The White House is concerned that Iran’s weakened position will prompt the regime to pursue a nuclear weapon, and national security adviser Jake Sullivan is coordinating with the Trump team on this concern. Iran has suffered a year of setbacks amid Israeli assaults on its proxy forces and a pull-out from Syria amid the takeover by Sunni Muslim forces, hostile to Iran’s Shiite government.
The Social Security Fairness Act checks all the boxes of bad legislation.
President-elect Donald Trump unleashed a slew of nominations on Sunday night, naming several new people to serve in his forthcoming administration.In several Truth Social posts on Sunday, Trump introduced various experts to work in the White House on issues ranging from defense to technology to budgeting. The Republican leader began by naming Stephen Alexander Vaden as his nominee for deputy secretary of the Department of Agriculture.
China has warned the U.S. that it is making “dangerous moves” by providing Taiwan with an additional $571 million in defense materials, which was authorized by President Biden on Saturday.In addition to the $571 million approved by Biden, the U.S. Department of Defense announced Friday that $295 million in military sales had been approved for the self-ruled island of Taiwan.The sales and assistance from the U.S.
President-elect Trump on Sunday named Callista Gingrich, wife to former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, as one of his latest U.S. ambassador nominees.Writing on Truth Social, Trump wrote that he picked Gingrich to serve as U.S. ambassador to Switzerland, citing her previous ambassadorial experience in his first administration. Gingrich, and the other ambassador nominees, will need to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
President-elect Trump estimated the exact time his administration will be “fully operational” on Jan. 20 in his first rally-styled speech since his decisive win over Vice President Kamala Harris last month. “You just have a few days to wait. We’re going to be fully operational, I would say, by about 2:00 on the 20th,” Trump said from the AmericaFest stage.
Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, has been living in a retirement facility, a source told Fox News on Sunday. The source also denied a local news report that said she was in a memory care facility.Granger, who is retiring at the end of this congressional term, has largely remained absent from the Capitol in recent months, having last cast votes on July 24. She was not present for over 54% of votes this year.
Lara Trump, President-elect Trump’s daughter-in-law, said Saturday she is removing herself from consideration for Florida Republican Marco Rubio’s seat in the U.S. Senate. “After an incredible amount of thought, contemplation, and encouragement from so many, I have decided to remove my name from consideration for the United States Senate,” she wrote on X Saturday. The president-elect has nominated Rubio to be secretary of state.
“Rockin’ around the Christmas treeAt the Christmas party hop” – Brenda LeeIt’s a yuletide tradition on Capitol Hill. An annual custom of rockin’ around a congressional Christmas tree, festooned with hundreds of legislative ornaments, Advent appropriations and mistletoe modifications.A political Polar Express chugs through the halls of Congress nearly every December.
President-elect Trump announced Saturday he has tapped the creator of “The Apprentice” to serve a diplomatic role in the United Kingdom.In a Truth Social post, Trump named Mark Burnett, a British-American TV producer who was born in London, as the next U.S. special envoy to the United Kingdom.”It is my great honor to appoint Mark Burnett as the Special Envoy to the United Kingdom,” the president-elect said.
As the dust settles on Congress frantically passing a stopgap bill at the eleventh hour to avoid a government shutdown, lawmakers are having their say on a chaotic week on Capitol Hill.President Biden signed the 118-page bill into law on Saturday, extending government funding into March, the White House announced. The bill provides over $100 billion in disaster aid for those affected by storms Helene and Milton in the U.S. Southeast earlier this year.
President-elect Trump dropped his latest round of nominations Saturday afternoon, including two picks to help lead the Department of Justice (DOJ) and one to work within the Department of Transportation (DOT).In a Truth Social post, the president-elect announced he was nominating Aaron Reitz to lead the DOJ’s Office of Legal Policy.
Senators voted to pass a new version of a stopgap spending bill early Saturday morning after the midnight deadline for a partial government shutdown came and went.The Senate advanced the third version of a short-term spending bill by 85 to 11, and it will now head to President Biden’s desk, who has already signaled that he will sign it.
A partial government shutdown began at 12:01 on Saturday morning after Congress failed to pass a stopgap spending measure before the deadline and send it to President Biden’s desk.However, the Senate is actively working through amendment votes and other considerations in order to send the measure to Biden. The stopgap bill is expected to be passed in the Senate in the coming hours. The partial shutdown comes only days before Christmas and New Year’s.
As President Biden’s term comes to an end, he is reportedly considering commuting the sentences of most, if not all, of the 40 men on the federal government’s death row.The Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the matter, reported that the move would frustrate President-elect Trump’s plan to streamline executions as he takes office in January.
