#govtrack — Public Fediverse posts

Republicans Boebert and Massie were the ones who came up with this? Why didn't Democrats do it?

Either this is legit, or there are devils in the details. Either way, you can look this over yourselves

#SurveillanceAccountabilityAct

#GovTrack

#tech #privacy #digitalprivacy #4thAmendment

https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/119/hr8470/text

Shutdown? Shutdown. Also More Epstein Files – GovTrack.us

Tracking Congress & the White House

• Congress
• White House
• Help
• About Us

Search GovTrack for

Legislative Recap Jan. 30, 2026: Shutdown? Shutdown. Also More Epstein Files »

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

Shutdown? Shutdown. Also More Epstein Files

Jan. 30, 2026 · by Amy West

Shutdown? Shutdown

By midday on Friday, January 30 the Senate had not passed the remaining appropriations bills and the current continuing resolution funding parts of the federal government ended Saturday night at midnight. The House is not in session this weekend, so there will definitely be a brief partial weekend shutdown, but the government is expected to be funded again, for a time, by later in the week.

As a recap, Congress is supposed to pass appropriations bills before the fiscal year begins on October 1, and last year’s failure to do so led to the long October-November shutdown. In November, Congress reached a deal to fund some federal entities through the rest of this fiscal year (Agriculture, VA, and Congress itself) and then in mid-January reached a deal to fund others (Commerce, DOJ, Interior, and more), but that still left out a lot. Now, Congress is working to fund Defense, Homeland Security (DHS), Labor, HHS, Education, Transportation, HUD, State, and more). It looked like a deal had been reached until CBP killed Minnesotan Alex Pretti.

Friday night, the Senate passed 71-29 a revised version of H.R. 7148: Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2026. While it has the same bill number as the one passed in the House last Friday, the content is different. The Senate changed DHS funding to a two-week continuing resolution, after which point DHS would face another potential shutdown, and attached that to the other five appropriations bills to fund those remaining parts of the government for the rest of the fiscal year.

So now, in order to keep this shutdown short, the House must vote again on H.R. 7148. Given that the White House has signaled support for this plan, the expectation was that things would go smoothly in the House on Monday. But as of February 1, House Democrats are blocking fast-track rules, which will add a few extra days to the process at most.

There was a hiccup on Thursday when Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), said he was objecting to this plan unless a repealed-in-the-House provision was reinstated. That provision would allow a small number of senators to sue the government for exorbitant monetary damages as the result of searches in Operation Arctic Frost. (This article is about the first unanimous House vote to repeal that provision, but they again voted unanimously last week and attached the repeal to the appropriations bills.) As of this morning, Sen. Graham also says he objects to the plan because he wants a vote on banning sanctuary cities.

Graham agreed to let the vote go forward once Majority Leader Thune agreed to separate votes later on reinstating the monetary damages provision as well as a vote on legislation against sanctuary cities.

What Effect Will the Two Week Continuing Resolution Have on ICE?

Very little. As Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) noted on X about just ICE, an agency within DHS:

In 2025, ICE received $10 billion in appropriations. The 2026 bill holds ICE at $10 billion — but last year Congress gave them $75 billion in advance funding. So even if ICE appropriations were eliminated, ICE would still have a 750% increase over last year.

Two articles this week have noted how ICE has been spending its vast sums of money: The powerful tools in ICE’s arsenal to track suspects — and protesters from the Washington Post and ICE Begins Buying ‘Mega’ Warehouse Detention Centers Across US from Bloomberg. A shutdown or continuing resolution would have no effect on these expenditures. Heck, even if ICE received no new funding at all this year, it would have no effect because these are expenditures based on appropriations already made.

Other parts of DHS do need funding to continue full normal operations, such as TSA, FEMA, and CISA.

Epstein Files

According to Ryan Nobles, an NBC reporter:

JUST IN: Deputy AG Todd Blanche says the Department of Justice has now released every file connected to the Epstein investigation that they are legally allowed and/or forced to release.

The files are posted on the Department of Justice website.

Today marks six weeks since the files were supposed to be released, if the administration felt compelled to follow the law. Is it all of the files? Definitely not since many have been redacted to prevent identifying Epstein survivors and because an unknown amount of legal activity remains in place. Is it all of the files that are required by the law that Congress passed? Also unclear. It just happened Friday morning and there’s a lot of files, so more information will doubtless come out in the near future.

Updated on February 1 to add some context and update the status of the bill.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Shutdown? Shutdown. Also More Epstein Files – GovTrack.us

Venezuela and Congress – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Analysis and Commentary

Venezuela and Congress

Get Analysis and Commentary Updates In Your Inbox!

Sign up (it’s free!) to get posts like this straight to your inbox. You’ll be able to choose posts from these categories:

Legislative Recap   –   Legislative Preview   –   Analysis and Commentary   –   The White House   –   News About GovTrack   –   Using GovTrack Tips

Jan. 8, 2026 · by Amy West

What has the U.S. done to Venezuela?

Was it an invasion, law enforcement, or extortion? Since last fall we’ve

• bombed small boats and their civilian Venezuelan crews that we have claimed were smuggling drugs to the U.S.
• Brought a fleet of military vessels to the region
• Dropped bombs near Caracas, the capital of Venezuela
• Seized President Maduro and his wife and indicted him in federal court over drug trafficking
• Announced a plan to seize some Venezuelan crude oil indefinitely and spend it at the President’s discretion.

Whether any of this was legal is a difficult and a somewhat philosophical question.

What is the War Powers Resolution?

The War Powers Resolution, a 1973 law,, “requires that the President communicate to Congress the committal of troops within 48 hours. Further, the statute requires the President to remove all troops after 60 days if Congress has not granted an extension,” per the Legal Information Institute at Cornell University. Since military action appears to be over, although the President has threatened further action around the world, the War Powers Resolution may have been satisfied.

What are Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs)?

The Constitution gives the power to declare war to Congress, not the President, but all recent presidents have engaged in military actions without declaring war. In most cases, it came with an authorization from Congress instead.

Per Congress.gov, AUMFs are laws which “permit the President to use United States military forces in pursuit of set objectives and within defined parameters.” Without an AUMF, the President must rely on inherent Constitutional powers of the presidency, which may or may not apply. For example, after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Congress passed an AUMF that was used as the legal basis for military force in a wide range of places around the world because the authorization was for military force against terrorists. That authorization, along with one from 1991, were both repealed in the Fiscal Year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act. President Trump signed that law last year about a week before he attacked Venezuela and captured the Venezuelan president.

Whether removing a head of state is tantamount to declaring war, and thus not permitted without Congress’s approval, is not likely to be resolved.

Are we bound by international law?

Well, we agreed to be bound by international law when we joined the United Nations, of which we are still a member. In general, UN members are prohibited from unilaterally using force against other nations, with very few exceptions. This is the point of having an entity like the UN – to help manage disputes in order to avoid or at least decrease violent conflict around the world. 

On the other hand, who’s going to stop us if we ignore international law?

Can the President control the proceeds from selling Venezuelan oil?

The Constitution is very direct in giving Congress ultimate control over government spending: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.” Trump’s social media post that the “money will be controlled by me” makes a big assumption that Congress writes him a blank check in law first. Currently, many members of Congress are going on the record saying that they want oversight over any US revenues from Venezuelan oil sales, side-stepping the Constitutional issue of how the revenue is spent.

What Might Congress Do?

