ballots left to be counted.

“With over 100,000 ballots left to be counted in Pennsylvania, the race has not been decided. As is custom, we will invite the winner once the votes are counted,” a spokesperson for Schumer wrote in a statement. As of Sunday at 4:30 p.m., McCormick was ahead by approximately 39,000 votes.

“Schumer is not allowing @DaveMcCormickPAto participate in Senate orientation this week because Casey refuses to concede the race. What happened to all the demands that our leaders accept the outcome of the elections?” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said in a social media post Sunday.

Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) has also not been invited to orientation yet as his race against Republican Kari Lake has yet to be called. Gallego is ahead by approximately 48,000 votes. (The Associated Press has not called that race; the New York Times has not called either the Pennsylvania or Arizona race.)

On Wednesday, Republican senators will vote for the next majority leader, who will begin serving in January. The three front-runners are Florida Sen. Rick Scott, South Dakota Sen. John Thune and Texas Sen. John Cornyn.

When asked on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” who he would support for majority leader, McCormick told host Maria Bartiromo, “I’m still just now spending time with each of the candidates, and I will have an opportunity to vote this week.”

He added that he would not speak about the pros and cons of each candidate, but emphasized the need to be “in step with President Trump.”

In response to Schumer’s decision to prevent McCormick from participating, Republican politicians have been speaking out, including the majority leader-hopefuls.

“The idea that Schumer would not allow him to participate in Senate orientation is beyond unacceptable,” Thune wrote in a social media post Sunday. “The voters of Pennsylvania have spoken. Looking forward to having Dave’s strong voice in the Senate Republican Conference.”

Scott called the move “disgusting” and said, “They did the same thing to me after I beat a Democrat in 2018. We have to fight this!”

Cornyn called on Casey to concede and reposted a statement by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), which said: “I can’t think of another time when a senator-elect has been excluded from the Senate’s week-long orientation for new senators.”

McCormick argued that there’s no way Casey can gain enough votes at this point to defeat him.

“Mathematically, there’s no path for Senator Casey to win,” McCormick said on Fox. “Currently, I’m up by something like 40,000 votes, which is a very significant margin. And ultimately, Senator Casey’s going to have to decide when he’s willing to acknowledge that.”

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Congress

Trump says Justice Department is investigating Ilhan Omar

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President Donald Trump on Monday said the Justice Department is investigating Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.).

Trump made the announcement on Truth Social, writing: “the DOJ and Congress are looking at ‘Congresswoman’ Illhan Omar, who left Somalia with NOTHING, and is now reportedly worth more than 44 Million Dollars. Time will tell all.”

It is the latest attack the president has levied at Omar, and the most recent instance of the president directing an investigation into his political rivals.

Trump has previously said Omar should be jailed or deported to Somalia, where she was born, though Omar has been a U.S. citizen since 2000. He has also linked Omar to government services fraud investigations in Minnesota, accusing her of being “one of many scammers,” despite no clear evidence linking her to the cases.

Tensions have only grown between the two as immigration officials continue to patrol the city of Minneapolis, which Omar represents.

Omar’s net worth skyrocketed in the last year, and House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) recently told the New York Post that he plans to launch an investigation into what caused the dramatic spike.

According to financial disclosures filed last year, Omar’s net worth principally increased due to her spouse — and not her work with the government. She disclosed her spouse taking in anywhere between $6 million and $30 million in partnership income from a venture capital firm and a winery.

Members of Congress’ and their spouses’ sources of income and assets are traditionally disclosed in broad ranges, not as a specific dollar amount.

Omar has previously denied the allegations of anything untoward and has said Trump has a “creepy” obsession with her.

Trump also announced Monday that he is sending border czar Tom Homan to Minneapolis. Residents have flooded the streets of the city this month, protesting the shootings of Renee Good, who was killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Jan. 7, and Alex Pretti, who was killed by a Border Patrol agent Saturday.

Neither the DOJ nor Omar’s office immediately responded to requests for comment.

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Capitol agenda: Shutdown odds spike after Minnesota killing

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The killing of Alex Pretti at the hands of federal agents is hitting hard on Capitol Hill, ratcheting up the odds of a partial government shutdown and spurring Republican lawmakers to make another break with the Trump administration.

