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Thune mocks Schumer’s shutdown stance: He ‘knows where my office is’

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune responded tartly to his Democratic counterpart’s calls for “bipartisan negotiations” ahead of an approaching government shutdown deadline Tuesday, underscoring the posturing that has marked the process thus far.

Minority Leader Chuck Schumer “knows where my office is,” Thune told reporters. “Why do you guys keep asking me this?” He later added during a floor speech that Schumer “knows my number. I haven’t heard from him.”

It’s a direct retort to Schumer’s repeated calls for a “negotiation” ahead of the Sept. 30 funding deadline. Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries have sent letters to Thune and Speaker Mike Johnson requesting a bipartisan meeting but haven’t gotten a response.

Thune told reporters he was “happy” to meet with Schumer though he questioned the “reason” for a meeting since Republicans are planning to proceed with a “clean” short-term stopgap bill that would largely maintain current government funding levels into late November without major policy add-ons.

Still, it’s the first time since March that Thune has acknowledged a willingness to meet with Schumer on funding.

Democrats have warned that if Republicans do not include them in negotiations about funding the government that they will bear the blame for a shutdown come Oct. 1. Trump indicated in a Fox News interview last week that he believed Republicans didn’t need Democratic votes, but in the Senate it will take at least seven of them to help advance a stopgap.

“When he says out loud that he says he doesn’t need or want our votes, that means Donald Trump wants a shutdown,” Schumer said Tuesday, adding that Thune and Johnson are “doing exactly what Donald Trump wants.”

“They have refused even to sit down at the table … despite repeated requests,” Schumer added.

Schumer, in particular, is under pressure to stand up to Republicans after agreeing to advance a GOP-written continuing resolution back in March. GOP leaders are eager to run the same play again this month and test his resolve.

Inside a House GOP conference meeting Monday, influential conservative Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) stood up to back the clean-CR plan, reminding his colleagues of Schumer’s recent comments opposing it.

So “send Chuck Schumer a clean CR,” Johnson told them.

Schumer hasn’t outlined a specific policy proposal that Democrats need to see attached to any stopgap in exchange for their votes, but he has said in general terms that health care needs to be addressed. Democrats have made expiring Affordable Care Act health insurance subsidies a key area of focus.

Thune, however, reiterated Tuesday that the subsidies, which lapse Jan. 1, won’t be attached to the stopgap bill and that there’s “nothing close to ready to go” that could be finished by the end-of-the-month deadline.

“I think the ACA subsidies will be an issue that will be addressed, but I think right now we’ve got to keep the government open so we can do appropriations bills,” Thune said, adding that he believes there’s a “path” to keeping the government open and having a conversation on the subsidies.

Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters much the same Tuesday, saying “there are some Democrats pining for a shutdown” and that there was “zero chance” that Republicans would heed another emerging Democratic demand: unwinding the Medicaid cuts included in the GOP megabill passed this summer.

Schumer indirectly responded to Republicans wanting to punt the discussion of an ACA subsidies extension, saying at a health care event Tuesday that “we don’t put any faith” in the GOP’s willingness to deal with the issue later.

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Congress

House again votes to surrender tariff powers to Trump

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House Republicans voted in near lockstep Tuesday to again cede congressional power over tariffs to President Donald Trump.

A measure that effectively blocks challenges to Trump’s sweeping global tariff declarations through March 2026 was adopted on a 213-211 vote. The vote was gaveled down only after GOP whips had a drawn-out struggle on the floor with a band of Republicans who initially opposed the legislation before flipping to yes. The vote was held open for more than a half-hour as they worked to bring the members back on board.

Three Republicans — Reps. Kevin Kiley of California, Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Victoria Spartz of Indiana — ended up joining Democrats to oppose the measure, a “rule” which also teed up several D.C.-related criminal justice bills for debate.

“I think this is a misuse of what rules are for, and I think it’s bad for the representative process,” Kiley said of the tariff provisions.