This week the Senate will vote on a War Powers bill to stop President Trump’s actions in Venezuela. It’s not expected to pass, and certainly not with enough votes to override the President’s veto. Democrats might also withhold votes on upcoming government funding bills, triggering another government shutdown at the end of the month, unless military funding is restricted or to extract other policy concessions around Venezuela and the sale of its oil.

Or Congress could pass legislation affirming the administration’s actions, instead.

What is Congress Likely to Do?

Nothing. It’s the safest choice politically. If you come out too strongly for or against and then public attitudes about the Administration’s actions go heavily one way or the other, it’ll cost votes. So the best thing to do politically is often nothing.

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Venezuela and Congress – GovTrack.us

The Shutdown is Over – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

The Shutdown is Over

Nov. 14, 2025 · by Amy West and Joshua Tauberer

Both sides caved. Senate Democrats didn’t get the extension of expiring health care subsidies they asked for or a guarantee in law that President Trump won’t cut programs funded by Congress (although they did get workforce protections — see below). And House Republicans, who vowed they would not negotiate with Democrats, came back into session to accept the deal struck in the Senate with a provision on payouts for senators which they already want to repeal (more on that too, below).

H.R. 5371: Continuing Appropriations, Agriculture, Legislative Branch, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Extensions Act, 2026 is the bill that ended the shutdown. It includes funding for the remainder of the fiscal year for the food assistance program SNAP, the Department of Agriculture, the FDA, the military, Veterans Affairs, and Congress itself (that is, through Sept. 30, 2026), and a continuation of Trump-level funding for the rest of the federal government just through January. It also contains a handful of extraneous provisions discussed below.

It cleared the Senate in a vote Monday night with 8 Democrats defecting. Then it passed the House on Wednesday 222-209, with six Democrats voting for it and two Republicans against. The President signed the bill later that evening and by Thursday, furloughed workers were returning to work and backpay was supposed to start disbursing without delay. Midday Thursday, the Department of Justice withdrew its case against SNAP payments so those payments that were held up should also be disbursed in the next few days.

What Democrats Got

The first of three notable extraneous provisions reverses firings of federal workers that occurred during the shutdown and prohibits any further mass firings of federal workers until the end of this continuing resolution which is January 30, 2026. (Whether that actually stops the Trump Administration from doing more mass firings remains to be seen.)

Democrats did get one other thing out of the shutdown: Delay. By grinding Congress nearly to a halt in what is usually one of the most productive months for legislating, Democrats prevented the Republicans’ agenda from moving forward. Although the Senate kept working during the shutdown as we mentioned last update, floor time was occupied by numerous failed votes to end the shutdown. And no Republican legislation moved forward in the House for 54 days, though that was on account of House Republicans’ choice to leave town.

A Payout for Some Republican Senators

The next extraneous item — and one that caused one of the two House Republicans to vote no — is a part of a new section on surveillance by the Executive Branch of the Senate. Though the provisions are written generically, it seems to give several senators a payout over the seizure of their phone records during DOJ investigations into the events around January 6, 2021. This section provides for $500,000 to each Senator for each “instance” of record collection that doesn’t meet new but retroactive requirements. Potentially this could be quite the payday for the senators involved, possibly in violation of Senate ethics rules. As of Friday, November 14, some of the Senators who would benefit say they won’t pursue the money. Sen. Graham (R-SC) on the other hand says he’s going to go for as much as he can get. The House says it will hold a vote soon to repeal that provision, but that likely won’t go anywhere without the senators who put the provision there in the first place.

Food Safety Rules Weakened

According to The Lever, “Amid a lobbying blitz and a flood of campaign cash, senators inserted language into this week’s emergency spending bill that eliminates rules designed to prevent food contamination and foodborne illnesses at farms and restaurants, according to legislative text reviewed by The Lever. The bill would also limit the development of rules to regulate ultra-processed foods, despite such foods being derided by the ‘Make America Healthy Again Movement,’ championed by President Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.”

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: The Shutdown is Over – GovTrack.us

#8DemocratsDefecting #democrats #ends #federalGovernmentShutdown #foodSafety #foodSafetyRules #govtrack #govtrackUs #hR5371 #noGuarantees #payoutToGopSenators #republicans #stopped #trumpsAgenda

The Shutdown is Over – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

The Shutdown is Over

Nov. 14, 2025 · by Amy West and Joshua Tauberer

Both sides caved. Senate Democrats didn’t get the extension of expiring health care subsidies they asked for or a guarantee in law that President Trump won’t cut programs funded by Congress (although they did get workforce protections — see below). And House Republicans, who vowed they would not negotiate with Democrats, came back into session to accept the deal struck in the Senate with a provision on payouts for senators which they already want to repeal (more on that too, below).

H.R. 5371: Continuing Appropriations, Agriculture, Legislative Branch, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Extensions Act, 2026 is the bill that ended the shutdown. It includes funding for the remainder of the fiscal year for the food assistance program SNAP, the Department of Agriculture, the FDA, the military, Veterans Affairs, and Congress itself (that is, through Sept. 30, 2026), and a continuation of Trump-level funding for the rest of the federal government just through January. It also contains a handful of extraneous provisions discussed below.

It cleared the Senate in a vote Monday night with 8 Democrats defecting. Then it passed the House on Wednesday 222-209, with six Democrats voting for it and two Republicans against. The President signed the bill later that evening and by Thursday, furloughed workers were returning to work and backpay was supposed to start disbursing without delay. Midday Thursday, the Department of Justice withdrew its case against SNAP payments so those payments that were held up should also be disbursed in the next few days.

What Democrats Got

The first of three notable extraneous provisions reverses firings of federal workers that occurred during the shutdown and prohibits any further mass firings of federal workers until the end of this continuing resolution which is January 30, 2026. (Whether that actually stops the Trump Administration from doing more mass firings remains to be seen.)

Democrats did get one other thing out of the shutdown: Delay. By grinding Congress nearly to a halt in what is usually one of the most productive months for legislating, Democrats prevented the Republicans’ agenda from moving forward. Although the Senate kept working during the shutdown as we mentioned last update, floor time was occupied by numerous failed votes to end the shutdown. And no Republican legislation moved forward in the House for 54 days, though that was on account of House Republicans’ choice to leave town.

A Payout for Some Republican Senators

The next extraneous item — and one that caused one of the two House Republicans to vote no — is a part of a new section on surveillance by the Executive Branch of the Senate. Though the provisions are written generically, it seems to give several senators a payout over the seizure of their phone records during DOJ investigations into the events around January 6, 2021. This section provides for $500,000 to each Senator for each “instance” of record collection that doesn’t meet new but retroactive requirements. Potentially this could be quite the payday for the senators involved, possibly in violation of Senate ethics rules. As of Friday, November 14, some of the Senators who would benefit say they won’t pursue the money. Sen. Graham (R-SC) on the other hand says he’s going to go for as much as he can get. The House says it will hold a vote soon to repeal that provision, but that likely won’t go anywhere without the senators who put the provision there in the first place.

Food Safety Rules Weakened

According to The Lever, “Amid a lobbying blitz and a flood of campaign cash, senators inserted language into this week’s emergency spending bill that eliminates rules designed to prevent food contamination and foodborne illnesses at farms and restaurants, according to legislative text reviewed by The Lever. The bill would also limit the development of rules to regulate ultra-processed foods, despite such foods being derided by the ‘Make America Healthy Again Movement,’ championed by President Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.”