Here’s the latest on how the fallout from the Minnesota shooting is playing out in Congress:

— Shutdown looks likely: The Senate is set to take its first vote on the last tranche of government funding bills Thursday, and things aren’t looking good.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is insisting that Republicans work across the aisle to rewrite DHS funding legislation but also signaling that Democrats would be willing to help advance the other five pending appropriations bills in the meantime. Several Democrats who helped end the previous shutdown say they plan to vote against the funding bills unless there are changes to the ICE operation in Minnesota.

At this stage, Senate GOP leadership expects to move forward as planned on the six-bill package including DHS. Republicans and the White House have reached out to Senate Democrats about how to proceed, but one Senate Democratic leadership aide granted anonymity said they haven’t raised “realistic solutions.” A number of rank-and-file Senate Republicans are speaking out against any attempt to “defund” DHS — and leadership would need buy-in from all 100 senators to quickly strip out the DHS bill. President Donald Trump is now pushing Republicans to pass a bill to “END Sanctuary Cities.”

A couple key reminders: The pending funding bills include money for the departments of Defense, Health and Human Services and State, and account for more than 75 percent of federal discretionary spending.

And don’t forget the House is out this week and wouldn’t be around to pass any revamped funding bills before Friday. The Senate won’t hold its first vote of the week until Tuesday afternoon because of the snow storm.

— Trump faces nervous GOP: A growing number of House and Senate Republicans are voicing public concerns about the incident and calling for an investigation, as top administration officials defend the agents involved.

Even close Trump allies are beginning to speak out. Sen. David McCormick (R-Pa.) said on X Sunday night that he supports the Border Patrol and ICE but that he agrees with the NRA about the need for a “full investigation.”

House Homeland Security Chair Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.) is calling for DHS officials to testify. House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) suggested to Fox News that Trump would want to “maybe go to another city” as Minnesota officials push back.

Some Republicans have been privately warning administration officials and GOP leaders for months that Trump’s immigration crackdown is not going over well in some pockets of the country.

“Many of us wonder if the administration has any clue as to how much this will hurt us legislatively and electorally this year,” said one House Republican.

Jordain Carney and Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.

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Fiscal hawks set out to kill earmarks. They are very much alive.

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Fiscal conservatives in Congress threatened for months to block government funding if GOP leaders didn’t shun earmarks. They succeeded in scrapping just one; the rest, almost $16 billion worth, are slated in the package the Senate needs to clear by Friday to avoid a shutdown.

Republican hard-liners on both sides of the Capitol have made things difficult this winter for their leadership, which has been scrambling to fund the government before cash runs out Friday for the vast majority of federal agencies. But they failed to significantly curtail the practice of directing federal dollars to specific projects back home.

Republicans swore off earmarks for more than a decade in 2010 amid corruption scandals and demands from conservatives empowered by the rise of the Tea Party movement that has since receded. Then in 2021, Democrats brought back the practice after the party swept control of the White House and Congress, softening the return with a rebrand as “community project funding,” new rules to prevent abuse and a cap at 1 percent of funding.

Now Republicans run Washington once again, and they’re overwhelmingly embracing the renaissance. As the Senate considers a nearly $1.3 trillion funding package this week loaded with thousands of earmarks for projects in specific congressional districts, fiscal hawks are acknowledging defeat.

“When a majority of the United States House and a large chunk of the Senate seemingly want to advance earmarks, there’s only so much you can do,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a member of the House Freedom Caucus, said in an interview.

“I’ve long stated I think it’s the currency of corruption, and we shouldn’t do it,” he added. “But, you know, members like to do it.”

Capitol Hill’s most vocal earmark proponents argue that, if not for the revival of earmarks, congressional leaders would not have succeeded in clinching bipartisan deals to fund the Pentagon and nondefense agencies with new budgets for the first time in almost two years.

The multibill funding package has yet to reach President Donald Trump’s desk and is now complicated by Democratic outrage over ICE funding after a federal immigration enforcement agent fatally shot another U.S. citizen in Minnesota over the weekend. But lawmakers in both parties are already touting the cash they secured for local projects as they campaign for reelection nine months out from the midterms.

