Congress

Trump’s difficult legislative demands

Published

2 years ago

March 5, 2025

President Donald Trump did not offer GOP congressional leaders any easy lay-ups in his joint address Tuesday night, sending mixed messages on his existing legislative priorities and proposing others that ranged from impractical to totally unrealistic.

Trump reiterated his campaign-trail promises to end taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security — policies House Republicans worry are too expensive to combine with permanently extending the president’s tax cuts from 2017.

He pressed Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, by name, to send through more money for his deportation agenda “without delay” — an ask that could give Senate Republicans renewed leverage to demand the House agree to their preference for passing Trump’s border and energy policies now and moving a separate bill with his tax cuts later.

But Trump also emphasized the importance of tax cuts, a potential nod to the House’s desire to enact one bill encompassing all three priorities. And he made a new call for no taxes on American-made cars.

Trump’s legislative proposals got tougher from there. The president bashed the CHIPS and Science Act — which passed with bipartisan support in 2022 and has led to major investments in red districts and states — telling Johnson to “get rid” of the law and use “whatever’s left over … to reduce the debt or any other reason you want to.” Johnson stood and applauded. Other Republicans were less enthusiastic.

“I’ve supported the CHIPS Act,” Rep. Mike Lawler said. “Obviously, the investment in chip manufacturing is critical, and certainly in New York, it’s an important investment as we move forward.”

Sen. Todd Young, a key architect of the CHIPS Act, ran out of the chamber on the phone a few minutes before the joint address ended and wouldn’t stop to talk to reporters. Others who voted for the bill, such as Sens. Susan Collins, Roger Wicker and Bill Cassidy, did not answer questions, either.

Other improbable acts Trump floated included codifying his executive order that mandates the death penalty for anyone who murders a police officer and building a “golden dome” missile system around the United States — akin to Israel’s so-called Iron Dome complex.

Democrats, of course, won’t help with any of this — even before their show of rebellion Tuesday night. Texas Rep. Al Green was ejected early in Trump’s speech after repeatedly shouting the president had “no mandate.” (Johnson is now calling to censure him). Others held up signs reading “Musk Steals,” “Save Medicaid” and “Protect Veterans.” They didn’t join the escort committee that led Trump into the chamber and many refused to clap, even during bipartisan moments in the speech. Some left early.

Trump seemed to relish in Democrats’ discontent, saying that there was “absolutely nothing I can say to make them happy.”

What else we’re watching:

Musk on Blue Light News: Musk will meet with the House GOP conference tonight to “give an update on his efforts” and discuss codifying DOGE’s cuts in a future government funding package, Johnson has said. Republicans have faced growing backlash in their districts to Musk’s mass firings of federal workers and congressional Republicans considering possible Medicaid reductions.
Hard-liners at the White House: Fiscal conservatives are meeting with Trump at the White House this afternoon as the president and GOP leaders personally lobby to get holdouts on board. But fiscal conservatives are playing hardball and say that if the speaker adds any additional funding to the shutdown-averting bill, then they will demand changes to Johnson’s budget resolution.
Sanctuary city mayors testify: Four Democratic mayors — Eric Adams of New York City, Michelle Wu of Boston, Brandon Johnson of Chicago, and Mike Johnston of Denver — will testify before the House Oversight Committee at 10 a.m. about their so-called sanctuary city policies. Republicans are set to excoriate them for their lack of cooperation with the administration’s immigration-enforcement agenda. The mayors have been preparing in hopes of avoiding a spectacle — but they haven’t been coordinating much with each other, Wu said Tuesday.

Jennifer Scholtes, Nicholas Wu and Hailey Fuchs contributed to this report.

Congress

Democrats drop $5M into Kansas Senate race

Published

2 hours ago

October 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Senate Democrats’ top super PAC is pushing into Kansas.

The Chuck Schumer-aligned Senate Majority PAC is launching a $5 million statewide television ad blitz starting Saturday through Election Day — the latest sign that Democrats believe the Senate map is shifting onto red turf.

SMP had signaled in recent days it could get involved in the race, telling Blue Light News late last month it was “actively thinking” about whether to wade into the state where Democrats haven’t won a Senate seat in nearly a century but where Adam Hamilton narrowly leads GOP Sen. Roger Marshall in recent polls. Internal SMP polling that found an increasingly competitive race factored into the group’s decision to spend. It will also run digital ads.

“The gap is closing in Kansas,” SMP spokesperson Lauren French said in a statement. “We are committed to ensuring families understand Marshall’s real record of making health care and basic goods more expensive for working Kansans.”

Republicans are scrambling to shore up Marshall. Senate Leadership Fund, a top GOP super PAC aligned with Republican leadership, has booked over $10 million in ads through Election Day in the state, per ad tracking firm AdImpact.

SMP’s first ad attacks Marshall for joining Senate Republicans in voting to table a Democratic-led amendment last year to release the Jeffrey Epstein files. The Senate later approved legislation to release the files by unanimous consent. It’s the latest in a slate of ads from Democrats hitting their Republican rivals over the late, disgraced financier and convicted sex offender. Marshall’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Senate Democrats’ plunge into the state comes as the midterm battle map is undergoing a major realignment. Georgia and North Carolina — primed to be two of the cycle’s premiere battlegrounds — are tilting left to the point where national Republicans are retracting spending in both states and Democrats are starting to follow suit, freeing funds on both sides to shift elsewhere.

Republicans are racing to reinforce incumbents across what was once safer red turf. SLF has also pledged $5 million to bolster Sen. Darline Graham in South Carolina.