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: The Shutdown is Over – GovTrack.us

#8DemocratsDefecting #democrats #ends #federalGovernmentShutdown #foodSafety #foodSafetyRules #govtrack #govtrackUs #hR5371 #noGuarantees #payoutToGopSenators #republicans #stopped #trumpsAgenda

The Government Shutdown at Day 40: Where are we and how did we get here? – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Analysis and Commentary

The Government Shutdown at Day 40: Where are we and how did we get here?

Get Analysis and Commentary Updates In Your Inbox!

Sign up (it’s free!) to get posts like this straight to your inbox. You’ll be able to choose posts from these categories:

Analysis and Commentary   –   Legislative Recap   –   Legislative Preview   –   The White House   –   News About GovTrack   –   Using GovTrack Tips

Nov. 9, 2025 · by Joshua Tauberer

On October 1 funding for many federal government programs expired, and 40 days later Congress still has not reached an agreement on how to proceed. This has never happened before for so long.

What the shutdown means

About half of federal government employees are still working, including federal police like ICE, TSA, and air traffic controllers, the military, and staff deemed essential throughout the government. But those workers won’t get paid until the shutdown ends, and it’s legally dubious that many should be working at all. Payments out of a contingency fund for SNAP, the food assistance program, are only covering part of SNAP’s benefits and recent payments may be clawed back (the Supreme Court also ruled on it). That’s all because the Constitution requires that federal dollars are only spent when a law is enacted to authorize it, and the last laws authorizing all this spending expired on September 30.

What each side wants

To end the shutdown, Republicans must find at least 8 Democrats in the Senate to agree on an “appropriations” bill for either short-term funding (called a “continuing resolution”) or year-long funding.

Republicans proposed to continue Trump-level funding until November 21, which would include the major increase in spending on immigration enforcement, major cuts to foreign aid, student loans, and food and medical benefits for the poor, and workforce reductions throughout much of the federal government that Republicans enacted during the year. The time until November 21 was to be used to negotiate full-year appropriations bills (which should have already been enacted before the fiscal year ended, ideally).

Democrats have said that they would agree to that with 1) an extension to expiring health insurance subsidies for middle-class families and 2) a guarantee that Republicans won’t break the deal in the middle of the fiscal year (again). More on all that below.

Senate Republicans offered to hold a vote on extending the subsidies, but they didn’t offer to vote for it. Democrats didn’t accept the symbolic offer, but negotiations in the Senate continue. House Republicans in any case said they would not negotiate until the shutdown ended. (Democrats didn’t ask for funding for illegal immigrants, contrary to lies from the other side.)

Republicans expected Democrats to concede rather than be blamed in the public eye for the shutdown. Neither happened.

Lights on, lights off in Congress

The shutdown doesn’t prevent Congress from being in session, and since the shutdown began the Senate has been working: The Senate passed a bipartisan full-year defense spending bill, passed bills to end Trump tariffs and reverse Biden-era regulations, confirmed a handful of Trump nominations for federal judges, agency leaders, and military positions, and voted several times on (failed) proposals to end the shutdown. And Senate leaders from both parties have been negotiating an end to the shutdown.

The House of Representatives, on the other hand, has had the lights off. Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson sent House Republicans home a week before the shutdown began until Democrats accede to the Republican proposal. Rather than actually being in recess, every few days a token representative gavels the chamber in and then a few minutes later gavels it out as if there is nothing to do. Most representatives are not in D.C., nor holding town halls in their districts, or apparently doing any work at all.

With the chamber technically in session, the Constitution would like a word: Johnson has refused to seat a representative elected in September. It’s unprecedented, and it’s to avoid a vote on an issue that would embarrass the President: Seating Rep.-elect Grijalva could trigger a vote on releasing DOJ’s Epstein files. (This is the second time the Speaker has kept the House out of session to avoid the Epstein issue.)

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: The Government Shutdown at Day 40: Where are we and how did we get here? – GovTrack.us

#AmericansHealth #FederalGovernmentShutdown #GovernmentShutdown #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #HealthSubsidies #HowDidWeGetHere #Trump #USCongress #USHouseOfRepresentatives #USSenate #WhereAreWe

The Government Shutdown at Day 40: Where are we and how did we get here? – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Analysis and Commentary

The Government Shutdown at Day 40: Where are we and how did we get here?

Get Analysis and Commentary Updates In Your Inbox!

Sign up (it’s free!) to get posts like this straight to your inbox. You’ll be able to choose posts from these categories:

Analysis and Commentary   –   Legislative Recap   –   Legislative Preview   –   The White House   –   News About GovTrack   –   Using GovTrack Tips

Nov. 9, 2025 · by Joshua Tauberer

On October 1 funding for many federal government programs expired, and 40 days later Congress still has not reached an agreement on how to proceed. This has never happened before for so long.

What the shutdown means

About half of federal government employees are still working, including federal police like ICE, TSA, and air traffic controllers, the military, and staff deemed essential throughout the government. But those workers won’t get paid until the shutdown ends, and it’s legally dubious that many should be working at all. Payments out of a contingency fund for SNAP, the food assistance program, are only covering part of SNAP’s benefits and recent payments may be clawed back (the Supreme Court also ruled on it). That’s all because the Constitution requires that federal dollars are only spent when a law is enacted to authorize it, and the last laws authorizing all this spending expired on September 30.

What each side wants

To end the shutdown, Republicans must find at least 8 Democrats in the Senate to agree on an “appropriations” bill for either short-term funding (called a “continuing resolution”) or year-long funding.

Republicans proposed to continue Trump-level funding until November 21, which would include the major increase in spending on immigration enforcement, major cuts to foreign aid, student loans, and food and medical benefits for the poor, and workforce reductions throughout much of the federal government that Republicans enacted during the year. The time until November 21 was to be used to negotiate full-year appropriations bills (which should have already been enacted before the fiscal year ended, ideally).

Democrats have said that they would agree to that with 1) an extension to expiring health insurance subsidies for middle-class families and 2) a guarantee that Republicans won’t break the deal in the middle of the fiscal year (again). More on all that below.

Senate Republicans offered to hold a vote on extending the subsidies, but they didn’t offer to vote for it. Democrats didn’t accept the symbolic offer, but negotiations in the Senate continue. House Republicans in any case said they would not negotiate until the shutdown ended. (Democrats didn’t ask for funding for illegal immigrants, contrary to lies from the other side.)

Republicans expected Democrats to concede rather than be blamed in the public eye for the shutdown. Neither happened.

Lights on, lights off in Congress

The shutdown doesn’t prevent Congress from being in session, and since the shutdown began the Senate has been working: The Senate passed a bipartisan full-year defense spending bill, passed bills to end Trump tariffs and reverse Biden-era regulations, confirmed a handful of Trump nominations for federal judges, agency leaders, and military positions, and voted several times on (failed) proposals to end the shutdown. And Senate leaders from both parties have been negotiating an end to the shutdown.

The House of Representatives, on the other hand, has had the lights off. Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson sent House Republicans home a week before the shutdown began until Democrats accede to the Republican proposal. Rather than actually being in recess, every few days a token representative gavels the chamber in and then a few minutes later gavels it out as if there is nothing to do. Most representatives are not in D.C., nor holding town halls in their districts, or apparently doing any work at all.