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Congress

Adam Schiff and Kash Patel get into a shouting match

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The yearslong feud between longtime political rivals Adam Schiff and Kash Patel reached a fever pitch Tuesday afternoon, complete with a shouting match that briefly derailed an ongoing Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

The confrontation occurred when Schiff, a Democratic senator from California, questioned Patel, the FBI director, about the Justice Department’s decision to move Ghislaine Maxwell — an associate of the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein — to a lower security prison facility.

Schiff asked Patel whether he believed the American people were “stupid” enough to believe his answer that the Bureau of Prisons independently made the decision to move Maxwell, rather than it being a politically-motivated move by the White House.

“What I am doing is protecting this country … and combating the weaponization of intelligence by the likes of you,” Patel said, interrupting Schiff. “We have countlessly proven you to be a liar in Russiangate, in January 6. You are the biggest fraud to ever sit in the United States Senate.”

Patel went on to call him “a political buffoon at best.”

The animosity between the two men dates back, at least, to Schiff’s time as chair of the House Intelligence Committee, where he led the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Patel, then a House Intelligence staffer, was tasked with working to discredit the probe.

Five years later, Schiff served on a select committee to investigate the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol; Patel, meanwhile, was an advocate for many of the incarcerated rioters.

Years later, in the lead-up to Patel’s confirmation to lead the FBI, Senate Judiciary Democrats pointed to the fact that Patel reposted a meme on social media that featured the likeness of Patel taking a chainsaw to Schiff’s head. Another photo shared by Democrats showed an image of Patel appearing to hold an object with Schiff’s face beside a catapult.

More recently, Patel has accused Schiff of moving to leak incriminating information about President Donald Trump while Intelligence Committee chair. Schiff, through a spokesperson, has denied the claims.

As the shouting on Tuesday continued, Sen. Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the Judiciary panel, pleaded with chair Chuck Grassley to take control of the situation. Grassley pounded his gavel repeatedly, saying, “Both of you be quiet.”

It was perhaps the most heated moment of the questioning on Tuesday, during which Patel was pressed on his handling of the Epstein matter and the investigation into the assassination of conservative political commentator Charlie Kirk, among other topics.

But it was not the first explosive exchange of the day. Patel also tangled with Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), who told the FBI director, “I think you’re not gonna be around long” — a suggestion Trump would eventually turn on him.

That comment set off a similar shouting match in which Patel called Booker “an embarrassment to your country” and Booker shouted back, “I’m not afraid of you.”

In a social media post after the conclusion of the hearing, Schiff contended that Patel went before lawmakers to “save his job” and argued he was “performing for an audience of one.” The White House, meanwhile, congratulated Patel for going after “Pencil Neck” — the president’s nickname for Schiff.

Patel will go before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.

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Congress

Top Democrats blast House stopgap proposal

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Democratic leaders signaled Tuesday they will oppose the GOP-led stopgap funding bill just hours after it was unveiled — and just two weeks before a possible government shutdown.

“The House Republican-only spending bill fails to meet the needs of the American people and does nothing to stop the looming healthcare crisis,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a joint statement. “At a time when families are already being squeezed by higher costs, Republicans refuse to stop Americans from facing double-digit hikes in their health insurance premiums.”

House GOP leaders are teeing up the legislation to extend government funding by seven weeks for a vote later this week. Democrats are under immense pressure from their base to mount a resistance to Blue Light News GOP’s funding moves, and while party leaders have decided to rally around health care, they have not laid out specific demands except to demand Republicans negotiate.

In a separate statement, the two top Democratic appropriators, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), said Tuesday that Republican leaders abandoned bipartisan talks on a spending stopgap that would include three full-year funding bills.

“We stand ready to continue down this path that would give us time to complete full-year bills, if Speaker [Mike] Johnson backs away from this partisan move,” Murray and DeLauro said Tuesday. “House Republican leadership has walked away from negotiations and are now threatening a shutdown by trying to jam through a funding bill on their terms alone.”

Johnson said on a brief interview Tuesday there was “no reason” for Democrats to block the stopgap “because it’s clean and short-term — it’s not a partisan exercise.”

Asked if Republicans would allow a shutdown if Senate Democrats block the measure, or if Republicans would then work on a backup plan to keep the government open, Johnson replied: “We’re gonna see what happens.”

Meredith Lee Hill and Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.

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