Democrats, meanwhile, are starting to spend more in red states. SMP has dropped over $2 million on digital ads in Texas. Schumer, the Senate minority leader, has included Kansas and Mississippi in his pitches to donors.

Congress

House Democratic campaign arm says it needs $17 million, and fast

Published

3 hours ago

October 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is begging for resources, and setting a hard deadline for donors to give $17 million in order to compete in a handful of districts that Republicans carried easily in 2024.

DCCC Executive Director Julie Merz said the committee needs the cash influx by Oct. 22 in order to “to take advantage of the opportunities we have” outside of the core battlefield, according to a memo shared with donors on Friday and obtained by POLITICO.

If they don’t pony up, Merz warns, the party “could be leaving winnable races on the table.”

Democrats have been clear that they have a fundraising disadvantage this cycle, but they have so far been reluctant to place a specific dollar amount on their needs, making the DCCC’s memo Friday a particularly surprising outlier.

“Here’s the tough reality though: the Republican ecosystem has amassed a massive war chest that is significantly greater than ours and is spending it,” Merz says in the memo after arguing that the members of the committee “remain confident that we will win back the majority in 25 days.”

Specifically, Merz dedicates significant portions of the memo to four districts where the committee is desperate for more money in order to compete — all of which President Donald Trump won by double-digit margins in 2024:

— Florida’s 27th District (Trump +14.6)

— Nevada’s 2nd District (Trump +13.9)

— South Carolina’s 1st District (Trump +13)

— New York’s 21st District (Trump +20.7)

The fundraising disadvantage has created headaches for both House and Senate Democrats over where, exactly, to deploy the resources they do have.

The committee tells donors that their internal polling shows all of those races within reach, but that Republicans’ big cash advantages — especially in the Trump-aligned super PAC MAGA Inc. — will make it harder to win those and other reach seats.

Merz also name drops a handful of other deep-red districts that are “worthy of additional investment in this environment,” including seats held by GOP Reps. French Hill (R-Ark.) and Richard Hudson (R-N.C.), the chair of the Republican National Congressional Committee.

The NRCC was quick to mock the DCCC’s memo.

“No amount of money fixes candidates voters don’t want. These seats are staying red, and Republicans are on offense across the map,” NRCC spokesperson Mike Marinella said in a statement.

Congress

Capitol agenda: How Warren could link arms with Trump’s GOP

Published

9 hours ago

October 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Sen. Elizabeth Warren may get her clearest shot yet to take on corporate America next year — thanks to the once unthinkable help of Republicans.

The Massachusetts Democrat is poised to chair Senate Banking if the party takes back the chamber. And while the progressive has long been a boogeyman to corporate America, lobbyists worry she’ll have powerful backup thanks to the surge of populist Republicans eager to take big swings at Wall Street and Big Tech.

One longtime financial industry lobbyist, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said Warren “has a streak that is not just wanting to be a progressive gadfly, but to actually reach across the aisle to push for policy ideas.” There is “absolutely” reason for concern, the person said.

Atop the panel, Warren would also have a strong position to shape the 2028 presidential debates on both sides.

“There’s very little doubt that the agenda of the Senate Banking Committee is going to overlap substantially with the core issues that the candidates in the 2028 election cycle are going to be grappling with,” said Dennis Kelleher, the outgoing leader of the progressive group Better Markets.

As Banking chair, Warren is expected to try to recruit Republicans in a crackdown on artificial intelligence — specifically restrictions on chip giant Nvidia’s exports to China, which already has some GOP support — and a follow-up of this year’s bipartisan housing law that sought to rein in private equity’s role in the market, according to people close to the senator.

Some of President Donald Trump’s own populist ideas, like credit card interest rate caps and limits on stock buybacks for defense contractors, would provide fertile ground for Warren.

But Trump would also likely be Warren’s biggest obstacle, as he’s been resistant to embrace policy overlaps with her. He’s also been resistant to any AI restrictions.

Warren’s approach also threatens to expose rifts between GOP populists who have been ascendent under Trump and more mainstream conservatives.

Asked about the possibility of a Chair Warren, Sen. Mike Rounds, a more moderate South Dakota Republican, said he doesn’t “think anything would get done except lots of investigations and lots of accusations.”

What else we’re watching:

— LAWMAKERS CLAMOR FOR GAO v. TRUMP — Lawmakers are desperate for a government watchdog to step up and help them in their fight against the Trump administration over control of federal cash. The independent Government Accountability Office concluded earlier this week that the White House illegally withheld more than $1 billion for education and health care research programs — the latest in more than a half-dozen such findings GAO has published since the start of Trump’s second term. But the agency has yet to use its unique power to take the president to court to challenge those “impoundments,” and lawmakers who are tired of the administration running roughshod over their funding prerogatives want GAO to act.

— MURPHY’S DEFENSE FUNDING ULTIMATUM — Democrats should not approve Pentagon funding or the annual defense policy bill if they control Congress next year unless those bills would hasten the end of the Iran war, Sen. Chris Murphy told reporters Thursday. “We should make the end of the war a priority,” said the Foreign Relations Democrat who was returning from a trip to Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Murphy also accused Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and officials of attempting a “cover-up” of the war’s damage and obscuring its true cost after he was denied entry on a base in Qatar. Given the damage to bases in the region, Murphy also told reporters that the U.S. should “reconsider its footprint” in the Middle East.

Jasper Goodman, Jennifer Scholtes and Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.