House lawmakers voted Friday to approve a newly negotiated spending bill that included many of the same components of the earlier legislation — but without the debt limit provision that had sparked consternation among many in the party.Republican leaders shared the text late Friday, shortly before lawmakers approved the spending legislation, 366-34.
Over 30 House Republicans voted Friday against a bill to avert a partial government shutdown.Lawmakers scrambled to reach consensus on a spending package ahead of the looming partial government shutdown deadline Friday. An initial 1,547-page bipartisan deal that would have extended the government funding deadline until March 14 was released Tuesday night, but the proposal crumbled after Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy criticized the spending bill.
House Republicans failed to secure the majority votes needed Thursday on a spending bill to avert a government shutdown by week’s end, handing a decisive loss to President-elect Trump in an early test of his ability to unite Republicans in the chamber. The bill failed by a vote of 235-174, including 38 Republicans who voted down the legislation. The bill not only failed the method that allowed lawmakers to fast-track it with a two-thirds majority.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sounded off Thursday about Elon Musk’s influence over the spending drama on Capitol Hill. “If you’re just catching up: the Republican Party, taking orders from the world’s richest man, is on course to shut down the government over the holidays, stopping paychecks for our troops and nutrition benefits for low-income families just in time for Christmas,” the 2016 presidential candidate wrote on X.
A bill to avert a partial government shutdown that was backed by President-elect Trump failed to pass the House of Representatives on Thursday night.Congress is inching closer to the possibility of a partial shutdown, with the deadline coming at the end of Friday.The bill needed two-thirds of the House chamber to pass, but failed to even net a majority. Two Democrats voted with the majority of Republicans to pass the bill, while 38 GOP lawmakers bucked Trump to oppose it.
House Democrats are balking at the latest iteration of a spending plan that was released on Thursday by Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.”The Musk-Johnson proposal is not serious, it’s laughable. Extreme MAGA Republicans are driving us to a government shutdown,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass., indicated Democratic leadership would whip their members to vote “no” on the deal.Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md.
Presidents past and present have displayed breathtaking Christmas trees at the White House. Former President Benjamin Harrison is credited by the White House Historical Association as the first to display a Christmas tree in the White House, having placed one in the Second Floor Oval Room in 1889. That first known Christmas tree to be displayed in the White House was adorned with candles for Harrison’s grandchildren, according to the White House Historical Association.
The 1,547-page interim spending bill to avoid a government shutdown is effectively dead. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has all but yanked the plan off the floor after President-elect Trump, Vice President-elect Vance and Elon Musk torched the package to avoid a government shutdown this weekend and fund the government through March 14.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., while speaking at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., called out House Republicans for breaking a bipartisan agreement to fund the government and avoid a government shutdown, accusing them of hurting everyday Americans across the country.
President-elect Trump commented Wednesday that it was “too bad” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., was recently turned down for a leadership position on a House committee, prompting an amused response by the progressive politician. “Really too bad that AOC lost the Battle for the Leadership Seat in the Democrat Party,” Trump wrote Wednesday on Truth Social. “She should keep trying.
A ‘clean’ CR that keeps the government funded in the short term should be the way to go for the House right now.
House GOP leaders are working toward a backup plan after an initial bipartisan deal to avoid a partial government shutdown on Friday was killed by an avalanche of conservative opposition.The legislation angered conservatives in both the House and Senate, as well as President-elect Trump’s pick to co-chair his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Elon Musk.
President-elect Trump on Wednesday said he is “totally against” the continuing resolution (CR) being debated by the House to keep the government from shutting down through March.Trump spoke with “FOX & Friends” co-host Lawrence Jones on Wednesday, telling him the “fight starts now.””I just spoke with President-elect [Trump], and he is ‘totally against’ the proposed CR,” Jones wrote in a post on X.
Members of Congress are vulnerable. They’re not super men and women. They are of flesh and bone like anyone else.A series of unconnected events in recent days spoke to the vulnerabilities of those who work on Capitol Hill as health scares impacted three well-known Congressional figures.Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., fell during the weekly Senate lunch last week.
President-elect Trump dropped his most recent round of ambassador nominations on social media Tuesday night, before issuing a warning to Senate Republicans about any potential deals with Democratic lawmakers.The Republican leader began by nominating Herschel Walker as his choice for U.S. ambassador to the Commonwealth of the Bahamas. Walker, a staunch Trump ally, ran for the U.S. Senate in 2022 as a candidate from Georgia.