Don Davis eyes open North Carolina Senate seat

Politico

8 hours ago

Republicans finally got their 'big, beautiful bill' across the finish line. Now they're turning to their next urgent tasks: codifying billions in spending cuts and avoiding a government shutdown.
The Senate plans to vote no earlier than next week on President Donald Trump's request for lawmakers to scrap $9.4 billion in previously approved funding for NPR, PBS and foreign aid, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss the plans. That's running dangerously close to lawmakers' July 18 deadline to vote in favor of the rescissions package, or the administration will be forced to spend the money as Congress originally intended.
GOP leaders have work to do to shore up votes for the package, which would formalize funding cuts previously sought by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency initiative. Among the wary Republicans is top Senate Appropriator Susan Collins, who helped tank Trump's unsuccessful rescissions request back in 2018. The Maine Republican said during a late-June hearing with White House budget chief Russ Vought that reducing support for the AIDS-fighting program PEPFAR would be 'extraordinarily ill-advised and short-sighted;' Collins later told Calen that she's looking at 'drafting an alternative package of rescissions.' Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan of Alaska and Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota have also echoed Collins' warnings about slashing money for public broadcasting, with Sullivan saying he's seeking an amendment for 'very rural' stations that would be affected by the White House proposal.
Looming over the rescissions talks: appropriations. Senators will Thursday begin marking up their first batch of spending bills necessary to fund the government beyond the end of the current fiscal year on Sept. 30. Leaders are under immense pressure to allow votes on individual measures rather than seek to avert a shutdown with a massive omnibus, and more than anything else want to avoid having to pass another short-term stopgap. But the scheduled August recess will take away four weeks of time lawmakers would otherwise be in Washington to negotiate.
The House has made some progress with its appropriations work, passing one bill so far and advancing four others out of committee. House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) says he wants to complete all 12 markups by July 30. Yet even the typically bipartisan bill to fund the Department of Veterans' Affairs garnered only two Democratic votes on the chamber floor. It underscores how a process that once relied on buy-in between the two parties has become a largely partisan exercise — a risky situation for Republicans who can lose only three votes on their side of the aisle for party-line legislation.
What else we're watching:
— How lawmakers respond to the deadly flooding in Texas: Some state officials are sharply criticizing the National Weather Service for severely underestimating the rainfall in its forecasts. The White House on Sunday pushed back against attempts to link the administration's NWS staffing cuts to its inability to warn Texas residents about the storms.
At least two members have been directly affected by the catastrophe: GOP Reps. August Pfluger of Texas and Buddy Carter of Georgia. Pfluger's daughter and Carter's granddaughters were rescued from a camp affected by the flooding, with Carter also sharing that his granddaughters' cousin was killed.
— More reconciliation bills ahead: Riding high on a legislative win, Speaker Mike Johnson is sketching out a timeline for potentially pushing two more party-line packages through the reconciliation process this Congress. Watch what policy areas they'll address — and whether they include the priorities of key hard-liners who claimed they got certain assurances to support the megabill last week.
— NDAA to shake up the Pentagon: House Armed Services is aiming to make it harder to withdraw troops from Europe and change how the Pentagon buys its weapons as it heads toward a markup next Tuesday of the annual defense bill. Senate Armed Services will mark up its version of the defense bill this week; the full panel debate is slated to begin Tuesday afternoon and will likely take several days.
Jordain Carney, Gregory Svirnovskiy, Mia McCarthy and Connor O'Brien contributed to this report.