“It’s not worth being in Congress if you can’t find ways to help your district,” Rep. Mike Flood said in an interview.

The Nebraska Republican secured almost $30 million in projects for his district in the current slate of funding bills, including millions of dollars to repave roads, about $750,000 for police cruisers and $500,000 for improvements to a shelter for minors who would otherwise be in juvenile detention.

Flood argues the inclusion of earmarks ultimately helped Republicans negotiate funding bills that keep federal spending mostly steady — a top priority of congressional fiscal hawks. “For all the things that people say are wrong with Congress, this process is working. And it’s working well,” he said. “And we are bringing this in under budget.”

This month members of the House Freedom Caucus threatened to tank a preliminary vote on spending bills if GOP leaders didn’t knock out at least some earmarks. They were able to kill only one: a $1 million earmark Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar secured for a community organization in her Minnesota district, in part because the address listed for the group was that of a restaurant.

House fiscal hawks made a final stand last week when they demanded, and received, a vote to nix hundreds of earmarks senators had worked to secure. That vote failed overwhelmingly, right before the House passed a funding package with a price tag of more than $1 trillion, with every earmark intact.

Rep. Ralph Norman, a member of the Freedom Caucus, said it was a “sad day” and called it “irredeemable” for a GOP-led Congress and White House to support the earmark-filled package. Norman said he now has no hope Republicans will ever do anything to get rid of earmarks.

“I wish it was different,” he said.

More than 70 House Republicans voted against killing the Senate earmarks. However, some hard-liners argue that it’s really the minority party driving the resurgence in a narrowly divided Congress.

“You need Democratic votes, right? So let’s not forget that,” said Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), a former chair of the House Freedom Caucus. “I’m not here to apologize for, or validate, a bunch of garbage Republican earmarks. But we’d have a much better time at making sure those didn’t prevail if we didn’t need the Democrat votes.”

In the Senate, where Democratic buy-in is necessary to overcome the filibuster, fiscal conservatives delayed action on funding bills for more than a month following the end of the record-breaking government shutdown in November — in part due to their earmark concerns. Now that the final slate of funding bills is before the Senate, those same lawmakers are again demanding a vote to eliminate the pet projects.

Last week Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), a leader of that charge, noted that in 2021 the Senate Republican Conference voted unanimously to maintain their rule against earmarks, a nonbinding prohibition many GOP senators were quick to flout.

“It’s time for Senate Republicans to follow our own rules. END ALL EARMARKS NOW!” Scott posted on social media.

The earmarks Congress has inserted in the new funding bills are the first of Trump’s presidency, since federal agencies have been running on stopgap funding patches for almost two years. Lawmakers in both parties see them as a way to protect their authority to dictate how federal money is spent as the Trump administration continues to shift and cancel billions of dollars in contravention of their wishes.

“It restores the institutional faith in Congress’ ability — albeit in a very small and minor way — to direct congressional spending and gets power back from any executive branch,” Tennessee Rep. Chuck Fleischmann, a senior Republican appropriator, said in an interview.

Many Republican lawmakers have been privately pressing GOP leaders to bring back earmarks for years, including as far back as 2016, when then-Speaker Paul Ryan halted a closed-door vote on restoring the practice.

At least under the old rules, earmarks were entwined with corruption. In the early 2000s, several lawmakers pled guilty to money laundering and bribery charges for abusing the practice. In the most high-profile of those cases, the late Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-Calif.) admitted to accepting $2.4 million in bribes to secure earmarks.

Now Congress has much tighter rules governing the process, including a prohibition on steering money to for-profit organizations. Senior members of the Appropriations Committees who want to avoid a repeat of infamous earmarks scandals also closely vet the requests, said House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.).

“We scrub them pretty hard, and honestly the Democrats do, too,” he said.

In a sign House Republicans are growing more comfortable with the practice, they are now discussing whether to expand earmarks in future funding bills to include education, health and labor projects, according to Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), who chairs the panel in charge of that money. Only senators are currently allowed to specify projects for funding within those jurisdictions.

“There’s interest on both sides, as long as it’s done in a way that doesn’t make both sides feel uncomfortable,” Aderholt said. “Members want to have a little bit of say-so, because we do have the power of the purse.”

Jordain Carney and Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.

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