With the chamber technically in session, the Constitution would like a word: Johnson has refused to seat a representative elected in September. It’s unprecedented, and it’s to avoid a vote on an issue that would embarrass the President: Seating Rep.-elect Grijalva could trigger a vote on releasing DOJ’s Epstein files. (This is the second time the Speaker has kept the House out of session to avoid the Epstein issue.)

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: The Government Shutdown at Day 40: Where are we and how did we get here? – GovTrack.us

#AmericansHealth #FederalGovernmentShutdown #GovernmentShutdown #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #HealthSubsidies #HowDidWeGetHere #Trump #USCongress #USHouseOfRepresentatives #USSenate #WhereAreWe

You Are Here – GovTrack.us

govtrack.us

Tracking Congress & the White House

• Congress
• White House
• Help
• About Us

Search GovTrack for

Legislative Recap Oct. 24, 2025: You Are Here »

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

Get Legislative Recap Updates In Your Inbox!

Sign up (it’s free!) to get posts like this straight to your inbox. You’ll be able to choose posts from these categories:

Legislative Recap   –   Legislative Preview   –   Analysis and Commentary   –   The White House   –   News About GovTrack   –   Using GovTrack Tips

Oct. 24, 2025 · by Amy West

Current Status

It’s the 23rd day of the government shutdown. Most federal employees, whether still working or furloughed, have begun to miss paychecks. The House has been out of session since September 19 and shows no sign of returning to do any of the work for which they continue to be paid.

The Senate comes in a few days a week; votes on a few nominations and re-votes on the House’s continuing resolution. When it fails, as it has every time so far (along with an alternative bill from Sen. Johnson which has also failed multiple times, most recently October 23), they head out for their usual 3 day weekends.

The President apparently isn’t concerned about the shutdown given that he’s leaving town for a week, but more importantly, the Senate has become passive as described by Semafor. The President’s trip also means that even if a bill passed next week, the shutdown still wouldn’t end until he returned to sign it.

Procedural Note: It’s possible for a bill to become law without a presidential signature but it requires a lot of time and for both chambers to be in session for that time period, so for all practical purposes, assume any continuing resolution that gets passed will need the President’s signature.

What’s the Standoff About?

During the Biden Administration, the Democrats used their majorities pass more extensive health insurance premium subsidies for people who pay for their own insurance (as opposed to employer provided insurance or medicare, etc).

The catch was that the subsidies were temporary. Why wouldn’t they make them permanent? Maybe they couldn’t get agreement from enough of their own members at the time, maybe it was the price of Republican votes or maybe it was a cynical political ploy as described by the New York Times.

Those subsidies will expire at the end of this calendar year. Democrats have made the extension of these subsidies their primary demand in exchange for their support in the Senate for the House’s continuing resolution.

Republicans have refused, so Democrats have refused. To apparently everyone’s surprise, but especially Republicans’, Democrats have held their ground on this demand.

So here we all are and here we’ll stay for at least one more week. FYI, if you are one of the people who pays for your own insurance, you should probably start talking to your insurance company now about what to expect in premium costs for next year, because it does not look like the subsidies will be extended.

Effects of the Shutdown So Far

So far, most essential federal employees have continued to work despite not being paid. Thus, air traffic controllers are at their desks, weather is monitored and so on.

Federally funded cultural institutions in D.C. have closed to the public including the National Zoo, the National Gallery and the Smithsonian museums. (Yes, the zoo animals are still receiving care – the zoo staff are working without pay just like most other federal employees)

Members of the military got paid on Oct. 15, apparently by shifting around unspent funds originally allocated for other purposes. In this, the Trump Administration is spending funds in ways not authorized by Congress and the legality is unclear. It’s also not clear how the military will be paid on Oct. 30.

ICE Officers are being paid. This too represents using funds authorized by Congress for other purposes and is of dubious legality.

People who need food aid will not get it after November 1 if the shutdown is not resolved before then. It’s unclear why, if other agencies can repurpose funds (legally or not) to fill gaps from the shutdown, the Department of Agriculture isn’t also working to protect poor Americans.

The House simply isn’t doing anything at all. They aren’t working on regular appropriations bills, they aren’t holding hearings, they haven’t sworn in a new member elected in September, nothing except for introducing new bills that will see no action any time soon. NOTUS wrote about frustrations in the House and Senate over Speaker Johnson’s refusal to allow the House to do its work.

Predictions

Steven Dennis, a Congressional reporter for Bloomberg has a series of posts on standoffs that go something like this one from 2022:

How the omnibus came together: NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO YES TO FRAMEWORK NO NO NO NO NO DEAL! HAS ANYONE TALKED TO MIKE LEE, RAND PAUL? NO NO NO TIME AGREEMENT LOCKED IN 68-29

The point being that public statements may or may not accurately reflect efforts to find compromise behind the scenes and you don’t know about it until after the agreement is made when things suddenly move quickly to resolution.

Right now, the public stance of both parties is still firmly in the “NO NO NO NO NO…” stage. There’s no evidence of negotiations behind the scenes, but perhaps we’ll get a surprise “YES TO FRAMEWORK” next week even if not an actual resolution.

See you next Friday for the next update.

Editor’s Note: There’s a lying phoney page from Trump (.gov), about blaming the Democrats for the shutdown. Talk about blatant lying to the American public. Anyway, ignore the lies at:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/government-shutdown-clock/

Continue/Read Original Article Here: You Are Here – GovTrack.us

#2025 #America #BlameGame #Congress #DonaldTrump #Education #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Health #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Politics #Resistance #Science #Shutdown #Trump #TrumpAdministration #UnitedStates

Shutdown Update; Senate Votes – GovTrack.us

govtrack.us

Tracking Congress & the White House

• Congress
• White House
• Help
• About Us

Legislative Recap Oct. 10, 2025: Shutdown Update; Senate Votes »

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

Shutdown Update; Senate Votes, Oct. 10, 2025 · by Amy West

Shutdown Update

Still going. 

The Senate voted for a seventh time on the two competing continuing resolutions in front of it to allocate funds to federal agencies (one Democratic, one Republican) and both failed again to reach the Senate’s 60-vote threshold. It’s possible that Republicans are beginning to soften their positions. On X, Igor Bobic posted about Democrats’ ask to extend expiring health care subsidies:

“[Sen.] Tillis says a deal on ACA subsidies wouldn’t be hard once government is funded, with mix of retiring senators & those up for reelection. “You’re telling me you can’t find eight people that could walk the plank?” “As a veteran plank-walker, it’s not near as bad as it seems””

One might reasonably ask why not walk the plank now in order to end the shutdown? However, if Senate Republicans have been asked this kind of question, no one has publicly recorded their responses.

(By the way, in a previous post we incorrectly wrote that these subsidies would affect low-income Americans. But that was wrong: It would affect middle class Americans who get health care through the ACA marketplace exchanges.)

