Congress
Senate to vet Trump’s pick for No. 2 post at White House budget office
Next week the Senate will begin publicly vetting President Donald Trump’s nominee for the No. 2 position at the Office of Management and Budget, known as the “nerve center” of an administration.
The Senate Budget Committee is scheduled to hold a confirmation hearing next week on the nomination of Hal Duncan to be deputy director of the OMB, Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) announced Tuesday.
Duncan, who currently heads legislative affairs at the White House budget office, was nominated to replace Dan Bishop, who was recently confirmed as a U.S. attorney.
The new nominee is expected to field questions about his stance on whether the executive branch has the power to withhold funding Congress has appropriated, as OMB continues to hold back billions of dollars more than 16 months after Trump’s inauguration.
Even Republicans on the Budget Committee have accused OMB in recent months of continuing to illegally “impound” federal cash. During a hearing this spring, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) chided White House Budget Director Russ Vought for not releasing hundreds of millions of dollars Congress previously approved to help states fund anti-poverty services.
Leon Black, a billionaire investor with ties to the late convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, declined to show up for his scheduled transcribed interview Thursday with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee — choosing instead to file a lawsuit calling the panel’s subpoenas for his participation “invalid.”
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, argues that the subpoenas served to Black compelling his testimony and demanding he turn over certain non-disclosure agreements go beyond the committee’s “delegated authority in seeking private information that bears no legitimate connection to [the committee’s] legislative purpose.”
Black’s escalation is likely to trigger a corresponding dramatic response from the Oversight Committee, where Republicans are still endeavoring to show they are taking their Epstein investigation seriously more than a year since its launch.
House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) said that Black’s deposition will move forward with an empty chair this morning and that he will talk to his members about next steps.
“It’s a shame Leon Black is hiding behind litigation rather than provide answers to the American people,” Comer said in a statement. “Our investigation is examining how the federal government for decades failed survivors of Jeffery Epstein and [co-conspirator] Ghislaine Maxwell’s crimes and how Mr. Epstein sought to curry favor with influential individuals to avoid scrutiny. Mr. Black’s testimony is crucial to our investigation as he was one of Mr. Epstein’s fee paying clients and has several nondisclosure agreements.”
Democrats are also eager to send a strong message that those who defy the panel now won’t be spared if the party retakes control of the House in 2027.
“By refusing to testify today, Leon Black is now defying two Congressional subpoenas. Black gave Jeffrey Epstein over $180 million over six years. He funded Epstein’s abuse and trafficking of women. Multiple women have also accused Black of sexual assault,” said Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the Oversight Committee’s top Democrat who is poised to take the gavel if Republicans lose their majority in the midterms.
“His connections to Epstein and his unwillingness to cooperate are unacceptable,” Garcia continued. “We must hold him in contempt immediately.”
Black, who founded Apollo Global Management, appeared in a closed door session with the Oversight Committee earlier this summer to discuss his association with Epstein. As a result of that meeting, Black was slapped with a subpoena to produce certain non-disclosure agreements he signed with women tied to Epstein and told to come back for a second grilling.
The panel has been counting on the NDAs to shed further light on how Epstein and his network were able to sexually exploit women and girls and evade liability for decades.
Black has since produced one NDA between himself and a woman with whom he had an affair and to whom he paid $9.5 million. Comer called that insufficient, demanding Black turn over the others and threatening to pursue contempt proceedings if Black did not cooperate.
Black’s attorneys contend the subpoenas “would … expose women who value their privacy, who have no known or public connection to Epstein, who bargained for confidentiality and have refused to release it, and who have no ability to protect themselves and their privacy before the Committee.”
Susan Estrich, one of Black’s lawyers, in a statement accused the Oversight Committee of going on “a fishing expedition that oversteps its authority and completely ignores its responsibility. This is no longer about finding the truth about Epstein. It is about trying to destroy Mr. Black. We were left with no choice but to file this lawsuit in response to an abuse of Congressional power.”
Estrich added that Black continues to deny his knowledge of Epstein’s misconduct and “feels terrible for Epstein’s victims.”
Republican leaders are set to announce Thursday that the final two weeks of the pre-election House session are canceled, according to two people granted anonymity to describe the decision ahead of a public announcement.
That means members are set to depart Washington no later than Sept. 17 and not return until mid-November. The House will recovene for one additional week of business after next week’s Labor Day break.
Leaders would recall the House for those canceled weeks if the Senate moves forward with a party-line budget reconciliation package in the meantime, the people said.
The decision comes as candidates agitate to get back on the campaign trail and as GOP leaders continue to struggle to maintain control of the House floor. Earlier this week, a procedural measure setting up votes on several Republican bills was poised to fail until two Democrats voted in favor, rescuing Speaker Mike Johnson’s agenda for the week.
The Democratic centrist group Third Way is launching a “new economic bargain” platform as part of its ongoing effort to steer the party toward a more coherent and big-tent vision heading into 2028.
The platform consists of what it calls 20 “ambitious and ruthlessly pragmatic” ideas, shared first with Blue Light News, targeting working-class voters. The ideas include a health care Bill of Rights, ONE MORE, and government-backed car loans to lower the cost of car ownership and forcing AI companies to pay for their own expansion without passing it on to consumers.
“Now that the primaries are over, the big question for Democrats is: What are you going to run on in the general election in ’26? What are you going to legislate on in ’27? And what are you going to promise to do and deliver if you become president?” Jon Cowan, Third Way’s president, said in an interview. “And so we see this now as the pivot moment away from the primaries and toward the policy debate in the party.”
Cowan said the policy ideas provide an affirmative vision for the party, instead of just being anti-Trump, saying the agenda is aimed at “Democrats who want to be able to beat MAGA, because here’s the key thing: you can’t beat something with nothing.”
Earlier this year, the influential think tank launched a $50 million effort seeking to make sure a “combative centrist” emerges as the party’s 2028 presidential nominee.
Now, Third Way has elevated a dedicated staffer — Sasha Galbreath, a longtime House policy adviser — to establish connections between the group and staffers for potential 2028 presidential and vice presidential candidates. The group is already in conversation with at least 16 potential candidates and their staff, according to Cowan.
“The ideas primary is really only just beginning now,” Cowan said. “I think the pivot into September and the end of the primaries is actually when the real ideas primary to determine the future of the Democratic Party begins.”
- Leon Black defies House Oversight Committee, sues Congress amid Epstein investigation
- House Republicans set to cut pre-election session short
- Third Way rolls out “new economic bargain” platform for Dems
- Kamala Harris is wading into the midterms. Some Democrats want her to stay out.
- The Trump administration is taking stakes in more companies — and progressives are taking notes
- Stephen A. Smith has some words for Democrats as he makes his 2028 plans clear
- Democrats’ new data center attack line
- Stephen A. Smith on Trump, Democrats and the politics of chaos
- Elon Musk unleashes first wave of spending on key races in the midterms
- House Democrats watch closely as Hakeem Jeffries vows to rein in rogue members
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