Watch the Body Language
Think about the photos and online dissection you scrolled after Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s Feb. 28 Oval Office meeting — coverage of what the Ukrainian leader wore, how he sat, President Donald Trump’s posture, his word choices, and his tone of voice. Get ready for more of the same when the next mayor of New York City comes calling this afternoon.
It’ll be the first face-to-face since voters chose Zohran Mamdani. The democratic socialist is seeking higher taxes on corporations and the wealthy to pay for his agenda — about as far as you can get from Trump’s approach to government services and business taxation.
Skylar Woodhouse reports that today’s meeting was Mamdani’s idea. “I want to just speak plainly to the president about what it means to actually stand up for New Yorkers and the way in which New Yorkers are struggling to afford the city,” the mayor-elect said in an interview on the cable network MS NOW. “And frankly, cost of living is something that I heard time and time again from New Yorkers about why they voted for Donald Trump.”
New York City received almost $10 billion of federal funds in fiscal year 2025, comprising 8.3% of total spending for its operating budget, according to the city comptroller’s office. Trump, who backed a rival candidate, said his administration would pull funding from the country’s largest city if Mamdani won. Since the election, the president’s aides have been reviewing funds that benefit the city for potential suspension or cancellation. Read More
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NDAA Negotiations
As we look ahead to the holiday-shortened Washington workweek, a Capitol Hill highlight will be the effort to put perhaps final touches on one of the biggest bills of the year: the National Defense Authorization Act.
House Armed Services Committee chairman Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) said he’s trying to get the details nailed down, so the text can be formally introduced by Dec. 1.
Roxana Tiron reports that those last details include some big decisions. Among them: whether to increase the Pentagon’s spending authorization by $32 billion as the Senate proposed (
Complicating the task is that everyone in Congress knows that the annual policy bill will be enacted no matter what. That tends to make it an attractive vehicle for add-on provisions that have nothing to do with America’s military.
Rogers has been getting some pressure to include language that would block state-level regulation of artificial intelligence. He’s also been hearing from those who want him to include Senate-passed language that would limit Nvidia’s ability to sell AI chips to China and other adversary nations.
Week That Was: Far from being a nose-to-the grindstone push to make up for lost legislative time, Congress’ first week back after the House’s shutdown absence was a circus, Jonathan Tamari reports in today’s Congress Tracker — and it’s likely to get worse.
See Also:
- Republican Governors Criticize Trump Push to Ban State AI Rules
- Democrats Prepare Fight Against GOP Push to Block State AI Laws
- No Plan for Obamacare Price Hikes as Congress Exits for Holiday
Eye on the Economy
Watch for fresh results from two ongoing surveys that take the pulse of US consumers.
The first one comes out later this morning: an update of consumers’ expectations tracked by the University of Michigan. It’s the final reading for the month, after the preliminary version registered a gloomy 50.3, just above a June 2022 reading of 50 that was the weakest in the university’s data since 1978.
Then the Conference Board will release its latest reading of consumer confidence Tuesday. Bonus: that’s the same day the Census Bureau plans to issue a report on how retail sales did in September — data that normally would have come out last month but was delayed by the government shutdown.
Apples and Oranges
After federal judges granted an injunction against the contested Texas redistricting plan, Maia Spoto dove into what that state’s legislature did and what Californians did as a rebuttal.
She found that though both states changed district lines to achieve a desired political result, it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison. Two of three judges in the Texas case found that race played a large role in the state’s redistricting.
They focused on a Justice Department letter that targeted only majority-non-White districts in Texas, which gave the panel a reason to believe race was a factor. A similar paper trail doesn’t exist in the California case.
“The Texas case involves the same general subject matter, but it’s so fact-specific, and it doesn’t really break new ground,” said Loyola Law Professor Justin Levitt. “I don’t think it’s going to affect California’s case at all.” Read More
Lobbying Success
Private space businesses were quiet winners in Congress’ massive tax-and-spending law. Zach C. Cohen reports that language in that law could unlock billions in new funding for spaceports.
The provision gives commercial space businesses the ability to use tax-exempt bond proceeds to finance their infrastructure projects, much like municipal authorities do to build airports and highways.
It’s the latest move by Congress to help companies that are owned by the world’s wealthiest men — a point critics like to emphasize — but that also are seen as critical cogs in the bid to out-muscle Russia and China in the space race. Read More
Before You Go
More Generational Change: Rep. Nydia Velázquez (N.Y.) announced that her 16th term in the House will be her last. The 72-year-old is the first Puerto Rico-born woman to serve in Congress. Greg Giroux reports that the Democratic primary will be the race to watch in her district, which preferred Kamala Harris over Trump by 47 percentage points.
Sacramento Sighted: Rep. Eric Swallwell, one of the House managers who prosecuted Trump in his 2021 impeachment trial, launched a bid for governor of California by promising to increase homeownership and employment and “keep the worst president in history out of our homes.” Read More
Ukraine Huddle: Leaders of Germany, France and the UK will be on an urgent call today with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy about a US plan to end Russia’s invasion that would force Kyiv to cede large chunks of territory taken by Russia, cap the size of its military, and lift sanctions on Moscow over time. Read More
Kennedy’s Promise Has an Asterisk: The CDC updated its website to say that scientists haven’t ruled out the possibility that shots given to infants lead to autism, despite years of research showing no conclusive evidence that vaccines cause autism. Also new on the site: an asterisk beside the phrase “vaccines do not cause autism.” When senators were deciding whether to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary, he promised Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) that he wouldn’t remove CDC language that debunked any link. A footnote on the website now states the phrase “vaccines do not cause autism” hasn’t been removed entirely because of the agreement with physician-senator Cassidy. Read More
Chambers Clash: The honeymoon period of united GOP government appears to be fading as House and Senate Republicans increasingly butt heads on major legislative priorities. Maeve Sheehey and Lillianna Byington found multiple examples of tactical maneuvers designed to one-up the other legislative branch. Read More
Running the Numbers: Our Bloomberg Businessweek colleagues followed the steps taken in just one deportation case to estimate what the procedures were costing taxpayers. They found that the cost can far exceed the $17,121 the federal government says it spends on average. Read More
Reversal: The prosecutor pursuing a criminal case against James Comey now says the former FBI director’s indictment was properly presented to a grand jury for a vote — a day after telling a judge the final version was never shown to the full jury. Read More
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