The House remains in recess. Many House Democrats are in D.C. anyway to make a messaging point and to push Speaker Johnson on why Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva hasn’t been sworn in yet. Earlier this year, Republican representatives-elect Patronis (FL-1) and Fine (FL-6) were sworn in immediately after election while the House was in recess. Why won’t Johnson swear her in? Punchbowl takes a stab at answering the question. Maybe it’s not about Epstein files; maybe Johnson is just really committed to this stop-work action he’s making the House take during the shutdown. A few Republican House members are expressing dissatisfaction with Johnson’s strategy.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Shutdown Update; Senate Votes – GovTrack.us

#2025 #America #DonaldTrump #Education #GOP #GOPShutdown #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Politics #RepublicanShutdown #Resistance #Science #SenateVotes #Shutdown2025 #Trump #TrumpAdministration #USSenate #UnitedStates

Back in Business – U.S. Congress – GovTrak.us

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

Back in Business

Sept. 5, 2025 · by Amy West

Ongoing Business

Rep. Massie’s (R-KY4) discharge petition to force a vote on releasing all of the Department of Justice’s files on Jeffrey Epstein now has 215 co-sponsors. It needs 218. Only three other Republicans have signed on and they can always remove their names if they think it’s in their interest. There’s no time limit on gathering co-sponsors for a discharge petition, so now it’s just a question of whether Republican voters remain interested enough in the topic to force any of their representatives to sign on or whether the Administration succeeds in preventing any more Republicans from signing on.

Senate Votes

There were two procedural votes on the Senate’s version of the S. 2296: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026 (aka NDAA). Because we were asked about “the filibuster” for our August Mailbag and we elided some detail, this is a good and short opportunity to show the detail in action.

This bill is nowhere near becoming law. The actual bill has yet to be voted on in the Senate and there’s a competing version in the House (also not yet voted on). These votes were just moving along the process to get to the vote on the bill.

• Vote 1 on Sept. 2: “Motion to Invoke Cloture: Motion to Proceed to S. 2296”. Because this was a cloture vote, it required 60 votes in support to pass, which it got easily with 84-14. A yes vote meant “yes, I would like to end debate on whether we will move to the motion to proceed”. Successful cloture votes have a practical effect of a two business day wait for the next vote in the process. You can read much more about it from the Congressional Research Service.
• Vote 2 on Sept. 4: “Motion to Proceed on S. 2296: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026”. This vote required only a simple majority, which it exceeded significantly: 83-13. A yes vote in this case meant “yes, I would like to proceed to debate”.

Of these two, Vote 1 was a filibuster vote because it required a 3/5ths majority or 60 votes to pass.

What’s next for the Senate’s FY26 NDAA? Very probably a cloture vote on the bill itself, so another round of 60 votes required, at least a two day wait and then a vote on the bill itself which will need only a simple majority. There may well be lots more interim procedural votes too. It depends on how much negotiation is needed to get to a final product the chamber is willing to vote on. But they will likely follow the same pattern: a higher passage threshold to get going on {X} and a lower passage threshold to pass {X}.

House Votes

These bills are not near passage. Having passed the House, they would need to pass the Senate in identical form. The ones repealing Biden Administration regulations may get through the Senate fairly soon based on the Senate’s actions on previous similar bills, but there’s no timeline for the rest.

• H.R. 747: Stop Chinese Fentanyl Act of 2025, which would place sanctions on Chinese producers of fentanyl and , passed 407-4
• H.R. 4216: Made-in-America Defense Act, which would, according to Quiver Quantitative, streamline and enhance the process for selling defense articles and services to foreign entities, passed 395-20
• H.R. 4553: Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2026 passed 214-213
• H.J.Res. 105 “Providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Bureau of Land Management relating to “North Dakota Field Office Record of Decision and Approved Resource Management Plan”’ passed 215-211
• H.J.Res. 106 “Providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Bureau of Land Management relating to “Central Yukon Record of Decision and Approved Resource Management Plan”” passed 215-210
• H.J.Res. 104 “Providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Bureau of Land Management relating to “Miles City Field Office Record of Decision and Approved Resource Management Plan Amendment”” passed 211-208

Notable Failure

Normally we don’t cover bills/resolutions that don’t pass. However, as the use of censure has become much more frequent in the last few years, we were surprised to see that the attempt to censure Rep. McIver (D-NJ10) failed this week thanks to support for a motion to table (aka kill) the censure resolution from a small number of Republicans.

Rep. McIver has been charged with assaulting law enforcement when ICE officers attempted to arrest the Mayor of Newark after three members of Congress had inspected an ICE facility in Newark and the members of Congress attempted to prevent ICE from doing so. The mayor was briefly detained and then released. The other Congress members were neither detained nor charged. Only McIver was charged. Her case has yet to be resolved.

Then, Rep. Higgins (R-LA3) introduced a resolution censuring McIver for being charged with assault and thus “not reflecting creditably on the House“. According to Axios, Republicans voting for the motion to table included members of the Ethics Committee. The Ethics Committee, as is required whenever a member is indicted, has an open investigation into the incident.

Continue/Read Original Article: https://www.govtrack.us/posts/536/2025-09-05_back-in-business

#2025 #America #Congress #DonaldTrump #Education #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Health #History #LegislativeUpdate #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Politics #Resistance #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #USCongress #UnitedStates

Try and Stop Me – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Preview

Try and Stop Me

Sept. 3, 2025 · by Amy West

House and Senate Return

The House has 12 committee meetings scheduled. On Tuesday, there will be a Rules Committee meeting to set debate rules for three resolutions canceling Biden Administration regulations and for the Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2026. House Appropriations will have markup hearings on the Fiscal Year 2026 Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Bill and the Financial Services and General Government Bill (also for fiscal year 2026). The House has 16 bills on its schedule this week on a wide range of topics.

The Senate returned late Tuesday to, per Craig Caplan on X, “vote at 5:30pm on whether to advance the 2026 defense programs and policy bill. This first floor action on the NDAA needs 60 Yes votes to advance it.” (The National Defense Authorization Act, aka the NDAA, advanced 84-14 on Tuesday evening.) There are nine committee hearings, none on appropriations, five on pending nominations.

Meanwhile

Epstein Files Transparency Act

Rep. Massie (R-KY4) has a resolution demanding the release of all Epstein files. He is filing it as a discharge petition which will need 218 co-sponsors. Currently, he has 134 with three Republicans besides himself.

A discharge petition is a tool for House members not in leadership to force votes on topics that leadership doesn’t want to vote on. The first hurdle is to get 218 co-sponsors. Once the petition has 218 co-sponsors, the member may introduce it which will require that the House vote on it within two legislative days.

Massie’s effort might have been doomed except that releasing the Epstein files is popular with the Republican base. Releasing them is not popular with the President though. Exploiting this intra-Republican conflict appeals to Democrats and so about 130 of them have signed on so far. It will take all of the Democrats signing on as well as a few more Republicans to get to 218. We’ll let you know how far Massie gets.

Government Shutdown?

Even with the appropriations work listed above, Congress will almost certainly not get all 12 regular appropriations bills passed through both chambers by September 30, the last day of the fiscal year. After that, government agencies cannot spend funds and will shut down. (See our post Learn how Congress directs government spending for more details).

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Try and Stop Me – GovTrack.us

#2025 #America #Congress #DonaldTrump #Education #FallTerm #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Health #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Politics #Resistance #ReturnForCongress #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #USCongress #UnitedStates

Learn how Congress directs government spending – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Analysis and Commentary

Learn how Congress directs government spending

Sept. 1, 2025 · by Joshua Tauberer and Amy West

Continuing our mailbag, this week we have a question that is perfectly timed for the potential government shutdown looming at the end of this month:  Russ, Jack, and bear6 asked us to explain how the government spending bills that we’ve talked about this year all relate to each other.

To explain it, we have to start a few steps back. Every dollar that the federal government spends is authorized by a law that starts as a bill in Congress — the Constitution requires that. There are two broad ways that Congress writes those bills:

The first are laws that direct payments to individuals or entities based on a benefit formula, such as entitlements like Social Security and Medicare and the federal portion of Medicaid, TANF, SSI, unemployment insurance, and SNAP. This is called, in jargon, “mandatory spending.” Mandatory spending makes up about 60% of federal spending, and these laws typically remain in effect until they are repealed. The Republican signature bill formally named the One Big Beautiful Bill, projected to add $4.1 trillion to the deficit over 10 years, affected this type of spending (and taxes).

The federal government also runs on fiscal years from October 1 to September 30, and about 30% of federal spending is tied to fiscal years. Since this type of funding lapses at the end of a fiscal year, or sometimes sooner, Congress must re-enact the funding or agencies funded this way must stop operating, which is informally called a shutdown. The recent bill that defunded foreign aid (USAID) and public broadcasting (CPB) was a “rescissions bill” which affected this so-called “discretionary” spending.

Let’s go deeper.

Discretionary Spending (Appropriations & Authorizations Bills)

In any given year, you may be hearing about the appropriations and authorizations bills that direct “discretionary” spending for the next fiscal year. It’s currently September 2025, so Congress is now working on fiscal year 2026, abbreviated FY26, which starts on October 1.

“Appropriations” are part of how Congress directs discretionary spending. For example, Congress might “appropriate” $50 million to a hypothetical Department of Cats and Dogs’s Cuddling Program for FY26.

Appropriations are provisions in law passed by Congress and signed by the President (or, very rarely, by overriding the President’s veto) that direct federal dollars to be spent by an agency for a broad purpose. Appropriations are written by the powerful House and Senate Appropriations Committees based on their spending priorities for the whole of the government.

If there are no appropriations bills for a fiscal year, that’s when a government shutdown occurs because it is also unlawful for agencies to spend money that they have not been appropriated.

The most recent appropriations law is H.R. 1968: Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025, signed by President Trump on March 15. This one bill consolidated the discretionary spending for the whole federal government, but often Congress divides the agencies up among 12 separate bills.

An appropriation is not enough for an agency to spend the funds. Funds can only be spent with both an appropriation and an authorization. An authorization is also a provision in law that looks a lot like an appropriation. The difference is that authorizations are made in bills that come out of the committees that have oversight jurisdiction over the parts of the government spending the funds. This ensures that the legislators most familiar with the government programs have a separate say in how those programs are funded.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Learn how Congress directs government spending – GovTrack.us

#2025 #America #Books #DonaldTrump #Education #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Health #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Politics #Resistance #Science #Technology #Trump #TrumpAdministration #UnitedStates

Military Powers & the Senate Parliamentarian – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Analysis and Commentary

Military Powers & the Senate Parliamentarian

Aug. 15, 2025 · by Amy West

Hi all,

So we still have your questions and have not forgotten about them!

In fact, a post that we’d originally intended to post last week or possibly the week before is still in limbo because of a disagreement in-house about how to approach the question. So if you ever feel like you should already understand everything about Congress, be assured that even folks who think about Congress all the time don’t necessarily agree on what they understand or how to say it.

In the meantime, we’re going to take two other questions that are a little bit simpler.

When can the military be used domestically?

If you thought this had a cut and dried answer, you would not be alone. One thing that this administration is making clear is that, if it can be litigated, then the answer is not cut and dried. We addressed this in The law President Trump used to deploy the National Guard, and what might happen next. For what it’s worth, the trial in Los Angeles over whether the administration’s deployment of military in June violated the Posse Comitatus Act is ongoing. Both sides rested this week, but the judge hasn’t issued a ruling yet.

What’s the deal with the Senate Parlimentarian?

Conveniently, the Bipartisan Policy Center has already answered this question.

In their post What is the Role of the Senate Parliamentarian? they note that

• the position is relatively new, having only been formalized in the early 20th century
• the position is advisory only, meaning that Senators can ignore the recommendations from the Parliamentarian and
• that because the Senate is an ongoing body, in which rules carry over from Congress to Congress, most of the change to rules comes in changes to precedents, of which the Parliamentarian keeps track.

With respect to item two above, Senators mostly follow the Parliamentarian’s advice. This has generally been most likely when reconciliation bills are in process. However, this year, the Senate Republican majority chose to ignore the Parliamentarian’s advice or bypass her role in two different ways that may mean new precedents in the Senate if Democrats act similarly when they next have control of the chamber.

Regulatory Waivers

The first case was about regulatory waivers issued to the state of California during the Biden administration. The Government Accountability Office and the Parliamentarian both agreed that the waivers did not fall under the Congressional Review Act rules for overturning regulations.

If the Senate had followed the Parliamentarian’s advice, then they could not have voted to overturn the waivers because such a vote would need a 60 vote passage for one or more procedural votes. The only way to overturn those waivers was to rely on a simple majority, which the Senate Republicans have.

So, Senate Republicans voted instead on a slightly different question about whether the waivers fall under the Congressional Review Act. That vote passed and the waivers were overturned. Technically they didn’t ignore the Parliamentarian, but functionally they definitely did.

How to count deficit effects

The bulk of the reconciliation bill passed this year focused on making the tax cuts in a 2017 bill permanent. But reconciliation bills are not supposed to add to the federal deficit. So, to make the tax cuts permanent and meet reconciliation requirements, the bill would have to raise lots of revenue in some other way or the Senate majority could change how they count.

The Senate majority decided to change how they count. There is the “current law baseline” which estimates about a $4 trillion dollar increase to the federal deficit versus the “current policy baseline” which estimates little or no increase to the deficit. The difference between the two approaches is that under current law, the tax cuts expire and estimates are created accordingly while under current policy the tax cuts are assumed to be extended in which case they make no difference to future deficits.

If the Senate Budget Committee had stuck to the current law baseline, then the tax cuts would be subject to review under the Byrd rule by the Parliamentarian and probably most would have been ruled as ineligible because of how much they’d add to the deficit. By deciding in committee that the analysis would based on current policy though, Senate Republicans bypassed an otherwise thorny situation in which they might have to jettison provisions because of cost or ignore the Parliamentarian repeatedly.

Like with the regulatory waivers, the Senate majority didn’t directly challenge the Parliamentarian. Instead, they used other procedural maneuvers to bypass having to go to the Parliamentarian at all.

That said, for the remaining provisions in the reconciliation bill, the Parliamentarian did do a review and items she advised violated the rules were ultimately pulled. So the Senate majority didn’t completely ignore the Parliamentarian; just on the things they cared about the most: overturning regulatory waivers promoting electric vehicles and retaining tax cuts.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Military Powers & the Senate Parliamentarian – GovTrack.us

Original article: View source

#2025 #America #Domestic #DonaldTrump #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #History #Libraries #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Parliamentarian #Politics #Resistance #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #USSenate #UnitedStates

Don’t federalize and militarize DC’s local police – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. The White House

Don’t federalize and militarize DC’s local police

Aug. 11, 2025 · by Joshua Tauberer

When I walk my toddler home from daycare every evening, it is safe. That’s here in Washington, D.C., where I have lived since I moved to work on government accountability 15 years ago.

For perhaps the next 30 days, or longer, District of Columbia residents will be policed by federalized civilian and military officers, per an executive order and presidential memorandum this morning. The executive order directs the police to be federalized to protect “national monuments” (which are in the safest parts of D.C. thanks to the existing park police) and other federal properties, but the memorandum directs the DC National Guard to address crime throughout the capital.

There is no crime emergency here. I live here. I have seen things get better, not worse, with my own eyes. Violent crime is the lowest it has been in 30 years. Overall crime is down this year already. According to 2019 data, crime is worse in Houston and Indianapolis than here in D.C. Like all places, we have crime. I have seen that too. But not more than most.

D.C. is not just the capital district. It is one of the largest cities in the country. It’s a great city. I love living here. 700,000 people live in D.C. — that’s more than two whole states, Vermont and Wyoming. District residents paid $45 billion in federal taxes in 2024 — that’s more than North Dakota, West Virginia, Wyoming, Alaska, and Vermont combined (and more than 21 other states individually).

How many votes do we have in Congress? None. We don’t have any say in the federal laws that bind us. But that’s not all. Arrests are already prosecuted by federal lawyers, not lawyers that work for the elected DC Attorney General. They enforce local laws that the District’s Council has been blocked by Congress from updating.

There is a lot of taxation here and not a lot of representation.

Instead, politicians from far away cities with crime worse than ours use us for their own gain.

It’s not enough that federal police officers already police many of the parks here (many of which are national parks), the area around the Capitol (which has its own federal police force), and White House grounds (which has the Secret Service). Now it might be our neighborhoods too. It will not make our communities safer, and it defies the American spirit of a government accountable to its people.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Don’t federalize and militarize DC’s local police – GovTrack.us

Original article: View source

#2025 #America #DonaldTrump #FederalizePolice #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Health #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #MilitarizeDCPolice #Politics #Resistance #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #UnitedStates #WashingtonDC

Senate Confirmations, Senate Time Off and How Many Votes When? – GovTrack.us

1. News From Us
2. Legislative Recap

Senate Confirmations, Senate Time Off and How Many Votes When?

Aug. 1, 2025 · by Amy West

Legislative Recap

The Senate continues to grind through the thousands of Trump Administration nominees. We’ll mention two notable now confirmed Administration appointees below, but first we want to say that we’re taking two of the shorter questions we got from y’all because they relate directly to what’s going on in the Senate right now.

The Senate was supposed to start its August Recess today, August 1st. But between public pressure from President Trump and Democrats insisting on voting on most nominees one by one, they’ll be in session at least through the weekend.

It’s possible to approve nominees in batches by unanimous consent, as has happened with military promotions. But doing that requires both a sense of trust and collegiality and for the chamber’s minority to feel they gain politically from doing so.

Military promotions? Democrats feel those are worth getting done en masse. But other positions? Not so much.

So until both parties in the Senate can agree to some group unanimous consent confirmations, they’ll stay in session.

One of the reasons that Democrats have insisted on one by one votes is because they often feel strongly that the nominees should not be confirmed. Here are two examples:

• Emil J. Bove III, United States Circuit Judge for the Third Circuit was confirmed 50-49. Bove negotiated a quid pro quo with Eric Adams, the mayor of New York City, to drop a corruption prosecution if Adams would agree to help with the Administration’s deportation efforts. Several whistleblowers also came forward before the vote claiming that Bove had directed them to ignore the courts when judges ruled against the administration. Previously Bove was one of President Trump’s personal lawyers. Now, at 44 and with a record of loyalty to the President regardless of law or circumstance, he has a lifetime appointment as a judge, a position in which he is supposed to render judgements in an unbiased manner.
• Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, Office of the Director of National Intelligence was confirmed 52-44. Kent, a twice failed Congressional candidate for Washington’s 3rd District (held now by Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp-Perez), has a long history of association with white nationalists and conspiracy theorists

Senate Time Off

A couple of folks asked us why the Senate takes so much time off. Well, as noted above, they may not in fact take much time off. But also, Congress members use time out of session to campaign, to promote legislation they’ve passed (for example, the reconciliation bill has polled extremely poorly), hold meetings with constituents, go on Congressional Delegations (quasi-official trips covering topics relevant to Congress) and yes, even to take some vacation.

We also want to note that collegiality – mentioned above – plays a big role in how the Senate operates. Time off lets everyone get a break from each other and come back ready to maybe find points of compromise.

This might seem trivial, but the next big hurdle is keeping the government open. The government’s fiscal year ends September 30. That gives both chambers 8 weeks to pass something that keeps the government operating in October. Negotiations will probably go better if the Senators don’t start out sick of the sight of each other.

Lastly, while the Senate is often out Mondays and Fridays, they work when not in session and often hold all-night votes and rarely, committee meetings. It probably averages out to a less leisurely schedule than it seems on its face.

How Many Votes Does it Take in the Senate?

Mostly it takes 50, 100 or 60:

• 50 (or a simple majority) for passage of bills and votes related to administration nominations including judicial nominations; these are the most partisan votes
• 100 for unanimous consent; or more accurately, no one who dislikes a bill or nomination enough to object; obviously, least partisan votes
• 60 because senators agreed behind the scenes to skip the step below and go straight to passing the bill, but with a higher winning threshold; less partisan votes
• 60 to end debate (and some other similar procedural steps) so you can get to the vote on the bill; less partisan votes.
• • This is the modern filibuster. While both parties have been flipping back and forth with just over 50 votes for several years now, 1977 was the last year either party had 60 or more seats. The next closest year was 2009 with 57 Democrats, two Independents and 41 Republicans. Otherwise, the Senate tends to stay pretty closely split. Because getting 60 votes to end debate has meant getting at least a few members of the opposing party on board since 1977, the votes to end debate give the minority party considerable power if they choose to use it.

The common thread here is that except for votes requiring only 50 votes / a simple majority, senators have to work together to get a bill through the chamber. So, again, collegiality is a crucial factor to actually getting anything done. Yet another argument for at least a little bit of an August Recess.

There are many, many, many exceptions to the vote numbers I listed above. But those are the most common situations in the Senate over the last several years. If you really want to keep up with procedural minutia, @ringwiss.bsky.social‬ (and probably other social media) is a good follow. The Senate also publishes lots of information on their rules and procedures.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Senate Confirmations, Senate Time Off and How Many Votes When? – GovTrack.us

#2025 #America #DonaldTrump #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #History #Libraries #LibraryOfCongress #Politics #Resistance #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #USCongress #USSenate #UnitedStates

Was Routine – Legistative Recap -GovTrack.us

July 18, 2025 · by Amy West

On Monday, we titled our preview post “Looks Routine” with the possibility that a few bills might make for a non-routine week in the House. But, in fact, it was indeed routine. What little controversy there was, was mostly in soundbites to reporters. When it came time to vote? Everyone ultimately voted as expected.

Rescissions Bill

The rescissions bill, which cut $1 billion from the Corporation from Public Broadcasting and $8 billion from a range of foreign aid, passed 216-213 Thursday night via an occasionally used move called “deem and pass”.

Specifically, as part of a Rules Committee vote setting the parameters for debate on other bills, there was a provision that said, effectively, if this rule is passed, then the rescissions bill is deemed as passed. It’s a way to avoid a direct vote on a bill and a way to save time. Roll Call wrote about its regular use over the last century in 2021.

The rescissions will become law and those already appropriated funds will not be spent.

Could Congress add those appropriations back into a future appropriations bill? Sure. It could. But as long as the Republicans have the majority, it seems extremely unlikely that they would challenge the President by doing so. Considering that foreign aid and funding for public broadcasting are unpopular with Republicans in general, there’s no reason to expect a Republican majority Congress to try and get those funds back. If Democrats take back one or both chambers in 2026, then maybe they’d try for it. But Trump will still be president and would certainly veto any bills. Given how hard vetoes are to override, one should assume that for the foreseeable future, those funds are gone and not coming back.

GENIUS Act

There was a brief delay in passing this bill, but on Thursday, the first attempt to regulate cryptocurrency passed 308-122. Along with it, two other cypto related bills, H.R. 1919: Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act (prohibits the Federal Reserve from issuing cryptocurrencies) and H.R. 3633: Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025 (specifies when Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulates cryptocurrencies versus the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)) passed, respectively, 219-210 and 294-134.

Epstein Resolution

All week the controversy over the Justice Department’s announcement that Jeffrey Epstein killed himself and there’s no client list to release stayed hot. On Thursday evening, the Wall Street Journal (gift link) reported on a birthday card from Trump to Epstein with conspiracy theory friendly content including references to having “certain things in common” and wishing that “every day be another wonderful secret”.

Speaker Johnson is attempting to defuse some of the controversy with a non-binding Rules Committee resolution recommending that Trump release all the files. Rep. Massie (R-KY4) has sponsored a stronger resolution, but it’s unclear if it will go anywhere. Massie has said that if the resolution isn’t considered within a certain time frame, he will begin gathering the needed signatures to make it a discharge petition. Discharge Petitions are a tool that legislators can use to force bills onto the floor even if the Speaker doesn’t want them on the schedule.

Department of Defense Appropriations

The Fiscal Year 2026 appropriations for the Department of Defense passed the House this week 221-209. This is only the first step in a long process. Given that the current fiscal year ends on September 30, it’s unlikely that this or any other appropriations bill will get through the full legislative process in time. Expect another continuing resolution (a resolution that says “keep spending at current levels until X date) in September.

Does Congress Even Matter?

Russell Vought, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget doesn’t think so. Even though the Constitution clearly states

No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law; and a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall be published from time to time.

Vought stated explicitly that the Administration need not treat appropriations as law to be followed, but suggestions to be ignored as he sees fit. Vought also said he thought the appropriations process should be more partisan.

These statements together lead to the obvious question: what’s the point of passing any appropriations at all, let alone ones that can garner support from any Democrats if there’s no reason to expect that those appropriations will be spent by the Executive Branch? And the answer is “we don’t know”.

August Recess

The House has now begun its 5 week August Recess. They will return after Labor Day. The exception to this are some committee meetings next week. The Senate is in next week, but then is off until after Labor Day.

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Was Routine – GovTrack.us

#2025 #America #Congress #DonaldTrump #GOP #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Health #History #LegislativeRecap #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Politics #Republicans #Resistance #Science #Trump #TrumpAdministration #UnitedStates

House passes 1,100-page spending and tax bill, raising debt by up to $4 trillion – GovTrack.us

News From Us – Legislative Recap

House passes 1,100-page spending and tax bill, raising debt by up to $4 trillion

May 23, 2025 · by Amy West and Joshua Tauberer

Early Thursday morning the House passed H.R. 1: One Big Beautiful Bill Act — yes, that’s it’s official title — a 1,100+ page bill with large cuts to both spending and taxes. We know the big picture but little about the details because it hasn’t been available for long enough for anyone to actually read it.

This is the “reconciliation” bill, the first signature legislation moved by Republicans in Congress and President Trump. This bill has special rules that make it immune to the Senate filibuster, so it can pass the Senate if a simple majority vote for it.

Here’s the bottom line: The bill has very large cuts to federal government spending, but it has even greater cuts to taxes. So overall, it’s projected to increase the yearly federal deficit by around $230 billion or 10%. (That’s so large that the global bond market has begun to reassess U.S. bonds, making the national debt even more expensive to keep up interest payments.) The last provision of the bill increases the statutory limit to the national debt by $4 trillion.

Some of the biggest cuts are in the low income food assistance program SNAP and medical assistance program Medicaid, in part through cuts and in part by making it harder for Americans to get the assistance.

But about half of those savings to the federal government are offset by increased funding for the military, border barriers (presumably on the border with Mexico), immigration enforcement, and immigration detention facilities, based on the latest Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimate.

The biggest change is to taxes: higher for low-income earners and lower for high-income earners. CBO estimated that “household resources,” meaning mostly household income but also federal benefits, would decrease by around 4% for the lowest earners and increase by the same amount for the highest earning households. That includes a higher “SALT” tax deduction, which benefits high income earners in high-tax states, restoring it to roughly how it was before President Trump’s 2017 tax cuts. The tax cuts are the main reason the bill adds to the deficit.

Other changes include repeals of laws and funding for green energy, bans on transgender care (originally limited to minors, then expanded to all people) and abortion. The bill also includes a provision limiting the enforcement of court orders against the government (see text in bill).

Read more: House passes 1,100-page spending and tax bill, raising debt by up to $4 trillion – GovTrack.usSource Links: House passes 1,100-page spending and tax bill, raising debt by up to $4 trillion – GovTrack.us

#Agenda #BeautifulBill #BigBill #Congress #CongressionalDemocrats #GOP #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #Republicans #Trump #TrumpAdministration

President Trump purports to install new officials at the Library of Congress

President Trump purports to install new officials at the Library of *Congress*

By Daniel Schuman (May 13, 2025)

The Library of Congress is not just shelves of books or a museum. It’s an active support agency that legislators in Congress rely on for nonpartisan research to make informed and independent policy decisions, and it runs the indispensable Congress.gov portal that provides public access to Congress’s daily work, which we rely on. That’s why President Trump’s action to take over the Library as Daniel describes below is incredibly concerning. This is a short version of Daniel’s extended post at his First Branch Forecast.

Monday was a tumultuous day for the Library of Congress, the broader Legislative Branch, and our system of government.

This past Thursday, President Trump asserted he fired Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden. On Saturday he announced he fired Register of Copyrights Shira Perlmutter. According to CBS News, Trump named Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to serve as the Librarian of Congress concurrently with his role at the Justice Department. Blanche previously served as Trump’s personal criminal defense attorney. Trump also designated an acting Deputy Librarian of Congress and an Acting Register of Copyrights.

The three Department of Justice officials attempted to enter the Library of Congress but were reportedly escorted from the building. While some reports described a standoff between Capitol Police and the officials, the exact details remain unclear and the Capitol Police have denied they were involved in a confrontation.

In an email to Library staff, Acting Librarian Robert Newlan stated he did not immediately recognize Trump’s appointment as valid. According to Politico, Newlen wrote “Congress is engaged with the White House and we have not received direction from Congress about how to move forward.”

Senate Majority Leader Thune, a Republican, said “congressional leaders ‘want to make sure we’re following precedent and procedure’ in naming a replacement for Carla Hayden” and added “we want to make sure congressional equities are respected and protected in this process.” (“Equities” is government jargon for Congress’s stake and rights in the matter.)

The President’s actions threaten Congressional independence and implicate constitutional and statutory issues. The Library of Congress and its staff provide confidential, nonpartisan support to Congress. That work must remain insulated from Executive Branch interference.

Read more: President Trump purports to install new officials at the Library of Congress

Source Links: https://www.govtrack.us/posts/503/2025-05-13_president-trump-purports-to-install-new-officials-at-the-library-of-congress

#Congress #DepartmentOfJustice #ExecutiveBranch #Firings #GovTrack #GovTrackUs #LibraryOfCongress #TakingCongressPower #Trump #USCongress